Loosening his knives in the sheaths at his waist and chest, Nocren followed close behind. Tensed for danger, he held himself ready for anything as Calya pushed open the door.
The container was as empty as the rest of the site. Empty of people, but signs of activity—recent activity—abounded. Tables pulling double duty as both desks and workstations filled every inch of the interior. The surfaces were covered with storage crate shelving holding logbooks and all manner of papers, cups of pencils and pens, inkwells and corked bottles. Someone had even managed to cram a teapot on a warmer stand into a corner.
Nocren gingerly touched the side of the vessel only to find it cold, the warmer’s candle long since gone out. But the contents of the pot itself weren’t that old. Cold, yes, but not evaporated to nothing. The liquid that remained was unspoiled.
The tables told a similar story: ink dried on the nibs of neglected dip pens, but the inkwells themselves were still mostly wet. The lamps on the walls burned, oil levels low in their reservoirs.
Nocren moved to examine a large technical drawing on a scroll that spanned the full width of the back table. “It’s like everyone just… stepped out.”
“But to where?” Calya muttered. “And why? No, wait, I think I can answer that one.”
He looked her way. She had her notebook out again, flipping through pages as she compared her notes to a logbook on the table in front of her.
“They’re all records of earth magic trials. Containment… and breaches.” She opened another heavy ledger, scattering loose papers that were tucked at the front. “Expense reports. Brint, you shit-for-brains, lying weasel. I’d be impressed if I wasn’t so pissed.” She met Nocren’s eyes. “I guess we know where the people from his old project went. Mostly know,” she amended, looking at the container devoid of anyone besides them.
Nocren traced the lines of the drawing in front of him. It was somewhere between a concept and a blueprint, detailing a series of excavated rooms and tunnels in the hills abutting the clearing, all built around a pool underground. More lines and arrows indicated a pattern of flow into and out of the pool, though he couldn’t read the symbols written at various parts along the cycle.
A smaller sheet of paper, letter-sized and bearing the Coalition crest—a scale and coins— embossed at the top bore a quick sketch of a grassy-looking plant on one side, and one of the same plant transitioning to grow blade-shaped leaves interspersed with large, frilly flowers, on the other.
Reacts to contaminated ground. Preventative to curative under right conditions—needs high concentration.
The note was signed simply S. Unease burrowed beneath Nocren’s skin as he backed away from the table.
Calya was going through each of the logbooks on the table. She tapped a chart pushed to one corner. “Some kind of schedule, though it’s hard to say exactly what the parameters are. Seems to cycle through on a weekly period, minus the ones scratched out.” She motioned next to a small tray containing several polished stones, each etched with a single rune. “These seem to be some kind of safety mechanism. They’ve got their own paperwork and everything.”
Nocren ran his thumb across the rune, testing it with a spark of his magic. The etching flashed gold before fading. “It’s a neutralizing agent. These are enchanted for earth magic.” He picked one up. “Probably for those plots outside.”
He went back out, Calya in tow, and tossed the stone into the closest bed of dirt. The stone blazed with golden light as it passed through the barrier. It landed on the ground and burst apart with a loud pop, faint curls of steam billowing up. A sizzle filled the air along with an acrid smell, and fine grains of soil shifted along the surface. The light in the ward’s stones flared, then went out, the invisible barrier dropping away.
Using the butt of a ward, Nocren brushed it through the dirt. It felt dry and gritty, more like sand than anything else.
“Huh.” Calya considered the plot. “Guess the Coalition weren’t being completely careless.”
“Aside from trying to make something like Eylle’s poison here, you mean.” Nocren looked toward the hills rising at the back of the clearing. Despite the apparent efficacy of the neutralizing stones, his sense of foreboding wasn’t comforted. If anything, it grew worse. “This way. I think they’re dug into the rock.”
Leaving the horses to their own devices, they found a door set into a natural crevice. Nocren held it open as he ushered Calya through, his fingers brushing the side of her arm. She glanced sideways at him, her expression unreadable. But she didn’t flinch away, and as they crept through the tunnel, she followed a step closer to him than she had when they’d first set out.
The tunnel opened into a deep cavern. A mixture of light sources kept the space somewhat illuminated. They hadn’t traveled very far, and bright spots higher up on the walls and ceiling suggested breaks in the stone. More scaffolding was littered throughout the cave, with torches and lamps betraying the construction’s scant, temporary nature. A pair of torches across the way marked a ramp up to a room built into the wall.
But the main source of light came from the floor itself and a shallow pool of water that had formed in a bowl-like divot in the stone. The water seemed to be lit from within, though as they approached, Nocren saw that it wasn’t magic in the water but another piece of quartz. A much larger one than those capping the wards, and there through the designs of human hands rather than nature. The bowl in the floor also felt off, too perfect. Likely made with the help of an earth mage versed in stone shaping.
“Is that… the wellspring?” Calya asked, walking around the edge of the bowl.
Calya only had a surface level interest in magic, caring more about what it could do for Helm Naval than its greater role in the world. She wasn’t particularly well-versed in the subject, but she’d never gotten the impression that her home was running short on magic. A ley line ran through Central District, and the magic-born citizens of Graelynd seemed to draw just fine from what energy was inherent in the land. The country served as a natural basin for the excess that flowed down from the Valley, and Calya had never heard rumors, substantiated or otherwise, of the threat of a drought. If they were to have more magic, she didn’t know what a new surplus would mean.
“A poor imitation of one.” Nocren gazed around the cavern, visualizing the drawing he’d seen in the container and the space before him.
Calya gasped softly. She spun away from him, walking quickly toward the ramp on the other side of the cave.
“Calya.” She didn’t slow. Nocren cursed under his breath. “Calya, wait.”
She hurried up the ramp. By the time Nocren caught up, she stood before a long table set against the wall overlooking the cavern, where a window spanned the distance to allow full visibility. The glass held a faint aura of power, enchanted to withstand who knew what kind of damage.
“They did it,” Calya murmured, perusing yet another logbook, this one with clearly missing pages. The one she held between her fingers had the bottom half torn away. “I can’t believe they really tried to— Those arrogant assholes.”
But couched in her annoyance was a hint of excitement.
“What are you talking about?” Nocren asked. “Who are you talking about?”
