All These Shiny Worlds

by Jefferson Smith

  Far above, she could just make out the crooked lintel of her home. She still wasn’t deep enough. She stared into the dark and lunged.

  ***

  The darkness didn’t swallow her alive. It scraped and slapped and arrested her with bony arms until she slammed into a deep cushion that enveloped her in a choking cloud.

  She sat up and sputtered. Gagged.

  “Shit.”

  “Yes, that’s right, Cave Daughter,” said the darkness above the rush of water.

  “Who’s there?” Kaaliya called.

  She inched forward, feeling with her toes. She’d fallen on a slope of some kind, the ground made of loamy packed earth. No, not earth. She knew the smell from the meager gardens grown in the upper houses of the Pit. It was guano. Shit.

  “Very funny,” she said, trying to sound brave. “Who are you?”

  Even the opening to the Pit was blotted out in a darkness so pure it settled like a film on her skin and eyes. Slowly, a subtle buildup of light burned away the murk. Separate from the rush of flowing water, she heard a sound like the scuttling of feet. Shadows flickered overhead. Insects, maybe, or bats. She continued scooting down the slope.

  Stark points of light winked into existence ahead of her, the source of the changing illumination. The points formed a loose cloud billowing out of a tunnel in the cliff wall. Water, which must have been from the spring, spilled into a stone gutter over the tunnel and diverted toward the base of the mound where she’d fallen.

  She looked overhead where the shadows flickered. Not bats or insects, but leaves. A tree grew behind her, straight and tall, with a trunk that looked like it was made of bundled limbs.

  At the heart of the glowing cloud forming in the tunnel, a figure emerged. It was short and broad, dwarfed under the high roof of the tunnel. Strange, sinewy gaps allowed the illumination to shine through where flesh and bone should have met.

  The cloud coalesced and draped the creature, and in the brilliance she could see a face. Twisted branches formed the outline of a head. Gaps suggested where eyes should be and in them she caught a gleam of spotted amber, each black spot contracting under the glare. The branches tapered together at the crown and pushed upward to form spiraled antlers.

  “So this is how we meet, Cave Daughter.”

  Her stomach clenched and she held her breath. The voice could’ve been an echo from the Pit, and the rumbling tone reminded her of Old Jai’s warning of the things that lived here. But far from terrible, this creature appeared regal, robed in light and crowned by horns that rivaled the beauty of a moonstrider’s.

  “My name is Kaaliya, not Cave Daughter,” she said.

  “You are embraced by the bones of the earth.” It tilted its head up. “And very fortunate.”

  She followed its gaze and saw the battered limbs of the tree reaching out over her. Picking out the path of her fall brought back each stinging slap and jarring crack of the branches. Fear tossed aside and her adrenaline sapped, her back and neck began to ache. Open cuts on her arms and legs burned.

  “Who are you?” she asked.

  “I am the root who pierces stone, watcher of the Elder’s passing, who runs deep and forever in the void.”

  “You must be a troll,” she replied.

  “I am the Hollow One, if lies are to be spoken.”

  “Lies?” She stood slowly, groaning with the effort. “What lie?”

  “Names. Words that seek to make us different.”

  She thought for a moment. “Some people call me Spider because I can climb better than most anyone. Maybe I am different.”

  The Hollow One raised its chin and gave a broken growl. It was laughing…she hoped. “Maybe you are. We are not.”

  “We? You don’t look like me.” Her bravery recovered, she moved toward the troll. “We’re very different.”

  It reached out a hand. Clad in the shimmering light to its wrist, the palm and fingers were a twist of bare wood the color of bone. She searched for her fear deep inside, but it had completely vanished. She’d known rough hands. Dangerous ones she needed to guide with subtlety and distraction, counting the time until the knock on the door. Despite the harsh appearance, these were not those hands. She took it.

  The troll traced her knuckles with a sharp finger. “Are these the hands that grip the walls when you climb, Spider?”

  She nodded.

  “Are they yours?” it asked.

  “Of course.”

  “Where did you get them?”

  “I was born with them.”

  “Ah, and they were spider hands then?”

  “No, I learned to climb.”

  “So you are only what you become?”

  “No… I mean, I don’t know.”

  “You are what you were when you came here and before.” It walked away from the tunnel, past the tree, and she followed, her hand clutched in the root-like grip. “The well is deep and you are always a part of her. There is no escape—only surrender.”

  She could see its eyes, sap in constant motion dotted with irregular spots, clenching and relaxing. It watched her and let go.

  They were on another ledge, not at the bottom. She and the tree and the troll occupied a large shelf with more darkness below.

  She stood at the precipice like she had so many times before. There were no shadows cast by the troll’s light, only smothering emptiness. The troll and the light moved away and those depths stayed the same.

  All she needed to do was to step forward. Surrender. It would work this time. She’d never have to leave her sanctuary.

  “You will follow us,” came the troll’s eerie voice. “But you will wash first in the water.” It said this not as a demand but a statement of fact.

  Why should she listen to that strange little thing? She’d be happier in the dark. She thought of Shailen above and hoped he didn’t follow. This was Shailen though. Fearful, cautious, he’d never come for her. He’d assume as she had when she let go that she’d been lost. Even Blind Old Jai, with all the things he’d seen and could still see, would think the same.

  Yet she’d explored everywhere in the Pit, and the tunnel beckoned. She walked to the entrance and watched the clear water trickle down either side, diverted by the stone gutter. She cupped her hands under the stream and rinsed her scrapes and cuts. When she was done, she looked up. The opening to the Pit was no bigger than her palm, and the dwellings tiny blemishes on the rock.

  She stepped into the tunnel and ran her hand along the smooth rock where the passing of the troll had left a luminescent coating. Light broke free from the wall under her fingers and floated toward her, condensing into a cloud. She opened her palm and let it cover her arm. A thousand tiny hairs prickled her skin, and the illumination bloomed.

  She squinted into the gauntlet of light. Countless eyes stared back. Miniature crystalline spiders coated her arm, their bodies glowing brighter than the cave walls.

  “Spiders,” she said aloud.

  Her voice filled the empty tunnel and even the splashing water behind her sounded far away. She half-expected the Hollow One to respond, but it was nowhere in sight. She raised her arm and made her way deeper into the tunnel.

  The sides narrowed, the ceiling dropped, and soon she was stooping but she pressed on, feeling more liberated than confined. Deeper she went until the tunnel opened into a tall, domed chamber. There, the Hollow One sat in the center on a carpet of moss.

  “Come.”

  She stepped lightly, feeling the soft squish of the ocher moss between her toes. Tentatively, she took another step. Her footing held, despite the constant sensation that she was walking on mist. The tiny spiders on her arm leapt into the air and floated toward the walls on hastily-spun strands of silk.

  “Is this your troll hut?” she asked.

  The Hollow One shrugged. “This is a hole in the earth. My hut. Yours.” It gestured to the sparkling walls. “Home to the spiders as you call them.” Amusement overtook its reedy voice. “They know you. This i
s good.”

  She rubbed her arm where the tiny feet had touched her. “What exactly do they know?”

  “That you are indeed a spider. You may catch many flies. Though one may prove too large for your web.” It patted the moss next to it.

  Kaaliya sighed and sat. “So many riddles. Why is that?”

  “Only truth is spoken here.”

  She settled into the moss and fell back without knowing she’d done so. Aching muscles uncoiled as she sank into the surface.

  “I’m so tired.”

  “See? Only truth,” laughed The Hollow One. It rose and moved toward the tunnel. She followed it with her eyes but couldn’t find the strength to do more. “Rest. You have a long journey ahead of you.”

  “Mhmmm…”

  The spiders scattered across the ceiling and dimmed. They did know her. In some strange way, they were connected. Like her and Old Jai, connected by stories. Or her and Shailen, connected by dual natures, like fire and water. Maybe she should have listened to his caution and not climbed down?

  So far under the earth, her clothes soaked through, she should’ve been cold, but she wasn’t. She felt…embraced. That was the right word. Isn’t that what the Hollow One had said? She’d been embraced by the bones of the earth? It was a strange feeling, but she couldn’t keep her eyes open long enough to worry about it.

  ***

  “Kaaliya?” She heard her name whispered and a hand touched her shoulder. Her name came again and someone shook her. Shailen. “Are you okay?”

  “You came?” she asked. She scrunched her eyes and rubbed her forearm across them. “How?”

  “I’m sorry it took us so long,” he said. “I tried to climb down…”

  She looked at the dirt on his hands and saw the deep earthy stain on his thighs where he must have clung to the rope for dear life.

  “But the rope, the bucket, it doesn’t reach down here,” she said.

  “We had to borrow more rope.”

  We. Of course he’d run to the village and gotten others. There weren’t many Pit dwellers who would bother tracking down a reckless girl lost so far below the inhabited ledges. She was surprised by the gesture, and amazed at Shailen’s bravery. She started to thank him but then her heart dropped.

  “Who did you get to help?”

  She hoped it was Old Jai. What better person to lead her out of the darkness?

  Shailen’s eyes weren’t on her but on the effusive glow of the ceiling. “Your father.”

  She sat up.

  A torch lit the narrow tunnel into the chamber. She heard a thud, followed by cursing. Her father squeezed in through the gap and the constellation of spiders above retreated ahead of the greasy torchlight. Shailen shrank away, distracted as he watched the ceiling move.

  The gap had been much too small, and she wasn’t sure how her father had managed to get inside. A welt was already forming on his forehead. Dirt and grime skinned his hands and knees, and she realized how out of place that was on him. His smile, supposedly of joy and relief, was a leering glare in the dancing orange fire of the torch.

  “My dear Kaaliya!”

  The cushion of moss under her felt like guilt and she avoided his eyes. His hand reached out to pull her to her feet. She stood without his assistance and gritted her teeth at the pain.

  “I’m so happy to have found you.” He pulled her close with his free hand and she flinched. She kept her hands at her side and her head down, waiting. He moved her to arm’s length. “I was worried I’d lost you like your mother. You can’t leave me like her, dear girl.”

  Shailen tore his eyes away from the ceiling where shadow and smoke had replaced the glowing spiders. His curiosity shifted to concern as he read her expression. There were things about her she’d never meant for him to know.

  “Are you hurt?” her father asked. He bent, inspecting her closely, the heat of the torch biting and the smoke stinging her eyes. Kaaliya looked away from Shailen as her father took inventory of the bruises and scrapes on her legs, then lifted her ragged shirt to inspect, finally ended with her hand in his, turning it over and over. “So much climbing has made your hands rough.” He sighed in dismay. “Come, let’s get you home.”

  Her father dragged her out toward the tunnel, the torch held before them. He continued to talk but she didn’t hear. Her feet left the moss and fell on the cold and uneven stone. Her father had blundered ahead without noticing the change, but she saw Shailen pause and press his foot deep into the carpet one last time.

  The tunnel, the ledge, they were both different in the fire’s unsteady glow. Darkness hunted them from the fringes. When they exited the tunnel the tree looked sinister, clawing up from the guano mound like a hand from a grave.

  “…firewood so close.” Her father looked past her to Shailen. “A healthy young man like yourself, you should be able to gather it?”

  Kaaliya stopped. Her father, still moving, yanked her arm and she stumbled out of the tunnel. His grip tightened.

  “What’s wrong?” He waved the torch toward where a fresh rope hung. Shadow crawled across his face. “Come, let’s go home.”

  She shook her head.

  He smiled, the corner of his mouth sharp points and his eyes flicking to Shailen. “You can’t stay here, dear.”

  Shailen watched mutely.

  “The boy will go first, eh?” Her father directed Shailen to the rope with a hard stare. “He’ll then pull us up with the winch. No problem.”

  Kaaliya looked at Shailen and his indecisive hold on the rope.

  “He can’t do it alone. Maybe you should go first,” she mumbled.

  “The boy has help, dear. We had a visitor waiting for you. He’s been very patient.”

  She shot Shailen a glance and he winced. He’d only mentioned bringing her father. Shaking her head, she swallowed back tears and understanding dawned on Shailen’s features. She’d kept her business to herself all the years she’d known him. Never had she invited him beyond that off-kilter lintel.

  “Maybe we should wait,” Shailen offered. “Let her rest.”

  Her father dropped her hand and spun to face Shailen. “We have no time for rest. It’s been one wasted night already, I won’t lose another.”

  She tried to hide from Shailen’s astonished look.

  “M-m-maybe she’s hurt?” More unexpected bravery from her friend, but he was pushing into depths he didn’t fully comprehend.

  Her father advanced and Shailen shuffled away from him further out onto the open shelf that held the tree. “She’s made of sterner stuff than you, boy. She’s fine, aren’t you?”

  Kaaliya nodded meekly.

  “I don’t—” Shailen’s words were cut short. The slap was sharp, a crack that lingered in the impenetrable depths. The boy staggered and raised his hands as darkness welled up behind him.

  “Don’t talk back to me. Climb the rope.”

  “Please sir,” Shailen wailed. “I mean no disrespect.”

  “You…” her father kicked the crouching boy and Shailen scooted away. Away from the tunnel. Away from the rope. “…are talking…” The man unleashed another vicious kick and Kaaliya stepped toward them, her tears flowing freely. “…not climbing.”

  “Stop!” she yelled.

  She withdrew as her father eyed her with suspicion.

  “Has he spoiled you?”

  The absurdity of the question shocked her and she couldn’t answer at first. “No! He’s a friend.”

  “Well?” he demanded, turning to Shailen.

  Any answer the boy might have given trailed off as he jerked violently backward, barely catching his balance. His groping hands, feeling their way along the ground as he scuttled away, had found where the shelf dropped into nothing.

  “Tell me!”

  Shailen’s wide eyes moved frantically between the edge and her father. Unintelligible sounds choked from his mouth. The bravery that had escorted him down the rope was lost and his old fear gripped him.

  “P
lease, no,” she whispered, creeping toward the two, scared that her presence might upset the deadly balance.

  Her father reached for the boy. Desperate, Shailen lunged for the outstretched arm. The two collided and her father swiped with the torch, battering Shailen’s forearm and releasing a spray of orange sparks. The boy gasped, his attention focused on the yawning void behind him.

  Kaaliya quickened her pace and the struggle continued, her father swatting and Shailen fighting madly to move away from the edge. The torch tumbled. Orange shadow dropped into the Pit like a dying sun.

  “You little bastard!”

  With the torch lost, the sounds were her only beacon. Muffled cries and grunts, rock scraping rock, wordless rage and protests.

  Then a noise reached her she’d heard a hundred times before while scaling the sheer walls of the Pit. Instinctively, she froze as though she were the one perched on the wall and the foothold she thought secure had loosened.

  A choked cry of alarm sounded and dissipated, like the retreating glow of the torch.

  She couldn’t move. Deep, solitary panting continued somewhere ahead of her.

  “Shailen?” she called.

  “This is your fault,” her father’s voice crept out of the black. “Now get up that damn rope.”

  Kaaliya turned and ran. She honed in on the sound of the spring that straddled the tunnel entrance and slowed, feeling her way around the corner.

  “Kaaliya!” her father shouted. “Come back here!”

  She moved faster. Behind her her father stumbled and cursed.

  “Hollow One!” she shouted.

  White light seared the walls. The only darkness was her own shadow made black and monstrous by the sudden flare. Spiders streamed along the ceiling and walls. She raised her arm and they spiraled down to sheath it, but they didn’t stop there. Tiny legs tickled her shoulders and face. They cascaded down her chest and legs. Soon they’d covered her from head to toe.

  Her father stood propped against the tunnel entrance, dazzled by the display. As his vision returned his mouth dropped open and his eyes shone like two swollen moons. She pointed a finger toward him.