The Emerald Dragon (The Lost Ancients Book 3) Read online

  They muttered at Alric’s comment, but regardless of how they felt about him, the entire town agreed he was not someone to be messed with. They dispersed and went back to their early Saturday afternoon drinking.

  “I thought we don’t get earthquakes.” I said.

  Alric took my arm and changed direction, so we were going further into town. “We don’t. That wasn’t an earthquake.”

  Damn. I would have hoped that in the last five months of knowing Alric I’d get used to the lies. Nope, he got me again.

  “Then what was it?”

  He grinned. Anything mysterious and possibly deadly seemed to make him do that. “I have no idea, but we should go check.”

  “Checking what? We go, too.” Garbage Blossom, my orange faery, said as she flew past while riding Bunky like a flying goat.

  “Bumbling rumbles!” Crusty Bucket chirped as she flew around Bunky.

  “Not our fault!” That was Leaf Grub’s contribution as she too flew over Bunky.

  As usual, Bunky said nothing but seemed content to be with his faeries.

  Before I could respond to anyone, the ground shook again. Instead of the long, slow rumble of a few minutes ago, this one was sharp enough to knock Alric and me to the ground. Then it stopped.

  Alric’s grin vanished as he got to his feet and helped me up as well.

  Garbage Blossom’s scowl matched his as she glared from atop her obsidian steed.

  “That was not an earthquake either.” He picked up speed and almost started running when a second sharp jolt hit. This time neither of us fell, but the faeries and even Bunky tumbled about in the air as an invisible pressure wave hit them.

  “What the hell is going on?” I said to anyone or anything that had an answer.

  Alric didn’t say anything but increased his pace. Unfortunately, everyone who had gone back to their pubs and homes after the first quake, were now back in the street. Running evolved into dodging at this point.

  “That was an explosion, a big one,” Alric finally said as we reached the end of the pubs and he turned down a narrow lane to the left. There were a few businesses at this end, scattered among a collection of tiny gnome houses. The only big thing down here was the Antiquities Museum.

  Or rather, the only big thing down here had been the museum.

  A huge wall of dust and airborne debris brought us to a stop before we could see the end of the lane, or the building. Bunky and the girls dropped lower in flight, and all four hovered a bit behind us.

  I thought Alric would keep going anyway, but instead he muttered a few words and threw his left hand in the air. A wind came from behind us and thinned out the dust.

  “I thought you said not to use magic for simple things?”

  He scowled at the dust still hanging in the air. “No, I said don’t waste magic. This isn’t wasting it. We need to see what happened. Now.” He flung his right hand up this time and the dust vanished.

  So had the museum.

  The Antiquities Museum had been built about sixty years ago. An offshoot of the university, no big elven ruins had been found at that point. Since then, each administration added onto it until it had become almost as large as some of the massive ruins below the city. It was ugly, awkward, and ill designed.

  It was also missing.

  “You didn’t accidentally do that, did you?” I didn’t think he would have, but one never knew.

  Alric’s glare said volumes. “If I destroy a building it wouldn’t be by accident.” He went to the far side of the hole where the museum had been.

  A group of unconscious people were in a pile at the bottom of the ruined steps that had led into the museum. While Alric stalked around the hole, I ran over to see if any of them were alive. There were two museum guards and two of the employees, all still breathing but very battered and bloody. They must have been running out of the museum when it collapsed into the hole before us.

  I stepped past them and peered into the giant hole. If anyone had still been inside when it went down, they were dead now. From the pile of bricks and debris, the building must have crumbled as it fell into the hole beneath it. As if the ground under the center of it vanished and the building followed. Even the nearby trees looked crooked.

  “These people need help,” I said to Alric but he was busy frowning at something in the dirt a few feet away from me.

  “It’s coming.” Alric waved a hand behind us. Foxy, his fiancé, Amara, and half a dozen townsfolk came up the path. Foxy and Amara were an interesting pair. Foxy was about seven feet tall, with long floppy ears and tusks that jutted up from his lower jaw. Amara was a pureblooded dryad, so tiny and frail she continuously looked like a faint breeze could lift her up. The faeries and Bunky led them and I hadn’t even noticed that they left us.

  Foxy thanked the faeries, then came to where I stood and motioned to the handful of townsfolk with him. “Gather around, we be needing to get these people to a healer.” Foxy was in his new take-charge mode, one that started after he fell for Amara a few months ago. I had no idea how the relationship between he and Amara had finally been settled. She had been originally using him to get information about us and the relics for the people she worked for. Who, unbeknownst to her, happened to be Jovan and Glorinal. Foxy had taken the betrayal hard, but it looked like love had managed to overcome it.

  “What happened?” Foxy stepped beside me and peered down the hole. Then he shuddered and took a step backwards.

  Alric joined us as he wiped his hands on his black pants. He’d been messing around with the dirt again. “I found a number of smaller holes and, judging by the age of the debris, someone spent weeks tunneling under the museum.”

  “So this was a natural collapse? Well, not natural if someone dug the ground out from underneath it, but this wasn’t an explosion?” I had my doubts.

  “Oh no,” Alric peered down the hole and shook his head. “There was an explosion. A bunch of them I’d say. The others were too far away for us to feel them, and they were probably smaller. They ended here.”

  Foxy folded his arms and nodded. “Then where it be starting?”

  Alric shook his head, and the frown on his face carved a few more lines. “I’m not certain, but judging from the collapsing trees, I’d say it started in that direction.” He pointed out to the forest behind the former museum. Trees, huge old gapens, tilted unnaturally. “If I had to guess I’d say it started about two miles from here. At the mine.”

  Chapter Three

  I regretted eating all of those sandwiches now. “What do you mean, mine?” While Beccia hadn’t mined for the last thirty or so years, plenty of former ones were around. It didn’t have to be that one.

  “That mine. The one that collapsed two months ago, taking that bastard with it.” Alric looked ready to jump down in the hole in front of us to find answers, but he shook himself and stepped back instead.

  One of the guards was too big for the others to carry, so Foxy nodded to us and went to help.

  I waited until he was out of earshot. “Are you trying to say that he caused this?” The townsfolk were almost as wary of Glorinal’s name as Alric was. “How could that be? That mine was huge and it collapsed. I don’t care how strong a magic user you are, if an entire mine falls on you, you are dead.” He needed to be dead. I still woke up at night in terror of him and what he tried to do. And what he threatened to do. Both he and Jovan had been working for someone else, someone they both called Master. However, Glorinal went crazy and decided that with me at his side, willing or not, we could overthrow everyone. Including Jovan and the Master.

  Alric bent down, sifted the dirt through his fingers, and then looked up into the trees. They were denser here than I recalled, but then I didn’t think I’d ever studied them as I was doing now. “I don’t know. What I do know is that magic was used—a lot of it—to displace the ground under the museum. And judging by the tracks, some people escaped into the woods afterwards.”

  “But it doesn’t have to
have been him. Besides, how can you even make a guess about what happened?” I was worried that someone destroyed the Antiquities Museum, but I was terrified that Glorinal might not be dead. Denial was a fine place, and I was staying there.

  Alric gave me a look as he rose to his feet. “I’m a scout, remember? I was trained in tracking.” He dusted his hands off again and put an arm around me. I slipped my arm around his waist and leaned close. He rubbed my shoulder for a few moments, then lowered his voice. “We have no idea if he survived. Most likely these were just treasure hunters looking for the chimera.” He dropped a kiss on top of my head.

  I looked up into those amazing green eyes. “Liar.”

  “I tried.” He shrugged, gave my shoulder a final squeeze, and headed back to the main road.

  I should have accepted the lie.

  The people carrying the injured had gone, but more townsfolk headed our way. More folks who looked like they would ask questions.

  Alric grabbed my arm and briskly started walking away. Harlan had been in the new crowd, but he broke free of them and followed us. He was a good friend, fellow digger, and possibly the nosiest person I knew. He hated me to say it, but I’d long ago decided his insatiable curiosity was a throwback to his feline ancestors. Harlan was a chataling, a species that looked like a house cat had mated with a human. Chatalings hated being called cats.

  “You two are up to something. Now, what really happened back there?” Harlan’s whiskers twitched.

  “We need to get to the mine. Now.” Alric dropped his voice low. As soon as we were out of sight from anyone at the collapsed museum, he turned us down another lane, and then twisted back through two alleys.

  “Mine? What mine?” Harlan kept up with us, but he had missed the earlier conversation.

  “Keep it down.” Alric shot him a look and gave a quick shake of his head.

  Harlan, sensing a great conspiracy at work, simply smiled and laid one claw aside his nose with a wink.

  “Alric thinks the explosion that took out the museum started at the mine,” I said then held up a hand to stop him. “Yes, that mine.” I looked around to make sure no one was listening; I was now sure I saw Glorinal everywhere.

  Harlan froze, his eyes wide, and his tail lashing about. Glorinal and Jovan had kidnapped him and Covey when they’d grabbed townsfolk.

  I was sure Harlan’s nightmares were at least as bad as mine.

  “No.” That was the most succinct I’d ever heard Harlan, but I agreed with the sentiment.

  “I need both of you to calm down. We’ve no idea what happened, but I can almost guarantee that the magic shields around the mine fell with those earthquakes. We need to get there and see what really happened before the council realizes their shields are gone.” Alric turned down a few more alleys, one nothing more than a two-foot-wide gap between two old stone buildings, then to a trail into the woods.

  I shoved Glorinal out of my head. With any luck we’d find his skeletal remains in the mine and I could sleep better at night. Finding the chimera artifact would be a bonus.

  It wasn’t hard to follow the line of destruction once you knew what you were looking at. The explosions out here hadn’t been as large as the one that swallowed the Antiquities Museum, but they left a brand-new ravine in the woods. Trees tipped over or hung out over the edge, their roots reaching out toward the abyss.

  The mine had already collapsed, thanks to the fight with Glorinal, so the new damage was even further down. I hadn’t been near the mine, none of us had, since that horrific day, but it looked like the hole was deeper and wider now.

  The fact that all three of us could walk right up to it told me Alric was right about the shield being down. Magic of that sort would have been tied to a nearby object. Chances were the tether was down in the hole now.

  “Who is going down there?” Harlan peered over the edge, but the look on his face said it wouldn’t be him.

  “Me.”

  Chapter Four

  I looked around trying to see who said that and realized it came from me. Possibly the last place I wanted to go was down there. Yet, there it was.

  “No, I’ll go.” Alric looked around for somewhere to tie his rope.

  I hadn’t even noticed he had a rope.

  Most likely, the enterprising former thief stole it as we moved between houses on the way here. Good to know he kept his skills up.

  I hadn’t meant to volunteer myself, but I knew why I did. “I need to go. I’m the best one at rummaging through debris and rocks. Especially considering where Qianru has me digging lately.” I tried to take the rope, but he moved it out of reach. “I’m the trained digger, remember? You’re just the trained spy and tracker. Not so helpful here.”

  “I’m stronger than you, both physically and magically. If there is anything unexpected down there—”

  “I’ll yell for help.” I yanked the rope out of his hands. He had already secured it around a heavy gapen tree that looked far enough from the newly exploded ravine to still be stable. I wished I had my digger tools, but we couldn’t waste time going back for them. The Hill council were politicians at heart, which meant they’d be arguing about the collapsed museum, and how to get their stored treasures out of the mess, for a while. It might take time before they looked to check on their shields on the mine. However, we couldn’t be sure that other folks didn’t make the same connection Alric had.

  Alric and Harlan held the rope and let it out as I slowly descended. The walls of the pit were jagged and uneven, a testament to their violent birth. I dodged a giant tree root blocking my path and focused on the dig. This was just a dig. I was looking for an artifact in a dig, not the body of my murderous former boyfriend.

  I figured if I kept telling myself that eventually I’d give in and believe it.

  The metal corral that Jovan and Glorinal had used to keep their kidnapped prisoners contained lay in a massive twisted heap not far below the exposed tree roots. Although he couldn’t see them from the top, I was sure Harlan would be glad to hear of their demise.

  I was almost to what could be considered the bottom—there were a lot of layers here— when a second, thinner rope dropped down along side of me. Followed moments later by Alric. The rope didn’t look strong enough to hold him, and it was an odd green color, faintly glowing.

  “First off, I said I was doing this. You were going to stay up top. Secondly, what the hell is that?” I swear the rope was slowly moving of its own accord, even caressing Alric’s hand when he let go of it.

  “I never actually said I would stay.” Alric smiled and looked around where we landed. “And the rope is made up of magic and tree leaves, something you might be able to make in a few dozen years or so.” He pointed to the rope near me. “I stole that one for you.”

  I settled on giving him a scowl and turned toward the collapsed cavern before us.

  A deep half-dome carved in the wall ahead of us looked like a likely place to start. It looked fresh, as if the recent explosion had cracked it open. It was also so dark that nothing beyond the first few feet could be seen. I waited for Alric to magic us some light; finally I turned around to him. “We don’t have much time, remember?”

  “I think you should try casting a light spell. It’s one of the first ones we teach babies.” He handed me a small rock. “It helps if you have a focus to pin it on.”

  I shifted the rock in my hand and shook my head. “I seriously doubt you elves trained babies to fling lit rocks around. What if something goes wrong? I could have a massive headache and pass out.” Granted, that hadn’t happened yet, but whenever he’d tried to get me to do magic without dragon bane, it sure felt like it would.

  “Then it’s a good thing I’m with you, isn’t it?”

  I wanted to smack the grin off his face. Instead, I turned my back to him and focused on the spell for light. It had some long-winded elven name that meant luminesce. I called it glow magic. I shut my eyes—something else Alric was trying to break me of, but my b
ack was to him for a reason—and pulled in energy to fuel the spell. My temples started throbbing first, and then a buzzing filled my head. I took a deep breath and concentrated on the spell, just the spell, the spell was all.

  “Another problem of closing your eyes.” Alric’s voice was right next to my ear and I almost jumped a foot in the air.

  I also opened my eyes. The blinding glow bathed the entire area in an eerie greenish gold light.

  “What’s going on down there?” Harlan used his yelling but trying to be quiet about it voice.

  Which meant they probably heard him back in town.

  “Taryn is playing around. Nothing to worry about.” Alric covered the hand holding the rock with his own and muttered a few spell words. The pressure in my head lessened and the glow dimmed down to a manageable level.

  “We probably want to move along before Harlan brings in the whole town,” Alric said as he started into the dark cavern.

  I swore under my breath at his back and followed him in.

  And swore some more after about ten minutes of scrambling over rocks. The ones near the entrance were jagged and blown outward. But further in…even to my magic-novice eyes it was clear magic caused the condition of the cavern. Neither tools nor nature molded rocks this way. It was as if a giant bubble had forced the rocks to curve around it. The further we got, the more evidence of magic showed in the rocks. Something, or someone, had magically pushed a giant bubble into the rocks as the mine had fallen in on itself.

  There wasn’t much space in the rock bubble. The original mine had been huge, but this was almost like a pocket of it that had stayed near the surface and burst open with the recent explosion. Before that, it would have been dark and almost airless.

  Lucky for me, I now had enough light to see the decimated corpse.

  From the clothing it was Jovan.

  “Was he drained…?” I couldn’t even finish my question.