Chapter 2 - 26: The Baron of Nirándomir

Foto de Francesco Ungaro en Unsplash

One by one, they entered the gallery that led down from Aniróndein's Gate, the Gate of the Silver Stars, behind Prince Erevin. Everyone was surprised, having seen the condition of the old Gate, to find the gallery well-maintained and with torches on the walls. It was well-lit and clean: that meant some kind of maintenance had been done, although it wasn't as closely guarded as the maintenance suggested.

Erevin turned and said to Danliada:

"You have to be careful: no one leaves a well-maintained building unattended, specially if there are important prisoners inside."

Then he picked up one of the torches from the wall and drew his sword again. He moved carefully down the corridor, checking the walls. For the first time since he had known him, Tunadros saw Erevin nervous. He seemed unsure of which gallery they were taking. They had turned a corner and then descended a rather steep staircase. They lacked railings on either side, but they were still clean and well-maintained. But when Erevin reached the second-to-last step, he knew that a trap lay on the next step.

"Stop! Wait a moment. Don't move. But I have a very strong feeling..."

"I understand," said Gutron. "That step isn't fixed."

"What if we jump over it?" said Domulus.

"No, I'm sure there's some kind of safety feature for the trap: some way to provoke something worse, if we put our feet on the floor of the back gallery and we haven't touched the last step."

"So what do we do then?"

After a moment, Erevin said:

"Let's see, we have to continue, and we can't touch either this step or the floor of the next gallery, which only extends a couple of meters, before continuing down there. But there are some ledges on the ceiling. If we can hold on, we can go to the next step without touching the floor."

Gutron stepped forward:

"Let's assume we can hang onto the next step. If we find the Baron, he won't be in good condition. How are we going to get him out?”

"We'll see that once we've located him. But I'm sure there's another direct exit from the dungeons. Besides, if they've fixed everything as well as this gallery, I'm sure they've fixed that exit as well."

"Okay, let's go then," said Danliada.

"You first, Gutron." They pulled the duenxy up until he could grab onto the first hook in the ceiling.

The duenxy made his way easily to the end of that step, which was deeper than normal, and when he reached it and came loose, nothing happened. So it was safe. One after another they went through like this, although some had more trouble than others. But they all made it through at the end and were able to continue down.

Erevin was in the lead again, still suspicious. The staircase finally ended a few meters later. Then there was another curve to the left, and as they turned around, they reached a flat area, although the ground wasn't very even there. They continued forward. From that point on, the tunnel began to look less well-maintained, but there were still torches on the sides. They had simply removed some cobwebs, and a little further on, they saw the beginning of another staircase.

But just before that, Erevin stopped again: there were some strange holes in the wall.

"Wait a moment, I'll check something. Don't go any further," he said, looking at them.

Then he dropped to the ground and began to crawl along the floor. Then he squatted and jumped up, then lay down again. Immediately, several spears shot out from both walls, crossed the gallery from one side to the other, and entered the holes on the other side. Then, he did the same movements again, and this time there were no more spears. Erevin heard the sigh of relief and said to them:

"Come on, you have to get through quickly. I know this mechanism: in a few minutes, the spears will be repositioned and ready to be launched through the gallery."

Everyone went through quickly: the last one, Yanos, passed and heard the spears starting to fly out again behind him.

"Oh, oh, oh," he said as he ran.

"Calm down, Yanos, you're done, you've made it through," Erevin told him with a worried face. "Go on calmly."

Since Erevin hadn't laughed, there were no jokes or gags at Yanos's shouts. Anyone would have reacted that way under the circumstances.

They continued along the gallery to the next bend, which led to the right. Afterward, there were other stairs, a few, about ten, but they were steeper than usual. They climbed them very carefully and reached the dungeons. They smiled: they were deserted, and judging by the smell and what they could see, there was no maintenance there.

"Let's get ready. I'm sure it's in deplorable condition... although I think it's worse than I imagine."

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Foto de Peter Herrmann en Unsplash

On both sides of the gallery, there were cells. The doors were made of bars, depriving anyone inside of any privacy. It seemed as though no one had been there for days: the floor hadn't been swept for weeks, and the atmosphere was terribly charged, as if most of the vents had been blocked, except for a few small windows, so there was little ventilation, which in turn increased the stench. They were all empty, but the stench came from the last one.

Carefully, they walked until they reached there, and when Erevin looked through the bars, his eyes first clouded over, and then he shouted angrily.

"Pass me that axe," he said determinedly.

Yanos handed it to him, and Erevin broke the lock and entered.

The Baron, dressed in filthy rags and unconscious, was chained to the wall with large chains. He was very weak: if they hadn't arrived at that moment, the end wouldn't be far off. As the fetid odor and damp filth penetrated his nostrils and his armor and clothing, Erevin felt his anger rise at the betrayal. Danliada had followed him, though she kept her distance, while he cut the chains as best he could. The Baron's body fell heavily to the floor; Erevin picked it up carefully and carried it out into the corridor. It was also dirty, but far less so than the cell he'd been in.

Kneeling down to check on his friend's condition, Erevin only hoped they hadn't arrived too late. Danliada, meanwhile, had brought out a small skin of water from the small waterfall in the Western Forest next to where she lived. She opened it and gave him a drink with care and patience. At first, the Baron swallowed with difficulty, but after a while, he opened his eyes.

"Erevin... I've prayed a lot..."

And he fainted again.

"He's very weak, but with proper care, he'll recover," Danliada said.

Gutron said:

"Someone is coming behind us; we have to get out."

Yanos and Domulos grabbed the Baron as they made their way up a ladder to the surface. It would be a difficult climb, but it was necessary for everyone to get out of there without anyone coming behind being able to catch them, dead or alive.

"Don't look down," Yanos kept saying, repeating it over and over again.

- Yanos, come on, you climb the ship's rigging as if you were walking on flat ground, Domulus told him.

"Yeah, but there's water there, if you fall..." He stopped talking because he had slipped, almost fallen and would have tumbled to the bottom of the stairs... or worse. On either side of the railing, there was only a drop of several meters that increased as they advanced up the stairs.

"The more you obsess over it, the worse it is," said Tunadros's voice behind them.

Finally, and without further setbacks, they reached the surface. There, Eliandar and Korian were waiting for them, like old men, playing checkers with a board they had placed on a flat stone. When they saw them coming out, they put the game away and went to meet them. Only then did Erevin see another figure next to them. In the thick trees, he couldn't tell what it was.

"They're chasing us," said Erevin.

"No problem," said Korian. He looked at Eliandar, and the two large Dragons appeared in his place. "Get in. We're leaving."

"We're carrying a wounded man."

Eliandar stepped forward.

"He'll carry him," and pointed to the griffin emerging from the thicket of the forest, trotting nimbly through the rocks and bushes. It was a magnificent animal, and it carried a sort of stretcher on top of it, where they could easily place the baron until they reached safety.

Erevin couldn't speak, between the excitement of seeing his friend could be cured and the betrayal of his mother, who was ultimately responsible for having stopped the faithful Baron. He only nodded, and then they all tied him up so he wouldn't fall off the animal's back and so they could go faster: his condition was too weak to linger.

Erevin, at first, intended to stay, but Korian told him:

"No, my prince, we must speak with you as soon as possible. There are things you don't know and that you need to know..."

"But they're going to attack Anírio..."

"Relax, we've already sent some people to help them. We believe they can be much more effective than any other aid you had planned."

And they set off for the Western Forest.

When several men, dressed in Hariokku's cloaks, came out the way they themselves had come out a while earlier, they only managed to see some distant specks flying through the sky. But they didn't know who had entered, and what's more, whoever had entered, had freed the Baron.

Right after, a man riding a winged serpent came down to where they were:

"What happened?" he said once on the ground.

"Who are you and why are you asking?"

He took a document from his cloak and handed it to them: it proved that he was on a special mission from the Chief of Intelligence and, therefore, could not be detained.

"Krarcok," said the head of the Hariokku guards who had arrived.

"Yes, that's my name. I'm here because I'm pursuing Prince Erevin. Have you seen him around here?"

They looked at each other:

"No, of course not."

"Well, what happened?"

They looked at each other again: this wasn't just a soldier, but an important agent, so it was better for them to tell him than for him to find out from others and then end up with a problem. The chief replied:

"In this fortress, there was one of the most important prisoners: the Baron of Nirandomir. He was in very bad shape: in fact, we had stopped giving him food and water so that he would die immediately. But after seeing movement on the beach and one of our officers found dead at the Aniróndein gate, we came to investigate. Well, the prisoner has disappeared”.

"I need to see the cell."

They said nothing, just gestured to him as if to say, "Come this way," and began to descend. They reached the cell, and Krarcok instinctively raised his hand to his nose: it smelled awful in there. But he entered the cell and it became clear to him who had freed the Baron:

"Well, you didn't see him, but Prince Erevin has freed your prisoner."

As he examined the chains, he heard a click behind him, and when he turned around, he had been locked in the cell.

"Ah," said the sleeper-maker, "so you've failed, and now you want me to take the fall, is that it? I regret to inform you that the locks don't hold many secrets for me."

He made a gesture with his hand, and the lock opened as he drew his sword out. But the guards, terrified by the stranger, seeing that he could perform magic, ran for the center of the cave. He surfaced, wondering how he would now pursue Erevin. When he came out, his snake was lying down, but when he saw him, he flashed a satisfied smile:

"Anything about Erevin?"

"Yes, he's freed the Baron. He's broken the locks, the chains, and gotten him out of the prison. The worst part is that those incompetent guards don't even know what happened, or at least, they haven't wanted to tell me."

The snake's eyes looked at him with a mixture of admiration and confusion:

"You have to admit the little prince is good, sir. It's obvious we arrived late, so in addition to repeatedly giving us the slip, he's managed to free one of the three most important prisoners. We must applaud."

"And now we have the problem of where the Baron is now..."

"No, that's not a problem, because we know," said the snake, rising as high as his body would allow. "They're in the Western Woods."

The man looked at her, quite angry. But he was more angry with himself than with any other entity.

"We can't follow him there..."

"No, sir," she said, with a softness in her voice that was betrayed by her hungry gaze, "but we can go and wait for her at the edge of the woods. She'll eventually come out."

He nodded wordlessly, and once he was mounted, she took flight.

"The master won't be impressed, Krarcok. Not at all impressed."

The sleeper felt the lump in his throat. Yeah, this wasn't going well at all.

---

Foto de Cory Thorkelson en Unsplash

The prisoner in cell number 9 was dozing when he saw the black wolf enter the cell. He was weak, but the animal had brought him food over the past three days, and since it was very difficult for him to eat raw meat, he had made a small fire in one place and roasted a little of everything he had eaten. Now he was a little stronger and realized they had given him up for dead: that was why they hadn't shown up for days.

He looked at the wolf: it was big and strong. That animal couldn't fit through any hole, so he was sure it could escape. But where to go? He looked at the wolf and thought: I'll decide once I'm out.

"I'll follow you. Tell me where to go."

The wolf looked at him, as if it had understood what he had said, and headed for a stone set back from the wall on one side of the cell. It would be difficult to get out, but this would allow him to heal and be able to return home.

The traitors were going to pay dearly, even if it is the last thing he would do.

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The prisoner hadn't cried again: the jailers often came in to check on her and always found her sitting on the floor, her head between her knees and her arms wrapped around her legs. Once they left, she continued to plot a way out to warn her brother. On the other hand, she was deeply worried about her fiancé: her disappearance had surely made him lose his mind and was going to cause a big fuss. She had to get out of there, and all she had left was her wits, before something even worse happened.

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With this, the second part of the Legend of Sinardia concludes. I hope you enjoyed it.

The third part begins with the story of two brothers, descendants of the knight of the dragon helmet…

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