"That door there leads to a maze of passages beyond," the barbarian volunteered as they reached the end of the stairway. Then he added, almost proudly, "Gord and I have done this before."
Eneever Zig, seemingly surprised by the revelation, turned his back to the heavy portal. "This is not the way we will take, barbarian," he told the hill-man flatly. Your past experiences are nothing to me. Come."
He strode to a place where the curved wall was built out to receive the last of the big steps. The wizard fumbled around for some time before finally managing to move a small stone. "Now shove against the slab," he told Chert, pointing as he said it. The barbarian gave a casual shove, and the rectangle of hewn granite swung inward.
"I'll be dipped in boiling- "
Take this lantern and go down," Zig commanded, cutting off Chert's sentence. These steps should take us down to the place where we will begin our quest."
". . . batshit," Chert finished, a mixture of surprise and determination on his face. He accepted the proffered lantern and started down the stairs, bowing his massive trunk in order to fit through the little opening.
"You next, thief," said the wizard. "I will remain in the rear to guard us from any attack from that quarter and so that I can have my spells ready when needed."
Gord readily complied. Chert was already several steps down and moving rapidly. The lantern revealed an open, web-strewn shaft. The stairs were hewn from its rock sides, and how far the circular opening went down was indeterminable, for the feeble light that the hillman held aloft illuminated only fifteen or twenty feet ahead. But the cold draft coming upward indicated they had far to go. There was a soft rumbling from behind. Eneever Zig had closed the secret entrance to the shaft behind them, a move that pleased Gord. Now if anyone wanted to follow them into this particular part of the dungeon, they would be hard pressed to figure out how to gain entrance.
"Shun those cracks and fissures!" Eneever Zig hissed as Chert stopped to peer into one of the many narrow openings carved into the stone walls of the passage. Those are distractions of no interest, leading to places where hostile things lurk."
"Oh," the barbarian said soberly. He proceeded to get a better grip on his massive battle-axe and then hurried past the crumbling fissure.
They came to the bottom of this hidden shaft after climbing down more than two hundred feet, as far as Gord could reckon. Considering the altitude of their starting point, the young thief estimated that they must now be no less than three hundred feet beneath the hilltop upon which the fortress was built, and possibly fifty feet beneath normal ground level.
The place was chilly and damp. Strange runes and symbols covered the granite walls. Water dripped into a shallow pool that dominated the center of the place, and slight trickles ran down the walls and added to the dark liquid. Again the exit was obvious — a pair of rusted iron doors were set in the solid rock.
"What now?" Gord asked the wizard.
"Ignore those," Zig said, nodding toward the iron doors. The master of this place put many distractions and diversions throughout his playground. Look for a mark of some strange sort on the stone floor circling the pool," he commanded.
Gord, Chert, and Zig circled the pool several times, each set of eyes intent on discovering some, sort of marking, though none of the three knew exactly what form that would take.
"I'm getting dizzy," Chert said after his fifth lap around the pool.
"Keep still, and keep looking!"
Gord stopped, so suddenly that the clumsy barbarian, following close on his friend's heels, was not able to halt in time to avoid a collision. Gord, who was promptly knocked off his feet, donned a wry expression and stared up at a sheepish-looking Chert.
"Geeesh, Gord! What're you doing down there?" the lumbering barbarian asked innocently.
"I wanted to get a closer look. Chert." Gord said in a patronizing tone. He waved aside the hand Chert offered in assistance and pushed himself away from the ground. But halfway up the observant thief gave a low whistle and crouched back down. "I think I see what we're looking for," he said softly to the wizard, indicating a faint scribing on the stone floor.
Brushing past the dumbfounded barbarian, Eneever Zig came to where Gord crouched. "Aha! That is the mark I sought," the spell-caster concurred when Gord pointed to the etchings on the ground. The wizard went immediately to the bare wall of the shaft and began searching there for a matching rune chiseled into the stone.
Gord and Chert followed his lead, both of them amazed at the various signs, symbols and runes covering the wall.
"It is here, just as I thought!" the wizard exclaimed excitedly. "Quickly now, both of you. Stand in the pool and I will join you momentarily."
"Are you keeping track of all this, Gord?" Chert whispered to his friend.
"Yeah, for what it's worth, I am. Chert, but you had better try to remember a few things, too."
The wizard was casting some sort of spell. Gord was unable to fathom what the dweomer was, but after making several passes in the air and uttering some tongue-twisting syllables, Eneever Zig rapped the wall with a small silver rod, turned, and dashed into the pool, the spray from his hurried entry wetting both adventurers as they stood in the ankle-deep water.
"ow! We're going to drown!" Chert cried as he noticed that the water had suddenly started to rise — rapidly! Or were they sinking? The water now covered his chest.
"What's happening, Zig?" The young thief demanded hysterically as Chert continued to emit a few loud complaints of his own.
"Quiet," the wizard hissed. "Don't distract me. We are merely sinking through stone. Hold your breath now," the fellow added hastily, for Gord's head was about to sink under the surface of the pool.
The sensation was strange indeed. Gord felt as if he were standing on firm ground, and at the same time the pit of his stomach told him he was falling. The cold water touched his neck, moved upward to bathe his face, his head tingled, and then there was a brown-gray darkness all around. He kept holding his breath until his lungs felt as if they would burst. Suddenly the weird darkness was replaced by a normal blackness. Having his enchanted sword in hand, Gord was able to see in spite of the darkness. Chert and Eneever Zig were beside him, standing with their backs to a smooth granite wall, facing a chamber with several passages leading from it.
"That wasn't so difficult," the wizard said under his breath, seemingly impressed with his own magical prowess. Eneever Zig calmly reached over and touched the lantern that Chert held in his left hand. It had been extinguished by their passage through water and stone, but as the wizard laid his hand upon the thing, flame sputtered and sprang to life from its plaited wick. "There, now we can all see," he said.
"Now that we can see, there's something i'd like to hear. The big question is, pal, do you know how to reverse the dweomer so we can return when we want?" Gord's voice reflected his skepticism.
"Good thinking, Gord. Just how do we leave this place?" Chert echoed his friend's question.
"We'll worry about that later," Eneever Zig answered, obviously annoyed. "It will be merely a matter of discovering the route upward and taking it."
"Discovering? What makes you so certain that there is a way out of this pit? We could be trapped here forever!" Gord was becoming uneasy, to say the least.
"Nonsense, thief! Haven't you learned to rely upon my ability yet? The same tome that enabled me to penetrate this place also mentioned a means of egress."
"Tell us both now," Gord demanded, his tone menacing. "If something should befall you, wizard, we two would be left lost and helpless. Share your information immediately!"