He put a calloused finger to her lips. “I don’t want anything happening to you, Riki. See Varek down there? The rope didn’t reach all the way. He had to jump.” He dropped his finger to her rounded stomach. “You’re not in any shape to be doing this.”
“Don’t want anything happenin’ to me,” she repeated softly. “Then why’d you leave me stranded in Blöten?”
“Riki, I…”
“I didn’t know you cared, Dhamon Grimwulf.” Her tone was skeptical. “Didn’t know you cared about anyone ’cept yourself.”
He opened his mouth to reply, then thought better of it. A moment later he had disappeared into the hole.
“Pigs, but I was in good enough shape to save you and Mal from them thieves,” Rikali fumed.
“Saved your worthless life. I’m pregnant. I ain’t an invalid. I can jump, Dhamon Grimwulf, an’ I can—”
“You’ll get more than your fair share of any treasure we find, Riki,” Maldred said. “If there’s any treasure to be had.” He made sure Dhamon was off the rope before he started down, frowning as he saw the makeshift torch had been tossed on the ground and was burning out. “We won’t cut you out. I promise. Now, keep an eye out.”
She watched Maldred scramble down the rope, her anger building, then watched the sivak climb awkwardly after him, the rope of cloth strips straining and threatening to tear.
“I don’t want to be left behind again,” she said too softly for the men below to hear. “I don’t ever want to be left behind again.”
They were moving away from the opening, as the torch burned itself out. She couldn’t see them any longer, and the light from the setting sun was waning.
“Ever, ever again.” She took a deep breath, waited a few moments, then followed them.
* * * * *
“By my father,” Maldred gasped. He’d fashioned another torch and lit it, the feeble light revealing that the three men and the sivak stood in a cavern so large that they couldn’t see it all.
“It stretches a few hundred yards in that direction,” Ragh informed them. As they moved forward, their light caused shadows to dance across stone and earthen walls and over the ancient wooden hulls.
“Ships,” Varek said, his voice cracking with awe. “I can see a dozen of them, I think. It could take days to search all of them.” He was standing motionless, transfixed by the sight of so many ancient ships. He didn’t hear the half-elf jump to the cavern floor and pad up to his shoulder, didn’t hear her gasp of amazement.
Rikali’s eyes were wide, her mouth gaping. She struggled to absorb it all, her mind filling with possibilities when Maldred dropped this torch and watched it burn out.
“Pigs but I can’t see nothin’ now,” she said. Her hand flailed about until she touched skin. A moment more and her fingers had fluttered down to grasp a hand. “Dhamon?”
He made no move to release her hand. “I told you to stay up top.”
She tugged free and groped until she found Varek.
“Ragh?” Dhamon peered through the darkness.
Maldred was on his hands and knees, feeling about for a dry piece of wood. The sivak was moving away from them, toward the closest ship.
“Ragh!”
Within a heartbeat it had disappeared inside the hull.
“Damn draconian.”
A few moments more and Maldred had a piece of wood burning merrily. “This isn’t going to work, Dhamon,” he said. A flash, and the wood became a long, glowing ember. “Wood’s so dry down here it goes up like kindling. We’ll have to backtrack, go to Wheatland and get some torches, lanterns. Might as well get that wagon while we’re at it, and…”
His words and the last of the light died.
“Pigs but I don’t like all of this dark. It’s creepy. And it’s so cold.”
The half-elf was right, Dhamon realized. He’d been so caught up in the discovery of the ships that he hadn’t paid attention to anything else. The cavern was noticeably colder than the land above. The air was downright chill, raising goosebumps on his exposed skin. His senses acute, he felt the hair on his arms teased by a faint breeze—as if the cavern were breathing. It was an unnerving sensation, made more so because of the darkness. After a moment he realized what was causing it—the warmer air from above seeping in and displacing some of the colder air. In a way, he mused, the cave was breathing.
“Pigs, but I don’t like this,” the half-elf hissed.
“Then you should have stayed above.” This stern response came from Maldred, who a heartbeat later had coaxed a long plank into flames.
The draconian was back, carrying a rusty but merrily burning lantern in one claw. The handles of three unlit lanterns were looped over his other arm.
“A handy beastie you have, Dhamon,” the half-elf said. She was quick to take one of the lanterns from the sivak. “Pigs but this is filthy.”
“There are a few small barrels of oil in the hold of that ship,” Ragh told Dhamon. He handed Dhamon an unlit lantern, then passed the others to Maldred and Varek. “There was not much else of value that I could see.”
Rikali held her lantern high and sucked in her breath. “Look at all of this. I’ll have somethin’ wonderful to tell my baby,” she whispered in awe. “All these ships, so far beneath the earth and so very far away from the sea. This is … well it’s… unbelievable. She glided forward, one hand outstretched. “Such a tale I will tell you, baby, ’ specially if we find treasure on each and every one of these ships. Gems and strings of pearls. You’ll grow up in a very, very fine house.”
“Riki,” Maldred cautioned. “Wait for us. There’s no telling how stable the ground is.”
To the south was a squat-looking ship, one that appeared nearly as wide as it was long. It was a cog with a largely intact main mast. The topmost part had snapped off, and the hold was buried deep in sand and dirt.
“This way,” Dhamon said as he moved toward the cog.
The sivak narrowed its eyes. “I said there was nothing of value on that ship.”
Dhamon didn’t reply for a moment. Instead, he gestured to Maldred. “No harm in all of us looking,” he finally told the sivak. “Besides, I could use some oil in this lantern.” He hurried ahead of all of them. He didn’t want them to see the uncharacteristic wide smile painted on his face and the excitement that had been so long absent from his eyes.
The cracked beams at the stern made the ship easy climbing, and within moments he was standing on a deck that creaked with each step he took. The wood was so old and weak, the planks bowed under him, and Dhamon knew he might crash through to the decks below at any moment. He spotted the hatch to the cargo bay, which was partially covered by a thoroughly yellowed square sail. He crept toward it, moving the rotting fabric and ropes aside so it would be easier going. He noted claw marks on the door and handle, the sivak’s work. The sivak had been here first. A ladder descended into darkness, and Dhamon held his breath and gingerly started down, counting on his luck to keep the rungs from breaking. “If they held for the draconian,” he said to himself, “then they’ll…”
Above him the deck creaked ominously, signaling the arrival of his companions, the heavy tromping coining from the sivak. “In here!” he called to them as he continued down. “Watch your step!”
“The search might take days, Varek?” Maldred laughed as he headed toward the ladder. “Indeed, I hope it takes many days. Weeks!” A grin was splayed across his tanned face, as his dark eyes danced merrily. “And if there’s any treasure to be had here—oh, and there certainly must be treasure—may there be so much of it we never have to steal again, not once in the rest of our hopefully long lives.”