Forgotten Secrets – Part 1

The invisible tentacles of the morning chill crept through my thick layers of clothing, brushing against my skin like the unwanted caress of an old, painfully familiar love. The cold morning mocked the timid rays of Kalys and their attempts to warm the Wastes as it stirred to life. Most of them never reached the damp earth down here, lost amidst the shadows of dense vegetation and the scattered ruins of Ra’Tradaan. Like the bones of a long-forgotten corpse, greenish and rotted, the remnants of solitary walls, columns, and other unidentifiable structures protruded from between the intertwined trunks of ancient maaka trees and various low-lying local flora. Among them, like overhanging natural terraces, sprouted clusters of giant creeping ch’irit leaves. This deep within the forest, some reached over a meter in length and were as thick as a man’s wrist. The thickets reclaimed by the ch’irit could serve as excellent shelter during the daily torrential rains of this season, but the moss upon the leaves was lethally poisonous; they often became tombs for the unwary or inexperienced traveler. Reason enough for us to give these places a wide berth as we forged our way deeper into this region long forgotten by the Overlords.

Twenty meters ahead, the broad back of Arin served as my guide, for today he had taken the role of vanguard for our small group. The methodical movements of his arms as he cleared the greenery in our path with wide swings of his machete were almost hypnotic to my sleep-deprived brain. The scent of fresh wood resin and sap from the severed vegetation lingered in the air behind him like an invisible but unmistakable trail. My brother had shed his leather coat despite the low temperature, wearing only a thin, sleeveless tiusan vest. The massive muscles of his bare arms rippled in rhythm with the strikes against the stubborn branches and shrubs in his way.

The tears in the fabric of the world around us were fewer than expected this morning, with only a few being of truly dangerous proportions. Over the years, I had learned to navigate between them as a near-subconscious activity, while my eyes missed no detail of the immediate surroundings and my ears weighed and sifted through every sound—near or far. A moment of inattention in the Wastes could prove costly. This fundamental understanding, however, continued to elude the other members of the expedition.

Some distance behind me, I could clearly hear the various signs of their noisy progress—just as, I was certain, every living creature within a radius of several kilometers could. Dilettantes. Unfortunately, the choice of personnel in the small border town of Rin’tussa, from which we had departed a month earlier, had been severely limited at this time of year. The more competent mercenaries had already taken other contracts or were seeking work within the Enlightened Realms, not outside them. The rest were local vagabonds, idlers, and former bandits who had never ventured more than a hundred meters into the Wastes in their lives. But for a risky expedition such as this, more men were needed, and Arin and I had no choice but to pick the best among the dregs and press on with them.

The approaching sound of trampled dry branches and brushed leaves, accompanied by heavy puffing, drew me from my stream of reflections.

“Mage Erdaras, how may I assist you on this fine morning?” I asked, without needing to turn.

The startled intake of breath behind my back brought a faint smile to my lips. I let it linger until my companion drew level with me. As I expected, the sight of it caused his sullen, perpetually sour face to contort even further.

“Could you not slow this mad gallop a little, Lord Vorat?” Erdaras blustered, dabbing his sweaty forehead with a silk handkerchief that was already soaked.

“Our current speed could hardly be called a gallop, Mage,” I said, returning my attention to the surrounding forest.

The stout Mage grunted in dissatisfaction but maintained his pace so he could continue speaking with me.

“I do not walk this fast even on well-paved streets!” he complained. “And here we are moving through terrible and, I might say, hazardous terrain, as if we are in a race. Why are you in such a hurry?”

I suppressed the heavy sigh that threatened to escape my lips at any cost and explained once more with excessive patience:

“The less time we spend in the depths of the Wastes, the better.”

“A few more partitions would hardly…”

But I ignored the drone of his voice. Arin had stopped and was eyeing something invisible ahead with heightened attention. My right hand found the hilt of my sword, and my senses sharpened in anticipation of any lurking trouble. With my other hand, I stayed Erdaras, which finally made him fall silent. The Mage looked around with a start, as if he had forgotten where he was. A mistake that could easily prove fatal, with or without magic at one’s disposal. Mages and their arrogance. If only Erdaras—or rather, his skills—were not so pivotal to the success of our expedition…

A minute later, my brother signaled and moved forward with renewed enthusiasm.

“What? What happened?” The Mage’s voice was hoarse. Beads of sweat rolled freely down his forehead, bypassing his bushy eyebrows only to continue down his plump cheeks.

“According to Arin, we are approaching our destination,” I replied, raising my hand so the other five members of our group could see it. In a series of short gestures, I gave them general instructions on how to follow us.

“For real?!” The Mage’s mood visibly improved.

“I suppose we shall find out in no more than a partition or two,” I said and pressed on.

The prospect that we were but a short distance from our goal drove Erdaras to summon his strength and, at least temporarily, forget his constant whining. This granted me not only blessed peace but also the opportunity to concentrate on the surrounding forest and its potential dangers. Given the noise we were making, it was a miracle that we hadn’t stumbled upon any of the larger mutants in the last ten days. This did not particularly comfort me. Their absence spoke of the presence of something even more terrifying in this region—something that had either driven them away or destroyed them to the last.

I could only pray to the Overlords that we would not cross its path. And keep my eyes wide open. Perhaps due to this anxiety, I had the fleeting but intrusive sensation that someone else was with us. Someone stalking the very edge of my senses, skillfully remaining just beyond reach. Try as I might, day after day, I could find no clear trace of this maddening, invisible presence. Up to this moment, today’s result was no different from yesterday’s. Yet that was far from a reason to give up.

The twilight of morning soon retreated before the rays of the blooming Niatema. The sky remained sullen and gray, but at least for the moment, the incessant rain had paused to catch its breath. With the passing of the first partition, the shadows among the trees receded and lost their density. This made my task significantly easier and somewhat distracted me from my worries. More and more ruins became visible amidst the dense vegetation around us—so much so that I could almost construct a mental, albeit incomplete, map of this part of Ra’Tradaan. Once, this must have been a thriving district in the heart of the city, with grand, beautiful buildings, wide paved streets, and spacious squares adorned with statues and fountains.

Now, four millennia later, almost nothing remained but parts of structures reclaimed by nature and fragments of unrecognizable infrastructure. Over there, amidst thickly intertwined roots, peered the stone face of a toppled statue. A little further ahead, a net of creeping vegetation had covered an unnatural cylindrical shape, and only the waterspout protruding from the leaves—fashioned in the form of a three-headed fish—betrayed that this had once been a fountain. Most buildings were razed to a single story and half-buried under centuries of soil deposits and the lush greenery that had sprung from them. How much had been destroyed by the War, and how much by the passage of time, was impossible to say. But I wished I could learn more of this place’s history. Perhaps, if luck continued to be on our side in this endeavor, we would find preserved books in the Academy that could shed light on the final days of Ra’Tradaan. In truth, any preserved written media from that Age were of immense interest to me, beyond their immeasurable value.

That was not the primary goal of this expedition, of course. The books were merely an added bonus. My research, based on several independent sources, pointed to this forgotten branch of the Academy of Magic and what lay within it. Knowledge from the distant past that—perhaps—would forever free me from a living nightmare.

After another segment of creeping through the inhospitable forest, following the cut path, we caught up with Arin. He was waiting for us in the middle of a vast and less overgrown area, unable to stand still from impatience. By the arrangement of the ruins around us, I could guess that this had once been a massive square, likely filled with beautiful gardens and wondrous places of rest. In its center still stood a relatively well-preserved, massive, three-story structure. The clearly recognizable architecture of Lir’Anarand shone through even under the shroud of various plants. At the far end, I could see the traces of a massive collapse, whispering of the violent end of this place. The administrative buildings of the ancient Empire possessed incomparable structural integrity; such damage was almost never the result of natural conditions or the passage of time.

“Kael! I think we finally found it!” Arin’s voice was enthusiastic and, as usual, carried a sense of unshakable optimism.

My brother had strapped the green-stained machete to his waist and held the nearly disintegrating map that had led us here in both his hands. I approached him and examined the faded signs around the marked location, then directed my attention to the surrounding ruins of the ancient city.

“I think your inference is correct, Arin,” I said. “The surrounding landmarks seem to match—”

“Heh-heh, we found it! We actually found it!” The joyous shouts and manic laughter of Erdaras drowned out my own words.

I exhaled deeply and rubbed my forehead. The tension behind it was threatening to turn into a genuine headache.

“Mage Erdaras, you would do well to lower your voice,” Arin said, his lips curling into a mischievous smile. “Otherwise, you risk my brother’s legendary patience evaporating entirely.”

Erdaras fell silent and scowled first at him, then at me, but the joy of the moment was too great for him to remain sour for long. Leaving us there, the Mage headed with a brisk step toward the central ruins. He evidently intended to examine them up close.

I shook my head and shifted position so I could observe both him and the immediate vicinity without obstruction.

“Still worried about that invisible stalker?” Arin asked quietly.

I nodded but did not take my eyes off the Mage. It mattered little whether I liked him or not—without him, the entire endeavor would fail. His safety, at least for now, was paramount. Once we found what we had come for, Erdaras could sink into the depths of Aartókh-Dággaras for all I cared.

“I looked carefully while clearing the path, yet I saw nothing unusual,” my brother continued. “Perhaps the tension of the last month is simply taking its toll.”

“You are probably right.” I shrugged, mostly to dispel his own concerns. “But even if there is something, leave it to me, Arin. You keep an eye on the others.”

“Always, Kael.”

As we spoke, the other members of the expedition caught up with us and appeared one by one on the ancient square. All five were typical representatives of that stratum of the common folk who could call no specific Realm their home. Vagabonds who sold their services as paid escorts for merchant caravans or as bodyguards for wealthy citizens. I harbored certain suspicions that during periods of low employment, these five engaged in other, less legal activities. But among the available mercenaries in Rin’tussa, they were the only ones who stood any chance of surviving this deep into the Wastes. And, consequently, of being of use to us. Up to this moment, all five had lived up to my expectations—mostly by not dying in any of the hundreds of terrible ways that stalked us at every step.

“So, is this the school then?” asked Karo, the eldest among them.

Tall for a commoner, wiry and flexible, his bearing was like that of a poisonous reptile always on the verge of striking. His gray hair, speckled with only dots of its former black color, spoke of an age over fifty. But this was in no way evident in his stance or the seemingly inexhaustible energy he had demonstrated thus far.

“The Academy! The Academy of Magic, not just a school!” Erdaras interjected irritably, but we all ignored him.

“Yes, by all accounts, this is the place,” I replied, scanning for a possible entrance.

“Finally, may Rashan spank me!” As usual, Tora’s tongue was dirtier than her face.

She was a large woman with short-cropped, matted hair and arms that were too long for her body. The leather armor she wore largely concealed her feminine form. Beneath all the grime, her face might have been attractive, but Tora cared more for the two short swords at her waist than for her appearance.

“As if His Holiness would want to touch a filthy wench like you.” Rasko’s drawling voice announced his arrival.

Small and dry, with a pockmarked face, he carried a large crossbow on his back and an arsenal of daggers of various sizes positioned at convenient spots on his body. In response to his words, Tora merely grinned and licked her middle and ring fingers slowly, then pointed them at him.

The other two—Drus and Marko, large and sturdy men with weather-beaten faces—snickered at this exchange of pleasantries but remained apart. Even in the calmest moments of this journey, they were not among the most talkative of our companions. From what I had gathered from their laconic answers, the two had worked together for years for various shadowy organizations in the Border Realms and felt no remorse regarding less-than-clean work. A useful quality, but also a potential source of trouble in the future.

A distant series of thunderclaps announced the end of the comfortable window of dry weather. The sky had darkened visibly in just a few minutes and was preparing to pour all its withheld water upon us with vengeful force. But it was not the prospect of getting soaked to the bone that worried me.

“This is neither the time nor the place for idle chatter,” I said, casting a meaningful glance at the dense forest around us. “You all know what comes with the rain.”

“You’re right, m’lord,” Karo agreed, scowling at the other mercenaries. “So what do we do now?”

I nodded toward the building.

“The entrance is there, but we shall need to clear a perimeter and sufficient space for a camp. Let’s get to work!”