The charged Fire Drake arrow found its mark.
A tremendous explosion ripped through the guts of the pig-steel mechanism, shredding it from the inside out.
Ancient gears burst apart, the massive mechanism wall was blasted free of its carriage rails, hurling black pig-steel cogs and rusted spears through the air like deadly confetti.
The duo had reached the end of corridor, Boris leapt left while Marla dove right.
Behind them came the thunderous roar of collapsing machinery.
The runaway mechanism wall ricocheted violently from side to side before careening into the end of the passageway.
”B-O-O-M!”
The enormous mechanism wall exploded into a shower of twisted pig-steel, shattered gears, and burning debris.
Boris scrambled to his feet and sprinted toward the wreckage.
The ruined mechanism wall was enormous.
It completely blocked the corridor, separating him from Marla.
“Marla!” he shouted over the crackling flames.
“Are you alright?”
On the opposite side of the burning wreckage, Marla climbed to her feet.
She quickly checked herself over.
Arms.
Legs.
Bow.
Everything still worked.
She rolled her shoulders, popped her neck, and walked up to the twisted wall of burning metal, raising her voice over the roar of the fire, she called,
“Did we just break up?”
Boris closed his eyes and let out a long sigh of relief.
“…Very funny, Pussy Cat.”
Boris reached into his kit bag and pulled out a cob tobacco pipe, packing it carefully, he leaned toward the burning wreckage, letting one of the tongues of flame catch the tobacco.
He drew deeply on the pipe and exhaled a thick cloud of fragrant smoke.
Even across the burning debris and cooking lizard man Marla wrinkled her nose.
“Are you smoking again?”
Boris casually waved the smoke away with one hand.
“No.”
Even though the debris seperated them Marla stared a long moment before snorting.
“Fibber.”
“I can feel your eyes Pussy Cat.”
She glanced toward the ruined mechanism, then back at him.
“So what now Honeybuns?”
Boris tapped the ash from his pipe onto a pig-steel cog. This chapter was copied from g.com without permission.
“No point standing around,” he said.
“We’ll regroup ahead, lets be quick about it, darling.”
Marla blew him a kiss.
“Okay.
See you in five.”
Boris reached into the air, caught the invisible kiss between his fingers, and pressed it to his lips.
“Don’t keep me waiting.”
Animus flowed into her legs and Marla became a darting shadow down the long corridor; Boris watched her then turned and hurried off.
As Boris traveled down his section of corridor his boot came down and activated a pressure plate, the floor before him fell away, revealing a tiger pit lined with spears!
The frozen stone floor fell away down into a deep pit, as the stones crashed upon one another down in the pit there was a great deal of noise, Boris whistled as he watched the floor fall away for nearly fifty meters.
“Damn, a pressure plate, and more spears.
Well, not a problem.”
Boris let the animus surge into his legs and feet and performed a wall run!
Running along the left passage wall Boris vaulted and wall ran along the right passage wall; in this manner he chained wall runs together until he had cleared the expansive tiger pit and entered into a dark room.
Carefully searching, Boris found one of those strange ceiling crystals embedded into the wall and let his animus flow into it, the crystal lit up, Boris looked around the room and found that it was a derelict library.
Boris noticed a book sitting in a glass case by itself.
“How provocative.”
But Boris was wary of the death traps at this point, so he decided not to take the most direct path to it but instead leapt from bookshelf to bookshelf until he had closed the distance.
Taking one final scan of the room he was satisfied and leapt down from the shelf to stand directly in front of the case.
Boris extended his spiritual senses over the display case.
Nothing.
No hidden mechanisms.
No pressure plates.
No trip wires.
He frowned.
“Really?”
Carefully, he leaned closer.
Resting upon a velvet cushion was a thick tome bound in white leather.
Its corners were reinforced with engraved gold, while dozens of tiny gemstones glittered across the cover.
The pages looked untouched by time.
Boris read the words on the cover and froze.
His heartbeat quickened.
He stared at the ancient book in disbelief.
“It’s…”
His voice barely escaped as a whisper.
“A Path Tome.”
Marla vaulted just as hundreds of steel darts erupted from hidden ports in the passage walls.
Whoosh!
Whoosh!
Whoosh!
The darts chased her down the corridor in a relentless storm.
Marla’s face twisted into a scowl.
“Oh, Boris is definitely paying for this later.”
“Are you game, Pussy Cat?” she mocked in a deep voice.
She snorted.
“You and your bright ideas, Boris!”
Wind Step still surged through her legs, but she could feel the blessing fading with every heartbeat.
Her speed bled away as the enchanted wind dispersed.
The darts were gaining.
Closer.
Closer.
One grazed her cloak.
Another clipped a loose strand of hair.
Marla gritted her teeth.
“Really starting to hate this place…”
Then—
Her eyes widened.
A doorway.
“Ha!”
With a flying kick Marla smashed the door down, behind her the steel dart death trap ceased.
Letting her animus flow into a wall crystal the dark room lit up, Marla winced as her eyes adjusted but as they did, she slowly looked around.
The room didn’t have much detail to it, really it was bare of any detail at all, save for one thing.
Turning her attention to the center of the room Marla observed a very large statue of a stone frog.
“A frog?”
Marla extended her spiritual senses and detecting no danger she walked to the stone frog statue, its mouth was open and on the large stone tongue sat a book.
Bending over Marla inspected the cover and gasping sharply brought both her hands to her mouth.
“It’s a Path Tome.”