The Orb of Wrath (The Merchant's Destiny Book 1) (24 page)

Ithelas crouched beside him. His knowledge of anatomy allowed seeing that the vocal cords had remained intact. Carefully he removed the arrow in his throat that was blocking, to some extent, the passage of air from the lungs. Then he applied a couple of patches over the holes on both sides of the neck, to prevent air leakage from them. The young cleric then began a chant that indicated, as always, the execution of a spell. The duration of the prayer, which Ithelas murmured almost in whispers, and the various complicated gestures he made, seemed to indicate that it was a spell much more elaborated than usual.

Suddenly the dead man opened his eyes slightly. His gaze was lost in the infinite. His eyes lacked any luster or expression. Ithelas then turned to the dead and began to speak.

“Where is the treasure hidden?” he asked.

“Downstairs. South Wing,” the body pronounced with difficulty.

His voice sounded hoarse, from beyond the grave. It lacked any inflection or expressiveness. It was the strangest and scariest voice they had ever heard.

“How can we access that area?” the cleric asked again.

“Stairs. Laboratory. Hidden door. Library.”

The cadence of the throat of the dead seemed to not fully complete any of the words, but everyone could understand the five he had just pronounced.

“Where is the crypt where the vampire lies?”

“Downstairs,” the corpse said, which a moment later closed his eyes and went back to lie "lifeless" again.

CHAPTER 7: THE LABORATORY

The answer to the last question was what everyone feared. Samar could not avoid swallowing loudly. To get to the treasure, where they hoped to find the box they were looking for, they'd have to pass close to the vampire. In fact, in the process of finding the treasure room, it was possible that they ended up facing him. They had already discussed this scenario as the most likely, and had agreed to the plan of action in that case.

They decided to hide the body. Erion crouched next to him and, after putting a pair of very thin black gloves, took two rings and put them it in his bag. Then Thost and Erion slid the body under the bed and went back into the hall. As they had done before, Erion led the group. He went to the door from where that strange man had appeared. Although he knew that it would be open, Erion again performed the entire ritual of reviewing it, to finally open it without much difficulty.

The young man walked into another room. It was a large dining room. In it there were two more doors, to their left and right respectively. It had many of the features of the other rooms. Not a soul was seen there either. By gestures, he ushered the group to prevent remaining in that hall, as close to the door behind which they knew they had a complete detachment of soldiers armed to the teeth.

“This may be a good place to cast an evil detection spell,” Ithelas said, as he began a brief chant”. I will be able to tell if there is some evil being in the next room before entering.

“How long does it last?” Mithir asked.

“I hope long enough to explore this floor,” the cleric answered.

They approached the door on the right. This time, as Erion revised it, the cleric was concentrated very close to him. When Erion finished, he looked at Ithelas, who nodded. He opened the door and stepped into a kitchen. The whole group went in after him. It was a spacious kitchen; inside it one could prepare comfortably, food for fifteen or twenty people. On the opposite side of the kitchen there was another door. On the roof they saw a couple of small skylights, also boarded up.

“No doubt, this is not the place where the food of the soldiers is prepared,” Samar said, observing the little use that the kitchen seemed to have.

“However, look there. It seems that they recently have cut vegetables,” Erion said, pointing to a table that was next to one of the two fireplaces of the room.

A small black cauldron was located in the center of the fireplace on a charcoal fire, already off.

“Possibly someone has prepared here a vegetable soup, or something similar; I would say yesterday,” Ithelas added.

The cleric and looter repeated their exploratory routine on each door. Erion opened it and they entered a larger room. It was a bedroom, which once would have housed eight people, possibly the servants of the castle. Now only one of the beds was used. The room looked alike the others in every detail, except the quality of the furniture. They were also very old but its sorry state denoted that they were not of the same quality. Probably its limited use had allowed it not to fall apart literally, but it hadn’t stopped it from looking worn.

The bed that had sheets and blankets was of a different type. It was much newer, perhaps less than ten years old. It was loreda, a wood of light color that was reasonably strong, but much more mundane. It was also unadorned and lacked special quality. Its mission seemed purely functional. The checked the closets of the room. All of them were empty except the one that was close to the new bed. They found more sheets in it, some towels and two robes identical to the ones of the man who they had questioned earlier. Erion found nothing of value.

The next room was locked. Erion used his picks and this time it took a little more work to open it because the lock was a bit old and a little rusty. Finally it relented and they managed to enter.

They had to cover their noses immediately. A horrible stench filled the room. On the ground they found several dead animals. There was a large cow, which was completely pale. It was the strangest color.

“Because of its appearance, I believe that it's been dead for one or two days,” Ithelas said, after briefly checking the animal.

The cow's sides had several holes through which a trail of blood had flowed. It was as if a flock of crows had pecked it and had left it to bleed; however there was barely any blood on the floor. There were two pigs in similar conditions, but with the difference that the state of decomposition of their bodies was much more advanced.

In the center of the room, there was a large table under which they saw several knives and other butcher utensils. There were also sharp hooks hanging from the ceiling, next to a wall. At the slaughterhouse there was no other furniture, but there was a gate at the far end of the room. It was split in two, so we could open the top half while the bottom was kept closed.

The looter and the cleric approached it. Erion parted only a couple of fingers of the upper part, looked and closed it again. The next room was very large and elongated; maybe about twenty steps long. It was a kind of barn, which had accumulated enough animals in a small space. It was divided into three sections; the biggest had half a dozen cows, in the opposite corner there was a herd of pigs, and included a partition separating a chicken barnyard. In one corner there were large amounts of straw and feed; possibly enough food for a week for these animals. They returned with the group.

“The barn is connected to the outer courtyard of the castle, but access to it is closed by a lattice,” Erion said.

They returned to the servants’ bedroom, happy to leave behind the nasty slaughterhouse and trying to forget the terrible smell. There was one last door in that bedroom. With steel reinforcements at different heights, it was really resistant. Erion and Ithelas were coordinating even better and took less time to carry out their checks. Although Erion found no traps, the lock was closed and was of high quality. The young man had to apply himself for a long time to get it open, but finally the mechanism relented.

Erion did not enter the room immediately. There was something strange on the floor. He felt that the first tile behind the door was separated from the others. After closely inspecting it he concluded that, when pressing it, some mechanism would be triggered. The remaining tiles were normal, harmless. He opened the door wide and told them where they should tread. He waited until they were inside the room and then gently closed the door again. He decided it was best not to find out what danger the trap would trigger.

The room in which they had entered was the most spectacular of all he had seen. It was huge! More than forty steps long. And the ceilings were high as well. It was a huge library. There must be thousands of books, even tens of thousands. Wide shelves covered the walls. They were so high that it would take a long ladder to reach the books that were on the upper shelves. In fact, halfway up, there was a narrow steel footbridge with a handrail. A pair of staircases accessed the catwalk.

The center of the room was occupied by reading tables, chairs; there was even a small copy shop at one end. Multiple windows exposed various objects such as maps and ancient scrolls, gold and silver coins minted in various countries, some jewelry and other objects of the nobility such as scepters. A showcase in the center of the room contained two manuscript books, ancient and beautiful. The room was decorated with several statues, mostly innocent scantily clad maidens or animals and hunting scenes.

They walked to the other end of the room and found a way out. Erion and Ithelas proved that there was no approaching danger and returned to the center of the library. Erion observed the room carefully again. The words dead, stairs, laboratory, library and hidden door, had been etched in the minds of them all.

“I would say that this room occupies the entire width of the castle. Also, all the walls of the room contact with the outside except this one, the north wall,” Erion said, pointing to the wall where the two doors of the room were.

“Erion had a lot of experience interpreting indoor spaces quickly,” Mithir explained. “We must listen to him.”

By now the whole group had appreciated the skills of the young man and although it had aroused new doubts for them, it was clear that the boy knew what he was doing.

“Am I to conclude that, therefore, we should seek a secret door in the north wall?” Thost said.

“Exactly. Those who are better equipped for the task are Samar and I. The elves have a sixth sense to find secret doors. It is always a difficult task, and not always a successful one, so any help is great. Let’s get to it.”

Erion gave them brief explanations of what kind of things they should look for and asked them if they thought they saw something weird just to call him. They began to review the wall and the shelves covering part of it. After ten minutes they had found nothing.

“My ability to detect evil is about to end. I think we should continue to explore this level. It seems that seeking the door will take long,” Ithelas requested.

“I think you're right. Let’s go,” Thost said.

They walked to the end of the library and reached the door they had yet to explore. Ithelas didn't detect any evil at the other side. It was locked. It was identical to the one in the library, which the young man had to work hard on, again, in an effort to open it. When it finally gave in, they saw that it overlooked a large living room, almost as large as the entrance hall where they had been awhile before but obviously much smaller than the huge library.

The room had two fireplaces and was divided into four areas with slightly different decor in each. Great quality paintings hung on each of the walls. Erion assessed that there was a small fortune there. They had the mark of the artist school of the Tylar kingdom. The best works of art were produced in that country. The young man had already noticed that the statues of the library were also of great quality, like the scene on the floor of the hall. Unfortunately it would be impossible to take any of those things, but those paintings...

Ithelas was in a corner of the room and had been petrified. Thost had asked him something, but the young man did not articulate a word. His eyes and facial expression were totally frozen. He didn't even seem to be breathing. They all went to him, worried. Moments later his expression changed to one of pure panic. Suddenly he took a deep breath with intensity as if he was drowning. They helped him sit on a chair. He recovered gradually.

“Are you okay? What happened?” his father asked, concerned.

“That corner... Evil,” the young man managed to say with difficulty.

Shortly after he explained that in that area of the room he had perceived various evil beings. He had felt more than five appearances, although he could not say exactly how many. One was overwhelmingly evil; the most intense evil that he had ever perceived. His spell was over and he didn't feel anything. He was well again, although a little uneasy.

They checked the corner of the room trying to make as little noise as possible, but found nothing. Their best bet to go down a level was what the servant had said. The living room had another door that was not locked and went back to the room where they had been a while ago. They had completed the exploration of that section of the castle and, as expected, there was no obvious access to the famous laboratory.

“Let's go back to the library,” Thost suggested.

“Yes. Let's look through every inch of the north wall of the room,” Samar added.

“Listen to me, everyone. Seek any irregularities in the wall; any shelf that looks slightly different from the others, either because they are slightly ahead or behind, either because the wood has a different wear than the other; any set of books that seem to snag; in short, any visual cue that seems unusual,” Erion explained didactically.

The elves were a race with a natural ability for this task, and Erion was highly trained in it. But despite everyone's efforts, almost an hour later they still hadn't found anything.

Erion returned to the lounge and dining room, and quickly back to the library. By the arrangement and the distances from the walls he realized that there was a space, which he had been unable to access, enclosed between the southern wall of the dining room and kitchen, and the north wall of the library. He explained these details to the group that listened with interest.

“The hidden rooms sometimes have more than one secret door. Let's check the south wall in the dining room and kitchen. Maybe we'll have more luck there,” the young man suggested.