Sorrow's Peak (Serpent of Time Book 2) (66 page)

“I feel it,” he assured him. “And so does Lorelei. Even now it haunts her dreams.”

As if to cement his assessment, she muttered unintelligible protest at their backs. Finn turned over his shoulder to look at her, even though she could barely be seen beneath the weakened ball of light hovering just over where she’d taken rest.

“She is terrified for her sister,” Bren lamented. “She feels helpless to aid her. Sometimes she says the girl’s name, as if she’s chasing after her, always just one step away from reaching her.”

“Oh, I know all about her fears. I couldn’t turn them off even if I wanted to.”

“You are doing your best to keep her calm. I respect that, Finn.”

“That’s what I’m here for,” he seemed to shrug, but the space between them made it impossible for him to discern more than the simplest outline of the U’lfer’s frame in the darkness. “What about you?”

Brendolowyn returned his unseeing eyes toward the darkness laid out before them like an endless field of absence. “What about
me
?”

“What is it that terrifies you and makes you feel helpless?”

“Myself,” he whispered. “My shortcomings, my inability to do the right thing even though I know I must.”

“The right thing in making sure I don’t die, you mean?”

“It’s more than just that. By the standards of your people I’ve lived a long life. I have seen much, done a lot of things I’m not proud of, but they become habits in time. Turning a blind eye, shutting out the voices of reason… it’s easier. Even when I know I should do the right thing, it all too often feels simpler to do nothing at all.”

“Lazier, maybe, but I hardly think it’s simpler.”

“Maybe you’re right.”

“So, what have you done that’s so bad it’s eating you alive?”

The half-elf tilted his head back, felt the stone brush through his hair as he tipped into the wall behind him and stared into the emptiness.

“I haven’t always been honest, most of all with myself, but I’ve withheld things when I knew I shouldn’t. Important things that sharing with the right people might mean the difference between life and death for some. I trick myself into believing everything will work out for the best, all the while knowing in the deepest part of myself that is not true.”

“We all have our secrets,” Finn said.

“And sometimes those secrets keep
us
alive,” he agreed. “But there comes a time when holding onto them no longer serves us and the keeping of them starts to kill us like a poison.”

“Come on, Elf. It can’t be that bad.” The thoughtfulness in his tone was an unexpected surprise. “Sure, we all have things that nibble away at us, but they are only a small part of who we are. Sometimes they aren’t about us at all, but we make them about us because we don’t know what else to do with them. Holding onto them and feeling bad about it doesn’t make us better people.”

“That’s…” he paused, an unexpected grin forming at the corner of his mouth. “That’s uncharacteristically wise of you, Finn.”

“What can I say? I’m full of surprises. Or maybe I’m just delirious from lack of sleep. I don’t know. It’s getting harder and harder to tell the difference.”

“You should take some rest.”

“Not a chance. I won’t rest easy until our job here is done. I can get plenty of sleep when I’m… dead. Or when I’m not dead. I’d prefer not to be dead, just for the record.”

Brendolowyn drew in a breath and felt his nostrils flare wide with it. He held it in until the pressure began to rise to his head and then he exhaled. “You are not going to die, Finn. I am going to do the right thing, no matter what it takes.”

“I appreciate that,” he noted, “but I think it’s equally up to me to make sure I don’t do something symptomatically reckless.”

“Just hold onto that notion, and I think you’ll be fine.”

“You’re not all bad, you know.” The thoughtfulness in his tone was an unexpected surprise. “I mean, don’t get me wrong I still hate your guts, but underneath my festering hatred, you’re all right. Don’t tell the princess. I’ve got a reputation to maintain.”

For the first time in a long time Bren laughed, a genuine chuckle as he pushed off the wall. “Your secret is safe with me. In the meantime we still have a ways to go. We should wake Lorelei and set out again.”

“Right,” he affirmed. “I’m getting tired of standing around feeling tired. Let’s get this over with.”

Lorelei was more sullen and quiet than Bren after they woke her, falling into line behind Finn as the trio worked their way through the oppressive blackness. Bren was so wrapped up in his own thoughts it took Finn’s continued prodding to keep both of them from succumbing to their woes. He joked, the light-hearted jests he threw over his shoulder sometimes so absurd it was impossible not to laugh and feel just a little bit lighter.

Loathe as he was to admit it, she would be in good hands with Finn. He wondered if he ever came to that conclusion on past attempts to complete the task before them. Had he ever taken a step back and truly witnessed what grew between them on the long road from Dunvarak to Sorrow’s Peak?

On the rare occasion he hadn’t been scowling and begrudging their senseless arguments, he allowed himself to see the light in her eyes when he caught her glancing in the U’lfer’s direction. From the outside looking in, they seemed an impossible match that would spend the rest of their days tearing out each other’s throats, but from time to time he saw something else in her eyes. Something beautiful that promised her future would be filled with light and laughter so long as he did the right thing and gave it to her.

Finn’s strength was indomitable. He came into the mountain knowing he never made it out during any other attempt, and yet there he was determined to walk into the sun again. It was astonishing to think he would willingly lay his life on the line for her.

Would Brendolowyn do the same if it came down to it? He’d faced death a thousand times or more in the duration of his life, and every time he walked away with little more than cuts and bruises. The more he thought about it, the less heroic it felt. His father’s people, Finn’s people, stood unwavering in death’s wake, ready to embrace it when it came.

Could he sacrifice himself if it meant saving Lorelei? He wanted to believe he could, but history’s repetition suggested he was unable. And yet… he felt different about things, or at least he thought he did. Ever since Gwendoliir showed him glimpses of the future, the balanced conflict between love and hate he saw in her eyes as she looked upon him at the end of all things certainly put things into perspective. The Light of Madra showed him happiness, but that happiness was not meant to be his.

He still didn’t understand why she would give him the burden of those things to carry with him through his days. Surely she had some purpose for having done it, but maybe he would never know what that was.

He only knew he owed her for the wrongs of several lifetimes. He would be a coward no more.

“Do you smell that?” The U’lfer called back over his shoulder, disrupting Brendolowyn’s steady train of troubling thoughts.

Lorelei stopped in front of him and he nearly collided with her. Gripping her shoulder in his quick hand, he saved her from tumbling forward and sending her and Finn both over the edge.

“Fish…” she muttered with a startled gasp. “It smells like fish and dirt and… wet.”

“Exactly!” There was a certain amount of triumph in his tone. “The fact that it smells like anything at all is nothing short of a miracle.”

“The northern side of the mountain leads to the sea,” Brendolowyn told them. “There are dozens of caverns winding through the mountain. That was how the dragon got inside.”

“We must be nearing the bottom,” Finn said. “I keep thinking I see flashes of light, little hints of it burning through the darkness.”

“Sunlight would do that,” Bren confirmed. “This is the kind of darkness that cannot abide the light of the sun.”

“Too bad we can’t just hammer through the stone,” the U’lfer sighed.

They trudged on, tentative footsteps leading them ever downward until their knees and their backs ached with the angle they had to hold their bodies to avoid pitching forward too quickly and losing their footing.

“I think Finn might be right,” Lorelei announced shortly after Finn’s revelation. “I think we’re getting close to the bottom. I swear I keep seeing flashes of light.”

“I thought so too,” Finn agreed, then added, “I thought I was crazy.”

He didn’t know where he was supposed to look. He could barely see Finn beyond the edge of Lorelei’s shoulder, even with the dimming ball of lights he strung between them and the sparse light of torches barely stretching beyond their flame to light the way. He stared ahead into the nothing, keen eyes narrowed and waiting for a glimpse. Disappointment bloomed; all he saw was darkness, and then it flashed so suddenly he almost didn’t believe what he was seeing. Maybe it was the burst of Lorelei’s excitement, her aura so brilliant it tricked him into believing there’d actually been a hint of something beyond the stifling gloom.

“I saw it again!” she cried. “I saw the bottom!”

“Blessed moons,” Finn rejoiced. “It’s not far now.”

“Creator’s light, all I can think about now is getting out of here. I actually feel… hopeful.”

“Right, hope is good, Princess, but first we find what we came here for,” Finn said. “Come on.” And then he headed downward again, driven by the promise of an end to their seemingly endless journey.

Drawing in a deep breath, the lightness of the air was invigorating. Brendolowyn started to forget how tired he was, but with that renewed sense of wakefulness, his mind sharpened and his apprehension grew tenfold. His empty stomach was a tangle of knots that only kept twisting tighter with every step they took.

It was hours of careful footwork before they reached the bottom. The air grew lighter, the darkness less oppressive, but the drakoren seemed to double its relentless efforts to weaken them before confrontation. Even Finn started to get testy again, easily annoyed when Lorelei refused to let his playful banter just roll off her back.

While the two of them argued back and forth, Brendolowyn repeated the words, “I can do this,” over and over in his mind like a mantra.

He survived Bok’naal. Only an arcane warrior of legend could survive the arena for as long as he had. He stood against epic foes and won the right to live time and time again. They were up against a single enemy, weakened by centuries of loneliness. He could take it if he fought hard enough. He was more than capable. In fact, he’d come to believe that wretched time in his life set him up for the battle with the drakoren, prepared him.

Only he would not fight for his life. He would fight to save the lives of his friends.

And they were his friends. Even Finn, whom he could barely stand at the best of times. The safekeeping of their lives was all that mattered, and though some selfish part of him was terrified, the piece of him that wanted to do things right was far more powerful.

His thoughts disturbed the drakoren. He could feel it ebbing away whenever it delved too deep, as it sifted through dark memory and danced around the edges of things powerful enough to fill a warrior like Finn with dread. He found himself almost arrogantly questioning the full extent of its power, wondering if a face to face meeting with the drakoren would really grant it full access to their minds and allow it to turn nightmare and unspoken fear into physical reality.

Or were the niggling thoughts and invasions into their fears all the creature was capable of after centuries alone in the belly of the mountain with no one to entertain it but itself?

As if in answer to his silent speculations, an echoing hiss of throaty laughter shook the mountain stone. Shuddering in response, Lorelei took a step back and nearly bumped into him. He held a hand out, lowered it trembling onto her shoulder and kept her steady.

“It’s all right,” he muttered that hollow reassurance and squeezed the muscle before loosening his grip. “It has no real power over us.”

“I know,” she whispered, but she sounded about as convinced as he felt.

The closer they grew to the mountain floor, the more amused it seemed to grow. It shook the stone each time it cackled, bringing sharp stalactites shattering to the ground like piercing spikes. None of them actually hit them, but their fears grew as they realized being beneath one when it fell was a death sentence for sure.

When feet finally touched solid, steady ground, torchlight spread further, alleviating the heavy darkness and the negativity it layered over them like a blanket. For the first time since they descended into the mountain, Brendolowyn felt like he could breathe. More than that, he felt hope.

Finn surveyed the cavern ground, eyes squinting as he spun around to take in their final landing place, and Lorelei actually laughed, turning wide circles in an almost gleeful dance. Brendolowyn drew his light wisps together into a single ball and summoned it to hover over them. He and Finn both watched her pirouette and laugh. It had been so long since he’d seen her smile he almost forgot what happiness looked like, and for the slimmest fraction of a moment there was no dread.

She squeaked as she tilted her head upward to take in the distance they’d come, the winding, treacherous passage into the belly of Great Sorrow was barely visible, but she knew it stretched higher above her than her eyes could see. A droplet of water splashed against her forehead and she laughed, the happy sound making the ball of light he summoned glow brighter until the darkness of their surroundings cowered from the light.

“It’s probably been hundreds of years since feet touched the earth and stone upon which we stand,” he marveled. A strange shiver moved through him, both shoulders shaking as he shrugged it off.

Lorelei spun again, as if she knew not what to do with herself and felt the strangest urge to dance. He watched her eyes scan the cavernous tunnels branching away from the landing in several directions, shaded in shadow and layered in sticky curtains of old, dusty cobweb so thick they would have to burn through them with their torches.