Page 218 of Of Empires and Dust

“I…” Calen narrowed his eyes, staring down the corridor. Had he imagined it? It was almost impossible to tell. He could barely trust his own eyes. More than once the world had shifted and turned skeletons to fresh bodies, blood leaking, screams ringing out. “Nothing.”

He allowed his gaze to linger on the shadows before stepping into the room. All he found inside were bones, shattered eggs, and sorrow. Just like all the others.

“This is pointless,” Lyrin said as they searched the next room, which appeared to be another antechamber, bare except bones, armour, and old sconces on the walls. “There are hundreds of these rooms in here. By the time we find what we’re looking for, the war will be over. That’s if there’s even anything here.”

Again, the hairs on Calen’s arms and neck stood on end, a chill creeping over him. For a second, he could have sworn the light from the baldír dimmed.

He rubbed at his eyes, the steel of his gauntlet cold against his skin. A shout echoed from the main chamber. All three men glanced at each other before darting back into the corridor.

“Here!” another shout bellowed. The green light of a Soulblade waved back and forth from the fifth storey.

When Calen and the others reached the top level, they found Sister Ruon kneeling by a pile of rubble, Sylven and Kevan at her side.

“What did you find?” Kallinvar, Varlin, and Ildris arrived only moments after Calen.

“This…” Ruon stood, touching her palm against a section of exposed wall where rubble had been removed.

“Ruon…” Lyrin took a step closer, tilting his head to the side and biting his lip. “I don’t mean to alarm you, but that’s a wall.”

“Well observed, Brother Lyrin. Is there anything else your genius mind has discerned?”

“There are a lot of walls in here.”

“There’s something missing,” Haem interrupted, staring at the section of wall upon which Ruon’s hand rested.

“Precisely.” A soft smile touched Ruon’s lips, stretching to a smirk as she looked at Lyrin.

“The chambers and passageways are all evenly spaced along the corridor.” Haem looked up and down along the corridor, his gaze lingering a few moments as though counting something. He tapped his fist against the stone. “There should be a door here, an arch… something.”

As the others debated, Calen pulled the pendant from around his neck. He remembered what Pellenor had called the glamour in the dungeons below Berona: a touch glamour.

Just as he had then, Calen pictured the lock in the chest that had sat below his bed back in The Glade. As he did, he pushed six threads of Spirit through the pendant in his hand and onwards into the wall before him. With the threads in place, he opened the lock in his mind.

The rubble piled against the wall tumbled as the ground shook beneath Calen’s feet, drawing shouts from the knights.

“A little warning next time?” Lyrin pushed himself upright against the wall.

Calen didn’t answer. The wall was gone, vanished as though it had never been. In its place was a corridor with three sconces set into the walls on each side and a tall metal door at the end.

Six Urak skeletons were strewn about, along with seven smaller sets of bones, their deaths marked by long gouges in the stone and shreds of time-withered carpet.

Calen studied the skeletons as he approached the door, the knights following in his wake. Clean holes had been punched into two of the Urak sternums and one skull, while the others were missing heads and limbs. The other bones appeared to be humans or elves.

Calen knelt beside the skeleton that lay slumped against the wall near the door, the battered plate of the Highguard resting on its bones. He placed his hand against the symbol of The Order worked into the plate. As he did, he cast his gaze at another of the remains and the worn, hooded cloak around its shoulders. The fabric tore at the slightest touch of his finger, time having wreaked havoc on its constitution. Calen could feel something odd about the cloak, something…wrong.

“Fades,” Kallinvar hissed. “Even now the stain of their souls inks this place.”

Calen snatched his hand back, then rose and turned towards the door.

In sharp contrast to everything else in the vault, the door was simple and plain and built entirely from what looked to be solid steel. Calen had not seen anything of its like. Where he’d expected to find a keyhole instead was a small circular alcove containing a spiral pattern.

Calen flipped his pendant over and looked at the brass back. The pattern on the back matched that of the alcove in the door. Rokka's riddle sounded in his mind.

A City once lost, found it needs to be.

Ilnaen.

A gem, a jewel, a trinket of sorts, but truly more a key.

---