Darkvision - Bruce R. Cordell [93]
"Aye, I suppose. Hey, look!" Zel pointed along the path in the direction of the wavering curtain Warian had seen when he'd first arrived.
"Uncle!" Warian recalled that Zeltaebar's reputation for exasperating dillydallying was well earned.
Zel said, "No, no… I see something, something important. Sort of looks like a spire. A tower, maybe? But it's all hazy, like I'm seeing it through water."
Warian followed his uncle's gaze down the path. He suddenly realized that the wavering curtain wasn't completely opaque.
A grand tower wavered and danced as if behind a heat shimmer, as if it were a mirage. The stone road arrowed for miles across the dark, directly into an elegantly arched gallery that protruded from the half-real structure.
Hundreds of secondary spires rose from the enormous, many-windowed edifice. Terraces, outside galleries, open stairs, and sealed doorways studded the structure's sides, barely visible through the shimmering veil. The base of the tower fell into invisibility far below.
"Do you think that's where the chief puppeteer lives?" wondered Zel.
"Yeah."
"Maybe Sevaera didn't follow because she didn't have to. Whatever possessed her lives there." Zel pointed at the shimmering behemoth.
"Possibly."
They gazed at the vast structure and the narrow path that led toward it.
Warian looked the other way, hoping to spy something that would offer better hope. In one direction, the stone path plunged onward, span after span, narrowing across the leagues to a single point-a point that appeared to promise eternity.
The other route, encrusted with crystal, led only to the nearby blob of dark stone, with its cracks revealing the crystal riches inside.
"Maybe we should check out the jumbo geode first." Zel rubbed his hands and picked up the iron bar he'd carried with him through the portal. After a moment's consideration, he dropped the bar and took up an abandoned pickaxe instead.
"This stuff is pretty valuable. We wouldn't have to make artificial parts out of it," he said, and walked toward the cart and scattering of tools. "Phew, something really stinks over… oh."
Warian walked cautiously down the path, across the mined-out crystal.
The source of the rotting odor lay in the mining cart.
A half-orc was stuffed into the cart, obviously dead. The half-orc wore miner's dungarees, and its hoary skin was filthy with dirt and crystal dust. Warian was startled when he saw a crystal pendant hanging around the orc's neck. Burn marks scorched the flesh around the crystal, as if it had overheated and cooked the orc completely through. Then Warian realized that the crystal itself seemed charred, and was obviously cracked. He gazed intently at it, but could detect no glimmer of light swimming in the pendant's depths.
"I can't figure what killed him," Zel said, his hands on his hips as he gazed into the open cart.
"His amulet."
"Aye, that's obvious. I mean, why?"
Warian shrugged, at a loss. "Maybe the 'puppeteer,' as you put it, couldn't control the miner well enough without a prosthesis, and just killed him with some sort of magical overload."
"Is that possible?"
"How should I know?" Warian kicked at the cart. "I don't know how Shaddon-or the puppeteer-is able to control people through Datharathi crystal." Warian froze for a moment. A worrying thought struck him as his eyes skimmed the fields of mined and virgin crystal that encrusted the stone road.
"Uncle, why aren't we dead?"
"Because we're smart, we're quick, and…"
"No, look! Crystal everywhere-the perfect vessel for controlling minds, right? We've seen that it only manifests in this damned stuff." Warian waved his hand down the stone lane, thickly encrusted with the pernicious material.
Zel rubbed his chin. "Well, you have an arm made of it, and so far you seem to be immune to its influence…"
"Yes. Shaddon made it before he found the portal. I just assumed that all the crystal on this side of the portal was corrupt."
Zel shook his head. "Maybe only if it's brought into the real world?"
"I wonder."
He thought about Shaddon's claims. "Or,