Ashen - Chapter 10: Preparation

 Chapter Ten: Preparation

No one needed to wake Ceru in the morning. The change in her sleep schedule kept her up for most of the night, but even so, the unrelenting heat of the morning sun and glare of the Pyre’s light on the pale and dusty ground was enough to shift her from her slumber. Even in the lee of the Black Ophelia, with the sun behind her and the long shadow of the ship to keep her cool, she and all her fellows were roused at first light.

    She dressed for the heat, fetched a tin mug of coffee from the cook’s impromptu kitchen, and joined the others at the map table. The scouts had returned a little while before sunrise and were lounging in the sand nearby, eating breakfast in silence.

    “The scouts put our target just beyond that outcropping,” Adovar said, pointing to a jagged trio of rocks in the distance. “We’ll find a small crevice leading to what is - apparently - a remarkably intact dungeon.” He indicated the spot on the map. “It’ll be a few hours march through the sand. I intend to have our base camp established before high sun, so we have somewhere to shelter against the heat.”

    “Are we going to need all of this,” Ceru asked, indicating the crates, barrels, and packs being gathered together by the dozen or so sailors around them. “Seems like a lot.”

    “My scouts aren’t paid to risk their lives,” the elf said. “Their job is to find these doors into the history of the ‘Verse. Not to go through them. We really don’t know what we’re going to find below. My years with the Explorer's Society taught me to be prepared for the worst, and to hope for the best. Most of this we'll regret having to haul across the wasteland; but we are marching into the unknown.”

    “I heard there were undead here,” Tormund said from over Ceru’s shoulder. He stepped up beside her, “everywhere. Are there undead?” Without waiting for an answer, he added, “we should’ve brought a priest.”

    The march across the desert wasteland was slow, hot, and uncomfortable. More than a dozen sailors, explorers, and adventurers, outfitted for desert survival and each one loaded to bear. Ceru and Oquee walked in the wake of the elf, who was sheltered from the oppressive sunlight by his attendant and an expensive looking parasol.

    By the time they reached the crevice, it was nearing high sun, and the entire party was exhausted. Dripping with sweat and moving slowly, but with purpose, they erected the elf’s tent and arranged the supplies around it.

    A few of the other crewmen were beginning to erect smaller tents around the first, when Adovar stopped them. He called everyone to him and then pointed to the entrance of his tent. Speaking a word from some ancient, mystical tongue, he pulled back the flaps of his doorway and ushered everyone in.

    Ceru could feel the cold air from within as she stepped close. Inside the elf’s tent there was space enough for all of them, with couches and cushions, and a small fire pit in the center. Toward the rear of the tent, which was easily twice as large inside as it was outside, there was a desk, cabinets, a small orrery and piles of books, each more ancient than the last.

    “This is amazing,” one of the crewmen said, picking a grape from a large basket of mixed fruit on a long table filled with meats, cheeses, water and wine.

    “It’s been a part of House Yaeldrin since before the first kingdom,” Adovar said. “It only came to me because I was the favored nephew of a long dead uncle.

    “We’ll shelter here for a short while, then descend into the crevice once we’ve refreshed ourselves.”