FWOOSH!
I was engulfed in a terrible pillar of fire.
Twenty-Four
It would’ve been ironic to survive the Elemental Plane of Fire for nineteen years, only to get burned to death in the Core after a few months.
But three things saved me.
My old crawler charm—which was designed to protect Red miners from extreme heat—activated.
The enchanted band I’d taken off a dead pirate, bearing the mark of Aarhobad, created by the vile elf who’d shelled my barge and murdered half my family, also triggered its protective magic.
And most of all, I’d gotten really fucking lucky.
Everyone is born with a bit of natural resistance to the magical element native to their home realm. As powerful as this spell was, if it had been based on any of the other elements, I would’ve died instantly. If it had been any of my companions who’d trigger this fire spell, they would’ve been immolated and burned to a crisp. Since it was me, it just really, really hurt.
It happened fast, but when the heat hit, I’d flung myself backward hard as I could. It was instinct from years of working around spitting lava and fiery plumes. This burned just as hot as one of those, but thankfully only for a few seconds; otherwise, it would’ve cooked everyone in the room.
I landed on my back, skidded a bit, and promptly had to tear off my burning cloak and fling it aside. Core clothing wasn’t nearly as fire resistant as what we wore back home!
The other Outcasts had been far enough back to not get scorched, but it still rocked them. Krachma had temporarily turned his skin to stone withImpervious. Azarin was shielding her eyes, and called out, “Oz!”
Swift Trax rushed to my side, coral sword at the ready, which was very brave of him because fire magic was notoriously unforgiving against creatures from the Plane of Water. As he stood over me, the cobwebs above us burned away into sparks. Then all the dust that had been blasted began to rain down in a choking cloud.
“Hold your position!” Rade shouted. “If anyone runs, you’ll just set off another trap. Carnavon, are you alive?”
“I’m alright.” I stood up and began stamping the fire from my burning cloak before it got ruined entirely. “Fuck, that was hot!”
“Is anyone else injured?”
From the responses to Rade’s question, I’d been the only one struck, and magic and natural immunity left me with nothing more than a reddened face and some of my beard and eyebrows charred off. When I checked my protections, the metal of my old crawler charm broke apart and crumbled to pieces. This hadn’t been the first time it saved my life, but it would be the last.Farewell, old friend.
“My condolences on the loss of your bracelet,”Trax sent solemnly.
That trap had been a lot flashier than the previous ones, and easily been ten times nastier than the biggestShroud of FireI’d ever managed to cast. Even a few seconds of burning had raised the temperature in the gigantic room dramatically. The other humans had surely begun sweating, but for me, it was a taste of home.
At least I wasn’t cold anymore!
Luckily, my light charm survived, and it revealed that the blast had struck the dust from the oddly shaped tiles. They were in various colors, and upon each was carved a different symbol. There werea lotof symbols.
“Well, that’s just lovely. It’s even more complicated than I thought. There’s got to be a pattern to this.”
“That one didn’t work, so just poke a different one,” Rufus shouted helpfully from where he was safely away from Korthican’s incredibly destructive magic. “You’ve got this.”
“Picking wrong once cost me a charm and nearly ended my life. There’s surely a bunch more spells ready just as dangerous or worse waiting, and I’d only need to guess about a dozen more right in a row to make it across safely, assuming that’s even possible at all. How about we think this through instead?”
“But that’ll take all day,” Rufus whined.
“Poking things until I die is a fine idea, but oh, look at that, the end of the sword got melted off.” And being at the center of the blast, that wasn’t even an exaggeration to shut him up. The tip was gone entirely, and the rest of the blade still glowed orange. “Sadly, we’ll just have to use our brains.”
“Huh… I suppose I’ll stay over here, then.”
“Why don’t you go check on Danny and Bognar?”
Rufus left after that, and the other—less stupid—Outcasts carefully retraced my steps so they could get close enough to see the puzzling tiles for themselves. There were dozens of highly stylized symbols, used repeatedly, across different color tiles. The one I’d touched was red, and carved on it was some lines with a sun on top. I recognized many of the symbols from theEncyclopedia Ettymus, while others were a mystery, and it all seemed too random to make any sense to me.
“Anybody good at puzzles?” I asked.
