The Hour Glass Dagger

by Jeremy Marr

He blew on the sap-covered rag and within half a breath, he heard a “whoosh” as flame engulfed it. Keeping the torch at full arms length, he stood while adjusting his pack that had gone astray on his back during his panic induced, hand-over-foot, busted assault for freedom a moment ago. He opened his eyes and an involuntary scream forced its way out of his clenched teeth.

  Looking straight ahead, past his out-stretched arm, at the point where his torch and fist ended knuckle-to-knuckle, was someone looking at him past his or her own out-stretched arm and torch. He could feel blood rushing from his face while he moved his gaze upward. His eyes met the others man’s eyes, which were wide with surprise of their own. Not knowing if the other man was armed, and knowing that he himself was not, he decided to play it passive for the time being.

  “Would not have to play it that way if I had not had to leave Lefebvre that quickly,” he thought while as he winced again at that deal gone wrong. “First time for everything though,” he finished. He raised his free hand to the side of his face; palm out to show no ill intentions. At the same time he did this, the other mans free hand moved up to his own face, palm up. With realization creeping in like the tide, slow but sure, he felt like the King of Fools for the second time that night. He moved the torch back and forth and his reflection imitated him perfectly.

  “Thank Kessela,” he said out loud, finishing in his head, “that no one else saw me looking as scared and as white as a ghost as THAT guy did.” He had to chuckle at himself. He then turned to his left and saw himself there as well. He recalled the way the stone up top had acted as a mirror under the full moons glow. Turning left, again, where he did not expect to see anything but more stairs down, he was puzzled to find his reflection just as he was on the previous two walls. He lowered the torch closer to the ground and saw that the step down he felt in the dark ended seamlessly with the third wall just inches from where his hands must have probed in the dark.

  “What do you know,” he stated, “I’m guessing this whole thing was one large waste of time.”

 

  CHAPTER THREE

  THE ONE-WHO-MUST-REMEMBER