The Hammer - Cor Series Book I

The room was empty, and Gavyn was nowhere to be seen, but off to one side a pair of bare feet stuck out beneath the ruined tapestry. When he gave the thick fabric a poke, Gavyn’s smiling face appeared in the hole.

“Gavyn, I need your help to save Tyreth from the Chief Watcher,” Corvan said.

The young boy backed away into the secret passage, fear etched across his innocent face.

“I’m not asking you to come with me,” Corvan said, pointing out the door toward the courtyard and the palace. “I will go to the temple karst, but I need you to run back to the City of Refuge, find Madam Toreg, and ask her to send Garek and the gray men right away. Tell her the Cor-Van needs her help at the water ceremony to save Tyreth from being drowned.”

The boy pointed to his lips.

Corvan nodded. Even if Gavyn could find Madam Toreg and somehow make her understand, she might not believe him . . . unless there could be no doubt Gavyn was telling the truth.

Removing the Texas star holster from his belt, he held out, then hesitated. Was this a good idea? What if the young boy lost it?

Gavyn wrapped his small hands around Corvan’s and looked into his eyes, erasing all doubt that he could be trusted with the mission. “’Keep it hidden,” Corvan said. “Don’t show it to anyone other than Madam Toreg.”

Gavyn nodded eagerly and pulled the holster to his chest. His smile broadened, then instantly vanished as a single drumbeat rumbled through the door. Gavyn pointed overhead to where soft light fell from the dirty skylights. A second drumbeat echoed through the room, then settled into a steady rhythm. The boy touched his arm, then whirled around, the door into the secret passage closing softly behind him.

Running into the hallway, Corvan found the priest’s gate into the main courtyard hanging askew, its great bolt laying in pieces on the ground. The empty plaza pulsed with the rolling drumbeats as Corvan sprinted up the sections of stairs two at a time, the throbbing drum matching his heart, beat for beat. The drum abruptly stopped as he sailed up the last set of stairs and headed toward a wide arched door in the circular wall. As he drew near the opening, he could see a white-robed man speaking from the front edge of a balcony.

Just as he drew close to the doorway, a guard stepped from inside the arched door, barring his way. This one did not have a weapon in his hand, only a few short sticks with strips of colored cloth tied to the ends.

Corvan skidded to a halt as a scarred face with bloodshot eyes thrust toward his hood along with the rank smell of a mouth full of rotten teeth.

“Where’ve you been, boy?” The ugly face pulled back to squint at him, and for a brief second Corvan was certain the man would strike him. Instead, the guard bent down and picked up a long-necked clay jar sitting just outside the door. “Lucky for you I saw this back at the barracks. If that new stone gets stuck again, it’ll be your fault.” He thrust the neck of the jar into Corvan’s hand and pushed him off to the side. “Get along to the priest’s entry before that old windbag finishes talking.”

Corvan’s heart was pounding as he turned away. The cloak had the man thinking he was someone else, but the priest’s entry could be a faster way to get inside the wall to locate Tyreth.

The clay vessel he’d been given smelled like well-used engine oil and was almost too hot to carry. Juggling it’s narrow neck from hand to hand, he worked his way along the outside of the newly constructed wall. A short distance ahead, a doorway jutted out and inside it, a shadowed stairway led down. Beyond the entry there was only a pile of scaffolding and the high wall surrounding the plaza. This had to be the priest’s entry that guard had spoken about.

As he descended the stairs the familiar odors of his father’s workshop rose up to meet him; hot metal, grease and damp. At the bottom of the stairs, the narrow passage curved along down a steep ramp to stop before a partially open door that was even shorter than he was. The speakers voice seemed to be louder inside that space. He pushed on the door, and it creaked forward on dry hinges. Was that what the oil was for?

A cheer from the audience swept in from another passage to his immediate left. He peered through that opening and found it led up a stairway toward a more brightly lit open space. Corvan was about to follow the new passage toward the noise of the crowd when heavy footsteps approached inside the room with the rusty hinges.

“I need that in here first,” a voice growled. “Hurry up!” Corvan pushed the door wider. Thick legs and large boots were visible withing the room on the edge of a raised platform. “I need a bit of oil on one of the gears and then the rest of it goes in them two new holes in the floor at the base of the amphitheater stairs. See ’em?”

Corvan stayed silent. Should he run away?

“Ya see ’em or not? We don’t have much time.”

Corvan stepped back and looked into the passage on his left. Two holes had been bored into the floor on either side of the passage, just before the stairs leading up to the crowd.

“They say it’ll work this time.” The man’s voice drew him back to the short door. “If it doesn’t, I’m going to blame you for being late, and ten he’ll feed you to his pet instead of the priests. Now get up here.” The boots retreated and Corvan ducked into the room. He couldn’t take the chance of being chased by this man or having him call the guards.

The room beyond the squeaky door was lit by a narrow horizontal slit along the far wall. Something white fluttered past. Most likely that was the direction of the stage and the speaker.

Up on a platform, the large man had squeezed his bulk into the middle of a complicated system of gears and levers. He reached a pudgy hand over his shoulder. “Give me the oil. Those idiots didn’t greased the main shaft either. How did they expect the sluice gate to lift into position.”

Corvan stepped onto the raised area. A door at the back of the room was propped open and rippling reflections on the walls beyond revealed he was at the water level in the karst. This man and all his machinery must be the one who would release the octopus creature who would eat the victims thrown down from the balcony where the man was speaking to the crowd.

“Oil!” the man demanded, waving his hand in the air behind him. Corvan quickly handed it over and the man pushed his greasy bulk deeper into the machinery. “If you ask me,” he grunted, “and of course they never do, this plan of using Tyreth as bait to catch Tarran is a grand waste of time. If he’s the brains behind the plot to overthrow the palace, he’d have to know this is a trap.” He poured a thin stream of oil from the jar, and the burnt odor was added to the overpowering aroma of the man’s sweat. “Besides, Tyreth wouldn’t even want him to try to save her. Most likely what she went tell him when she sprung him out of the cell and killed Morgan.” He grunted again. “There, that should do it.”

The man shoved the bottle back towards him and Corvan had to move in past two of the levers to grab it. From here, at the back edge of the long slit in the wall he caught sight of the gatekeeper with the scarred face, standing above at seating tier packed with spectators, flicking a red flag back and forth.

“What are you gawkin’ at? Get going and dump the rest down them holes, equally mind you, and use all of it. Don’t get in the way when it lifts. I’ll get the signal to crank it into position any time now. Let me know when it’s all the way to the top.”

Corvan jumped off the platform, ran out the door and turned into the other passage. Up the stairs, he could hear the white robed man speaking passionately about the future of Kadir and the Cor. The enthusiastic response of the crowed filled the hallway as Corvan knelt to examine the holes in the floor. Brushing a cone of stone chips away from a freshly bored hole he poured the oil into one and then did the same to the other, alternating back and forth to let it seep down to wherever it was going.

Setting empty bottle down, he turned back to the stairs just in time to see a slab of stone rise from the floor between the two holes in spasmodic jerks. Behind him, in the control room, energetic grunts matched each rise as the stone wall inched upward.

The passage was halfway closed before Corvan came to his senses and leaped over the thick stone and onto the steps. He’d barely cleared it when the slab reached the fresh oil and slammed up into a notch in the ceiling. There was no turning back now.

The volume of the speaker’s voice increased as Corvan crept up the stairs, edged around a corner and peered out an opening into the curved amphitheater. From his Geographic magazines he knew he was just inside a vomitorium, the internal entry into the lower level of the amphitheater, the bottom floor where dangerous beasts would be fought, and gladiators would die as the audience watched. In this amphitheater, however, a pool of water held a hidden monster lurking below the surface, with the large unfinished statue towering overhead.

To his left, the first four tiers of seats at the edge of the karst were crammed with green-robed priests. Behind them, a curved wall the height of a man separated the priests from the rest of the crowd who were listening to the speaker on the raised balcony across the water in rapt attention. The white-robed man approached the front of a stage covering the space between the ankles of the huge stone statue that towered over the people below. It unfinished face still conveyed a smug satisfaction with the scene below.

The white robed man stood between two short pillars on the stage and spread his arms wide. “Today we celebrate the opening of our new water temple. We are thankful to the Chief Watcher for his work with the city council in building a place to honor the water gods.”

The man moved to one side and gestured to the wall of high black curtains at the back of the stage. As he moved off the stage, the curtains parted in the center and concealed footlights came to life along the front edge of the stage.

The Chief Watcher strode out from between the curtains, the lights glittering off silver bracers on his arms and from every scale of the lizard’s meticulously polished hide. The crowd collectively caught their breath as the creature stopped between the two pillars.

“People of the Cor!” The Chief Watcher extended his arms towards the people. “All of you remember when the water of the gods erupted and ran through the streets, killing your families and friends. It made us all deeply aware of the prophecy that our world could be filled to the top,” he gestured overhead, “with water from this karst.”

A silent fear settled over the crowd.

“Over time we have been making our sacrifices to keep the gods pleased at our water ceremonies.”

He paused as a ripple of murmurs ran through the seating area. The priests sat stiffly on their benches, many of them looking at the floor instead of the creature on the stage.

Corvan studied the lizards lean face. Unlike his visit to the hall of the High Priest, its tongue was not flickering out and it was not hissing its words. Something had changed with it had eaten the seed of the mother plant. It seemed almost more human now.

“I believe there is a better way to appease the anger of the gods, anger directed at those who lie to our people and take advantage of others. Why should the innocent continue to suffer while the guilty go free?”

The black lizard pointed directly at the priests before his arm swept in a grand gesture over the water. “This new pool of justice will allow the gods to show us who we can trust. Instead of throwing the young innocent ones into the water, we will put those who appear to be guilty in the place of judgment.” He pointed to a narrow stone pier that descended down a few steps from the audience side of the karst and out over the water towards him. “If they are innocent, the water will remain calm and still beneath them, but if they are guilty, the water will rise and punish them for their lies.”

He waited, arms outstretched, until the crowd responded with a hesitant cheer.

The black lizard sauntered out to the front of the stage. “Recently, Tarran, the son of the High Priest of the old temple was arrested on a charge of treason against the palace. He was brought to the prison to await trial, but he murdered our good friend, Morgan, and escaped. That same night, I went to speak with the High Priest and to ask for his help but instead I was attacked by Tyreth and her father. They were both arrested but now we must determine if the entire family of the High Priest is guilty of treason. In these days of perpetual lies, only the water gods know for certain.” He pointed to water below his clawed feet. “Today we will call on them to judge the truth.”

Corvan scanned the audience along the left side. The priests sat stiffly in their places. A few older ones shook their heads in response, but above them, many in the crowd nodded.

A narrow door opened on the far side of the karst, below the level of the stage near the heel of the statue’s right boot. There was a gasp from the crowd as the High Priest shuffled out around the pool. His mouth was gagged, and his hands bound behind his back, but he walked past the lower section full of priests with his head held high.

Stepping purposefully onto the stone pier, he walked down the shallow steps until he was well below the lip of the karst, then turned to face the crowd.

“High Priest,” the lizard called out, taking a step back and bringing his thick arms to rest on the two stone pillars, “you stand accused of treason. You are silenced before the people so that instead of hearing your arguments, we shall hear only the answer of the water gods upon whom we call to judge between truth and lies.”

The Chief Watcher raised his long claw and pointed high overhead to the face of the unfinished statue. Corvan resisted the urge to follow his gesture and kept his eyes on the lizard. As the lizard’s right arm went up, he saw the creature lean firmly on the pillar to his left. The pillar moved and dipped ever so slightly.

A geyser of water shot up around the High Priest, and he was momentarily lost in the spray. Someone in the crowd cried out and ran up the stairs and out the upper gate. The tower of water fell back into the karst, and the surface began to bubble and rise.

“If the water takes the man, the gods have found him guilty,” the Chief Watcher shouted. “If it subsides, we will know he is innocent.”

All eyes were on the priest and the rapidly rising water. With a fierce look of determination, the High Priest’s glanced down as the water rose to his ankles. The crowd leaned in closer, the High Priest looked slowly around the amphitheater, then he turned his gaze defiantly over his shoulder at the Chief Watcher above him on the balcony.

With one deft movement, the man stepped back off the pier and slipped below the surface of the rolling water.

The crowd sat frozen in stunned silence.

The Chief Watcher yanked has arms away from his pillars and looked off to the left at a narrow slit in the side wall. That was where the man in the room with all the gears had worked to raise the stone to block off the priest’s entry.

The water grew still and as all eyes turned to the Chief Watcher, a smug expression settled across his dark face as he left his pillars and came forward.

“Our former High Priest has declared his own guilt by offering himself in an attempt to buy favor with the gods. It was futile, for he remains in the water. If he were an honorable man, the gods would return him to us, but they have not done so.”

Corvan knew there would be no returning, for in the froth he’d caught sight of tentacles much larger than those he and Tsarek had encountered in the labyrinth. His stomach knotted. That meant Tsarek had failed to chase the water creature away with his firesticks. There could be no last-minute escape that way.

The black lizard spoke out. “Our High Priest has sacrificed himself in an attempt to save his daughter from being tried for treason, but each one of you must be judged on their own merit.” He gestured again toward the left side of the karst.

A figure in brilliant white emerged from the doorway across the pool at the statue’s heel. Everyone’s eyes followed Tyreth as she moved slowly around the perimeter of the karst, her hair flowing in dark waves with each measured step.

As drew closer to the stone tier she nodded to the section of priests, then looked directly toward Corvan’s hiding place. He stepped forward just enough for the light to touch his face and drew back his hood.

Tyreth’s eyes widened as she looked into his, then she shook her head slightly and looked quickly away. She wanted him to stay hidden and with the door sealed behind him down the stairs, there was nowhere to run.

Tyreth turned to descend the stone pier, and Corvan caught sight of the jagged scar across her right cheek. She made her way slowly out to the end of the pier, wavered for a moment, recovered, and turned to face the audience. As she glanced down, her lower lip trembled. She caught it in her teeth, turned her head deliberately toward him, then slowly and firmly shook her head.

Tyreth was telling him to let her drown.