distorted air in front of her face. The weapon grew warm as it disrupted Kylon’s spell, and her voice lost its unnatural volume.
“Go!” she shouted. “The Hall of Torments is a trap! Into the Hall of Forges, now! Run! Run!”
They turned to sprint for the Hall of Forges.
A deep, resonant click echoed through the Hall of Torments, and the floor started to tilt beneath Caina’s feet. A long, straight crack appeared in the floor a few inches to her right, and on the other side of the crack the floor began to tilt in the opposite direction.
A double trapdoor.
Of course. This had been Kharnaces’ throne room. Likely the ancient Great Necromancer had executed slaves by having the floor fall open beneath them, sending them plummeting to their deaths in the Halls of the Dead below.
“Jump!” bellowed Nasser. He leaped for the archway as the trapdoors slid ponderously open and caught the edge, pulling himself over. Laertes followed suit, and Malcolm seized Nerina by the waist, slung her over his shoulder, and jumped. He wavered at the edge, and Laertes seized them and pulled them over.
Caina and Annarah ran for the archway, the floor tilting even more ponderously. Morgant heaved himself over the edge and stood, while Kylon hesitated, looking back at Caina as the floor’s tilt grew sharper.
“Damn it, Kyracian, go!” shouted Morgant. “Ciaran, your rope! Throw it to us quickly!”
Caina reached for the coiled rope at her belt, and suddenly the trapdoors fell all the way open. Kylon leapt backward with a surge of sorcerous power, but Caina lost her balance and fell.
She slammed into Annarah, and both of them tumbled into the yawning darkness below the massive trapdoors.
Chapter 17: Undying
“Hold on to me!” screamed Caina, wrapping her left arm around Annarah’s waist and hooking her left leg into hers.
She didn’t know if the loremaster heard her through the rushing wind of their fall, and it didn’t matter. Caina had exactly one chance to do this right. If she missed, both she and Annarah would plunge to their deaths. At least it would be quick. Though they might rise as undead in the darkness of the Inferno.
Best not to find out.
Caina opened the collapsible grapnel at the end of the rope and flung it with all her strength. It tumbled overhead, the rope unwinding as they fell, and Caina saw a flash as the grapnel went over the right edge of the trapdoors.
The rope went taut, and Caina came to a sudden halt, the jerk sending a spasm of pain through her waist as the rope pulled her belt against her stomach and hips. For an awful instant she was sure that the belt would snap, or that the rope would break. Yet both the rope and the belt held. Annarah’s arms and legs tightened around Caina, and she caught a brief glimpse of the loremaster’s eyes, wide and green and terrified. Distantly Caina realized that she was terrified too, but seemed a less urgent matter than climbing back up to the Hall of Torments before the rope broke.
Or before the Immortals simply cut the rope.
“Kylon!” shouted Caina. “Pull us up!” Another click echoed in the darkness, and the squeal of metallic gears came from somewhere. Caina looked around, trying to spot the source of the noise, and then she started to rise, Annarah still clinging to her.
The stone doors were closing, pulling up the rope. Caina suspected the grapnel had lodged in the hinge between the stone door and the floor. The sheer weight of the doors would crush the grapnel, and then Caina and Annarah would fall to their deaths.
There wasn’t enough time to get back to the Hall of Torments, and not even Kylon’s strength could pull them up before the doors closed.
“Down,” said Caina. “We have to go down.”
“What?” said Annarah.
“Hold on,” said Caina, releasing one of the leather ties on the coil of rope at her belt.
All at once the coil released and they fell. Again they came to a jerking halt, pain shooting up Caina’s stomach and hips as the belt dug into her. Annarah yelped and grabbed at Caina to keep from falling, which also hurt. She was a fit woman, but taller and heavier than Caina.
Caina felt herself rising as the doors continued their ponderous swing.
“Light,” croaked Caina. “Light, we need light.”
Annarah thrust her left hand. At some point the pyrikon had reverted to its bracelet form, and her fingers shone with white light. In the pale glow Caina saw a