Eje sits cross-legged on the first step of the staircase. Ariel and Salaya sit a few steps higher, legs dangling as they eat. Octave higher yet. “Hey Octave, have you ever killed another person?” Eje speaks through a mouthful of apple tart, provisions from Blaketik Manor.

“Tal certainly thought so, as you'll recall.”

“No, I mean directly. Like in a fight.”

“Why are you so curious?”

“Come on. We all shared stuff about our pasts. What about you?”

“Eje, it's impolite to ask someone about that though.”

Octave leans against the back of the staircase and looks down at them. “No, I suppose it's fair. I've killed before. All the mercenaries at the castle have too. You'll take lives too, when the time comes.”

Salaya looks at the others uncomfortably. “I can't imagine ever doing that. I swore when I first learned colour magic and its power, I would never use it to kill another person.”

“I once thought like that too. It's a gradual process we who fight undergo. I'm sure you haven't noticed yourself becoming more comfortable with increasingly violent measures, but it's begun, creeping in like the tide. At first, a wave washes up at your feet and you think nothing of it. Some time later, you look down and the water is up to your knees. Not long after that, you have no choice but to swim. Killing is like swimming, and I saw you swimming all too well when we battled orcs in the desolation and cut them down as they ran; some take to it quicker than others, but anyone can learn. People and orcs are killing each other without remorse, without compassion. Is there a difference between us? Irrelevant. At a later point, you'll look back and realise that killing one thing isn't so different from killing another. I killed a rat, so why shouldn't I kill a chicken? I killed a pig, so why not a horse? I killed an orc, so why not a horrible person we'd all be better off without? I killed a horrible person, so why not a bad one? It's a gradual descent into madness.” She laughs softly as the others shift on their seats. “If you're uncomfortable now, don't fear. You'll overcome it.”

“I can't see myself ever killing another person.” says Eje flatly.

“Once you see someone as an enemy, it's enough. Is there any person you see as the enemy, Eje?”

“No.”

“Not even Gaskaback? The water must still be lapping at your feet.”

“Gaskaback is a nation, Octave, not a person. The tide comes in, but it must also go out.”

Salaya cuts in. “This isn't an appropriate topic for a meal. What about that demonic magic? Where did you learn it? I need to know.”

Octave takes a last bite of lunch and washes it down with a swig of water. “I didn't learn it. It's something you pick up here and there. Travel enough and you'll start to see patterns in the world – that's your starting point. I never got proficient with it, but I can recognize its presence and manipulate it here and there.”

“It connects to lightning. How is that?” Salaya wishes she'd brought a notebook.

“No idea. It probably doesn't and some self-important mage stuck it there for lack of imagination. Even the name is nonsensical. Demonic magic? Who dreamt that up?”

“What do you call it?”

“Some call it empathic magic. That's insufficient; it's emotional, but there's more to it than that. I've also heard it called celestial magic, though that name is suspiciously promising and unclear. Empathic magic works at a simple level, however, and that wall back there was very simple.”

“Do you mean the wall had feelings?”

“Perhaps not quite feelings. But there were the stirrings of consciousness there.”

“Now that's weird and a little unsettling.” mutters Eje. “Now I want to get out of here before more walls bursts into life. Come on. It'll at least get me above the waves lapping at my feet.”

They finish eating and ascend the staircase, winding along up and up in the dark. Eje at the back and Ariel at the front carry torches; Salaya rests her mind. Whoever carved the stairs did so with the precision of an artisan. Each perfectly smooth step takes the same amount of effort to climb. However, the builder didn't bother with a central column, nor are there handrails. The higher they get, the less confident she is that the thing will hold. When she takes a peek down the middle, she nearly loses her balance. It's a straight drop down. The far side is no better. She trains her eyes on Ariel's back and never looks to her left or right again. When they finally reach the top, her chest is heaving, but more nervously than painfully. She's improved markedly from the easily tired Salaya who set out from Three Peaks mere months ago.

They exit the staircase through a doorway and leave the dark, damp maze behind them. “An empty room. Well this is hardly better.” Eje looks around. As opposed to limestone caverns, this room has been entirely constructed with brick and cement. “At least there are spare torches. I wonder if they're flammable after all this time.” They are. No sooner has she lit a torch in a bracket, but the door behind them slides shut with a dull slam. “As if we'd ever want to go back down there.” Salaya agrees. She and Ariel light the remaining torches, two for each corner. Thrown into relief, the room could be a prison cell. The floor, walls, and ceiling are all uniform grey mud-bricks. At the far end, a statue no bigger than a dog sits. “Kio really lacked imagination when it came to design, didn't he? Or maybe he didn't have much money left after paying his architects for the mansion.”

On the far wall, the outline of a single door can be seen, but there's no opening it. Salaya approaches the statue instead and it looks back up at her, more grotesque than she could have imagined. If she were trying to draw an ugly approximation of a stunted person, she could scarcely have done a better job: long ears jutting straight out of the head like bat wings, a nose that manages to be both squashed and curved, and a lipless mouth baring needle-like teeth. The arms are crossed over a thin body squatting on fat haunches, clawed feet protruding from underneath. She reaches down toward it, then recoils in alarm. The thing is watching her.

“Are you ok, Salaya?” Ariel walks over. “What is this thing?” The statue's solid eyes shift toward her and she freezes. “Is this is a puzzle? Do we have to figure out what it is?”

“Why don't we ask it?” Octave joins them. “Who or what are you?”

The statue's eyes shift to Octave, then its mouth cracks open and it speaks with raspy fortitude. “I am without name. I am the doorkeeper. You may attempt to reach my brother, but first, you must satisfy me.”

“What are you though?” asks Eje. “I've never seen a creature like you before.”

“I was crafted by Kio Blaketik to watch the doors.” It appears to be crafted from clay rather than stone. Salaya resists the urge to reach out again and touch it.

“Huh.” Eje looks the doorkeeper up and down. “I always thought crafting magic was a waste of time. Had I known people were capable of this, I might have given it more attention.” The doorkeeper sits dormant.

“So,” says Salaya, “um, how can we get through the door?”

The doorkeeper turns its stony eyes toward her. “If you wish to pass, you must prove your worth. If you have your worth, then you must prove it.”

“Another test?” asks Eje, flexing her fingers. “I'm ready.”

“A simple test for ones who can perform magic. I ask not that you show me strength or power or determination. No, your worth must be proven in your knowledge. Your worth must be proven in your expertise. Consider the branches of magic and tell me: which door did you enter through?”

“The green one.” No response. The doorkeeper has reverted to being a statue. “The life magic door.”

The doorkeeper's eyes pop open. “Correct. What door did you exit from?”

“The demonic magic door.” Salaya's voice is less confident this time.

“Correct.” Octave smirks. “What three branches come from colour magic?”

“Ice, fire, lightning.”

“Correct. What three branches are closely related to water magic?”

“Air, fluid, vigour.”

“Correct. What are the five bases of magic?”

Eje sidles up to Salaya before she can answer. “These questions aren't exactly difficult.”

“I know.” says Ariel. “It's like something from a children's test. Is it tricking us?”

“Information that was hard to come by in centuries past is now common knowledge.” says Octave. “If anything, this is confirmation that Kio truly did set all this up.”

“I guess so.” Salaya turns to the doorkeeper. “The five bases are conjuration, wilds, water, colour, and metallurgy.”

“Correct.” Though the doorkeeper has a monotone, Salaya could swear she detects just a hint of smugness in its voice as it lays out the next question. “Now consider the following scenario. A man finds out his wife is cheating on him. He hires a murderer to kill her. The murderer tracks her down but she flees and is lost in a river. The man and the murderer are both sentenced to death by beheading. On the day of the execution, they are led up a scaffold so that the crowd may watch. As they kneel and the executioners raise their axes, a single person appears before the judge and begs him to relent and spare their lives. It is the wife. What should the judge do?”

Salaya takes several steps back to discuss with her teammates. “Is this why Rol told us that story and gave us the stones?”

Eje shrugs. “Who knows? Maybe he's less crazy than I thought.”

Ariel says “That would make sense. The other teams might get their own doorkeepers and have to answer a similar question.” She ponders this for a few moments. “That would mean that Rol wants us to answer this the same way we answered his problem.”

“You mean Octave's bizarre answer? We should let them go?”

“That makes the most sense.”

“Ok. fine. Do it. But if he tells us we're idiots with no sense of law or justice, blame her.”

Salaya approaches the doorkeeper again. “We cancel the execution for both the husband and the murderer.”

The doorkeeper shifts to life again. “Very well. I will provide you with passage to the next room. Remember that my brothers and I act in a purely logical manner. People are the most untrustworthy of all, for they do not act logically.”

“What do you mean by that?” But the doorkeeper has fallen dormant again. Eje prods it to no avail. A simple statue no larger than a dog, and far uglier than one, squats on its haunches at their feet. A door behind it slides open.

“I wonder how much effort this all took to make.” They pass through and the door slides shut behind them. “This sort of enchantment couldn't have been cheap. And all of it just to retrieve some artifact? What sort of artifact is it?”

“I don't know, but – oh!” Salaya stops and turns back to the closed door. “It won't open.” She pushes and pulls at the stone, but it remains solid and impassive.

“What's wrong?”

“We forgot to put out the torches. They're going to burn out!”

“Who cares?”

“Who cares? What if another team gets into that room?”

“That team will have torches of its own. Relax and let's keep going, Salaya.” Salaya keeps going, but she can't relax. The corridor they find themselves in is brief, and the room it leads to, already lit. Slits in the stone wall reveal the light of day. Peering out one, Salaya looks over Arrow City itself.

“We're already above ground.”

“Salaya, quit looking out the window and get over here.” Salaya turns reluctantly from the window cut into the mountain and turns to where Eje is facing down another statue, a gargantuan statue. A statue not unlike the one they had just passed, but the size of ten men. Maybe twenty. As she approaches it, suddenly aware of the noise her steps make on the stone, it shifts. Its eyes blink.