it? Maybe there was some in the alchemy lab. Would there be manticore venom? And had Zoltan been messing with me, or had he been earnest? The vampire had sent a giant tarantula after me. Manticore venom sounded like something that would kill me, not save me.
But if I couldn’t fix my lungs, I might die anyway.
I scrambled to the cabinets and started flinging open doors, hoping I’d be able to identify whatever ingredients I found. If everything was in the dark-elf language, I was screwed.
More shouts came from the tunnel, and the floor quaked. Startled, I gripped the counter. Whatever was going on, it was more than two scouts warning their people of an intruder in the complex.
Two cloaked dark elves ran past the alchemy lab, their hoods down and their white hair streaming behind them. They didn’t glance my way. I didn’t know what was happening, but if it bought me a few minutes, I’d gladly take them.
I spotted and lunged for a giant bag of Epsom salt. Not only was it not labeled with obfuscating dark-elf symbols, but it looked like it had come from Walgreens. Or maybe Amazon. Did they two-day ship to subterranean dark-elf lairs?
With my breaths growing wheezier and more ragged by the moment, I verified on the label that it was magnesium sulfate—thankfully enough of that infrared light filtered back from the chamber for me to read. I tore open the bag and dumped some out. The tiny crystals that spilled onto the counter didn’t look like anything that one could inhale easily, but the stuff dissolved in liquid, didn’t it? People bathed in Epsom salt.
Leaving it, I went in search of manticore venom. Sadly, that wouldn’t be in a drugstore bag.
I saw an atomizer bottle and set it over by the magnesium sulfate. A mortar and pestle followed. A pen and a small notebook open and face-down on the counter caught my eye. I turned it over and spotted fresh ink in a foreign language and what looked like a list of ingredients, then shoved it in a pocket. It wouldn’t help me breathe, but maybe it had information about the formula the alchemist had used on Willard.
After checking a dozen more cabinets and not seeing anything venom-like, I tugged open a refrigerator door. Vials and vials of blood, ichor, and unidentifiable strangely colored liquids I couldn’t guess at hung in racks.
A boom rocked the tunnels, and the floor heaved again, the vials rattling. My senses were alive enough to tingle with awareness—someone was throwing magic around. A lot of magic.
Between the magic of the dark elves themselves and all the artifacts in the place, I couldn’t begin to sort out individual auras. And at that moment, I didn’t care who was giving them trouble. I felt faint, and the tips of my shaking fingers were numb. I wasn’t getting enough oxygen into my body.
With fumbling hands, I pulled out racks, scanning the labels on the vials. These had all been labeled with sigils reminiscent of the one from Willard’s apartment. There were three vials with symbols identical to that one—were these more of the same potion? They had to be. I snatched one in case it would help Zoltan create an antidote, and stuffed it in a pocket.
In a rack in the refrigerator door, there were vials of dark red liquid—blood—mingled with clearer vials. The labels held drawings as well as sigils. They were of animals, lizards, and even fish. There was the kraken. I grabbed it for Zoltan in case I didn’t get my sample kit back and kept scanning. An elephant, a wyvern, a toad. I didn’t see any dragons. But there—my heart lurched. Lion head, wings, barbed tail. A manticore. There were two of them. One vial held blood and the one next to it was filled with a clearer liquid—it had to be venom. I hoped it was venom.
As a female voice screamed nearby, more power was unleashed, back in the direction of the ramp. It was closer than it had been before, as if the dark elves were fighting off some intruder.
I dumped some of the Epsom salt into the mortar, then stared at the little vial of venom. There wasn’t nearly enough to fill an atomizer bottle or even mix with more than a few crystals. Maybe I was supposed to dilute it? That seemed logical. Breathing straight venom sounded suicidal, but maybe a smaller dose stimulated the airways into expanding without killing a person.
I