Page 78 of Soul of a Witch

“If I had better control, this wouldn’t happen,” I grumbled, applying ointment to my palms from a jar in the kitchen.

But Grams scoffed. “Fire is the most dangerous and difficult element to conjure. Even incredibly experienced witches still wear protective clothing to use it. Regardless of age and skill, mistakes will happen. Such is life.”

By the time I was standing in front of the vault, I was confident I could summon the spell if I needed it. With the grimoire clutched tightly in one hand and Grandma’s radio tucked under my arm, I stood before the massive sealed doors and took a deep, steadying breath.

Hopefully, beyond these doors lay the secret to destroying the God. We didn’t have the luxury of time to truly hone my skills; we needed a trump card, something to give me an advantage despite my limited experience.

Sybil had believed whatever was within this vault was worth protecting, even if it meant locking it away from her comrades. The thought filled me with anxious hope as I laid the palm of my hand against the door, and there was an audible click from within.

The gears turned faster, steam billowing out. Stepping back, my mouth hung open as the door trembled, then slid open, the massive metal vault splitting in two as it moved along invisible tracks set into the floor.

Darkness greeted me within. But as I stepped inside, two lanterns hanging on either side of the door flared to life, surrounding me in their flickering glow. I was standing on a metal platform, looking over the railing into the sea of darkness beyond. Metal stairs led down on my left, and I followed them as they curved along the stone wall. More lanterns lit as I passed them, slowly illuminating the room.

The space was shaped like a cylinder, with shelves set into the stone walls. Books were squeezed into every available space, along with piles of papers and hand-drawn maps. Dust motes drifted through the lantern light, and when my foot left the final step, a great chandelier overhead came to life. Two crescent-shaped desks were in the center of the room, facing each other like a ring split in half.

“It’s like someone was only just here,” I said, looking over the notes and open books on the desktop. A feather quill lay discarded upon a large sheet of yellowed paper, a sentence of Latin text left half-finished. I summoned a little flame in my palm, using it to illuminate the fading text.

“It has been demonstrated that aether causes significant damage to…to the…” I frowned, unfamiliar with the term scrawled before me. “Hellkite…”

“It is an old word for the creatures we now call gods,” Grams said, her voice echoing in the strangely quiet space. “It was long believed the gods originally came from Hell itself, like Reapers. Now it is known They came from somewhere else entirely. Another dimension, most likely.”

“But how?” There was a peculiar smell in here; beneath the soft odor of dust and old pages, there was a scent that cloyed in my throat, faint but unpleasant. Like old fish and stagnant water. “How is it possible for creatures to pass between dimensions?”

“Unfortunately, I don’t know.” My grandmother sighed, and I set the radio on the desk. “Perhaps we will find the answer here.”

A wide hallway with a low stone ceiling led out of the room, but I couldn’t see into the darkness within. Summoning another flame, I tried to send it floating down the hallway to illuminate my way, but it kept guttering out when it went more than a few feet in front of me.

“Damn it!” I hissed, accidentally burning my fingers. Putting them in my mouth, I said, “Do you know what’s down there?”

Grams replied, “Another study room, I believe.”

Lanterns came to life on the walls as I stepped down the hallway. Perhaps it was only my imagination, but their light didn’t cast as far as the ones in the first room did. The smell of stagnant water grew stronger.

Halfway down the hall, I paused. There was a room ahead of me, but I could see nothing within, darkness shrouding everything.

But I couldhearsomething: a strange, rasping rumble. My footsteps sounded different too, and I realized it was because there was water on the floor. My boots splashed through a shallow puddle as I entered the larger room.

Lanterns flared to life, illuminating a strange structure in the center of the room. It was round, built of stone, about three feet tall. A bronze lid was affixed to the top with a single thick hinge. It was ajar, revealing the deep inky blackness of a narrow tunnel leading straight down. Thick metal rungs led into the dark, and I shuddered as I peered down.

“What the hell is this?” I whispered.

Seizing one of the lanterns from the wall, I held it over the tunnel. But its light didn’t reach the bottom. If there was anywhere in this vault to hide something top secret, it would be down there.

Tying the lantern to my belt, I shouted, “Grams! There’s a lower level back here! I’m going to check it out!” The radio crackled faintly, and a cool breeze rushed around me as I pulled back the bronze lid, opening it fully. The metal rungs were slippery as I made my way down, covered in a greenish-brown substance that looked like algae.

The air turned damp and cool the further I went. After climbing about twenty feet, I reached the bottom, and my boots were on solid ground once more. Holding up the lantern and encouraging its flame to brighten with a bit of magic, I peered into the gloom.

It was a cavern. A narrow tunnel in the far wall led deeper into the Earth, but I ignored that for now. Three simple wooden tables, stained and darkened with age, stood before a chalkboard covered with minuscule writing. Beakers, corked vials, and all manner of strange glass laboratory equipment covered the tables, with ancient pages of fading text scattered everywhere.

Stepping closer, I raised my light to examine the specimens floating in murky glass jars. Some of them looked like nothing more than mutated lumps of flesh, bulbous and discolored, covered in tiny bumps that looked like…eyeballs.

Another jar held the familiar skull of an Eld beast, its thick fur and jagged teeth still intact. Others held strips of seaweed covered in neon green pustules and similarly afflicted fish. Making my way to the end of the table, I came to a glass terrarium, sealed with a cork covered in red wax, filled with a cluster of pale mushrooms. A tangle of white threads extended around the glass like a web, and the threads were tangled thickly around the inside of the cork.

As if looking for a way out.

I had to narrow my eyes and step close to read the writing at all. Not all of it was in Latin; some of it was written in the strange runic script I’d first seen in the greenhouse. There were lists of herbs and minerals, with some crossed out and some circled. My eyes moved rapidly over the words, my excitement growing despite struggling to translate the messy writing.

…break the flesh barrier…infuse…poisonous to the Hellkite life force…

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