Transcendence
PART 1 TO THE EDGE OF DARKNESS Chapter 9 Dark Solitude

The Path of Starless Night offered a darkness beyond anything that Brynn had ever known, deeper even than the blackness of the peat JJL cave. Walking the tunnels, descending under the mountains beside Juraviel and Cazzira, Brynn began to understand a second element to the darkness, a profound sense of brooding, a quiet so intense that it numbed the ears and made her retreat within herself. She tried to consider the goal ahead, tried to find strength and determination in the realization that this dark path marked the end of her journey home. When they exited the Path of Starless Night, they would look upon To-gai, the grassy steppes of her homeland.
Brynn couldn't hold the thought against the pounding silence, stifling and seeming almost hungry.
They had lamps, those curious glass-and-wood creations of the Doc'alfar, all glowing bluish white. But even the light seemed uncomfortable there, di-minished and out of place. Given the limited range of the glow, it occurred to Brynn that their lamps served to highlight them to predators more than they revealed any predators to them.
The air was warm and still - so still that it settled about them like a heavy blanket, weighing down their steps.
The tunnel was broken and uneven, so that even they, two elves and an elven-trained ranger, had to take care with every step not to stub their toes or trip and fall. Similarly, the walls were broken, with jags of stone all about, casting ominous shadows in the dim light.
"How much worse are these shadows in the flickering light of a flaming torch," Cazzira said suddenly, her voice breaking the stillness so starkly that both Juraviel and Brynn jumped. ?With each flicker, the shadows come to life," Cazzira went on. ?Many died in here in times long past, before we learned the secrets of the fazl pods. Those who traveled these paths became so numbed to any danger from the repeated dancing of the shadows that when real danger presented itself, they were caught unawares." R nn regarded her glowing scepter, its carved wood handle and the d class ball set at its top. The light was fairly constant, but in looking 1 * the ranger did note that there were some things moving about rtthin the frosted sphere.
"Fazl pods?" Juraviel asked, as if reading Brynn's mind.
"Small centipedes of the deep peat," Cazzira explained. ?They make the though it normally dissipates into the air like a glowing mist. Encased  airless globe, they glow for many weeks. Without them, we would , a chance of crossing under the mountains, for we could not carry enough wood and I doubt we'll find any down here!
The conversation died at that, and the trio went on. They came to many forks in the trail, and intersections, and crossed a few wider chambers, some -hat had many exits. But Cazzira went on in seeming confidence that she knew the way, and it took Brynn a long while to catch on to the secret: all choices in the path had been marked, subtly, in flowing elven script deli-cately carved upon the walls.
"Your people come down here often," she said, and she winced, for her words sounded as an accusation.
Cazzira looked at her hard, as did Juraviel, the Touel'alfar silently signal-ing for Brynn to tread cautiously.
"You know the way, because the passages have been marked by Tylwyn Doc, I mean," Brynn stuttered, trying hard to keep her tone nonconfronta-tional. ?Your people are not strangers to the Path of Starless Night, I would assume. ?
"We used to come in here quite often," Cazzira answered after a long pause. ?Once, many centuries ago, Tymwyvenne was comprised of two settle-ments, the one you have walked and one in here."
"Why was the second abandoned?" Juraviel asked before Brynn could, the elf apparently past his trepidation at broaching the subject.
"The reasons are many, but in truth, this is not our place. Dark things crawl along these corridors, and after a few more days in here, you will understand why we prefer the open air."
"I understand it already," Brynn remarked, and Juraviel laughed in agreement.
They walked through the rest of the day - to the best of their estimation - and set a camp in a small side chamber, placing their glowing lamps strate-gically in the corridor outside, so that whoever was on watch would see the approach of a threat before it saw them.
Ihe next day went the same way, with brief conversations punctuating the silent blackness. The second day, Cazzira showed them some moss and rang! that they could eat, and some other mushrooms that they would be wise to avoid. On and on they^wallted, and oftentimes crawled in corridors too low for even the two elwes, and th?n set a similar camp.
ihe next day was much the sameand the next after that, and the next after that, where the only highlight was the discovery of a small stream where they could refill their waterskins, and even bathe a bit. Brynn was glad of that, very glad, but despite the clear water, every day they got a bit dirtier and a bit smellier.
On and on they walked, and the paths were so winding, left and right that they had to wonder how much progress they were really making to the south. At times, the trail before them ascended at such an angle that they had to climb hand over hand, struggling for finger- and toeholds. At other times, the path dropped so dramatically that they had to take out the fine silken ropes Cazzira's kin had provided, and slide down.
None of them complained; they just kept putting one foot in front of the other.
So many wondrous things did Brynn, Juraviel, and Cazzira see in the days to come: a wide underground lake, its water gently lapping at the shore, dis-turbed somewhere out in the darkness by something unseen and unknown; an underground waterfall, tumbling noisily, echoing like tumultuous music in all of the caverns and corridors about; strange and beautiful formations of crystals squeezed from the rocks, twisting and turning into exotic, shin-ing shapes as they became pushed out over the eons.
The trio were walking through another wondrous place, a three-tiered plateau of gigantic mushrooms, thicker of trunk than a large oak and thrice Brynn's height, when they came to know, for the first time, that they were not alone.
It came as a flicker of movement, a subtle brushing of darker shadows at the edge of Brynn's consciousness.
The woman couldn't react defensively, couldn't get her staff up to intercept the rushing creature as it ran past her, but she did let out an alarmed yelp.
His muscles toned to their finest warrior edge, Belli'mar Juraviel dove immediately to the side, launching himself into a somersault. As he came around, easily finding his feet again, he noted the shiny line of a thick blade, slashing through the air where he had just been. He started to call out to Cazzira, but saw that the Doc'alfar was already exploding into motion.
She came around on her tiptoes, her arms out wide, her small, golden-wood club flying at the end of one extended limb. She whipped it past the dark attacker, too far away for a strike, but with enough of a whipping sound to freeze the creature in place for an instant.
That was all Brynn needed. As the creature jerked upright, the woman dashed forward, slipping her bow between its widespread legs. She caught the leading edge of her bow with her now free hand and continued on, low-ering her shoulder as she lifted with both hands, slamming into the crea-ture, which was somewhat smaller than she, while her lifting bow took away its balance.
Down it went, crashing to the floor.
Before Brynn could pursue, she noted other movement, all about, and ,amst a sec- came up just in time to set herself in a defensive posture !" Juraviel yelled, as a pair of the creatures rushed through a t area, their ugly features showing clearly. The elf leaped toward then fell into another roll to avoid the thrust of a pair of spears. 'Ijrynn shifted her bow out toward him, and Juraviel grabbed on, wel-ding the momentum assist as Brynn pulled him right past her, to dive yet another roll that brought him up between Brynn and Cazzira, and 1 ser to the Doc'alfar. He started toward her, alarmed, but realized almost t once that Cazzira needed no help at that time.
Her movements were every bit as fluid, graceful, and beautiful as bi'nelle dasada, the elven sword dance. She twirled about, spinning on a pointed toe leaping and kicking, and all the while shifting her small club from hand to hand, letting it flow out from her, an extension of her perfectly con-trolled body.
She seemed to leave an opening, and a goblin rushed in at her back, spear leading.
But Cazzira spun and the spear went past her turning back, and the gob-lin got too close, inside the reach of her club.
The crack was so pronounced that Juraviel and Brynn figured the Doc'-alfar's club must have split apart, but when the strike was finished, Cazzira continued her dance, intact weapon in hand, and the goblin skidded down and lay very still, the side of its head caved in.
Cazzira's club swiped past another goblin, which hunched back out of range, then came on, for it seemed clear that the diminutive Cazzira had overbalanced.
Nothing could have been further from the truth. The club went sliding harmlessly past, but the Doc'alfar flipped it over to her other hand, her left hand, weaving against the flow of her body as she turned right to left.
Her left turned under and handed the club back to her right, reversing the weapon so that Cazzira took its thick end.
Out snapped that right hand, stabbing the thinner, handle end of the club into the face of the attacker, whose own momentum worked against it.
Two goblins down and the dance went on.
Belli mar Juraviel's fascination with the tantalizing dance of Cazzira nearly cost him dearly, for the goblins coming at him paid no heed to any-thing other than their intended prey.
Lne elf got his sword out in front to parry one spear and force the welder of the second to hold back its thrust. Then Breynn was there right behind the attacking pair, her bow-staff mentally before her with widespread hands. She punched out, left right, smacking both goblins hard. toe on the back of the head, on the shoulder, and both stumbled forwlrd.
Where JuravieJ's fine-tipped sword stabbed them, one-two, one-two.
The elf spun about, and Brynn leaped up beside him, but the remaining goblins on the flank ran off screaming and shouting, shadowy forms blend-ing into the darkness.
Both Brynn and Juraviel spun about to regard Cazzira, who seemed stuck in place, like a statue fashioned after a dancer caught in a pose, one arm ex-tended above her head, her weapon held perpendicularly to it, back over and across her head, and her other arm out before her like some targeting instrument. She was up on one foot - on one toe, actually - with her other leg looped about the supporting limb, lending to her perfect balance.
No goblins approached; no goblins, save those on the ground about her, were to be seen.
"We must move from this place," Juraviel said. ?To tighter tunnels where goblins cannot throw spears at us from the shadows!"
"Some are wounded," Brynn remarked, but if that meant anything to the two elves, they did not reveal it.
"Away! Away!" Juraviel demanded, and on the trio ran, past the tower-ing mushrooms and out of the wide chamber, rushing down one narrow corridor.
Around the first bend, Juraviel, in the lead, came face-to-face with yet an-other goblin, its sickly eyes wide with surprise.
A fine sword slid into its belly; a club came past Juraviel's shoulder to smash it in the face.
The three ran over it as it fell back, stomping it flat to the stone.
They heard the loud flapping of wide goblin feet in pursuit sometime later.
Brynn handed her lamp to Juraviel, then strung her bow as they ran, and when the sound closed in at their backs, she turned suddenly and let fly, her arrow disappearing into the darkness. She knew not if she hit anything, or if her arrow skipped harmlessly across the stones, but the sound of pursuit stopped for a bit, and the three ran on.
They crossed a large chamber, keeping near to the wall, then turned into the first opening, only to hear goblins, many goblins!
They passed that, and the second opening and the third, as well. Then, using nothing more than a simple guess, they charged down the next. In the dim light of her glowing lamp, Cazzira in the lead nearly stumbled over the edge of a precipice. She fell to her knees, watching in horror as a few loose stones fell before her, dropping out of sight.
Seconds later, the three heard the echoes of the stones bouncing along the deeper rocks.
"Back!" Juraviel yelled. ?Quickly, before the goblins cut us off!"
"They already have!" cried Brynn.
"There is a way!" said Cazzira, pointing to the right, past the precipice.
Peering into the gloom, just at the edge of the lights, Brynn noted a rocky ding trail that seemed full of loose stones. She was about to point out ' h rious danger there, but Juraviel and Cazzira weren't waiting, with the far leaping out and beginning her controlled slide, and Juraviel hop-it behind her, his wings flapping furiously so that he put as little Sit on the unstable slope as possible.
Brvnn turned and let fly another couple of arrows, wanting the other two be far below before she tried the slope with her greater mass. Then she went out gingerly, and lay out on her side, using her bow like a guiding oar she slid down, down, into the deeper blackness.
She caught up to Juraviel and Cazzira at an apparent dead end: a lip overlooking a deep, deep drop.
The two were working furiously - to set up some defense, Brynn figured at first, but she looked on curiously as they unpacked the fine silken rope, Cazzira taking one end and handing the bulk of it to Juraviel.
With a shared nod, the Touel'alfar leaped out into the blackness, wings beating furiously. He disappeared from sight, but the fact that the rope didn't seem to be tugging at all gave Brynn hope that his descent was controlled, at least.
"He has found footing," Cazzira told Brynn a few seconds later.
Brynn glanced back to see Cazzira tying off the rope around the stub of a stalagmite with one of her patented slipknots. Holding the rope in both hands, the Doc'alfar set her feet against the mound and pulled with all her strength, tightening the slack as much as possible.
"Use your belt," she said to Brynn, then she looped her own belt over the rope and swung out, sliding away into the darkness.
Leaving Brynn, who had given her lamp to Juraviel, in absolute darkness, and with the sounds of goblins approaching.
The woman worked furiously, pulling off her belt and falling down to her knees, groping her way to the stalagmite mound and the taut rope. She had no time to pause and consider what she was about to do, no time to yell out and make sure that Cazzira was clear and she could come on, no time even to shout and ask how far she would have to slide. She just looped her belt over the rope, grabbed up her precious bow, and slipped out, tucking her feet defensively as she blindly slid over the rim of a deep chasm.
Juraviel and Cazzira put up lamps to guide her in on the other end, the pair standing on a landing, with a dark tunnel behind them. As soon as Brynn touched down, Cazzira grabbed up the rope and gave a deft twist and tug that detached it across the way.
If  hey pulled it in and ran on, and this time, with a gorge blocking the way behind them, they did not hear the flapping feet of goblin pursuit. Tthey went on for a long, long time, until sheer exhaustion stopped iem.
They made their camp in as defensible a position as they could find, set their order of watch, and, despite their nervousness  each of them slept soundly.
They moved off with all speed the next day, along the only tunnel available to them, though Cazzira admitted that she had little idea of where they were "In Tymwyvenne, we have a saying that most who perish in the Path of Starless Might do so of old age," she told them with a half-hearted chuckle If she was trying to be humorous, neither of the other two caught it.
They seemed to be going generally in the right direction, south, as far as their instincts could tell, but more troubling, they were going down more than up. And the air grew warmer and more stifling with each passing hour The next change came so gradually that it took them all many, many steps to even notice.
Juraviel stopped, and the other two glanced at him and were held by the curious expression on his face. ?The tunnels are not natural," he explained ?They have been worked."
Both Cazzira and Brynn moved to the side of the tunnel, holding aloft their respective lights to study both wall and flooring. Sure enough, they found crafted supports along walls and ceiling, and worked blocks flooring the somewhat even slope beneath their feet.
Brynn and Juraviel inevitably turned to Cazzira for some explanation, but the Doc'alfar had none to offer.
"There are no cities down here, no settle-ments at all, that the Tylwyn Doc know of," she explained. ?Unless these are goblin tunnels."
Juraviel was shaking his head before she ever finished that last, ominous thought. ?No goblins made these,"
he said with some confidence. ?Goblins tear down, they do not create."
"The world is a wide place, Belli'mar Juraviel," Cazzira reminded. ?By your own words, not all humans are alike - the men of the kingdom north of the mountains are not so closely akin to the To-gai-ru. Perhaps the same can be said of goblins."
Juraviel considered the words briefly, but shook his head again. Not goblins.
"We should know soon enough," Brynn put in, and she started away, the other two falling into step beside her.
The worked tunnel went on for more than a hour of walking, opening fi-nally into a wide chamber sectioned by walls of mortared stone, each run-ning out from a wall, left and right, and with a narrow doorway set in the middle. Gingerly, ready for fight or flight, the trio moved up to the door, to find that it was not fully closed, and was swinging unevenly on its old and rusty hinges.
Juraviel took the lead, gently pushing it open, studying the stonework im-mediately beyond, then rushing ahead, glancing left and then spinning around to the right, looking past the door.
Then he looked back to his companions and shrugged.
The trio went left, moving along a corridor of stonework walls, six to feet high, all the way to the wall, and finding only a dead end, with no 'her doors or openings apparent. ' raviel looked at his companions, shrugged again, then hopped, beating jmss to lift him to the top of the wall. Then he leaped higher, a short gave him an overview of the wide chamber for as far as his light would illuminate. Knowing that he would make quite a fine target there, the elf came down almost immediately.
A maze of walls," he explained. ?There seem to be openings, but at op-osite ends of each successive corridor. ?
"A defensive design," Cazzira noted. ?To force enemies to battle along hundreds of feet of narrow corridors merely to cross this one chamber."
"Then let us hope it is not now defended," said Juraviel, and he started along the corridor the other way, all the way to the far wall, where they found an opening that turned back into the second corridor. All the way back to the other end, they found the entrance to the third.
Entering that third corridor, Brynn jumped up, caught the top of the wall, and pulled herself into a sitting position atop it. ?My feet ache from the walking," she explained, reaching back toward Cazzira. The Doc'alfar took her hand, and Brynn easily pulled her over the wall, while Juraviel flut-tered up and over to join them.
And so they crossed, wall by wall, gradually working their way back toward the center of the room, and finally they came over the last of the thirty barriers, to find a series of carved steps leading between four fabu-lously decorated columns, and with a great iron door set in the chamber's back wall.
The carvings on those columns told them much.
"Powries," Juraviel said breathlessly as he inspected the worn reliefs. He looked to Cazzira, who seemed not to understand. ?Bloody caps. Dwarves." The Doc'alfar shrugged and shook her head, even after moving beside Juraviel to see the fairly accurate depiction of one of the fierce powries sculpted into the column.
Fittingly, that relief showed the powrie in threat-ening pose, hooked sword at the ready and in full battle gear.
If we go through that door to find a city of powries awaiting us, then we are surely doomed," Juraviel remarked.
Cazzira looked up at him, a knowing grin on her face. ?Yet you wish to open it as much as I do."
A strange feeling washed over Brynn as she watched the two elves exchange smiles, a sudden intuition that some deeper connection was forming between them. She didn't say anything about it, just followed, her bow ' hand and ready, as Juraviel and Cazzira walked up to the large iron , studied it for a few moments, then pushed it open, its  rusted hinges creaking.
A thin, glowing fog awaited them.
"Fazl pods," Cazzira noted, moving forward. Just inside the doors \va landing, a balcony overlooking a wide chamber with a series of platea stepping down into the bowels of the mountains. Hundreds of structur houses and larger communal buildings, sat on those various plateaus nected level to level by stone-worked stairways, all of it illuminated in d n white. They saw the pockets of fazl pod colonies, dozens and dozens great living lamps and each containing pods numbering in the millions K Cazzira's guess. So many were there, that few corners of the various plateau were hidden in shadows, and this city spreading beneath them was surely huge, level upon level upon level.
But, they learned as they descended the stairway from the balcony to the nearest plateau, it was a city long in decay. Upon closer inspection, the trio noted that the stones of the various buildings were crumbling, their mortar gone. What few items they found in the many houses, pots and clay vessels utensils and stone furniture, were broken and dusty, with no sign of any continuing society.
They moved along, down another stairway, then across a narrow stone bridge to a small section of what seemed to be more lavish houses.
"Back!" Cazzira warned as soon as they had stepped off the bridge, and the other two froze in place.
Following her gaze, they saw the threat, first one gigantic subterranean lizard and then another, slithering across an area of tumbled stones. The creatures went on their way, bodies swaying in a fluid, mesmerizing manner, forked tongues flicking out before them.
"The new inhabitants," Cazzira. whispered.
"But what happened to the old ones?" Brynn asked; and intending to find out exactly that, the three went down again to another level, then down from there, and down again.
On what seemed to be the bottommost section of the city, in a chamber similar to the first they had crossed, full of defensible walls, and even with the rotted wooden remains of what seemed to be a ballista, they found their answers.
The room was full of skeletons, piled at every portal.
"Short and thick," Juraviel remarked, holding up one broken femur. ?Powrie bones." He shook his head in disbelief as he searched on, for the bones were devastated, smashed and clawed. ?What could have done this to a colony of hardy powries?" he asked, and the other two, having no ex-perience with the powerful dwarves, didn't truly understand the weight ot that statement.
They made their way from pile to pile, coming to a wide-open anteroom, where they found many more bones, but with wounds very different.
Brynn bent low and picked one up, holding it for the other two to see.
on one side, as if some intense heat had blasted across it ndous force. Likewise, one wall of the room was blackened and with the war engine could have done this?" Juraviel asked.
wurm," came a quiet answer from Cazzira a few moments later, both Turaviel and Brynn looked at her directly, she added, aeon?" Brynn echoed, and she looked to Juraviel, her expression full Turaviel's look dispelled those doubts, for he was nodding in agreement.
"P rhaps they dug too deep," Cazzira remarked. ?Perhaps they uncov-ered that which should have been left undisturbed."
"Do you notice that something is missing?" Juraviel asked, and the other two looked at him curiously.
"Their weapons," he explained. ?Their armor. All of their treasures. The entire city, as far as we have seen, has been picked clean."
"By centuries of pillagers," Cazzira reasoned, and they left it at that and went back to their searching.
By the tunnel opening of the anteroom, Brynn found the next surprise. ?This was no powrie," she said, holding up a longer and narrower fe-mur, charred on one side. Several other larger bones, human bones, they seemed, were about it, some crushed, others just burned.
"Humans and powries did battle in here?" Cazzira asked.
"Why would they leave only one set of human bones, then?" Brynn asked. ?A traitor, perhaps, who betrayed his clan to the dwarves?"
"You assume too much," said Cazzira, but her scolding was cut short by a cry of surprise from Juraviel, who had exited the anteroom to inspect the beginning of the tunnel beyond. He emerged from that shadowy place holding a piece of wood as long as his arm. What is it?" asked Cazzira.
Darkfern," Brynn answered as she inspected the piece, to see the silverel lines encircling it. ?That was part of a bow, a Touel'alfar bow! ?
She turnedt over to reveal a tiny signature near the tapered end.
the mark of Joycenevial, my father," he explained. ?This was the bow ranger - of that ranger," he said, pointing to the human remains. He isidered the piece of the bow and the mark and searched his distant memories.
-mhem Dal," he decided a few moments later. ?Bow your head, Brynn what does it mean?"
1 means that he never made it home," said Cazzira.
"And that his sword, Flamedancer, was lost here," Juraviel added. He looked at Brynn, his golden eyes narrowing with determination. ?Are you ready to find and earn your ranger sword, Brynn Dharielle?"
The woman stared back at him hard, then nodded grimly.
"If the dread wurm has it, then you'll not likely get it back," Cazzira was quick to put in. ?Behold the devastation of the beast." She swung her arm about at the piles of charred and crushed bones as she spoke. ?Behold the fate of the last ranger who stood before the dragon!"
"That was hundreds of years ago," Brynn put in. ?Can the dragon still be alive?"
"We shall see," was all that Belli'mar Juraviel replied, his tone more grave and angrier than Brynn had ever heard it before. Clearly, the sight of the re-mains of Emhem Dal had unsettled him.
Cazzira suggested that they should return to the city to search for more clues, but Juraviel pushed on down the tunnel, his pace strong.
They followed their instincts, they followed the heat they could feel puls-ing beneath their feet, then they followed the smoke, wafting through cracks in the floor on hot updrafts.
After three long marches, with only short rests in between, they came to a huge and broken chamber, with a shattered stone bridge that had once crossed a deep gorge. Far below, they saw the orange glow of fire, the heat radiating up to flush their faces.
"If the dragon remains, it is down there," Juraviel said. ?If Flamedancer remains, it is down there."
"You cannot know that," said Cazzira.
"I feel it," was all the answer she was going to get.
Juraviel stood up straight, peering across the way. ?We can work our way to the entrance of the tunnel."
"Or we can go down there," said Brynn. She spent a long time staring down into the gorge, then looked up at Juraviel, whose gaze led her to Cazzira.
The Doc'alfar chuckled under the intensity of those two looks. ?What is life without adventure?"
she asked at length.
And so they descended even farther, so far that they had to set their hun-dred foot rope several times. Sweat stung Brynn's brown eyes as she hand-walked down rope and stone, finally coming out on what seemed to be the floor of the place.
On they went, the air smoky about them. Soon the reflected light of flames was enough so that they did not need their torches, and rounding a bend in the corridor, they happened upon the source of the light and the heat, a wide and winding chamber full of what seemed to be water - except that the water was burning at various points.
"There is oil leeching onto the water," Juraviel reasoned.
-But what ignited it?" came Cazzira's response.
learn," said Brynn, and she stepped out from the bank onto a then hopped to another. She paused there and bent low, and gradu- '?lowered her hand to the water, dipping it below the surface. ?Warm, "Take that as comfort if you fall in," said Cazzira. ?A pleasant thought before the dread wurm eats you."
For many minutes, they made their way along the only trail open to them, broken walk of small ledges and stepping-stones that wound through the fires and across the waters.
"Do we even believe that the dragon is still alive?" Brynn asked. ?Three hundred years is a long time."
"Only in the measurement of humans, said JuravieL Not m the memory of the Tylwyn Tou or Tylwyn Doc, and certainly not in the memory of the great wurms, the longest living creatures of Corona."
"What do you know of dragons?" Cazzira asked.
"Only what you do, I presume," Juraviel answered. ?Since our legends on the matter should be similar."
Brynn started to join in, but she stopped abruptly - so abruptly that the other two turned to regard her.
She stood there on a stepping-stone, looking down at the orange-glowing water, and when her companions similarly looked to the base of her stone, they recognized the potential problem - for the water was lapping at the rock, as if something had disturbed its stillness.
"Move along, and be quick," Cazzira instructed. ?I have little desire to meet a dread wurm out here."
"I have little desire to meet a dread wurm anywhere," Juraviel added.
Brynn pushed on with all speed, hopping from stone to stone, running along ledges, ducking stalactites when they dipped low to block her way, and choosing left or right without bothering to ask whenever they came to a tork in the way. They had to double back more than once, and saw more ripples spreading out toward them on several occasions, though they never discerned the source.
Finally, they found an opening in the sidewall, another dark tunnel be-yond, and though they had to leap and even swim a bit to get to it, they rent on without question, just glad to be away from the fiery lake.
ihe tunnel only went on for a short distance, opening up into a wide uamber, a pit, and with a larger chamber up above, one that glowed from e unseen light source. The climb was easy enough for Juraviel with is wings, and he went up without question, then sat there on the ledge >ove his two companions, staring into the larger chamber, his mouth roPping open.
What is it?" Cazzira called up to him softly.
"Juraviel?" Brynn chirped in when the elf didn't make any move to answer "It was worth the trouble," he finally said, motioning for them to climb up and join him.
The wall was nearly fifty feet high, but it was of broken stone. Cazzira verily ran up it, and agile Brynn wasn't far behind, and as each crested the larger room's floor, each assumed an expression as dumbfounded as that worn by Belli'mar Juraviel.
There, spread before them, were mounds of treasure, gold and silver coins and glittering gemstones, pieces of armor and furniture, sculptures and dozens of metallic weapons.
"So we know what happened to the powries," Brynn remarked dryly.
"But more importantly, what happened to the one who assembled this hoard?" asked Cazzira.
Juraviel motioned to the side of the largest mound of gold and silver, to a single curving white rib bone. A gigantic bone, that even a tall human could walk under without ducking.
"And so the wurm is dead," Cazzira said as they approached. ?And its treasure lies unguarded."
"And so one of the wurms is dead," came a correction, in a voice that was neither human nor elf.
The pile of gold and silver shifted and broke apart, and from within came the dread wurm, the great dragon, its scales all red and gold, its horns taller than a tall man, its blazing eyes slitted, like those of a cat, and with wisps of smoke coming forth from its great nostrils. Three sets of eyes went wide with surprise and horror, three mouths dropped open in simple awe at the most magnificent beast.
"Welcome, thieves!"
"Not so..." Juraviel started to say, gasping and stuttering through each word. But he stopped his sentence and started his legs, leaping aside as a great foreleg came swatting down at him, smashing into the gems and coins where he had been standing, rending the very stone of the floor!
Cazzira leaped in near to that foreleg and whipped her wooden club about hard, smacking it against the scaly limb.
She might as well have smashed it against the side of a rocky mountain.
"Run away!" Belli'mar Juraviel cried, and all three scattered, diving about the treasure mounds, using them for cover from the beast. The dragon thrashed its tail, sending a fountain of coins, gems, and trinkets flying about the room, showering poor Brynn, who went tumbling down over a smaller pile of spears and other weapons.
She hit hard and turned about, fearing that the wurm was upon her.
But the dragon had gone the other way, in pursuit of Cazzira. The Doc'alfar cut around one pile of coins; the dragon lowered its head and plowed right through.
Apparently anticipating the move, Cazzira came right back out the way  scaling another nearby pile and rolling right over the top, the other side.
' t\'? bellowed the dragon, and its voice boomed off the rock and?s if it W0uld sunder the very stones that supported the chamber. Tie work for my meal, that I might enjoy it all the more!" 3 her worst nightmares, Brynn Dharielle had never imagined anything as rful and monstrous as the dragon. It seemed as if it could kill her with done, and every time it spouted a word, a bit of flame came out 'it! All that Brynn could think of was running away, diving back down * pit and rushing back across the fiery lake. Despite the plight of her two companions, the young ranger actually started on that very course - until something else caught her eye A specter hovered by the pile of weapons over which she had just tripped, the ghost of a man, a To-gai-ru.
"Emhem Dal," she whispered, though she had no idea of how she knew the ghost's identity.
The specter lifted a translucent arm, pointing to the side, and Brynn felt a command, one that she could not ignore. Pushing away the continuing thunder of the dread wurm, the shouts of Juraviel and Cazzira, the screech-ing of dragon claws on stone, Brynn rushed out to the side, toward a mound of assorted treasures, following the specter's command. She reached the pile and began digging, having no idea of what she might be looking to find, for she had not taken the moment to consider any of this.
She just dug and dug, tossing aside goblets and jewelry, strangely shaped coins stamped with a dwarven face, and even a helm and short sword. And then another sword...
Brynn almost threw that second one, until she felt a wave of compre-hension as her hand closed about its fashioned golden hilt, beautiful in design. It was formed into a sculpture of an elf dancing, her arms out-stretched as she twirled, forming the crosspiece, and her head, fashioned of a light red ruby, serving as the joint between the slender blade and the pommel.
I he blade was no less magnificent, razor thin and with delicate carvings tinning the length of the flat sides. It wobbled as Brynn flicked her wrist, it despite that, the woman could sense its immense strength.
Understanding the truth of the sword, a ranger sword, Brynn looked back to the ghost. . but the specter was gone.
: came out of her trance then, and abruptly, seeing Juraviel flying over ? mound, his bow in hand, launching a series of arrows back at the pur-ring dragon.
sucked in her breath as Juraviel approached another treasure > thinking that it would stop him and that serpentine neck would catch up to him!
clever elf dropped right before he got there, and the lunging dragon snapped over him as he fell, colliding with the mound and sending a shower of coins and gems flying about the chamber.
"Run away!" Juraviel cried again. ?To each your own, and find a way out!"
"No escape!" the dragon promised.
"Not for me, perhaps," Brynn said under her breath, and with a howl she charged forward, rushing past the surprised Juraviel as he continued his flight, rushing right toward the dread wurm, her sword held high.
"Feel the sting of Flamedancer!" the furious ranger cried, rolling past the snaking head, coming up between the gigantic forelegs. She chose her mark carefully, the hollow of the breast, and threw all of her momentum into the powerful strike, stabbing the mighty ranger sword for the dragon's heart with all of her strength and passion.
To the sword's credit, it did not break.
And to Brynn's credit, she did manage to scratch the targeted scale a little bit.
"Brynn!" Juraviel cried.
The young ranger considered the mark on the scale, realizing that if she had the time to strike a hundred times more, she might manage to get through that outer armor. With a sigh, she looked up, to see the wurm's re-tracted head, those awful catlike eyes beaming down at her.
Up went a foreleg.
Brynn dove aside.
The dragon hit the floor with enough force to split the stone, the shudder knocking Brynn from her feet. The foreleg bore right through the floor, and the overbalanced wurm fell to the side, against yet another pile of treasure, disturbing it so that it began to flow out of the chamber and into the opened crack. It wasn't nearly enough of a flow to topple the dragon, but the momentum of it did catch poor Brynn, carrying her along on a river of gems and gold, to spill out of the chamber, to tumble and bounce and fall along a rocky decline, smashing her body and head, tearing her clothing.
She didn't know how far she had fallen, for she lost consciousness long before she settled far, far below the chamber of the dragon.
Cazzira never even tried to go in against the great dragon. As soon as the beast made its presence known, the elf turned and fled, and she almost made it into a side passage. Almost, but a great tail stamped down in front of the opening, blocking the way even as she reached it.
She stumbled into the tail, regained her balance immediately, and started off to the side, but a sudden swish of the great tail caught her and sent her flying away.
She hit the side of a treasure mound, and the unstable nature of that pile alone saved her from serious injury.
For the mound gave beneath her, then Kl d about her, and she went down in a heap, coins and gems and jew illing over her, burying her as she lay there unconscious.
> dragon wasn't even paying attention to her. The human woman had down the hole, and so the beast had started into the hole in pursuit, head snaking down after the tumbling human and dropping treasure.
t the descent narrowed too quickly for the dragon to continue the pur- to catch up, and the great head came back out, the beast roaring in That rage focused almost immediately upon a second figure, Belli'mar Turaviel, skittering for the open hole.
A huge claw slammed down in front of the running elf, barring the or seemed to, for the elf leaped, his wings flapping furiously, getting him up and around the blocking leg. And then he dropped, like a stone, into the opening.
But this time the dragon was not caught by surprise, and with frightening speed, the quickness of a striking serpent, the great head snapped down.
And when it came back up, the elf's flailing legs stuck out between the beast's huge fangs.
Brynn Dharielle opened her eyes, or rather, one eye, for the other was caked closed by dried blood. She was not in darkness, for her glow torch had fallen beside her, but she knew at once that the globe had been cracked, for unlike the sharp edge of light it had previously shown, it was now dulled, surrounded by a glowing white mist.
She remembered Cazzira's explanation of the torches and feared that she would soon be in total blackness.
Spurred by that, Brynn rolled to her side and forced herself into a sitting position. At first, her thoughts went right back to the cavern above, to the huge beast and her fall, to her friends and the grim fate they had likely found before the dragon. But soon enough, Brynn noted all the glittering items about her: gems and jewels, and her newfound sword, a ranger sword.
Brynn picked it up reverently, then nearly threw it aside in anger, feeling that it had betrayed her with its inability even to pierce the great monster's scaly hide.
She didn't throw it, though, but held it up before her eyes. ?Flame-dancer," she said, reciting the name Juraviel had spoken. She studied the fabulous detailing of the long and very slender blade, her ey.es and her free hand roaming down to feel the cool metal and the sculpted hilt, the female elven form with the ruby head.
Brynn stood up and with a nod, slid the sword into her belt. She consid-ered the tunnel far above her and realized that she could hardly retrace her steps back to the dragon's lair.
Nor did she want to. The woman closed her eyes in a silent salute to Belli'-mar Juraviel, and to Cazzira, who had become somewhat of a friend over the days of traveling the Path of Starless night. But they were dead, she told herself - or else they, too, had escaped, and would likely do better than she in these dark tunnels.
Either way, Brynn understood that she had to be strong, had to put Juraviel and Cazzira behind her, had to find her way out of those black tunnels and to her homeland, where she could lead the To-gai-ru to freedom and do honor to Belli'mar Juraviel and to all the elves who had trained her for the task.
She searched all about the fallen treasure then, ignoring the gems and the coins, seeking a light source, or anything else that might help her on her way.
The first thing of note that she happened upon was a beret, shining red even in the dimming light. She picked it up and put it on, more to keep her bloody and sticky hair out of her face than out of any fashion sense.
Almost immediately, Brynn began feeling a little better, but it was a sub-tle thing and she didn't make the connection.
A gem-studded bracer lay nearby. Looking at her left wrist, which had been cut and bruised in the fall, she took it and tightly strapped it in place. She completed the outfit by replacing her torn shirt with a fine-looking sur-coat, lined with sown metal rings and tied with a red sash that held her sword perfectly.
And then she picked up her broken glow torch and started off along the hot and dark tunnels, determinedly putting one foot in front of the other. She shrugged off the pain as the hours passed, and searched out some food as Cazzira had taught her.
She made her camp in a side alcove and spent some time, futilely, in try-ing to repair her broken lamp.
Then she fell into a fitful sleep, remembering her lost friends in terrible dreams and awakening in a cold sweat.
But she dragged herself up and moved on, step after step, day after day.
The fourth day out, with miles of snaking tunnels behind her, her light source grew dimmer and dimmer, then winked out altogether, leaving her in total darkness. Overwhelmed by the sudden blackness, more profound than anything she had ever known, the ranger fell into a crouch and drew out her sword, praying for light, some light, any light.
And then her magical blade erupted in flames, and Brynn shrieked in surprise and dropped it to the stone. It lay there, burning, for just a moment, then the fire went away.
After she had recovered from the shock, Brynn fell to her knees, search-ing all about and finally gathering up the fallen blade. Then she stood again and presented the sword before her, and willed it to ignite once again.
It did so, as bright as any torch. Since she had no idea of how long the fire might last, Brynn started away immediately, and with renewed hope.
Days slipped past. Brynn walked among the shadows, climbed hand over hand up black chutes, and crossed an underground river, the waters freez-. _ cold. She went on at times with the sounds of other creatures, predators rkely off m t^le shadows about her, and at other times in complete silence. She kept her focus on her goal, wherever it might lie and tried not to think f Cazzira's remark that most who died in the Paths of Starless Night did so of old age.
On and on she went, through the hours and the days, and though her torch did not seem to be based upon any finite fuel, for it did not dim, the battered woman nearly surrendered on many, many occasions.
Nearly. For Brynn was a ranger, elven-trained, and Brynn was To-gai-ru. Her people needed her; she could not fail. It was as simple as that.
One morning, or perhaps it was evening, Brynn squeezed through a nar-row opening into a wider, ascending chamber. It was a tight crawl, and an exhausting one, and so she paused in the larger area to catch her breath.
And felt a current of air.
Not the rising hot air of lava, but a true breeze.
Invigorated by the thought that her ordeal might at last be at its end, Brynn rushed along the tunnel. But as the minutes became an hour, she slowed; and when another hour passed, and then another, the woman had to stop and take her rest.
She walked on again after a short nap, and the feeling of the air became lighter about her, and the breeze seemed to intensify, just a bit.
And then she saw it, far ahead: a dot of light, real light, daylight!
Brynn extinguished her fiery sword and stood there staring numbly at the pale light.
And then she ran, as fast as her legs would carry her.
She exited the tunnel on the side of a mountain, but not too high up. Down below her, spread wide, were the blowing, brown-green grasses of her homeland, of To-gai.
At long last, Brynn Dharielle had come home.