Realms of Infamy - James Lowder [105]
He hung his head, his shoulders slumping.
"Tell me!" she whispered harshly.
Slowly, he drew something from one of his pouches. The deck of cards. "Yours isn't the first destiny I've read," he said quietly. "You see, for the last year, I've been following the cards, trying to find my own destiny. First the cards led me to the ruins of a wizard's tower, where I discovered the jar of salve, and then to the library where I found the history of these mountains. After that, the cards led me to Darkhold. Always they led me on, as if I were caught in some great spiral myself. And now…" He pulled a single card from the deck.
"What is it?" Ravendas asked intently.
"You didn't want to see your fate." He handed her the card. "Well, this is mine."
She turned it over. Blue magic sparked along the outlines of a dark, knife-edged spire. The Tower.
"I came here hoping to find my fate, Ravendas." He reached out and gently touched her hand. "And perhaps I have."
Before she could say anything, he stood and moved toward the spiral staircase. Shivering, she followed. For a heartbeat, the card glimmered on the floor where she had left it. Then it lay dark.
"Let's finish this," Marnok said. He leapt off the edge of the shaft, his cloak billowing behind him, and landed on the staircase. Lithely, Ravendas did the same. She drew her sword as they ascended, but nothing assailed them from the surrounding darkness. The stairway ended, and the two stepped into a circular chamber. Silver moonlight spilled from crystalline windows high in the domed ceiling above. A basalt pedestal stood in the center of the chamber. On it lay a small, pale object. Eagerly, Ravendas moved forward, but the mage grabbed her arm.
"Careful," he hissed. "There is magic here."
She nodded, halting a half-dozen paces from the pedestal. Leaning forward, she peered more closely at the object that rested upon it.
"That's it?" she said in disgust, her voice reverberating off cold stone. "That's the wondrous Finger of Ckai-el-Ckaan?"
"It can't be!" Marnok shook his head in disbelief.
Rage blossomed hotly in Ravendas's chest. Was this to be the final joke, then? "By all the blackest gods," she spat furiously, "it's nothing but an old knuckle bone!"
No, it is much more than that, a voice spoke in their minds.
Ravendas and Marnok looked up in shock. A man stood-no, he hovered-behind the pedestal. His long crimson robes drifted slowly on the air, as if feeling the touch of a distant wind. A gold skull-cap covered his head, and his yellow eyes glowed eerily in the angular landscape of his face.
"Ckai-el-Ckaan!" Ravendas whispered in dread.
No, I am but an image he conjured in his likeness long ago, when he raised this fortress to protect his most precious relic.
"Precious?" Ravendas snarled, braver now that she knew she was not facing the ancient sorcerer himself. "What's so precious about an old bone?"
Ah, but it is not any bone, the image said. You see, as great as Ckai-el-Ckaan's magic was, all his sorcery could not reveal to him the time or place he would meet his demise. So he forged this tower, and here within he cut off his littlest finger, and laid it on the pedestal.
"But why?" Ravendas demanded in confusion.
"I think I understand," Marnok whispered. He was trembling. "The book told how Ckai-el-Ckaan was obsessed with living forever. So he must have left a finger here, knowing that, one day, the bone could be used in a spell that would forge a new body for him, and bring his spirit back from the Realm of the Dead."
Ravendas stared at Marnok in amazement.
The image of the sorcerer nodded serenely. That is so. He created this fortress so that only one who was strong, and powerful, and clever enough to see him returned from the dead could gain the relic. Climbing the walls was the first test, the test of strength. Now begins the second. The ghostly wizard gestured toward the relic. Take it. But know that only one who has magic to match that of Ckai-el-Ckaan's may attempt to leave