“Go! Get goin’!” Gorm waved them to the exit while holding the horde at bay with his shield.
Kaitha was first through the door, scouting the next cavern. Heraldin and the mages followed, hurrying through while Gorm and Gaist brought up the rear, bashing any non-newtonians that came within range.
The oobleck’s back was emerging from the pool now, arching up to the ceiling of the cavern like a snake preparing for a strike. It launched toward Gorm as he backed toward the door, barreling forward like a siege weapon and sending a spray of amber non-newtonians flying in its wake. The Dwarf and Gaist dove through the door and Heraldin slammed it shut. A moment later, the cavern wall boomed with sudden impact and orange light flared beneath the door. Dust and pebbles rained from the wall.
“Are we clear?” Gorm asked.
“We are.” Kaitha nodded to a corner where a couple of dead scargs bristled with silver arrows.
“Where do you suppose we are at this point?” Laruna asked.
Gorm took a deep breath. He felt the weight of the mountain around them, and judging by its pressure and their orientation, he’d estimate they were below the Seventh or Eighth Tier by now. The stone walls of the room were stone blocks rather than hewn stone or cave walls, and the doors on either side of the chamber were built with distinctive, if plain, arches. “Looks to be an entrance to the Low Way,” he said.
“Thank the gods,” said Heraldin.
Jynn frowned. “A day behind schedule.”
“It’s not behind schedule,” said Kaitha. “We said it’d take two days to make it here if monsters had returned to Johan’s path through the dungeon, and they certainly have. Assuming this is his path at all.”
“You think we’ve lost his trail?” Laruna asked.
Kaitha shrugged. “Monsters don’t repopulate a dungeon like this in days. These creatures have been here for months at least. It takes years to spawn that many newtonians, or whatever they were, in a pool that size.”
“But we encountered those blightbats in, what, the third room of the dungeon?” said Jynn. “How could we have lost his trail that fast? And if we did, where did he actually go?”
“Only one way to find out.” Gorm drew his axe and nodded to the door. “We keep movin’ forward.”
Chapter 22
Alone in the common room of Mrs. Hrurk’s Home for the Underprivileged, Feista Hrurk couldn’t see where to go from here.
Another guild appeal on Hristo’s death could take years, assuming she could find a guildmaster to approve one. A dull, buzzing pain thrummed in her chest at the thought of regularly revisiting old injustices and salting the old wounds in her soul. Despair crushed the air from her throat, choking down sobs that never emerged. Even if she set her career and the pups aside to fight her way through the darkest depths of the Pit and back, she’d probably lose her appeal again. It would take everything she had to fail once more. She wasn’t sure she had anything left to give.
But then what? Normally, when the ache of missing Hristo overcame her, she could turn to her children or get lost in her work. Yet if her husband could be murdered in the street for a petty violation, where did that leave her children? Her friends at the home? Her house and her career? What did she have that couldn’t be taken away with a minor infraction and a flash of a hero’s sword?
She might have spent all night paralyzed by such thoughts had it not been for the knock at the front door.
A flash of panic lanced through her spine as she wondered if the guild had come for her, if her pushing for an inquiry had exposed some issue with her papers. Or perhaps her allegations had run afoul of a rogue hero, and they’d fabricate the paperwork after she—
Feista shook her head and hurried to the door before the knocker woke up Aubren or the pups, because she knew that there was little good in letting fear bind her. She still looked through the peephole before opening the door, however, because she was sure there was even less good in letting foolhardiness kill her.
She blinked. The view outside was totally black, as though all of the streetlamps had gone out and no candles or glowstones lit the windows.
Then a familiar voice cut through the darkness. “Hello? Is anyone there?”
Feista threw open the door and caught Duine Poldo in a deep embrace. Poldo’s contingent of Wood Gnomes poured into the house around their feet, and from the floorboards and furniture Mrs. Hrurk’s team rushed to meet them. The Gnoll and the Gnome towered over many happy reunions as she wept into the dewy tweed of his suit coat.
She composed herself quickly, and pulled back enough for propriety. “I am so glad to see you, Mr. Poldo.”
“And I you, Mrs. Hrurk,” said Poldo. “But I am afraid I must ask you for a favor.”
Her smile froze, her perception caught between a dear friend and the face of a Lightling asking her for yet another thing. She took a deep breath. “I… yes, of course, Mr. Poldo. What do you need?”
“Oh, it’s not for me, my dear.” Poldo gestured to the area behind him and, notably, far above his head.
Feista gasped. In the light pouring out through the door, the darkness behind Poldo had the texture of matted fur. Her eyes followed the wall of flesh and hair up to a slack face. A Troll swayed as he stared vacantly at the second story of her house, like a man who had won a pyrrhic victory in a drinking contest.
Poldo squeezed her paw. “Thane and I are in the city on pressing business, but he needs rest. I wonder if he might make use of—”
Thane toppled with the slow groan of a falling oak. Wood Gnomes leapt from his fur like sailors from a sinking ship before he crashed to the pavers. Startled cries rang out from several windows, nearly drowning out the thunderous snoring of the Troll.
“Uh… use your front steps, I suppose,” Poldo finished. “Just for the night.”
Feista took a shaking breath through a grin she couldn’t hold back. “You’re a good man, Mr. Poldo. Of course, you’re welcome as long as you like. Won’t you come inside?”
“I would love that, but I worry what the bannermen will think if they find Thane sleeping here.” The Scribkin sat down on the top step and wrapped his coat around him. “He’s in no state to deal with the king’s law. I think—oof—I think it’s best that I watch over him from here.”
“Good idea,” said Feista. “I’ll keep you company.”
“But it’s so late, and I’m sure you have much to attend to in the morning,” Poldo protested as the Gnoll fetched a shawl from its hook and stepped out into the chill. “Mrs. Hrurk, please, you don’t need to do this.”
Feista looked at the prone Troll the Gnome was helping, and remembered what Poldo had done for her and her children when the rest of the world had left them in the rubbish. “But I do, Mr. Poldo,” she said, sitting down next to him. “I truly do.”
“There isn’t a choice in the matter,” said Garold Flinn. “When the king sends one—or two—a direct order, it carries all the weight and force of the law.”
“We break the law all the time,” said Benny Hookhand.
