Pandora Chronicles

8 - The Underground Roads

***Istoviir’s POV***

There was not much camaraderie between the dark races, most being dangerous and selective of only their own kind. Some were tolerant of the others only because a trade contract between their home cities was in place, but most were volatile and roamed the tunnels looking for trouble. Wolf had already experienced that in Baerevhel, and it was obvious she was no stranger to violence. “It is a six day walk to the entrance of Tagnik’zur’el so we must only rest when needed.” I told her.

“Why are we going to Tagnik’zur’el Master?” She asked.

“You will see.”

“Yes master.” She said obediently.

We walked on through the dark tunnels without stopping for over a surface day, according to her magical time keeper. I was surprised at her ability to adapt to the pitch blackness, but she explained that unlike most humans she was able to see heat signatures when the light began to dim too far, even in the moonlight. A very rare ability for a race that did not live below ground. She could also see color waves around sounds whether in the light or dark. This helped her greatly as a living moss grew on almost every corridor of the tunnels, and small insects made small clicking noises, and she used these markers as her guide.

If she was beginning to tire she did not show it, and I made small conversation trying to get her to speak. She didn't say much, but answered direct questions, and kept quiet, always on watch.

“How have you been trained until now? What is your routine?” I asked her.

“Marchus would take me to book houses, I would read every book on the shelves, he would randomly test my knowledge and we would move on to the next.”

My eyes squinted at her curiously when she said that. Why would he teach her that way? I continued questioning her relentlessly until she grabbed me by my shoulder to stop me, "Shhh." She hushed, as she listened. I couldn't hear anything, but she said she could hear the padded feet of a group of creatures, and saw green and blue sound waves in the distance. After a few moments, I heard them too and the end of the tunnel began to glow far off in the distance from the torchlight.

"Drugar." I said, starting to get uneasy. Drugar were a mining race of dark gnomes, their small size was no match for their vicious bloodlust, and they hated all other races, but especially the Ilythrins and any surface creature. Wolf saw the panic in my eyes as the light got closer. I had hoped to avoid conflict, but there was nowhere to hide.

I began to speak, and Wolf hushed me again as she pushed me up against the cave wall and stepped in front of me, spreading her cloak out to cover us. She whispered a spell under her breath and in a moment, we had blended into the cave wall, and the Drugar continued on as if nothing were amiss. She waited until they were far out of sight before she moved, and I was honestly enjoying the closeness. Her chest was pressed against mine so tightly, I could feel her heartbeat and every breath, and I intended to savor this moment.

She pulled away quickly and we continued through the tunnels silently until we came to a large open cavern. Within the cavern was one of the many dark underground forests, and I said, “We will stop here to rest.”

Wolf took her wand from her belt, and with a flick of her wrist, a large flower shot swiftly out of the ground, and twisted itself together. The stem made a strong small house, and the petals made two soft beds right before our eyes. She was so tired that she said not a word, she simply walked through the blossom door, with another flick of the wand started a small fire, and then she lay down and fell quickly asleep.

I entered and also fell fast asleep. As we had traveled in silence, I thought of what her name should be. Every Ilythrin student is given a name but they are usually also more than half of her age. I decided that her magic would choose her name for me, but that she would continue to be called Wolf due to the fact that she was already an adult. I simply couldn’t put her real name in the records, but it was a mere formality at this point. We rested only a few hours and then continued on. Wolf was ever on guard and she had told me that she did not like these tunnels, and was getting the feeling of danger around every corner.

As we walked we heard what sounded like the rock cracking, and she saw worry in my eyes. "Stiphons." I said shortly, and then her eyes went wide. She had read about the massive cave dwelling scorpions in the book I had her study before we left, but had never seen one, nor did she desire too. They had bodies the size of a horse with a tail just as long behind, and could snap a man in half with one claw. They made webs like spiders to catch their prey, usually cave Snulies, which were like huge pigs that ate anything they could fit in their mouths. No, she did not like these caves, everything in them wished to kill and eat us and while I was used to this life, she was not.

Suddenly the rock floor beneath us fell through and we plummeted down a long hole until we were caught in the sticky net of a Stiphon. I tried to struggle, tangling myself even further, but Wolf lay still. She closed her eyes, and as I continued to thrash, I noticed her glowing red and watched. The web was burning from her and as soon as her arm was free, she reached up and grabbed my ankle. I began to glow as well, and felt the fire that surrounded me as a cool liquid. We continued to fall through the web until we hit the bottom of the cavern with a large thud.

I looked around, the only way out was up, through the trap door that had fallen through. It was by pure chance that the narrow cave wasn't filled with Stiphons, but after all of the commotion I knew we didn't have long. Wolf was already in action, grabbing pieces of hanging web and swinging them together to make a rope. She started to climb but was getting stuck in the webbing. She stopped for a moment to think of a new plan, just as a huge Stiphon dropped into the cave with us, slashing at us with his huge pincers and stabbing at us with his poisonous tail stinger.

Wolf's sword was out in an instant, and my double blades went to work, deflecting the snapping claws. Wolf dodged the swiping tail dagger and dove beneath the Stiphon, clinging to its scaled underbelly, looking for the soft spot between it's armor. She wedged her leather wrapped feet between the strong scales, and knocked around with the butt of her blade, hitting what sounded like stone. She found the soft spot, a hollow thud below the breast plate. She spun the blade in one hand and jammed her long dagger into the beast as hard as she could. She twisted it and shoved it in further as he thrashed, the blood pouring all over her as the Stiphon began to stumble. I couldn't believe it as she rolled out from under the creature before it collapsed and stood before me, drenched in the foul smelling sticky black blood. We said nothing to each other; I didn't know what to say, and she continued her escape plan.

She went to the mouth of the beast and covered her hands in the slimy saliva. I looked at her like she was crazy, but I had also just seen this young quiet girl kill a full grown Stiphon; a difficult feat for a group of trained warriors. "The saliva doesn't stick to the web." She said as she began to climb again. I followed suit and covered my hands in the nasty smelling saliva, following her up the rope.

We reached the mouth of the hole, and pulled ourselves up, laying on the hard rock to catch our breath. I stood up first, "Wolf, we have to move." I said, looking down the tunnel behind us and seeing a torchlight. The Drugar were coming back, and Wolf rolled to a stand. We swiftly moved down the tunnel on silent feet, and came to a split in the corridor. She heard water rushing to the left and before I could protest, she went down it. I followed her until we came to an underground stream, with glowing insects swimming around in it.

She dove in and began scrubbing the sticky Stiphon blood off of herself. It burned her skin like acid, and she worked hard to get it all off. I kept watch, trying to hurry her to continue so we didn’t get caught in a battle. She finished as quickly as she could, but as we returned to the main tunnel we were spotted by the Drugar band, and the chase was on. Just as I had feared, the group was large, at least fifteen that I saw before I turned and began to run with Wolf in front. They were swift, but then the close corridor opened into a large ravine and Wolf noticed how much trouble we were in.

We had run right into a Drugar Mining camp, with armed guards on watch and an army of arrow slinging warriors along the walls. They must have settled in the cavern recently, as it had only been a year since I last traveled through, and I met with no trouble at all. Wolf thought quickly, and took from her bag three small black stones, carved with tiny silver symbols all over them. She threw them to the ground, "Sham tra na scaiy!" The rocks disappeared in smoke, and three massive rock golems stood up around her. I stepped inside the protective triangle beside her.

The Drugar stopped trying to attack when they saw this; they prayed to rock gods, and would never hurt a servant of the stone. They let us pass through the cavern, but Wolf did not return the golems to their vessels until we had gotten far away from any sign of Drugar. We had escaped death, and I knew it. I was beginning to get a little intimidated by my new student; so far I had almost gotten us killed three times, and she had been the one to save us. I realized she was not as helpless as she had appeared to be in the tavern when I killed that brute for her. She would have let him carve her face to keep her promise to her master, when she was obviously capable of defending herself. What can I possibly teach her? I thought to myself. We continued in silence, and she treated her burns from the acidic blood with a salve that she carried as we walked. I suddenly didn’t know what to say.