“Told me to give you a chance,” Kern said. His face cracked into a small smile. “Said he was confident you’d prove yourself. I didn’t believe him, but I do now.”
Calder didn’t want to ask, but he had to know. “You said he was a Reader. How did you know?”
Kern hung his helmet from a loop on his belt. “Some places, Readers have strange customs. They believe blinding yourself helps you sense Intent more clearly. This man, he seemed like the polite, civilized, educated type, but it looked like he’d blinded himself. He wore a metal blindfold over his eyes.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Upon realizing that they had been mysteriously transported to a towering library that most likely had connections to a Great Elder, Calder’s first reaction was not fear. It was irritation.
He’d tried to leave a few people behind to protect them, but the entire crew had ended up off the ship anyway. If he’d known it would turn out like this, he wouldn’t have wasted his time worrying.
Petal’s tiny quicklamp expanded the circle of candlelight, allowing everyone to see the surrounding bookshelves in more detail. Each structure stood as tall as any building in the Capital; ten stories or more of endless books stacked to the cavernous ceiling.
After staring into the darkness for any sign of movement, Calder carefully slid a little closer to the books.
On the bottom shelf, dusty scrolls were surrounded by glass cases. On the next, the books were bound by wood and hide—he knelt to examine the spine of one tome bound in polished blackwood, and found that he couldn’t read it.
That fact alone confirmed what he’d already suspected: there were Elders involved. And not the lesser Elderspawn, like Shuffles, who seemed to have little more intelligence than animals, but the higher Elders. Maybe even a Great Elder.
It had been over a thousand years since any language except Imperial was heard among humans. That left two possibilities: either these words did not originate with humans, or they were over a thousand years old.
Either way, that meant Elders.
His memory whispered to him the name of the one sealed underneath Silverreach: Ach’magut.
Without inspecting that thought any further, he turned back to his crew. They had shown their training and experience by standing with their backs to the candlelight, weapons in hand. Even Jerri looked fierce and ready for battle, though she only held a dagger. If Elderspawn attacked, she’d last even less time than Petal, who held a stoppered bottle of acid ready to throw.
And that was a cheery thought, wasn’t it?
They were still comparing notes. “…I was on the wheel. I didn’t lose consciousness, I didn’t even blink, but I found myself here with no warning.” Jerri.
Foster had a pistol pointed off into the gloom as he scanned the shadows. “Doesn’t matter how we got here, we’ve got to go. Now. I’ve been imprisoned by crazy Elder worshipers more than enough in my life.”
“If you’d like to be the first to run off into the dark, Mr. Foster, be my guest.” Andel sounded calm, but he had one hand on his pistol and the other around his White Sun medallion.
“Might as well die out there!” Foster shouted. “It’s better than standing around here, waiting to die!”
Urzaia’s voice was even louder than Foster’s. “You will not die here! I will protect you!”
Whatever they decided to do, Calder was certain that shouting wasn’t the way to go about it. Foster started to reply, and Andel opened his mouth to cut him off, but they both froze when Calder’s cutlass cut down the middle of the group. His blade came to rest inches above the candle’s flame.
“That’s enough of that,” Calder said, his voice little more than a whisper. “Urzaia, lead the way. Foster, take the rear. Andel on the left, I’ll take the right. Walk straight down the row of bookcases. Petal, leave a mark on every row we pass.”
“Walk straight down the aisle?” Foster choked out, though at least he stayed quiet. “If they’re waiting for us, that’s right where they’ll be!”
“Or they’re waiting for us to go back the other way, or waiting for us to stay here, or waiting for the light to go out so they can take us one by one.” Calder kept his eyes locked on Foster’s as he spoke. “We might be playing into their hands no matter what we do, so we may as well try to escape while we’re at it.”
Foster grumbled under his breath, but Urzaia had already taken up his position and started a slow march. The rest of them followed.
Every few yards, Petal carefully let a drop of acid fall from her stoppered bottle. It scarred the floor with a hiss and a little wisp of smoke, leaving a mark the size of a breadcrumb in the smooth floor.
They had traveled for the better part of an hour, according to Andel’s pocket-watch, when Jerri gently rested her fingers on his arm. “Don’t look up. There’s something moving between the bookcases above us. Do not look up.”
Calder resisted the urge to throw his head back and stare straight up, keeping his movement natural. He continued to scan the shadows around them, as he had the entire time, but this time he allowed his eyes to flow a little higher.
For the first minute or two he spotted nothing, which was agonizing in its own way. The only thing more frightening than Elderspawn he could see were Elderspawn he couldn’t see, and his imagination told him that they were right behind him, descending to the back of his neck on silent threads.
But he kept his calm, and finally he caught something—a flicker of movement at the corner of one of the bookshelves, like an insectoid leg being withdrawn.
His heart pounded, his breath came faster, and he feigned a stumble to grab onto Urzaia’s shoulder. When the Champion looked at him, surprised, Calder whispered the situation to him.
Urzaia’s face darkened, and his hands tightened around his hatchets, but otherwise he gave no sign that Calder had spoken. He continued marching down the hall as Calder and Jerri conveyed the information to the others.
Even as he whispered to Andel, Calder’s thoughts buzzed frantically. The position of the Elderspawn left them with very few helpful options. They’re above us, so they’re tracking us. They’ll see everything we do. We have to reach the end of this room at some point, so will they drop down on us then? Will they wait so long?
They had seen enough curve of the ceiling at this point to realize that the room did in fact have an end; they weren’t sealed in some sort of Elder-generated dream world. The room had walls, though they were unbelievably far apart. In the back of Calder’s mind, he wondered if the bookcases acted as columns, helping to support the weight of the chamber.
If they stood and fought, the terrain didn’t favor them. How could it, against an enemy capable of leaping down on their backs from above?
Since they couldn’t stop, that left only one option: move forward as fast as they could.
Calder increased his pace, and as soon as the others realized, they matched him. Within ten more minutes, the crew had effectively doubled their speed, and was all but running down the library aisle. They maintained complete silence, so only the pounding of their shoes and their harsh panting breaths cut through the quiet.
Overhead, the flickering movement of the Elderspawn hurried to match them. Calder began to catch them more often, even when he wasn’t focusing, as they hurried from case to case. With enough fragmented pictures—jointed, alien legs and eyes that waved on flexible stalks—he confirmed what he’d already suspected. These were the spawn of Ach’magut, the ten-legged spiders with innumerable eyes. The same ones that had haunted Silverreach four years before. The Inquisitors.