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Tomb of Arnon
Beneath the overhanging arch of the silent tomb, shadows pooled in patches of blackness so dense that Tierra’s lantern could not penetrate the deeper recesses of the vast, ancient stonework. Thain stood behind her upon the topmost step, staring up at the imposing edifice with an expression on his bearded face that seemed to be a mixture of awe and faint apprehension. Millennium’s Door Even after she had deciphered the message, it had taken her years of poring over old scrolls, visiting ancient ruins, and listening to tales of traveling loremen to finally understand what it meant. The two sisters were their own world; Capriel, and that of Thesia, which appeared as a bright blue ball in the northern sky. Long had these sisters played out an intricate dance about each other, which the great stargazers of old had studied and mapped out on charts. In their observations, they had learned that every thousand years, on the second day of the second month, the two sisters drew nearest to each other. The day of this millennial occurrence was known as Sisere, at which point, the entire northern sky was supposed to light up with a brilliant aura from late afternoon of that day to early morning of the day after. According to Tierra’s calculations, that phenomenon would commence within the next half hour, and as it did, the ‘Eye would behold the light’, and the door would open. The End
“I don’t like this,” he muttered, fixing Tierra with a distrustful look. “I don’t like this at all.”
Behind him, his two scraggly companions began to whisper also, giving the temple dark looks and making warding expressions in front of their eyes. The young warrior woman stared at them contemptuously. “You agreed to this. You’re getting paid three times what the job is worth.”
“But you did not tell us it was the Tomb of Arnon,” Thain protested. “No one goes in there.”
“Fine. Then leave,” Tierra whirled around to face them, her green eyes flashing fire and the burnished tip of the spear she held in one hand glinting in the sunlight.
The thieves looked at her, and then at the temple. She could see the indecision clearly written on their faces, as well as the apprehension in their eyes. But in the end, their greed won out. The thought of the three bags of gold that would be theirs once the job was done was just too much to resist. No doubt, they also planned to raid the Tomb treasures. Not that Tierra cared. She had come for one thing, and once she had her hands on that one item, her unsavory companions could do as they pleased.
“The curse be upon you, Shieldmaiden,” Thain snarled, grabbing the lantern from one of his underlings and stomping up the steps to where the huge, two-leaved doors awaited them. After a moment of uneasy silence, Thain’s men followed him.
The door into the tomb towered several feet above their heads, made of brown stone, though the markings on it were overlaid with gold. A symbol had been engraved upon the face of it, that of an open eye. Below the eye, in blocky runes, was written a message that few could read. It was in a language that had disappeared from their world long ago. Tierra smiled grimly. Ten years before she had stood upon this very spot, and the writing had been as much a mystery to her as anyone else. Not so anymore. She had searched diligently and paid a horrible price; but, at last, she knew the secret of the great door, only one of many locked within the ancient tomb.
The message on the door was simple, a riddle of sorts:
When the Two Sisters draw nearest
And the Eye beholds the light
Thus entrance into the Tomb could only be achieved once every thousand years. The Shieldmaiden smiled fiercely. She had always believed the time of her birth was a work of fate. With the great treasure of the Tomb safely in her hands, she could end the century-long war that had plagued her people. They would be the victors, and she would avenge the death of her family at the hands of their enemies.
“What do we do now?” One of the men, Galiun was his name, asked.
“We wait,” Tierra said shortly, shaking herself from her dark thoughts. She turned to gaze up at the sky. Thesia hung there, larger than ever. Already, light from it was beginning to spiral outwards, painting the horizon in a vivid splash of sapphire, tinged with deep purple.
“By the gods, I’ve never seen that happen before,” Thain murmured in astonishment, staring in awe at the sight.
Tierra shook her blond head in disgust at the apparent ignorance of such denizens of Capriel. While her companions shifted impatiently on their feet and muttered to each other, she stood in disciplined silence, the strange blue aura overhead glinting off her light armor and the tip of her eagle’s head helm. A moment later, though, even Tierra could not contain a gasp of pure wonder at the sight that greeted them.
Suddenly, beams of pure, blue light shot out from the distant planet and radiated across the face of the northern horizon. Through a round hole in the archway of the tomb, which none of them had noticed, one of the vivid beams pierced down and struck the open eye. The thieves were still gazing upwards, open-mouthed, but Tierra moved instantly into action. This opportunity only came once every thousand years, and she didn’t want to lose it.
She placed her hands against the cool stone of the door, feeling it vibrate as something within began to grind and move. Her eyes widened as she realized it was the door itself. It was beginning to slide back.
“Thieves, on guard,” she called. “The door opens!”
In a flash, all three men had their weapons in hand. A black opening, which their eyes could not pierce, yawned before them like a great maw as the door disappeared into a slot on the right. The thieves crouched down, holding their knives and swords protectively in front of them, as if they expected some creature to issue out of the darkness and launch itself at them. But Tierra stood straight and proud, her long spear held easily in one hand. She barely jumped as something toppled out through the opening and landed on her leather boot. Looking down, she saw it was a human skeleton. Even as she watched, the skull, detached by the fall, rolled away and bounced down the steps past the men who stared at it in wide-eyed fear.
“What was…” Galiun began, but Tierra didn’t let him finish.
“It was leaning against the door,” she stated calmly. “When the door opened, it fell over. That is all.”
“That is not all.” Thain eyed her angrily, though she knew his ire was merely a mask to hide his fear. “What was it doing leaning against the door? He, or whatever it was, must have been trying to get out. Probably trapped in there.”
“Most likely.” The Shieldmaiden’s beautiful face was impassive. “We’ll just have to make sure we’re smarter than he is.”
Without another word, she walked into the darkness awaiting her. The men looked at each other uneasily, weapons still held in readiness; but finally, with a growling command from Thain, they entered in after her.
It was dank and darker than pitch inside the tomb. It smelled of earth and rot, and air that had not been recycled for a thousand years. Galiun coughed suddenly, startling his two companions so badly that Shasher, the other thief, nearly dropped his lantern. Thain gave them both a warning look. As they continued, the tunnel began to slope downward and wind around, as if they were going around in circles. Tierra suspected that wasn’t far from the truth. The Tomb was said to be the resting place of the first king of Arnon, a kingdom long vanished from Capriel. There was little that was known about it, but the ancient books of lore seemed to indicate that the shape of a circle was somehow sacred to the people of Arnon. It would make sense if their tombs were constructed that way. There appeared to be markings on the walls, pictures of some kind. Though it was much too dark to make them out clearly, the tomb raiders could see, by the light of their lantern that many of them seemed to depict men with swords and great beasts and cities in ruin. Tierra thought, perhaps, they were telling the stories of great battles in Arnon’s history.
At last, they came to a door that seemed to be made of solid gold. The thieves looked at it with a mixture of greed and trepidation. “The inner tomb,” Thain murmured, “where the treasure rooms lie.”
“Also where the king of Arnon lies,” Tierra replied, “and that would have been far more important to the people who made this tomb.”
The leader of the thieves scoffed, pulling at his scraggly beard. “What does it matter what they thought? They’re long dead.”
“And you will be also,” the Shieldmaiden answered harshly, her emerald eyes flashing in the lantern light, “unless you have a care. There are bound to be traps around here. The subjects of Arnon would have considered it a sacrilege to enter the final resting place of one of their kings. This tomb did not get the dark reputation it has by accident.”
Silence greeted her words and the thieves glanced about, as if they thought the ceiling was going to fall in on them. With one hand gripping her weapon tightly and every nerve ending in her tall, lithe body tingling, she reached for the handle to the door. Carefully, ever so slowly, she began to turn it, her ears perked for any sound that seemed out of the ordinary, any noise that told of danger. But the tomb was silent and the door opened easily, swinging in without a sound to the chamber beyond.
As they cautiously crept in, Tierra saw what looked like wisps of smoke hanging in front of her. Shasher stepped back in fright. “The gods save us!” He cried. “Spirits of the dead! The curse be upon us!”
He and Galiun both would have bolted, if not for Thain’s strong hands grabbing each of them roughly by the front of their tunics. “Quiet, you fools!” He muttered harshly. “They’re just curtains.”
“Yes,” Tierra murmured. As she reached out to part them and go through, the cloth disintegrated into dust upon her hand.
Beyond that, lay a small entryway that had three doors to the right, left, and center. It was the center door that concerned Tierra the most, for it was the color of silver, yet the metal was not of silver. She knew it would be heavy, so heavy in fact that it would take the strength of all of them even to open it. It was the primary reason she had brought her companions with her. “It is called limun,” She said. “No one knows where it came from. No one knows how the people of Arnon made it. It is a lost craft, and the metal cannot be found anywhere in Capriel except at the doors of the inner tombs of the kings of Arnon. It will not be easy to move, but move it we must.”
Again, making warding gestures with their hands, the thieves approached the door, half-dragged toward it by Thain, whose greed for the tomb treasure outweighed his fear. Tierra set her shoulders against the metal, and when the others had done likewise, she cried “Push!”
Grunting and groaning, they pushed with all their might, the cold metal biting into their skin and their booted feet digging into the floor. Sweat poured down Tierra’s face as the door moved an inch, then two. Several minutes passed as they strained in the darkness, and the small crack they had made in the door grew wider and wider. Finally, breathing heavily and feeling as if every muscle in their body was on fire they stopped and stepped back.
“The treasure rooms are through the doors on either side of us.” Tierra said coolly. “Go take what you want and then leave. I care not.”
Galiun and Shasher seemed perfectly happy with this prospect and turned to do just that. Thain, however, had other plans. He grabbed them again and shoved them toward the opening. “Oh, you’re not going to get rid of us that easily, Shieldmaiden. You might be holding out on us. The greatest wealth might be within the king’s resting place itself. So we’re coming along too.”
Tierra shrugged and turned away. “Very well. If you consider a three thousand year old body of great wealth, then who am I to argue with you?”
There were tall lamps on either side of the door. Tierra opened the glass on her lantern and used the flame inside to light one of the lamps. When Shasher saw her doing that, he immediately went over to the other side and did the same thing. But a moment later they heard him scream in fright and stumble back, his eyes wide with fear. Tierra whirled around, bringing her spear up to let it fly at whatever had spooked the thief. But when she saw what it was, she dropped her arm and simply stared at it curiously.
A creature stood there beside the lamp, immobile and silent. It had the bronzed, muscled body of a man, clothed in a loincloth and holding a long spear upright in one hand. But its head was that of a hawk, and two piercing black eyes reflected the light of the lamp back at them. Shasher gave a nervous laugh as he picked himself up off the floor after having stumbled. “It’s just a statue.”
“No, it is not a statue.” Even Tierra could not resist a small shiver. “It is a Sithaur.”
Galiun backed away from it. “What is a Sithaur?”
“A guardian of the underworld,” Tierra answered. “A keeper of the dead. When the mortal body dies, it is the Sithaurs that lead the spirits across the river to the land of the dead. It has long been said that such beings are stationed within the tombs of the great kings and in the temples upon the Seven Hills, but most consider them a legend."
“Are they alive?” Thain’s voice sounded gruff, which Tierra had learned it usually did when he was trying not to show fear.
“Alive?” She laughed shortly. “I am not sure that a Sithaur could ever be described as being alive.”
The Shieldmaiden left them to mull that over on their own, for as soon as the lamps had been lit she had seen that for which she had come for. In the very center of the room lay the marble coffin where the king of Arnon had been entombed. But it was not the coffin that caused Tierra’s eyes to light up. It was the item hanging upon the wall just above it. She pushed Thain out of the way, nearly toppling a table beside the coffin, on which strange-looking jars had been placed, in her excitement at finally finding the treasure she had been seeking for so many years. It was a Sun Disc, completely round in shape, made of gold, with the symbol of the open eye upon it. “At last,” she whispered, reaching out one hand to barely touch it with her fingertips. “At last, my people’s fate will be assured.”
For only she knew of what the Sun Disc was capable of. Only she knew the power it contained, for those who weilded it were considered gods. They ruled the elements of the earth, and could destroy their enemies, by fire, flood, earthquake, and wind. With trembling hands, she reached out and lifted it from the wall.
A deep, terrible voice echoed suddenly in the silent tomb. “Your doom is sealed.”
Everyone stood in frozen terror, their breath coming in short gasps as they gazed about wildly for the source of that awful sound. It had seemed like the voice of the grave itself, and the thieves glanced in fearful silence at the king’s coffin. Tierra, however, knew better. She turned her head slowly toward the Sithaur and found its piercing bird eyes staring right toward her, through her it seemed. “What do you mean, our doom is sealed?”
As if in answer to her question, they heard a grinding sound echoing in the tomb from far away. “It’s the door!” Galiun cried in fright. “The door to the tomb!”
Before anyone could stop him, he fled. The two other thieves and Tierra hurried after him. At a dead run they raced toward the entrance, the men sobbing and crying aloud to the gods, while Tierra merely held onto the Sun Disc with a grim expression upon her beautiful face. She knew even before they reached it what they would find. The entrance was sealed shut. The thieves beat upon it and tried to pry it open until their hands were wet with blood, while the Shieldmaiden paced back and forth in front of the door. At last, Thain, realizing that all their efforts were futile, grabbed his sword and turned to her. “You brought this upon us, Shieldmaiden!” he cried, rushing towards her. “We are all going to die, but you are going to beg for death before I’m through with you.”
In one fluid motion, she brought up her spear and knocked his sword aside easily, and then stuck out her foot as the momentum of his charged attack carried him several steps forward. He tripped and went sprawling on the ground, crying out as he fell on his side and jarred his muscle against the hard stone floor. She left him moaning in pain as she strode back toward the inner tomb.
“So what happens now?” She asked as she stood before the creature that guarded the tomb.
For long moments, there was only silence. But, at last, the Sithaur stirred, and that same awful voice, as deep and dark as the grave itself, filled the chamber. “You die, and I will lead you across the river.”
Tierra refused to give into terror. “What caused it? Why did the door close? It was supposed to stay open until morning of the next day.”
The Sithaur stared at her with fathomless black eyes. “You removed the Disc. The Eye upon the door is merely a path through which the light travels, but it is the Disc that receives the light and controls all things.”
“So if I place the Disc back where it was, will the door open?” She asked.
Tierra could have sworn she saw a ghostly smile in his gaze. “How easy it would be if that were so. The Eye upon the temple door is closed. When the Disc is placed back upon the wall, it will begin to open again. But the process will take nearly five hundred years before it is finished.”
And that, of course, was the trap. Tierra turned away and walked to the coffin with the Disc still cradled in her arms. Echoing through the tomb, she could hear the sounds of distant shouts and screams, but she cared little whether the thieves were in the process of killing themselves or each other. Her path since birth had been one of destiny, but how could she have known her destiny would be this.
Perhaps, it was the weight of the Sun Disc in her arms, or maybe it was her own indomitable will never to give in, to always survive. Whatever it was, the thought came to her like a ray of light. She had the Sun Disc. She was a Shieldmaiden and a learner of the Secret Arts, one of the last in Capriel. The power was hers to wield as she saw fit, and if that meant digging herself out of the grave she had fallen into, then so be it. Ever so carefully, she laid the Disc on the top of the coffin, and glanced at the Sithaur.
“Do I bring doom upon myself yet again?” She asked haughtily.
“The Circle always completes itself.” There was neither condemnation nor redemption in the Sithaur’s tone. It had watched the flow of life and death for centuries untold. It had but one purpose, and that was all that mattered. “Do as you will. The Door still awaits you, and not until you pass through it will you know what your fate is to be. But heed this. It is not without price that one wields great power.”
“Then I am willing to pay the price.”
And with those words, her fate was sealed, though it would be long years before she realized what the price would be….
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