Page 28 of The Demon Crown

Altan hadn’t been pleased. He’d worn that pinched expression on his face when she got back, and then argued that he’d been handling it. But he hadn’t. And she’d had to take matters into her own hands.

Sometimes she wondered if he wanted to keep her around more. He certainly stood in the way of every adventure she headed out on, trying to keep her home more and more these days.

Stopping her from adventuring would be like killing her. Varya would never stand for it.

“One foot in front of the other,” she muttered as she started up into the lion’s mouth.

And there it was again. The faint prickling at the back of her neck which had started four days ago and never quite let up. Turning on her heel, she scanned the desert horizon but still saw nothing. No matter how many times she looked, there was never anyone there.

Still, she couldn’t quite shake the feeling that someone was following her. It had started in the town, then trailed her across the desert to get here. She never saw any movement, though. Nothing. Not even a grain of sand out of place.

Squinting, she turned back to the entrance and headed inside. The Sanctum of Exiles had once been a thriving kingdom, or so the legends said. All the people who were banished here ended up building an empire. They’d lived for centuries underground, gathering all the magical artifacts they could until Greed led a battle to their doorstep.

They’d fought. They’d lost. The story was the same as all the others. Anyone who tried to stand up against the demon king always failed.

She didn’t quite understand how, of course. He wasn’t that impressive. But she had only seen the man when he was weak.

The mouth of the cave quickly descended into darkness. Varya pulled out a small torch from her bag and lit it on fire. The blaze illuminated the interior of a massive cave, one that was filled with bats above her head. At the light, they all shrieked and took off in the air, funneling up toward an opening at the very top of the cave that she hadn’t noticed before. There wasn’t any sunlight coming through it, though. Another exit?

Beside her feet, stairs disappeared into the darkness. There was no railing, only a steep drop off into what looked like nothing.

She nudged a rock with her foot and listened, counting the seconds until the rock suddenly clattered against the ground. A long way down.

“All right,” she muttered, her voice echoing in the cavern. “Down we go.”

She hated stairs. They were the worst part of raiding tombs like this. They always took forever, they were always spirals, and it always made her nauseous and dizzy by the time she got to the bottom. It didn’t help that they were always wet, too. Algae covered the stone surface, making it hard for her to brace herself against the wall because her hand slipped in the sticky substance.

Not that she was in any rush. Varya already knew she’d be staying the night in the haunted remains of what had once been a rather bloodthirsty kingdom.

At the bottom of the stairwell, there were three pillars. Each one carved with a symbol of an element. Waves. Air currents. Flames. There should be earth too, she thought. Varya stepped closer, her light catching on one of the pillars that had fallen into ruin. Crumbled like dust.

“Damn,” she muttered as she circled it. “This looks important.”

Tombs like this were always part of some intricate puzzle. She was probably supposed to know what deities these people worshipped, turn the stones in the right pattern, and then press a stone button. The Sanctum had been very exclusive, she knew that. They were intelligent people as well.

Unfortunately, their puzzles didn’t stand up to the test of time.

“Well, that solves it.” Varya set her bag down on the ground, and dusted her hands off on her pants.

She’d taken to talking to herself on adventures like this. Varya so rarely saw other people, and when she did, she wasn’t allowed to speak with them or they might steal from her. The sound of her own voice echoing in caverns like this was soothing.

Looking at the puzzle one last time, committing it to memory so that someone at least would remember it had once existed, she sprinted at the pillar with fire symbols. Her shoulder struck it hard, and it fell as she expected.

Wincing at the pain in her shoulder, she did it again. And again. Until all the pillars were on the ground and revealing the mechanisms underneath them. It was a shame to do it, but a girl had to keep moving. No one was stopping her.

Varya rummaged through her bag to get out her chisel and hammer, and then she spent the next hour chipping away at the metal underneath. It took a while for the first one to click into place, but then she’d gotten the hang of it. The only one that fought her was the damn earth symbol that had rusted so much in the century since this place had been abandoned that it almost didn’t give.

But it did. They always did.

Grunting in approval, she stood and watched the floor beyond groan. There were circular markers on it that she’d thought were just indentations and carvings. Instead, they turned out to be a giant doorway that opened up and revealed running water about two stories down.

Deep running water.

“Oh, damn it.” She muttered. She’d hoped she wouldn’t get wet, but she also knew how these tombs went.

Back in the days when this was used, there were probably boats down there. There were stairs that meandered down into the darkness for people to walk down as they leapt into their boats and made their way to the real kingdom. Unfortunately, that was not the case for her.

Tightening the straps of her bag, she said a brief prayer and then toed the edge of the opening. One leap. She’d hold her breath and then the river would take her where she had to go. At least she didn’t have to walk anymore.

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