“I think I can translate it,” Bryn said eventually. She haltingly began to read the words from the wall, line by line, first reading each in Old Vallenite, and then translating it.
“I am Cloudhaven.
I was made by the first of the dragonsmiths.
I will be known by the last of the dragonsmiths.
I will stand against wind and rain, against battle, against the shaking of the earth.
Those who have been granted my protection may roam me freely.
But only those with the keys of my founders may open this final door.”
As she finished reading, a door began to form at the base of the huge stone wall. Lines of blue light glowed around its edges, and when its outline was complete, itopened with a soft click, swinging inward to reveal a staircase beyond it.
They all gazed at it in silence, and eventually Bryn spoke. “Should you go down there?” she asked. “I know you have to find out, but is it safe?”
“There’s a bigger problem than that,” Anders said, still looking down the stairs. “Leif and Hayn said the dragons, the wolves,andthe humans are getting ready for another battle. We don’t have long to use the staff and the mirror. But if things go badly, this might be the only chance we ever have to find out what happened to our mother. And it’s not just for us. I think... I think it might be important for everyone to know. Her disappearance was mixed up in the start of the last great battle.”
“We’ll be back as quickly as we can,” Rayna said.
“Let everyone else stay asleep,” Lisabet said. “Whatever happens tomorrow, we’re going to have a big day. We napped at Tilda and Kaleb’s—we’ll make sure we’re back up here by morning.”
“We?” said Anders.
She looked across at him. “You don’t really think I’d let you two go alone, do you? We’d better hurry.”
“I’ll be waiting for you when the sun comes up,” Bryn promised. “Right now, I’m going to run all the way back to the entrance hall, just to be sure I don’t meet anyunfriendly artifacts. You three go. Find Drifa.”
They watched her to the corner, and then the twins retrieved their augmenters, hanging them around their necks once more. Silently, the trio began to descend the stairs, moving slowly at first, and then gathering speed as they became more confident.
They were about twenty stairs down when the door above them swung shut with a click.
Anders’s heart stopped for a moment as he stood there in the dark. And then the soft greenish-blue glow of the paths that led them around Cloudhaven began to emanate from the walls.
So down and down and down they went, seeming to descend the stairs endlessly until Anders’s feet hurt and the muscles in his legs ached. But they couldn’t leave this mystery unsolved. The path that had promised to show them Drifa’s location had led them to this wall. Drifa was down here somewhere, and though she had told them not to come, they could do nothing else.
Eventually, Anders began to wonder how they were going to get back up again. Even if they climbed all the stairs—and he was beginning to think they were descending all the way down to ground level—would they be able to open the door from the inside?
But his thoughts were interrupted by a distant noise.He couldn’t quite tell what it was, only that he had heard something, and he knew by the sharp turning of Rayna’s head and the way Lisabet paused that they had heard it as well.
They continued down, but they moved more slowly now, careful to keep their footfalls silent. He trailed one hand along the cool rock beside him, wishing he could communicate with Cloudhaven more clearly. Wishing it could tell him what was waiting for him.
When they reached the bottom of the stairs, they emerged through an archway into the largest cavern Anders had ever seen. At first, he didn’t know what he was looking at. Then, by the dim light that glowed from the ceiling, he began to understand.
He was seeing row after row after row of artifact warriors, all standing to attention, staring straight ahead. There were hundreds of them, maybe even thousands, the rows stretching away as far as he could see. The air vibrated with the same tingle that Anders always felt when an artifact that he was holding activated.
“What is this place?” Rayna whispered, but Anders had no answer.
Lisabet pointed up at the ceiling, keeping her voice as soft as she could. “Look, there are hatches up there. Remember when you locked the warrior in that room,and then it vanished through that trapdoor in the floor? This must be where it ended up.”
They waited in silence for a little, but there was no sign of life anywhere. So eventually, they began to creep forward.
Every part of Anders was on edge as they made their way between the warriors, but none of them stirred or gave the slightest sign that they knew the children were there.
Lisabet nudged him, and when he looked where she nodded, he realized that some way away, perhaps at the center of the room, there was a brighter glow. There was something there.
They altered course toward it, still keeping their footfalls silent, every sense awake and searching for danger.
