War of the Words/Chapter 23

Delnar wandered through a series of catacombs beneath the Temple in astonishment. Were all temples constructed in this bizarre fashion, with hidden depths and equally hidden secrets? To his relief, beyond the first level he did not discover any more evidence of undead presence. Still the catacombs wound deep beneath the streets.

'Water must be pressing in all sides of me,' Delnar thought. 'Being so close to the ocean, one cannot dig far without hitting water.'

"A most apt and accurate observation," a voice spoke from the darkness. It took Delnar a moment to both recognize the man who warned him of the undead menace and realize that the figure had perceived his thoughts without them ever being vocalized.

"A side effect of being where you are," the figure said, his face still buried in his robes.

"And where exactly am I, other then about twenty levels beneath the surface?"

"Closer to thirty, and in the inner sanctum of my patron, the Water Lord."

"This is some sort of specialized temple to the God of the Sea?"

"One might say that. It is where 'communicants' come to speak to the Water Lord and discern his will."

"Communicants?"

"Those few that possess the innate ability to communicate with the deities can become communicants. That I can communicate with you via thought means you possess the gift. Have you considered service to the temple?"

"No," Delnar responded. "I am and always will be a knight."

"So become a templar," the man said. "You need not align with any deity. Serve the temple itself. You could go very far."

"Further than First Knight of the Order? I doubt it. I am too old for such career moves, plus I never had a taste for divine politics."

"Oh well," the man said.

"How come no one knows of these places?" Delnar asked.

"Ordinarily, these areas are sacrosanct. Only the highest in the individual faiths and in the temples as a whole know where one might exist and to what deity it is consecrated. Ordinarily, your presence here would be cause for either your death or at least taking substantial pieces of your mind to keep your silence."

"Ordinarily?" Delnar asked.

"Yes."

"Why not now?"

"Two reasons: firstly, the Water Lord wished me to save you and your men because the world needs all the able warriors it can get to fight the approaching menace and secondly because this space is being inactivated and you knowing it existed is without consequence. It was found already by the undead and desecrated by them. It was also subsequently raided by numerous Vandarians who sought to escape by fleeing the swarm, not that they found solace here. With no place to go but through the sluice into the sea or back into the arms of the undead armies, they died. The wise ones, fortunately, chose the sea."

"What of the rest of this temple? Why is the Temple of Light sealed?"

"The Temple to the Light Lord was sealed by the clerics before they apported, I imagine. They would have had the clearest warning the undead were coming, even more so than the Temple of Darkness. As to that temple, it was never active in this city where the Water Lord reigned and was likely empty when the undead came. Though it is, of course, possible that the necromancer that brought this upon us worked from that space. I really do not know the local hierarchy. I am not from Neld or Vandar."

"You are not? So what nation do you call home?"

"Not that it is relevant, Sir Knight, but like you I was born in Deren."