The Orb of Wrath (The Merchant's Destiny Book 1) (25 page)

There was not much to lose in this attempt and, again, this seemed to be Erion's field of competence. They inspected the dining wall for a while and were unsuccessful. As it was not covered by shelves, it was much faster and easier to check. There were only a couple of furniture pieces against it that, since they weren't very heavy, they could easily move them to check the section of wall behind them. They moved to the kitchen and repeated the operation. Finally, Erion saw a small spring in the wall between the two fireplaces. He examined the area of the wall with the utmost care and then retired.

“There is a secret door here. If we're lucky, by moving the spring it will open. But I have a hunch that it will not be enough, and that they will have to do more to open it. I'll know more after I trigger it,” the young man explained.

“Ok. What are you waiting for?” Thost said.

“We can't be sure that we'll have the time or opportunity to go through this area of the castle. We'll probably have to face great dangers,” Erion said, who was about to continue his explanation when Samar interrupted.

“You've seen some valuable things,” she said.

“Right. I suggest we lose only a few minutes to collect the most valuable objects. Please, everyone, follow my instructions and we can finish quickly.”

They followed Erion, who went inside the room first. There he instructed Ithelas and Thost to collect two small chandeliers, and he pointed to five of the paintings hanging in this room.

“Pick them up, separate the canvas from a frame with a dagger, and then roll up the canvases together and keep them, as best you can, in your pouches,” he instructed.

With a gesture he told the others to follow him to the library. He asked the elf to keep some jewelry and other objects that were in two of the windows in the middle of the room. Erion kept the two old manuscripts that were also exposed in another case and asked Mithir to cast a spell he had used countless times. The magician concentrated for a moment and then nodded he was ready.

“Walk in front of all the shelves of the room. Walk the perimeter as quickly as possible. Remember to look at the second level also,” the young man requested.

Mithir did as he was told. It took almost ten minutes to walk the entire room. When he was finishing checking the south wall shelves, he suddenly stood and opened his eyes, excited. He sought the nearest spiral staircase and climbed it to the second level. Then he walked a few steps down the runway and took a book. He stroked the cover as if he were touching a holy book. He opened it in half and they could see a huge smile on his face. He swooped down.

“Thanks a million. Thanks,” Mithir said, gesturing.

“You're welcome, brother. Anything else?” Erion urged.

The magician finished checking the few remaining shelves and then approached another group of cabinets where they hadn't taken anything. Of all the objects he took a small rod, which had no ornaments or jewelry or, apparently, no special value. Then he told the others that he was done.

Erion led the group back into the living room where father and son had just finished their tasks with the paintings. Without missing a beat, he asked everyone to follow him into the kitchen.

“Can you still detect magical auras?” he asked his brother.

“Yes. But I have little time left,” the magician said.

“Look at this area of the wall,” Erion requested, pointing to the place where before he had sensed the presence of a door.

Moments later, Mithir explained that as Erion had suspected, the door had some kind of magical protection. It was not going to be as easy to open. Luckily, Mithir believed to be prepared.

“While we were coming here, did you perceive another aura in the previous rooms?” he asked the looter.

“No. Nothing more, brother,” the magician replied.

Erion asked everyone to be located at the other end of the room. Although he hadn't perceived any trap connected to the spring, it couldn't be trusted. The young man triggered the spring and, after a loud clack, they suddenly saw how the outline of a door was drawn on the surface of the wall. Erion thoroughly reviewed the structure that had appeared but found no way to open it. With a gesture he asked his brother to come over.

“Let’s cross our fingers,” the young man said. “Good luck,” he added as he retreated a few steps.

Mithir began chanting a spell and after a few magical passes, struck with the tip of his stick in the middle of the door, as if he was knocking.  Then they saw as the tone changed and it no longer appeared to be made of the same material as the wall; now it seemed to be made of conventional wood. It was open.

Erion went in first and the others followed. They were in lab for alchemy and other magical experiments. It had tremendously complete equipment. In a corner of the lab there was a spiral staircase that seemed to go to both the lower and the upper level.

Before they could check more, the door they had entered closed. Everyone started to feel dizzy and coughed. Ithelas perceived a smell of some strange gas in the air. Mithir fell fainting to the ground while everyone else got worse. Was this their end?

CHAPTER 8: THE CRYPT

Samar was the next one to fall unconscious to the ground. Ithelas knew that this gas was slowly poisoning them. He started casting a prayer to invoke his magic. He had to make a tremendous effort of concentration, since it is very difficult to control the magic if at the same time one is experiencing pain or evil of any kind. Control of magic requires absolute serenity. Before losing consciousness too, he managed to complete his spell.

Suddenly he began to feel much better. The magic would protect him from the effects of unbreathable air. Erion and his father coughed profusely. They hadn't lost consciousness yet but they were completely incapacitated. The cleric had to move fast. On a table in the room he saw that there were powders, similar to cooking flour. It seemed, rather, that they were the bones of an animal that had been repeatedly ground. He had seen similar materials in other laboratories. They were used to make potions.

"This will do," the young man thought.

He took the jar and started throwing small handfuls into the air around the room. Soon after, a good part of the room had a bit of that powder floating. Ithelas stopped and carefully looked. There it was! The movement of the dust in the air allowed him to verify that there was an inflow into the room by a small flap that was well hidden in one corner of the room. He quickly sought some rags and as he did not find them, he ripped the sleeves of his shirt and made them two small balls. He then moved to a table closer to the trapdoor and, after climbing it as best he could, put the pieces of cloth to block the flow of gas entering the room. With some difficulty he got his way.

Although the situation wouldn't worsen, there was still a significant amount of gas in the room. He went to the spiral staircase and saw that both the accesses up and down were blocked by a trapdoor. He decided it would be less dangerous to try the top hatch first. He could open it without problems, since it was not locked. As he discovered it, he saw that there was a fence that prevented the passage. It was closed but fortunately, it would let the gas out of the lab. 

He returned with the group. He helped his father and Erion to move to the opposite corner of the room to the trapdoor. Then he did the same with the unconscious bodies of Mithir and Samar. He reached into his bag and pulled out a small bag that had several herbs. He selected some oval leaves and placed one under the tongue of the magician and archer. Finally, he gave another pair of leaves to his father and Erion and told them to do the same.

“Sucking this leaf helps the lungs to exhale any foreign agent,” he explained.

A while later Thost and Erion were much better. Ithelas poured some water on the faces of his unconscious companions and Samar opened her eyes. She felt very nauseated and she couldn't help vomiting. Mithir then regained consciousness and was even worse than Samar.

The cleric decided he should do something more for them and consumed an additional portion of his magical energy to complete a cure for everyone. They both felt a lot better after this. It had been necessary. The poor things wouldn't have been of much use in that state. In addition, he hated seeing his friends suffer; he hated to see anyone suffer.

Erion reviewed the trap without touching Ithelas' improvised coating.

“You're probably wondering why I didn't find this trap,” Erion said, apologetically.

No one had really asked why, and weren't accusing him of the accident that they had just suffered. But they let him continue.

“I must tell you that I will not be able to detect all the traps in advance. Some are so well hidden that I simply won't be able to see them. For example, look at that wall. There is the library door. From this room you could see it clearly, but from the library we could not find it,” the young man said.

“Erion, don't worry. We each do what we can. And for the moment I must say I am quite impressed with your skills,” Ithelas said, conciliatory.

“Thanks. In any case, this flap was not a gas trap which is operated with a spring. The gas enters constantly in this room. And it allows it to keep a highly toxic level of concentration in the air despite that there are small leaks from that narrow chimney. This probably means that the people that frequently cross this room have no major problems with this poisonous gas,” said the young man.

They cast a closer look at the laboratory. It didn't seem to have been used very recently, but it was not abandoned many years ago either. There were all kinds of reagents in different shelves, and a myriad of flasks, pipettes and stills of all sizes. It was a fantastically equipped laboratory. Mithir dreamed of one day having such a laboratory.

Erion approached the staircase and reviewed the top flap. After a while he managed to open the gate. He poked his head out and then went down.

“From the outside we saw two towers of similar height and configuration. Both were arranged in the south of the castle, one on the east side and one on the west side. I would say that that trapdoor leads to the west tower. I have seen that the spiral staircase continues up to higher levels. The four levels above us have several windows, as we saw from the outside.”

“Did you see any soldiers?” Thost asked.

“No. Not in this tower. Moreover, the east tower should be in that area,” he said, pointing to the other side of the room. “My conclusion is that there is no access to the tower from this level of the castle. Therefore, there must be access from the outside or from the parapet. In other words, I bet that the soldiers do have access to the other tower and possibly some are guarding it,” the young man explained.

“Interesting. On the one hand, the castle is guarded by the troop. But then work has been done to isolate a wide area of the castle from the area that the soldiers have access to, probably because of the nature of the inhabitants. At this time it is playing to our advantage because we could access this area avoiding patrols,” Mithir said gesturing, while his brother reproduced what he said.

They all recalled the moment when the servant was about to raise the alarm, and how close they were to absolute disaster. In any case, they should continue without further delay. They used the moment to drink some water and took a look in the laboratory, but didn't find much. Ithelas managed to open a drawer that seemed closed, under one of the tables. In it he found what he believed to be four different potions. He didn't know its effects, however. He put them in his bag.

It was the moment of truth. Erion approached the trap of the spiral staircase leading to the lower level. He revised it for a while before attempting to open it.

“It's connected to a trap,” the young man said at last. “Move to that corner of the room, I'll try to deactivate it.”

Erion took out his picks and slid down the side of the hatch trying to locate the point where the device was attached to the door. When he arrived at one of the corners he noticed something and stopped. It was there. He was sure. There was a linker that would trigger something if he tried to open the hatch. He had to try to force it back to disengage it. He took another of his tools that was more difficult to handle but it was also longer. With it he could reach the correct place at the other side of the hatch. He began to move the mechanism; it was of good quality, this would be difficult. Then he heard a click he did not expect. He knew what it meant. He rose slightly and jumped giving an acrobatic somersault towards one of the walls, away from the stairs. Four arrows shot out from somewhere in the ceiling and went to dig into various points around the hatch. One grazed him and made a slit in his pants. He had barely avoided the trap.

Suddenly, he felt a sting in his leg, where the arrow had scratched him. He beckoned to Ithelas.

“Something's not right. It's just a scratch, but it's starting to hurt horribly,” the young man said.

Ithelas reviewed the wound carefully and frowned.

“The arrows must be poisoned. And it is a very dangerous and aggressive poison. Take this potion that neutralizes poison and drink it immediately,” the cleric ordered.

At the same time, he applied a compression on the leg to hinder the progression of the poison in the body. Then he cleaned the wound and put on it a kind of tube he carried in his bag of herbs. He began to suck through the tube. He managed to take some liquid out of it. Then he cleaned the wound again. He applied an ointment and covered it with a bandage. The cleric went to the trapdoor and took one of the arrows. He left it on a table and tried to identify the poison by sniffing and checking its color and texture.

“I've never seen this poison exactly, but it seems to be jerpex,” Ithelas said.

“What is that?” Erion asked.

“I'm afraid that it's in the family of scorpions with the most potent poison known south of the continent,” Samar explained.

“Right. You were lucky not to have taken a direct hit. It would have killed you in less than three seconds. I've done everything I could for you. We can only wait and cross our fingers. If the poison did not penetrate into your bloodstream, you'll find yourself perfectly well in a few minutes,” the cleric explained.

“And otherwise?” Erion asked worried.

“Well, let’s not think of that scenario,” Ithelas said.

It was the longest ten minutes of Mithir's life. He couldn't imagine what he'd do without his brother. In the last six years they had faced some important dangers together. But he could not remember ever having such a critical situation.

Thost and Samar tried to make conversation, talking about what they would do with their share of the treasure when they were back at home. There was still much to do, but it was the way they believed they could distract the others, especially Erion. However, the young man did not think anything of it. In fact, for some reason, he wasn't worried. He sensed that his end had not arrived; he still had plenty to do.

Time passed, and the pain in his leg was subsiding. Finally, he stood. The ten minutes had expired. Mithir snorted very relieved. Ithelas separated the bandage again and found that the wound had improved dramatically. Now it looked like a common scratch and the blackened color of the skin had disappeared. Everything was fine; they could continue.

Erion demanded he continue leading the group, despite the insistent complaints from the others, especially Mithir. No one could convince him. He returned to the hatch and pulled the arrows out, one by one. He didn't want anyone to get scratched by them accidentally. Then he opened the hatch and used a small hand mirror to see what was in the room. The spiral staircase continued to the lower level, and there it ended. The room had no furniture but several statues. It was dark and Erion could barely make out the shapes, with the little light that came from the lab.

“Ithelas, light a torch,” he requested.

The cleric did as he was told and passed the torch to Erion. The young man approached the opening of the hatch and could see that the room had only one door, which was locked. He dropped the torch to the lower room and was able to verify that there was nobody there. The entire group descended after Erion. They placed a torch in a holder on a wall. That seemed the only way out, and they wanted to ensure they could return to it fast. The strange room was virtually empty. The only furniture that was in it was a wooden chair with thin legs. Probably it wouldn't hold the weight of one of them, though perhaps maybe the magician's or the elf's.

Erion reviewed the door and tried to open it. It was locked, but only with a conventional lock that did not prove to be a problem. By opening it, he saw that it led to a dark hallway. Mithir cast a spell on his cane and held it to Erion, who used it to illuminate for just a moment. After checking it out, he came back into the room and closed the door.

“It's a hallway. It has five other doors on this side, four on the opposite side and a larger one at the bottom. Everything seems to be completely dark at this level, so we need light,” he explained.

“It's time to do a quick recognition work,” Ithelas said, invoking a new enchantment.

“I can help,” Mithir said, as he cast another spell.

They both left the hall and stopped only briefly in front of each door and then they returned. Ithelas came in pale.

“The two middle doors on the other side of the aisle have a magical protection,” the magician said. “I have not detected other auras.”

“Behind these two doors there are several undead, maybe four or five. They are powerful, especially one. Behind the door down the hall there are many, many undead. They aren't so powerful, but there may be more than thirty of them,” he said very seriously.