72

70 - The Good, the Bad, and the Dried Up

Ulric panted hard as he followed the scent and tracks in the sand from the dwarves and their animals.

'I don't know whether to be glad for this thick fur for shielding me from the sun's rays, or hate it for being black and soaking up all the heat.'

Valdys raised her eyebrows inside Cat, which followed him out of sight from the dwarves.

'Haven't you tried your chameleon ability, love? You might be able to change your fur colour to sand.'

Ulric wanted to facepalm for forgetting about his new ability and imagined his fur changing colour. It took a few moments to find the right state of mind, but he grinned when he slowly changed from black to the beige of the sand he walked on.

'Yes! I can! This is a cool superpower.'

The girls giggled at his boyish enthusiasm.

'Just remember, you don't have to use that to secretly watch us undress, Wolfie.'

said Iphigenia.

'Unless you want to play a little kinky game.'

'But don't you dare to use this to peek at other women, darling.'

said Elzbieta.

'I'll have your hide if you use it for other perverted means.'

Ulric sniggered.

'No worries, my beloved ones. I'm not interested in doing perverted things with anyone else than you.'

he said, and pricked up his ears at the sound of hacking noises and voices farther away. He reached the top of the dune he climbed, and laid eyes upon a sandstone structure in the distance.

'Valdys, you'll have to confirm it, but I think I see where the artefact is stored.'

Valdys had Isazea move Cat into another direction, and checked the artefact's direction.

'I think you're looking at the right place. The artefact points to a short distance ahead of you.'

'Park somewhere to the right, I'll come to you after I take a closer look.'

***

Ulric arrived a while later at Cat's hiding place behind a large dune, and guzzled down a bucket of water and splashed one over his overheated head before he could speak in other manners than dry panting. 'I saw lots of dwarves excavating some kind of temple, carrying out cartloads of sand and broken stone.'

'Could it be they're after the artefact?' asked Caylais.

Valdys folded her arms and sat back. 'They could be working for someone else who has an interest in history, but if you saw no one else than dwarves, my love, I doubt it.'

Ulric shook his wet head while his fur returned to his natural colours. 'Unless they were inside and smelled like dwarf, I saw no one else.'

'I think we should assume someone knows there's an artefact there and they are trying to retrieve it.' said Iphigenia.

Ulric wiped his face and looked at Valdys. 'I'd like you and Elzbieta to come with me for another look. Maybe we can spot or think of a way to enter the temple.'

The three settled later behind a dune with a good distant view of the grounds in front of the temple. Tents stood in a group at one side along with a corral for the pack animals, and a double rail system led in and out of the large temple entrance, with dwarves pushing full carts to the side, where they were emptied and other dwarves shovelled the contents further onto large heaps.

Valdys peered at damaged statues out front, depicting guards with snake heads or scorpion bodies with lances and large shields. 'I found something in the library. This used to belong to a small civilisation that had links to the demons when they ruled this country. Desert storms must have buried it ages ago and people forgot about it.'

'Someone sure didn't.' said Ulric as he searched for any other entrance into the temple. A group of dwarves walked away from a couple of tables, and spread out to relieve others, and those went into the tents next. 'They're working in shifts. Seems there won't be a break that we could use to sneak in.'

He looked at once to his left when he heard distant footsteps. 'Dwarves!' he growled at the sight of a group led by a dwarf woman at the far end of the dune.

Two thick tails of her copper red hair draped around her shoulders and she wore a chain mail outfit that fitted tight around her thick hips and large bosom. She waved a spade around as she ran towards the intruders with the others.

Ulric and his girls jumped up to run away.

'You're not leaving this place alive now, you spies!' the dwarf shouted, stopped, and to the surprise of Ulric and the girls, suddenly shovelled a huge amount of sand up into the air.

Like a small sandstorm, it rained down on the three, slowed them down, and buried them in mere moments.

The dwarves moved to the spot after she stopped sending sand up in the air, and stomped on the sand in satisfaction. One of the men grinned at her as she blew the bangs in front of her eyes aside. 'They won't forget the earth ability of our Tipper. Although it won't last long while they suffocate.' he said, and the other men laughed as they left.

Valdys lit up a small ball of light underneath the dome formed by Ulric's wings. 'Well, that rules out asking politely if we may enter the temple.'

Elzbieta brushed some sand out of her hair. 'I still don't favour attacking them all for that.'

Ulric blew sand from his nose. 'Neither do I, but if there is no other way to enter that place, we might have to.' He gazed at a beetle the size of his fist, which popped up out of the sand. 'Or maybe we need to dig through the sand like this fellow.'

'That might be an idea.' said Valdys, and held her open hand in front of the beetle. It touched her finger with its feelers, and crawled onto her palm. She lifted it up and gazed into its black eyes, mumbling softly. then set the beetle down a moment later and smiled at Elzbieta and Ulric. 'There is a secret entrance far behind the temple.'

Ulric chuckled. 'You sure do learn neat tricks out of all those magic books from your library.'

***

After waiting long enough to be sure no one was around, they dug their way out of the sand and hurried along a route marked by more beetles crawling out of the sand until they came to a depression between two dunes, and found a partially exposed wall. Another beetle sat by a crack and Ulric removed the sand there until he cleared a recess with a carving of a coiled snake the size of a man.

Valdys looked closer at the carving and pressed her fingers against the snake's fangs. The wall turned inwards with a stone rumble. 'I'd say we found our way in.'

They looked at the long passage while Valdys sent a low light sphere down it. 'All right, who are the best choices to come along?' said Ulric.

Iphigenia and Caylais arrived later, along with Isazea's golem Oono, who gained some golem version of mental improvements with his master's boosted abilities. 'Isa had Cat crawl underground, so we won't have to worry about them being seen.' said Iphigenia as she handed out flashlights.

Valdys looked at the beetle on her hand. 'Our insect friends can't tell us anything about what we'll find inside, and I found no more information on this temple in my library, so be on the lookout for anything like traps or hidden doorways.'

Ulric led the way ahead in case there were floor traps, with Valdys, Caylais, Iphigenia, and Oono following him. The fine sand layer on the floor along the length of the sandstone passage showed no one had been in here for a very long time. An occasional room held nothing but more sand, and a couple of passages were blocked by a collapsed ceiling, but after a while Ulric stopped and held up his paw.

'I hear the dwarves working.'

Silently and in near darkness, they went forward until the passage was lit by windows looking out over a great hall lit by torches and sand piled high against the walls, covering most of the statues lining the sides. The dwarves were busy hauling up sand from wide stairs leading farther underground and pouring it into carts. Ulric watched the dwarves work in a sombre mood.

'I thought dwarves sang while they worked.'

'Have you ever heard them sing?'

said Elzbieta.

'This whole place would collapse if they did. There's a reason for why it's banned in mining operations. Or anywhere else underground, actually.'

Ulric thought back at the few dwarves he had met and the not so silky sound of their voices.

'Good point.'

They kept low and followed the passage along the width of the hall, which led away to the rear again until it hit a dead end. Ulric knocked on the wall. 'And this concludes our tour of the ancient temple and the empty back rooms. We hoped you enjoyed it and will visit us again, and please don't forget your tour guide.'

Iphigenia sniggered softly. 'There must be more. It's strange to have all this when there's no way to reach this place from the hall.'

Valdys nodded. 'It's possible we must find a secret door to enter deeper into the temple. Let's split up in pairs and do a thorough search of each room.'

Several rooms were searched by tapping on walls and checking every crack and hole in the walls, until Caylais noticed a pattern of faint rectangles in the fine sand on the floor in the room she and Elzbieta were in. 'Elz, do you see that as well?'

Elzbieta gazed at the part of the floor Caylais pointed at, and saw the thin shadows as well when she held her flashlight closer to the floor. 'A row of rectangles.'

Caylais knelt and wiped away the sand. 'There are thin cuts in the stone.'

Elzbieta examined a little more of the floor. 'I think you just found our secret door, or better said, steps.' She looked around the room. 'Now we need to find the trigger.'

After pulling on the torch holders and trying to turn them, Elzbieta found a loose stone in a corner and pressed it. it moved inwards, and part of the floor transformed slowly into a flight of steps leading down with the noise of scraping stones.

'People, we found a way down.'

The others hurried into the room and Ulric gazed at the way down. 'I thought I heard something.'

Elzbieta gestured at the steps. 'Cay noticed an odd pattern in the sand.'

Ulric gave Caylais a big smile and she blushed. 'Good work.' he said and shone his flashlight down below. 'I suggest we move in the same formation again.'

More ancient passages and stairs led the party deeper underground to another hall with pillars, where a couple of the passages were filled with sand, and warrior and snake statues lined the walls. They looked around for a clue on which direction to take next. 'No stairs going down.' said Elzbieta. 'It could be any of the clear passages we can take, or the blocked ones.'

Ulric looked at Valdys. 'Any ideas?'

She examined the ceiling. 'Nothing that comes to mind, other than taking a lucky guess.'

A shout from the other side of the hall surprised them.

'You!?' said the red haired dwarf that buried them earlier in front of other dwarves. 'How did you escape!?'

'Capture them!' said another dwarf, and the group stepped forward, brandishing hammers and pickaxes.

The girls, Oono, and Ulric dodged and counter-attacked their stout opponents, but the wild swings of the dwarves quickly cracked several of the pillars with each hit. It was the swing of the female dwarf's spade missing Ulric and slamming against a cracked pillar that caused it to break apart under the weight of the ceiling, and caused a cascade of pillars breaking in return, and the ceiling coming down.

She froze as she looked up while the other dwarves fled back screaming, and the girls and Oono pulled back towards the corner of the hall at once.

Ulric grabbed the front of the female dwarf's chain mail without thinking and pulled her with him while raising one wing for protection.

Valdys ran into the only nearby open passage with the others behind her, and Ulric barely made it inside with the dwarf before sand and stone rained down and closed off their way back.

Valdys used a spell to remove the dust from the air while the rest coughed and covered their faces until they could breath freely again. She sent a light sphere deeper into the passage. 'Well, thanks to our our friend here and her companions, we won't have to pick a passage any longer.'

They gazed at the pouting dwarf. 'You are the ones that don't belong here.'

'It's equally debatable how much you dwarves belong here.' said Elzbieta.

The dwarf sprang up. 'We're here to help on an important search!'

Iphigenia chuckled. 'There's only old junk from a bygone civilisation here. The only important things are maybe a few old pieces for antique collectors. Hardly anything to have a bunch of dwarves dig up the place for.'

The dwarf's face turned red and she gripped her spade. 'The artefact is not junk! It'll strengthen dwarf society with its power!'

The girls and Ulric exchanged glances.

'As I thought.'

said Iphigenia.

'It was easy to provoke her into telling.'

Valdys glanced at the angry dwarf.

'And it sounds like they have no idea what its use is. Someone has been lying to them to gain their trust, otherwise they wouldn't leave their homes so easily, and I strongly suspect they were demons.'

Ulric nodded.

'All the more important to find it before these dwarves do. And they'll put in more effort now that they know we're here.'

'What do we do with her?'

asked Elzbieta.

'I don't want to abandon her like this, even if she did try to kill us earlier.'

said Ulric.

'I say we'll let her tag along if she wants to.'

said Valdys.

'If she wants to try to dig out of here on her own, it's her choice. Agreed?'

The others nodded in agreement, and Elzbieta turned to the dwarf. 'You have the option to come along with us while we search for a way out of here, but if you give us any trouble, you're on your own. All right?'

The dwarf crossed her arms and grumbled.

Valdys moved farther into the passage. 'We'll be on our way, so decide quickly.'

Ulric took up point again while the others followed, and as soon as the darkness grew around the dwarf, she reluctantly gave up her pride. 'All right, all right. I'm coming with you.' she muttered as she hurried after them.

***

At first it seemed there were only more chambers attached to the passage, but the last one had an additional locked door. Valdys sensed the magic on the lock at once. 'This looks promising.' she said, and unravelled the spell knot to unlock it.

Ulric pulled open the door and they peered down a long stairway. 'I think our dwarf has done us a favour in swinging her tool around recklessly and forcing us this way.' he said.

'The name is Tipper.' she grumbled. 'And this is not a tool, it's a special spade befitting the great earth user that I am.'

He raised an eyebrow at her. 'Earth user? As in doing tricks with sand and dirt and stone?'

Her face turned red again. 'Not tricks! Real magic!'

He turned to the stairway and went down the steps. 'I would have thought you could dig yourself free then.'

She grumbled again but followed the party going down.

They barely moved along another wide passage with more chambers at the bottom, when Ulric pricked up his ears at moaning coming from different directions. 'Hold up. Something's here.'

Elzbieta pulled out her sword. 'I hear it.'

The moans and shuffling came closer, and Valdys spread more light spheres around. The sight of dried up corpses scampering towards them in the light of the spheres and the flashlights complemented the creepy being trapped underground atmosphere.

Iphigenia used the spell to duplicate her sword along with Elzbieta. 'Val, can't you control them?'

Valdys probed the undead with her senses. 'I can't. They're locked into a curse. It'll take too long to undo that one in these circumstances.'

'How about it, Tipper?' said Ulric. 'Use your ability to block them or bury them.'

Tipper stepped back from the dead. 'I, I can't like this.'

'No choice but to chop them up then.' said Ulric and looked at Caylais. 'Can you stun them?'

She charged her hands. 'I don't know if it works, but I'll try.' she said, and stepped forwards. She took a deep breath, and unleashed a storm of lightning on the walking corpses.

They jerked feverishly where they stood, and Iphigenia and Oono took care of them, while Caylais hit the other side coming towards them, and Elzbieta and Ulric made sure the corpses became permanent dead.

They moved farther along the passage fighting the last undead, while the dried up attackers stopped being people but became snakes and large, black, crab-like creatures, who sported scorpion stingers instead of claws.

Caylais zapped them first again before the girls and Ulric sliced and diced them. Ulric wiped his paws as he looked at Tipper. 'It's almost a shame your friends won't enjoy meeting the local wildlife down here. I'll bet they'd have lots of fun while the demons who sent you here watch the carnage.'

'What demons?'

'The ones who manipulated you into digging up the artefact they need to protect the demon lord.'

Tipper huffed. 'We're not working for demons! It was our own lord who discovered texts about the artefact and the power it held.'

'And you don't suppose someone could have fed him that information? I thought it was usually the scholars who find out about things.'

'No! Our lord is a great and wise ruler.'

'The only other ones who are looking for the artefacts has been a party of demons. And they're trying just as hard as we do.'

Tipper pouted. 'Demons are our enemies. We would kill them.'

Ulric stopped when the light from his flashlight lit up a pair of large, black, doors, decorated with one snake coiled across both of them. 'Hello. I do believe we'll find what we're looking for behind door number one here.'

71 - Deception

Valdys touched the black stone doors. 'These are made from one of the hardest stones available, and the lock is too complicated to pick before the dwarves descend upon us.'

Ulric touched the door as well. 'Let me give it a try anyway.' he said, armoured his hind legs, and kicked it with all his might.

The result was a dull thud and a gritting of his teeth while he nursed his aching paw. Frustrated, he armoured one fist and punched the unflinching door with all he had.

He wiggled his stinging paw and Tipper laughed. 'Try yelling at it.'

Ulric took a deep breath. 'Why not? I'm just in the right mood.' he said and tensed himself. 'Girls, cover your ears.'

Tipper thought he was kidding, until she saw the girls cover their ears for real. She slapped her hands on hers just in time before the bloodwolf let out his deafening angry roar. 'BREAK!'

She thought it was rather amusing after all and grinned. 'How impressi-' she began, when a crack snapped across the lock of the door.

Ulric gazed at it for a moment, and hit it once again with all his might.

Tipper stood with open mouth as the lock part broke into pieces and the doors creaked partially open. Iphigenia kissed Ulric's muzzle. 'You never cease to amaze me, Wolfie.'

He chuckled. 'Nor I myself.'

'You have a weird way.' muttered Tipper.

He pushed open the doors further, and they gazed into more deep darkness until Valdys sent her light spheres into it. 'I wonder if we'll ever find an artefact simply in a box in a closet or something.' Ulric said as they gazed upon a large, natural cave with a wide column in the middle formed by a fused stalactite and stalagmite. Rough stone circular posts stood scattered around the floor.

'There's a tomb at the foot of the column.' said Caylais.

'It's most likely there.' said Valdys. 'Let's be careful.'

They moved cautiously towards the oblong and plain tomb, and felt relieved nothing had stirred when they reached it. 'I hope this isn't a practical joke with a nasty surprise inside it.' said Ulric as he grabbed the lid to lift it. He froze at the tremble rocking the cave.