The Sartious Mage (The Rhythm of Rivalry: Book 1.5) by B.T. Narro

Author:B.T. Narro [Narro, B.T.]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Published: 2013-06-29T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 21: Underground

They roped our wrists and ankles, and plopped us on the back of their saddles. Each was overweight, but they stuck us with two archers who were less heavy than the rest. I’d never seen ten fat men all in a group before. I couldn’t figure out what to make of it.

The place they took us to was surprisingly close, about a twenty-minute ride at an uncomfortable trot.

At first glance it just looked like the side of a small mountain, roughly a third of the height of the one where we’d made camp. This mountain contained nothing but bare stone and patches of dirt.

When the horses stopped and the men started dismounting, I noticed a crevice between two boulders ahead of us that had been hidden until we were right beside it.

They pushed us toward the gap with unnecessary shoves. Passing through, I could see the crevice was man-made. A thin path curved through the boulders, opening to a square grass field where the horses were tied. The portly men led us through the field to a doorway made in the mountain itself.

There was a wide wooden door resting crooked on one hinge. The door itself wasn’t dilapidated, but with one of its edges resting on the ground along with a slanted gap between the top of the door and the mountain above, it was a shoddy sight. To make matters worse, it looked like one man couldn’t move the door on his own. Two of them grabbed the end of it, braced themselves with a few big breaths, and lifted it off the ground, pulling it open with a series of grunts. I noticed then how thick the door was, equal to the width of the rotund men lifting it.

I looked behind me at Lisanda. One of the men had his arm around her. She looked squeamish, her shoulders crunched against his man-breasts. The man clutching her like a valuable prize had a scraggly, graying beard that hung like an animal’s claw, twisting into points.

The man beside me pushed me forward. I turned back ahead to find that those in front of me had disappeared into the mountain.

Following them, the first thing I noticed when I passed through the doorway was the faint but unmistakable stench of excrement. The next was dim, dancing light from lit torches along the walls. It sent a chill down my neck.

We emerged onto a wide, winding staircase that seemed to wrap around itself. As we went down the stairs, I noticed it encircled an enormous caged area that was the center of this cavern within the mountain.

“What is this place?” I asked with nervous wonder.

The man beside me gave me another shove. “Just keep going.”

We passed an open door along the stairs leading away from the center. I took a quick glance. It seemed to be some sort of storage room. There were shelves stocked with cheeses, bags of oats, and far too many other foods to see in my short time passing by.

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