'Owain!'
Iola sat up, her breathing ragged. Someone pulled aside the bed curtains, spilling light into the cocoon of her bed. The sheets were oily from her sweat.
A gentle hand pressed a wash cloth against her forehead. She pulled it away, throwing her legs over the side of the mattress.
'I must go!' she cried, but she was pressed back to the pillows.
'Easy, Iola. You've just woken.'
She recognized the soft baritone of her father's voice immediately. As her eyes focused and grew used to the mid morning light she saw the Hugh King and Queen Teleria standing at her bedside. A worried look creased her father's brow.
'You need your rest,' her father said.
'I'll go fetch more water,' Queen Teleria murmured.
'No, you don't understand.' A cord of panic was tightening around Iola's chest, making it difficult to breathe. 'Owain… something has happened. We must go.'
The king sat down on the mattress next to her, smoothing her hair away from her face. 'Your mother and Gareth and several of our best soldiers have gone to find them. She will return your brother to us.'
At those words the corner of his mouth kicked up into a smile. Iola wanted to scream in frustration, but her temples began to throb. She closed her eyes and gritted her teeth against the pain.
'Drink this,' he suggested, holding a cup of steaming tea to her lips.
Iola took the cup from his hands, letting it warm her palms. She looked over to the window. The snow-capped peaks of the Eagle Mountains were shining in the sunlight, looking as peaceful and regal as palace sentinels. They hurt to look at.
Iola squeezed her eyes shut, willing away the image of a stabbed Owain, bleeding out on the ground.
'Iola,' the High King said, 'your mother will find them. It will be alright.'
But the darkness had been so black and deep and vast. She could feel the expanse of it, the sickening drop in her stomach as she jumped forward. What else could it have been but death?
Rhys, she thought to herself. It's only up to you now.
The arched entryway faded behind him as Rhys walked down a long, empty corridor. He drew the sword from its scabbard, holding it aloft in his hands, ready to strike.
An odd sense of calm washed over him. He knew he had to hurry, but the cave around him was quiet and strangely peaceful. It was as though time had slowed down; similar to the feeling of the Night Market.
There was daylight shining down from cracks and holes in the ceiling. The passageway had been carved a long time ago, though it did not show the normal effects of time. He couldn't see cobwebs in the corners, there was no dust coating the floor.
The scrape of his boots on stone and his breathing were the only sounds in the hall. Eventually he passed through a second archway. The light began to dim a little. Rhys squinted his eyes to see better.
There were small darts of sunlight straining out of the sides of the wall, sending beams of light into his path. Rhys paused, feeling a shiver run up his spine as he saw that the rays were coming from the carved mouths of all manner of creatures.
There were the faces of men, twisted in pain and rage; the wide jaws of an angry lion and the pointed teeth of a dragon and more yawning, screaming maws. There were hundreds of them lining either wall.
And even more than the faces were the arrows. There might have been thousands of them, choking every spare bit of mortar around the creatures. There were other lumped shapes lying in the corners. As his eyesight adjusted, Rhys realized they were skeletons.
Rhys felt his muscles bunch under his skin, willing him to run. He took a step forward, sword at the ready.
The whistle of an arrow made him jump back. He felt a slice of pain through his upper arm. Looking down, he saw that it was bleeding.
What did the Morrigan say? He tried to remember, but the faces were peering at him and the air was stale and his thoughts were turned only toward Owain and his frightened eyes
He lifted his sword and another arrow flew out of the semi darkness, landing an inch away from the toe of his boot.
Rhys cursed terribly. He needed to move. Owain was still lying on the floor. If he didn't get to the sword…
Only the gallant challenger that looks inside, can defeat what lies beyond him.
But what did that mean? It made no sense to him now. There was nothing in him but pain and fear and anger. How could that possibly help him win this challenge?
Rhys closed his eyes, forcing himself to be calm. He wicked sweat away from his forehead and gritted his teeth.
Look inside yourself, he thought.
But when he did, a memory of Caer Dallben and summers spent adventuring around the farm came to his mind. Owain, always cautious, would never jump into something without assessing it. And Iola always needed to form a plan before she started something.
And Angharad… well nothing frightened her. Ever.
And then there was Gareth, who was excellent at assessing his surroundings and picking out the small details no one would notice.
And Matilda, who never did anything without a sense of honour or grace.
Rhys gulped.
'Gareth would have noticed the faces'. His voice sounded almost foreign to him, but speaking helped him puzzle it out. 'They serve a purpose.'
Holding out his sword, he cut it quickly through a beam of light. An arrow shot out from the side of the wall, quick as lightning. Rhys thought even his younger brother would have been proud of that experiment.
Kneeling down, he retrieved the arrow. It was small and thin and had the sharpest point he'd ever seen. Bringing it under his nose, he noticed a tangy, rotted smell.
'Poison,' he muttered. His wound might even now be festering.
He had to call on all his bravery now to make it through. But he needed to think. Chewing on the inside of his cheek, he wondered what Iola would have them do, had they encountered this if they were together.
Grunting, he tossed his scabbard aside, and then the sword. There was no sign of anything alive that wanted him dead along the corridor, and the bulky weapon would do nothing but hinder him. He threw off his jacket next. And then his thick soled boots for good measure.
Sucking in a deep breath, he gathered all his strength and began contorting his body through the beams of light.
Suddenly, the hall felt as though it were a hundred miles long.
The work was equal parts arduous and nauseating. At one point he reckoned that his dancing lessons had trained him better for this challenge than any time spent with the sword master.
As he neared the end of the corridor a wind whipped up. A loud screaming gale blew threw the hall, an icy spring wind streamed through the mouths of the carvings, nearly sending Rhys off his feet. He fell forward, wheeling his arms for balance. An arrow whistled out from the wall, slashing across his thigh.
Rhys shouted, more from shock than pain. He was sweating and felt shaky, but couldn't be sure if it was from the strain or poison.
Taking a moment to steady himself, he willed his body on. The second he crossed over the last beam of light, he fell to his knees, shaking.
Rhys took in several deep breaths, rising to his feet as soon as he was able. His sword now lay on the other side of the corridor. He was not going back to it now.
He stepped forward into a darkened alcove, refusing to look behind him. The stone was roughly carved here, and the passageway narrowed until he was forced to turn to the side to fit through.
He spilled out into a small room. There was a high ceiling with a small well of light coming from a long crack. The room was shadowy, but as his eyes adjusted, he saw that there were three doors in front of him.
One was wrought in gold and precious stones. There was a great man, carved in raised relief with his arms wielding a great sword. Rhys recognized it as Belin.
He heard Owain's impatient assertion at the Night Market ring out, cutting through his thoughts. Belin!
It must be that door, then.
Rhys paused, looking over at another door to the side of the room. That one was etched in bronze, inlaid with deep red carbuncles. He walked toward it, but could not name the king who was seated on the throne, a staff clutched in his hand.
Rhys suddenly wished he'd paid better attention to his history tutor. He was always more interested in sword craft and riding than reading books.
There was one more door on the opposite end of the little room. This one was meaner than the rest, with hewn wood and a rusted handle. Instead of a proud king, there stood only a simple farmer. He was leaning on a rake, a sedate look on his face.
Rhys scoffed.
He pressed on the door and it swung open on creaking hinges. The way beyond it was black.
'Not that one then,' he murmured to himself.
Then he walked to the golden door. His heart hammered in his chest. When he pressed on the gold carving, the hinges groaned. Rhys' stomach sank when he also saw only darkness lying beyond the threshold.
The bronze door produced the same result.
Dismayed, Rhys routed through his leggings for a match, or something to produce light. He'd been stripped of his belongings before he had been presented to Eadgar and the rest of the mercenaries.
Then, reaching under his tunic he looked down at the Wayfinder. It was still shining brightly, and lit the walls of the chamber around him.
But when he held it up to each threshold, using it as a torch, the blackness seemed to swallow up the light. Still, he could see nothing of what lay beyond.
Rhys pushed down the creep of dread that began to well in his chest.
The prince began pacing, history lessons and the names of long dead kings intermingling with images of Owain lying on the ground, bleeding to death. A sharp pang of nerves squeezed at Rhys' stomach.
He needed to make a decision and he needed to make it quickly.
He strode to the golden door. If Owain knew the answer, he was likely right. The relief of Belin was partially obscured by darkness. Reaching forward, he toed the edge of the black line where the light ended. Sweat poured down the sides of his temples.
Hammering his hand against the opposite wall, he cursed to himself.
There is more honour in a field well plowed, than a field steeped in blood.
The memory of his father's words stopped him suddenly. He was poised in mid-air, ready to bring the weight down on his foot, but found that he couldn't move.
'No,' he said to himself. He pushed back. 'No, there were kings before Belin, even if it is his sword that we are looking to find.'
Rhys walked toward the smaller door. By all rights it shouldn't have been the one to lead to a legendary treasure, but Rhys could not ignore the wisdom in the platitude he'd heard both his parents extol many times.
Indeed, there had been kings before Belin, but who ruled before them? There were still parts of Prydain where men and women ruled themselves, pledging allegiances only to a far and away High King.
Hadn't his father learned to wield a plow and fill a trough? And was it not these people, people who loved and respected and defended the land, who had full as much right to rule it?
If his own father could have been raised up to rule all of Prydain from humble beginnings…
Rhys laid his hand over the carving, pushing it further open. If he paused too long to think of it, he would never find the sword.
Squeezing his eyes shut, he leapt into the darkness.
And his feet touched stone beneath him. And touched stone again, and again.
But then he fell forward, somersaulting. The floor had went out from beneath him. Rhys yelled, scraping his fingers against the walls on either side of him. But he was not falling, he was sliding down a ledge. The passage was growing clearer the further he tumbled down, he could see the reddish stone growing brighter.
Eventually he was spat out onto a ledge.
His bones ached and muscles shook as he struggled to stand. He could feel blood dripping from his nose, he'd torn a hole in the right knee of his legging.
Standing on shaking legs, Rhys took in the spectacular view of the cave around him, gasping.
The bowl of stalagmites and ceiling of stalactites surged up toward one another, as though he were in the jaws of some great beast. In the middle of the maw was a beam of light, shining down on the rusted hilt of a sword that jutted up from a small pond of smooth shale on the other side of the cave.
Rhys nearly cried out in wonderment.
After all of their searching, there it was. Resting as easily and unbothered as a doe in a thicket. He only wished Owain were by his side to see it.
Rhys' wound ached as he toed the sharp end of the ledge. Looking around, he saw no staircase, nor craggy stones he could use to clamber toward the sword's perch.
So this was why no one had lived to tell tale of the last trial.
'It's impossible,' he muttered to himself, and his voice echoed like a laugh in the cave around him.
Rhys felt his stomach lurch as he looked down. The jagged rocks beneath grinned up at him. He did not want to know how many broken bones lay nestled at the bottom of the pit.
He collapsed to the ground, letting his knees hang over the side of the ledge. His wounds smarted, sweat poured down his temples, his heart stuttered in his chest. Rhys impatiently wiped away the blood from his nose on his tunic. And then, it came to him, so suddenly, so clearly, it was as if someone clanged a bell in his head.
A leap of faith, he suddenly realized.
'Oh Llyr, no.'
He could try to make his way back, find Eadger, tell him what he found. But Rhys knew that was impossible. By the time he scrambled his way back up the chute and went through the light beams again… Owain…
Pressing his fingers into the ground, he stood.
Now or never, he thought.
Rhys jumped.
