The following morning came too fast. It was only a few hours after the fight with the spiders when Cari woke up and saw Helen tending the small camp stove in the center of the hut. She was heating up some tea.
“I’ll have some of that.”
Helen smiled, poured her some tea into a tin cup, and handed it to Cari.
Cari sipped at the plain black tea, wishing for some cream or even honey to sweeten it. When they were on the road like this, it was hard to find things like that. She’s gotten used to having it when on board a ship.
“Hopefully we don’t run into any more spiders,” Percy said sitting up from his bedroll and stretching his arms. “Those things looked nasty.”
“They were nasty,” Cari said. “We’re just lucky no one got poisoned.”
“Yeah, I’m not sure what I would’ve done if someone had,” Helen said. She had been the healer for Cari and her crew before she became the first mate. Helen knew what she was talking about. It forced Cari to remember to be cautious with getting into any fights down here in these tunnels. They wouldn’t be able to stop in the next town and try to purchase some healing potions while they were down here.
Francesca came in from outside. She must’ve been tending to some personal needs.
“Did you find someplace we can use as a latrine?” Cari asked the woman as she set the lantern she carried down by the door.
“There’s a fissure, in the ground about ten yards to the right after you leave the door. There didn’t seem to be anything down there when I looked into it.” Francesca chuckled as she continued. “Certainly nothing complained when I went to the bathroom in it.”
“Good,” Cari said. “We can all take a turn using it. Let’s finish our breakfast and get moving again. I’d like to get away from those dead spider carcasses. They’re likely to draw scavengers and I’m not sure I want to find out what kind of creature scavenges in a place like this.”
“I second that,” Helen said.
The group gathered their gear after having a brief breakfast of the remaining cheese and some of the jerky. They’d finished off the venison they brought with them the night before. They were down to the trail rations they managed to gather together from the ship before they left.
“We’ll continue moving along the side of the cavern, keeping the wall to our right. My hope is to find an exit roughly opposite where we entered. That should take us on a continued path towards the other side of the mountains.”
“How can you even get a handle on which direction you’re going?” Helen asked. “I have no idea where we are down here.”
“I’m not sure where I’m going either,” Cari said. “I’m just trying to trust the process.”
Helen frowned at that but left it alone.
Once they all shouldered their packs again, they left the tiny hut in the small village behind them. They continued their path walking around the outskirts of the cavern to the right. As they went farther and farther, they encountered more and more buildings until Cari realized they were entering what amounted to an underground city.
The buildings were now much larger than the single-story hut in which they’d stayed the night. Most had two or three stories now. After traveling forward, Cari found herself walking down what amounted to a main thoroughfare with buildings and homes freestanding on the left of her in the open cavern and others stacking up like stairs leading up to the ceiling on the right, all built right into the wall of the cavern. It must’ve been magnificent living down here when this city was inhabited.
Cari reminded herself that something had driven the residents away from here at some point. Perhaps it was just the fact that the trade route through the mountain died out as other routes were discovered. She hoped that was all it was.
They continued moving along until Cari felt her stomach rumble. She decided it was time for them to stop and take a break for lunch. She looked for a good place to rest and spotted a sort of open courtyard in the street ahead with what might have been an old fountain in the center of it.
As the others took off their packs and sat down to take a break, Helen walked over to the fountain. It was a square stone pedestal that stood about four feet high in the center of a broad stone basin about ten feet across. She grabbed a stone lever sticking out of the side of the pedestal.
“I wonder?” Helen said as she lifted the handle and pumped it up and down a few times. She smiled when crystal clear water flowed out of the pedestal to splash into the basin below. “Looks like we found a source of freshwater boss.”
“Great,” Cari said. “Everybody, make sure you refill your canteens.”
The party ate their lunch, listening to the silence around them in the cavern. The only noise they heard was the occasional drip of water in the distance and sometimes the sound of a chirp that might have been an insect or another cavern denizen. How far away and how big it might be, Cari wasn’t sure.
Getting packed up again, they continued on around the cavern’s perimeter until they reached what must have been the center of the city. A broad avenue, lined with tall buildings stretched out to their left into the darkness of the cavern’s center. To the right, the street ended in a flight of magnificent stairs leading upward to what must be the central palace or perhaps a government building for this underground community.
Cari pointed up the stairs. “I wonder what’s up there? It might lead to an exit or somewhere we can spend the night again. It might be a good idea to check.”
“I’m game, Captain,” Francesca said. “It might be interesting to find out more about the people who lived down here once upon a time.”
“Helen?” Cari asked.
“We’ll need to camp again, soon. This is as good a place as any to find a safe place for the night.”
“Good, it’s settled then. Let’s check out what’s up these stairs.”
The group started climbing up the broad staircase. There were several landings or ledges in the cavern wall along the way the top. At each of the ledges, there was a small plaza of sorts with doors opening to the left and right into buildings along each side of the staircase.
The stairway continued upward, though it narrowed as it went higher towards the top. This led to Cari to think that perhaps whoever was in charge of this city either lived or governed from that point in the tavern. When the city was inhabited and lit up below, it must have been a spectacular sight from this vantage point.
They continued upward, pausing at each landing to look around for a moment before continuing on. At one point, Helen glanced inside one of the doorways off to the side of the landing plaza and smiled as she took the spare lantern and went inside for a moment.
“Helen, what do you think you’re doing?” Cari asked. “We need to stick together.” A few seconds later Helen emerged holding a cask of some sort. It was small, made of wood bound with iron hoops.
“I think this is lamp oil. I thought I smelled some as I passed the doorway. A few of the casks had been broached and spilled on the floor, probably as the iron hoops rusted. This one was still intact. We can refill our lamp supply from it.”
“That is good news. Good work, Helen.” Cari said. She and the others joined Helen at the edge of the stairway and refilled the flasks they’d been using to carry lamp oil from the ship. With a replenished supply, they should be good for several more days.
Once the cask was emptied of the lamp oil it contained, Cari and the others continued upward, climbing to the top and final landing that looked out over the city below. Turning about, Cari saw two large metal-bound doors set in the wall of the cavern itself. Cari started towards them. “Shall we see if we can open these doors?”
“I’m not sure that’s a good idea, ma’am,” Francesca said. “Perhaps there is something sacred or special kept in there. It certainly sits in a place of honor for the city.”
“We’ll just have a look around. We won’t touch or desecrate anything.”
Cari pressed against one of the doors. It moved a fraction of an inch, then stopped. She put her shoulder against it and leaned into it while she pushed with her legs. With a grinding screech, the door slid open about twelve more inches.
“Helen, Francesca, come here and help me push. Let’s see if we can open this a little bit more.”
The three women pushed together against the massive door and it moved again, but only about another twelve inches or so. Beyond that, they could make no more progress. “I guess that’s far enough. We can squeeze through in single file.”
Cari took the lantern from Percy and held it in front of her as she slid sideways through the narrow opening between the double doors. The glittering walls all around her drew her eyes as the light of her lantern reflected off the facets of a thousand individual gems covering the walls. The worked stone around her was covered in elaborate stone carvings and inscriptions. Each of the inscriptions and scenes carved into the rock was accented with semi-precious gemstones and clear reflective crystals of various sizes. They all bounced the light from her lantern back at her.
Without realizing she spoke aloud, Cari said, “It’s like the inside of a room-sized disco ball.”
“What’s a disco?” Percy asked as he entered the room and stood next to Cari.
“It’s a sort of—” Cari stopped, realizing she never be able to explain a disco or a disco ball to her friends. Honestly, she wasn’t sure she understood its origins either.
“It’s something that reflects the light and creates pretty patterns along the walls. It’s something sort of like this but in reverse. In here, the walls reflect the pretty pattern back to the center instead.”
The rest of the party entered and the five of them walked farther into the large chamber. Cari felt a tug on her belt and looked down to see Jaycee standing next to her. She had the fingers of one hand hooked over Cari’s sword belt.
The young princess stared around them wide-eyed.
“Pretty nifty, huh?” Cari said. “I’m glad we made the climb up here. We would have missed seeing this spectacular room.”
“I wonder what it’s for?” The little girl asked. “There must’ve been a reason to create something so beautiful.”
Cari pointed to the far side of the rectangular room. Several doors led off to either side but the central feature in the distance was a carved stone throne. “My guess is the ruler of this place used to sit there and hold court. When this place was lit up by torches or lanterns, it must have lent a mystical and regal air to the proceedings.”
“We’ve seen what we came up here to see, Cari,” Helen said. “Maybe it’s time for us to head back down and find someplace to stay in a room down the stairs a bit?”
“We have some more time to look around. This might be a good place for us to break for the night and rest up too instead of going back down. It will be difficult for any large groups to sneak up on us if we close the doors and block them with something.”
“It would be nice to explore a little bit more,” Percy said. “Imagine what kind of treasures there must be hidden here.”
“We’ll worry about that after we set up a place to sleep,” Cari said. “Let’s go down to the far end of the room near where the throne is and look around.”
The five of them continued through the room, their lantern light creating sparkling patterns everywhere along the walls and floors as they walked along. The stone throne appeared to be carved from a single, massive block of quartz crystal. It was almost completely clear, though it was cloudy in places. Cari wondered who might have been the last person to sit upon it.
Without thinking, and before she really knew what she was doing, Cari walked up to the throne, turned around to face the others, and sat down.
There was a sudden flash of light. Everything and everyone froze in place around her.
Quest accepted — discover the final ruler of the city in the cavern