Page 53 of Elex

“Jerk,” I said. “Seriously.”

“Crete? I think,” Vlakas answered.

“Really? The site of the original Labyrinth?” I asked.

Vlakas shook his head.

“I visited there with the King when I was a child,” he said. “That’s further inland. But I remember that mountain range. I think these are the ruins of Heraklion.”

I tried to recall what we had been taught about Crete.

“Heraklion? Isn’t that the city that was destroyed by fire in the Great War?” I asked.

The residents of Heraklion had resisted assimilation into the Greek territories. It had been the capital of the Region of Crete, a group of islands along the Adriatic and Sea of Crete.

“Yep. They didn’t want to be a part of the Greek coalition,” he said, nodding and shining his flashlight down the hall. “Greece didn’t appreciate their reluctance.”

I snorted. Why couldn’t people in this world just live and let live?

We came to the end of a hall, a series of doors branching off to either side. I’d been keeping an ear out behind us, but no sounds warned of anyone trying to follow us in the building.

I opened the door cautiously, only to find a decaying stairwell into darkness.

I nodded at Vlakas. “Can you see if the stairs are safe?” I asked.

He stretched his hand out to touch the concrete floor.

“It’s a little dodgy going up, but if we’re heading down, we should be okay. Just stay away from the outside edge if you can,” he responded after a moment.

He moved ahead of me down the stairs to another landing. I closed the door behind us and knelt.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“Giving us a heads up if someone follows us in,” I answered.

Using my Air powers, I did another one of those finely tuned weaves we had practiced and stretched an invisible line of Air across the doorway. I manifested an Air alarm spell and attached it to the tripwire. If someone opened the door behind us, the alarm would sound, giving us at least some warning. It wouldn’t last forever, but a day or so should be plenty of time.

We moved cautiously down the stairs and reached the bottom of the stairwell. A door opened into another hall wherewe found a room with only one entrance. It seemed like it would be a pretty good place to take stock of our supplies.

“Turn off the flashlight,” I told Vlakas. “We need to conserve the batteries.”

Vlakas flipped his light off, and the darkness grew heavier around us with only the single light shining. We quickly inventoried the contents of the backpacks: two maps, rations for about two days, two flashlights, two knives, one coil of heavy-duty rope, a sheet of plastic that was about six feet square, a thermal blanket, an empty square plastic jug with a lid, some extra carabiners, a couple of flares, and a magnifying glass. Supplies were provided at random in the backpacks, making it so contestants had no idea what they would end up with. We were fortunate to have gotten two with food. Since we were underground, we’d have to figure out fuel for a fire if we wanted to cook anything.

The maps drew my attention next. They appeared to be topographical maps judging from what I saw. We’d been taught map reading, of course. We seemed to be inside of a roughly square area of the city if the maps could be trusted. It was bounded on three sides by a river and the fourth side by what looked like the mountain range edge.

“What do we do now?” Vlakas asked, his voice trembling only a little.

“We need to find food, fresh water, and a more defensible location. Too many people saw us enter this building, so we can’t stay here for long,” I answered.

“I think I can help with the safe location part,” Vlakas answered. “I picked this building because there are some kind of tunnels running beneath us. They extend just about everywhere under the city. Or at least as far as I can sense, anyway.”

“Any idea how deep?” I asked.

“Deep. Feels like fifty feet down from this level, or more,” he answered.

“Okay, I want you to figure out where we can access those tunnels. I’m going to see if I can find where the water I sensed earlier was coming from.”

We both settled onto the floor. It was dangerous for both of us to work sensing magic at the same time, but I was confident that if anyone was following us, the Air alarm I had set would give us plenty of notice.