Chapter Twenty-six – The hive
“Prince Andin?” said the courier at the entrance of his stone cabin.
“Come in,” he answered.
“A message sir, from Beldur,” the courier handed Andin a note and left before Andin could tip him.
It was from his old headmaster; The faculty and I wish you the best in Rosewood; our doorway opened to a small swampy wilderness. Aura and I miss you dearly. Be safe –Svoi. The fire in Andin’s heart was glowing. It was a strange feeling for the prince. After a millennia science had finally cracked portal magic. Yet the happiest that revolution had made him was a two sentence note from his old mentor. It’s a funny world we live in, thought Andin.
The fire prince left his hillside cabin, coffee mug in hand. The courier bounded down the hill back towards the portal site. The shipbuilders of Pelagos spread into the woods, harvesting the trees. Andin was impressed with the Brother’s careful management of the harvest.
The courier reached the bottom of the hill. Andin launched a barrage of stones at him knocking the boy into the ground. “I know it’s you Fake,” shouted Andin. “And stop intercepting my mail!” he added.
The illusionist’s disguise vanished and Fake walked back up the hill looking like a sad puppy. “Why did you let me get so far away?” he asked.
“So you would have to climb twice,” answered Andin.
“How did you know it was me?”
“If I tell you that, I might not know I’m being duped next time.”
“Who’s Aura?” asked a curious Fake. The illusionist pressed Andin about her while pouring himself a cup of coffee. He took a sip and stopped pandering his friend, “No one makes it quite like you.” Andin gladly accepted the compliment, secretly pleased that Fake now shared his addiction.
“I had just assumed this whole time you had some sort of romantic interest back in Beldur.”
Andin shrugged, “Not for a while now.”
They took a long roundabout path to their hidden cave entrance. As he jumped through the cave’s ceiling Fake went on, “Any reason why not?” Andin jumped in after and sealed the entrance. They had walked for a few minutes before he answered.
“There are a few reasons I guess. Until I was born there had never been any other immortals. The second gods were created after the Sundering and that was it, including you apparently. For a long time the immortals freely loved their mortal counterparts.”
“But one by one, each of the planar gods stopped their relations with mortals and each other. The grief of always outliving their children and lovers was just too much. My father was the last to stop; he finally swore off his physical desires when my sister Anni died.”
“So even if I found that one girl to go the distance with, I would watch as she grew old before my eyes, as my own sons and daughters withered and died – witnessed by everlasting me,” finished a melancholic Andin.
“I think you could make it work,” said Fake optimistically. The illusionist went on, “I live the way I do because I know that just as easily as I stumbled into this world I could fall right back to my empty plane. I owe it to myself to make the most of every good and free moment I have.”
Fake went on, “Immortal doesn’t mean immune to pain or suffering. You know that just as much as I do. In fact I think the mortals have it easy when it comes to misery and tragedy. There’s an end for them, the just reward of a life well lived and well suffered.”
“But just because there is no end in sight for us doesn’t mean there isn’t one. The first gods are dead now; and now we’re going to try to kill one of the second gods,” argued Fake. Andin listened as Fake managed to inject hope into what was once a hopeless subject for the prince.
They were now deep in the cave network. They had spent the last few days since the festival exploring each branch. There was a whole host of curious creatures living underground. Fake and Andin wished to see everything it had to offer before revealing it to the magi who would surely be interested in studying it.
The patch of discolored mushrooms put a lump in the fire prince’s throat as they walked by. The branch they were exploring sloped down sharply. Andin led the way. “Well now we know where that rushing noise was coming from,” he said as the running stream soaked his clothes.
As the tunnel grew narrower and steeper their progress stopped. “It’s only getting steeper; this stream must empty into another cave,” said Fake.
Andin agreed holding his hand against the rock, “I can’t feel the bottom, this opens up substantially, I think.”
Fake had the same look Andin had before he leapt into the grotto at the Hinge. Andin smiled, “Are you sure? We don’t know what’s down there.”
“Can you make this for me?” asked Fake who shifted his sand into the shape of a stone cylinder.
Andin pulled a hollow stone rod out of the wall of the cave. Fake poured some of his sand in it and said, “Okay now seal it.” Andin sealed the rod and Fake tested his theory.
The rod floated and twirled at Fake’s command. “Just like the magi’s canteens,” he said pleased with his work. The illusionist would use the rod to control his descent. Andin, not to be outdone curled two bracelets and anklets of stone around his limbs.
It was a race to the bottom as Fake jumped passed Andin and slid down the stream. Andin followed suit chasing his friend. There wasn’t room to overtake as the tunnel choked tighter and steeper. The incline was now near vertical and the boys shot through the roof of the massive underground lake.
The few luminous mushrooms clinging to the roof of the cavern couldn’t compete with the darkness. They plummeted into black. Over rushing wind Fake shouted, “Andin! I can’t see where we’re going!” Andin streamlined his body and passed his hesitant friend.
Growing worried that he would smash into something unpleasant Fake gripped his stone cylinder and pulled on the black sand inside it. The sand slowed Fake’s fall and Andin shot balls of flame illuminating the cave.
Andin steered himself towards the shoreline of the underground lake. Fake drifted in after him. “I win,” said Andin.
“I’m still prettier,” countered Fake. Fake tried to see the opposite side of the lake but couldn’t, the chamber was simply too large. “Will you light the back wall for me?” asked Fake.
Andin obliged and hurled a mortar high above the lake.
“We must be at least a mile below the surface now,” said Fake in awe.
Andin knelt near the water’s edge, “Does this look strange to you?”
Fake sat beside him and sniffed the water, “What is that?”
Andin smelled it too, “I’m not sure.”
Fake dipped his hand in; as he pulled his hand back out it was covered in a thin stringy material. “Gross,” he said with a matching face.
Andin rubbed the slimy threads between his fingers, “I’m glad we didn’t go swimming.”
Andin stood using his hand as a torch, “Well, we know we aren’t alone down here.” Fake remained fixated on the weird material. Andin stared at his friend, “Fake? Let’s check out the shoreline; I think there’s something over there.”
Still entranced by the slime Fake answered, “Yeah… sure.” As they walked Fake kept eyeing the water’s edge.
Andin had to ask, “What are you looking at?”
“That stringy material, I’m sure I’ve seen it before.”
“Well whatever it is there seems to be less this way,” said Andin.
Fake sighed, “I’ll figure it out eventually.”
“You know what this stuff reminds me of?” asked Andin rhetorically.
“What’s that?”
“In Beldur the wildlife has all sorts of different strategies for surviving, which mostly entails just staying warm. The animals that can’t generate their own heat have to nest near the volcanoes. We have these furry arachnids that will put their webs around the entrances to the thermals, snaring their prey as they are headed home.”
Fake didn’
t like the spiders of Pelagos; he cringed at the thought of a large furry one. Andin saw his grimacing friend, “They’re really friendly to humans; farmers use them as pest control for their greenhouses.” Fake wasn’t convinced.
Fake pointed at the water, “There it is again.”
“Look up ahead,” said Andin.
“Maybe that’s where it’s coming from,” speculated Fake.
The pair reached the floating mass of pale white ovals. The stringy material held the cluster together. “Eggs?” asked Andin.
“That’s what they look like to me,” answered Fake.
Andin stuck his hand in the slimy mass and grabbed one of the eggs. The prince cut open the soft shelled egg sack. An unidentifiable mass was curled inside.
Trying not to gag Fake said, “I think that’s the head.”
Unfazed, Andin removed the fetal creature from the egg; Fake had to look away. “Look at it and draw it so we don’t have to carry this with us,” ordered Andin.
Still disgusted, Fake examined it and drew a copy for Andin. “You got it?” asked the fire prince. Fake holding his mouth and nose nodded. Andin buried the egg and its contents in the shoreline.
Every few hundred feet of shoreline there was another floating patch of eggs. “This cave system must connect throughout the plane,” deduced Andin.
“Why do you figure?” asked Fake.
“Look at how many eggs there are here; if these tunnels didn’t extend deep into Rosewood’s underground these things couldn’t possibly find enough food.”
“Do you think it’s dangerous to be here?”
“Maybe for you,” teased Andin.
Another tunnel branch punched deeper underground from the lake. “Let’s check it out,” said Andin. Only Andin’s fire lit the way now. Fake groaned, “I wish those mushrooms could have made their way down here.”
“Here you go,” said Andin handing Fake a makeshift torch.
“It will stay lit?” asked Fake.
“For half an hour at least,” answered the fire prince.
Fake still looked a little nervous in the dark and cramped cave. Andin talked to ease his nerves. “That is one of the first useful spells a Beldurian kid will learn; mothers across the plane forbid children to leave to play before they have mastered it.”
“Is that why Beldur’s element is fire?” inquired Fake.
“It is; when the spirit of humanity reseeded itself amongst the planes after the world’s destruction the element most crucial to survival became the natural discipline of the plane. In Beldur’s case, fire magic is essential for surviving the frigid winters or an angry volcano.” Lecturing on Beldur reminded the prince of his students at the Academy.
“What about Pelagos?” asked Fake feeling less claustrophobic when Andin spoke.
“Despite its bountiful islands and archipelagos there is little fresh water in Pelagos save for the rain and the coconuts. The first humans needed a reliable source of drinking water; they found it through magic.”
“Wait so do the humans in Torment need pain to survive?”
Andin lowered himself down a small rocky face before answering. “The Sundering tore apart the essence of both mortal and immortal life; the second gods, we think, were formed when the flesh of the first gods latched on to a human spirit. The gods of the hostile planes are believed to be the result of Odium’s flesh latching onto mortal spirits.”
Andin stopped and grabbed Fake’s shoulder, “Listen.”
“What is it?” said a worried Fake.
“Just listen.”
“Andin why is there music a mile below ground?”
Andin snapped his fingers and Fake’s torch went out, followed by his own burning hand. The darkness gripped the illusionist with fear. Fake whispered, “Turn it back on!”
Andin whispered back, “Just wait for your eyes to adjust.”
The distant music helped Fake relax as his eyes widened in the dark. After a few minutes it was clear there was a gentle glow coming from the direction of the music. Andin motioned towards the glow, “Are you ready? We must be completely silent.”
Fake reluctantly nodded, it was still terribly dark. The pair crept slowly and deliberately. Andin kept their path as clear as he could of the looser rocks that would announce their approach. Andin signaled that Fake should conceal them; Fake’s jacket melted into a shroud.
They rounded the bend to the subterranean garden. Three-legged brellai chirped in beat to attract mates. Glowing insects darted from the branches of the cave coral. Curled split snakes rested in their nests. Singing wings filled the living city with their soft music.
Andin whispered, “They eat the glowing fungi; the whole population will slowly crawl through the cave eating and music making as they go.” The contrast of unforgiving cave and lush oasis made the whole scene more surreal. They watched the machinery of the microcosm for an hour before a hidden threat scared the creatures into hiding.