by Joseph Lallo
He lit the new torch from the old and raised it high. There was little to suggest which way was best, but he noticed that a rotting scent was strongest to his left. Reasoning that where there was death, there was likely to be the beast responsible, he marched off in that direction. It led to a long, wide tunnel with a low roof and a slight downward slope. He feared that it would end blocked by water as so many others did, but instead the slope leveled at a point where murky water was only ankle deep. The roof of the tunnel was only just tall enough to keep his ears from brushing the roof, and the water covering the floor was biting cold, but the scent guiding him forward was certainly stronger here. He pressed on.
Progress was slow, as he was forced to slosh carefully in order to be sure there were no pitfalls or jagged stones hidden by the cloudy water. The floor must have kept a bit of its downward slope after all, as more than an hour of twists and turns brought the water level first to his knees, then to his waist. The clash of frigid water and muggy air was shocking, but the scent still beckoned. It wasn't until the water was chest-high and he hadn't found any trace of what he was after that he decided to turn back.
After a few minutes of backtracking, though, something wasn't right. The water level stayed high, and may even have crept a bit higher. He stopped, eyes wide with chilling realization. The floor hadn't been dropping—the water had been rising! He forced panic aside and quickly assessed his options. The last branching cavern that led upward was well behind him. The water had been below his knees when he passed it. At the rate he was moving, the tunnel would be entirely flooded long before he reached it. His eyes turned back in the direction he'd been heading. He had no way of knowing if it would lead to safety or doom, but he had little choice. If he had to die, let him die moving forward.
Heedless of any dangers the water might hide, his urgency drove him forward. Almost as though it sensed it had been discovered, the rising water seemed to quicken its pace. Before long, it was hissing against the head of the torch and he was forced to sweep against the flow with his free arm to make any progress. Now it was neck-high, his feet only barely able to stay on the floor. Soon after, it was to his chin and the torch was all but extinguished, but there was a whisper of hope. He couldn't see it, but ahead he could hear the hollow echo of an alcove. The water continued its rise until he had to tip his head up to keep his nose above the surface. The torch finally went under, leaving him in total darkness. He released the useless light source and abandoned the ground entirely, pivoting to float on his back and scrabble along the ceiling with his hands and kick with his legs.
Only the top of his snout was above the water now, and he was moving blind. His submerged ears told of little more than his thrashing motions, dulled by icy fluid. That left him with only his sense of direction to lead him onward. He tried to shut desperation out of his mind. It would do no good. Precious sips of air came fewer and further between until finally the water met the roof. His lungs were burning and heaving when finally his clawing fingers reached for the ceiling and instead found only more water. He worked his arms and legs hard, and not a moment too soon he broke the surface.
He threw his mouth wide and took a deep grateful breath. Though they were no longer under the inky water, his eyes were still useless to him in the darkness. Worse, his skill at swimming hadn't improved much. Floundering in the darkness eventually took him to a wall. It was slick with the same coating of slimy liquid as the rest of the cave, but there were deep striations that made it at least climbable. He pulled himself from the icy water. Once free of it, he paused only long enough to cough his lungs clear. If the water was rising, he wanted to be as far from it as he could manage. He located solid grips with slow, deliberate searches using numbed fingers, and eventually found his way to a reasonably level platform to crawl onto. Once there, he collapsed, trembling from the cold and stress. The oppressive warmth of the cave chased the cold away in time, and the rest was forced aside. There were other things to deal with now.
The torch was gone, and with it the only source of light he had. Without it, the darkness was complete. For one with eyes as sharp as his, even the darkest night provided light enough to give him shapes to navigate by. Darkness, true darkness, was something he had never faced. It was unsettling, and might even have been terrifying if there hadn't been far greater concerns to consider: he had no food, and the path to the outside was blocked. Perhaps there was another way out, but he'd been walking with purpose for many hours, and with a light to guide him. Trying to find his way blindly through unfamiliar tunnels would just as likely lead him to the bottom of a chasm as to daylight.
Just as his mind began shifting and swirling with the first moments of panic, something else broke through and seized his attention. The scent that had brought him this far was near. Very near. The moldy, sickening stench of decaying remains was doubtlessly coming from this very ledge. He felt his way along on his hands and knees, always mindful of the edge. Steadily the ripple and splash of water was joined by the skitter of hundreds of tiny legs. Finally, his fingers brushed something rough and metallic.
It was difficult to be certain by touch, but he seemed to have discovered the remains of a knight. There was certainly a shield, and with it many metal plates and leather straps. He maneuvered himself to a crouching position, balanced on the balls of his feet, and felt for the only pieces of equipment he had left, his flint and steel. He dragged it in a short, swift motion and conjured a brief spray of sparks. It wasn't much light, and it only lasted for an instant, but his eyes didn't need much. Using the light of the flash without washing out his vision was difficult, but in it he saw a swarm of tiny black beetles scatter. They had been feasting on what little remained of a fallen warrior. Sturdy armor that must have cost a fortune was orange with rust. It was draped over what was now little more than a skeleton with scraps of flesh clinging to moldy bone. Beside it lay a pack, discarded and open.
It was a gruesome scene, but as he turned it over in his mind, he couldn't help but think that there was something wrong. He scratched out another rain of sparks, then another. Things were missing. The armor was undamaged. No bones seemed to be broken. There was no stain of blood. The sword had not even been drawn. There wasn't any evidence of battle.
He grasped at the ground beside the remains until his fingers closed around the pack. Inside he found a lantern, dry of oil. There was rancid cloth that still smelled of salted and smoked meats, and wineskin that had been utterly drained. One corner of the skin had been chewed—not by insects or rodents, but by large, blunt teeth. It had been teeth like the man's own. This was someone who had come prepared. He had brought plenty of provisions, and he had exhausted them. It was no beast that had killed this warrior . . .
The deeper meaning of the discovery had only just begun to come together in his mind when something demanded his full attention. There was a rumble just below the level of hearing. It began as just a tremble beneath his feet, but steadily it grew until it was rattling his bones. His heart raced and he crouched low, clawing for the grip of the sword and pulling it free, scattering the rest of the remains. He stood tall and planted his feet, eyes pointlessly sweeping the darkness. Gritting his teeth, he strained his ears, but they did him no good. The sound was coming from all around him. A deep breath told only of the stench of the fallen warrior. All the while the sound built, unrelenting. It reached a crescendo, the rumble shifting to a deafening grind and finally to a rush of water. He felt an icy spray of mist against his face and hands. The sound must have been a cave wall giving way, or perhaps some ancient natural dam releasing. It was no beast, but it was no less deadly. Already he could hear the lap and splash of water creeping higher against the wall that he had climbed to reach his current perch. He needed to find higher ground, and quickly.
He made his way as quickly as he could along the platform, heading away from the edge. In just a few moments, he reached another wall, one that wouldn't be nearly so simple a climb. The floor at its base seemed to
slope upward toward the left, and the echoing seemed more distant in that direction, so left he went. Eventually it led to a tunnel just barely large enough to crawl through. Tunnel after tunnel passed in the same way; wedging himself through whatever opening seemed to take him upward and away from the sound of water.
Before long, the splash of water was well behind him, but he didn't stop until he couldn't hear it at all. The trek quickly taught him that, with a bit of care, it was possible to navigate by ear. A wide-open room sounded quite different from a narrow tunnel. Likewise, a dead end, even a fair distance away, sent more echoes back to him than the hollow reverberations of a clear path. It wasn't ideal, but a few hard raps with the pommel of the sword on the stone floor could give him a rudimentary image of the cave ahead. At the very least, it was enough to prevent him from falling into any chasms.
An hour or so of tapping and crawling led him to what seemed to be a relatively dry and quiet nook in the mountain. He dragged the flint along the sword a few times, providing him with enough of a glimpse of his surroundings to see that there was no obvious danger lurking unheard around him. Satisfied, his mind was finally given the time to dwell upon his situation.
The remains had not painted a picture of a heroic battle with a legendary foe. That warrior had withered away. He had consumed his supplies, run out of light, and lost his way. By the end, he had been reduced to gnawing on leather to try to ease his hunger. He had starved, and with a pack that size he must have been in the cave for many days before it happened. Surely if the beast were anywhere to be found, it would have encountered him in that amount of time . . .
His stomach rumbled. Though he couldn't be sure, it may have been a day since he'd entered this place. He would need food soon, and he'd found nothing here that might begin to provide nourishment. A creeping coldness gnawed at his mind. After all he had been through, all he had survived, was this how it would end? Would he just waste away in the bowels of a mountain?
The iron-hard shell of determination that had kept the dark feelings and thoughts away until now had finally buckled. Despair and fear were rushing over him. The impenetrable darkness surrounding him seemed to press down, closing in. It was over. He'd made the wrong decision, taken on a task too great for him, and now he would pay for it with his life. His heart hammered and his breathing became swift and shallow. Images raced through his mind as the maddening feeling became more familiar. He'd felt this same hopeless fear once before. His memories settled upon the day he had tried and failed to catch his first thorn elk. He'd found himself up a tree, cowering just as he was now. Shaking, his fingers found their way to the inside of his shirt, to the pocket he'd sewn there, and the simple swatch of cloth within it. He clutched it in his fingers as the scene progressed in his memories. Sorrel found him. She talked him down from the tree, took his hands in hers, and confided in him the one lesson he was never to forget: never stop trying.
It wasn't over. He hadn't been beaten yet. He was still breathing, he still had his wits, and he still had his senses. He would not die as that knight had. There was too much left to do. Raising his nose he took a breath, long and slow. There was the lingering stench of the remains he'd left behind. Mixed with it were the scents of other fallen adventurers, older than the first and scattered. The dank smell of the cave itself seemed to be all that remained . . . no. There was something else. Something deeper. He couldn't identify it, but it was undeniable.
Three quick sniffs selected a direction, two quick taps gave him a mental picture of the way forward. When the cloth was safely stowed again, he was off toward it.
The way was treacherous. Despite being so far above the water, there seemed to be a permanent glaze of moisture on the stone. Even as his skill at navigating by feel and by ear grew, several times he lost his footing, and once he nearly fell down a drop that would surely have killed him. Finally, he abandoned the boots he wore. It was worth losing their protection to gain a firmer grip on the treacherous surface. When untold hours of travel brought him to a pool of still water, he approached it, hoping that a few swallows of it would hold his hunger at bay. Something was wrong, though. The water had a subtle smell to it that Sorrel had warned him away from in the past. Poison. Two more tainted pools had to be avoided before a pure one could be found. Near the second poisoned pool was the skeleton of another warrior, one who had learned too late of the water's hidden danger.
It was not until what felt like days later that he finally seemed to be nearing the source of the mysterious scent. By then he was weak with hunger, almost lacking the strength to drag himself forward. As the smell grew stronger, he became certain that it was coming from droppings of some kind, and they were fresh. That was welcome news. Fresh dung meant that somewhere near there was fresh food. He forced himself to continue, and steadily the odor grew stronger, until it was almost choking. With it came a new noise. It wasn't the drip of water or the grind of stone. The endless tunnels smoothed and distorted it until it was nothing but a wavering, high-pitched tone.
He was delirious with hunger and on the brink of collapse when he stepped into something pasty that oozed grotesquely between his toes. The sound was more distinct now, but his mind was too dulled by hunger and fatigue to work out the source. It was just a vague chatter at the edge of hearing. He fumbled for the flint and sparked a flash of light.
What happened next seemed to occur in stages. First, there was an explosion of sound. The chattering became a thousand times more intense and was joined by an unholy rustling all around him. Random bursts of wind buffeted him from all sides, and he felt the sting and slice of claws and teeth. His addled mind first was bewildered by the blast of sensations. He then believed that he'd at last found the beast of the cave. Things latched on to him, screeching and clawing. He dropped the flint and tore at one of the wriggling forms, managing to pull it free. Finally he realized that it was a bat. Another time he might have run for cover lest he be shredded by their claws and teeth, but his shriveled stomach reminded him that he was surrounded by thousands of flying morsels.
He swatted his hands and snapped his jaws, making a meal of as many as possible before the flapping and screeching died away. In the end, it was hardly a feast, but it was a source of food, and for now that was enough. He took a few minutes to recover, then many more to find the flint and steel he had dropped during the madness. It was an unpleasant task, but necessary. Now that he had a reliable source of food, and safe water could be found without much effort, survival was possible. That meant that come hell or high water, he would find what he was after, no matter how long it would take.
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In the absence of light, the passage of time ceased to have any real meaning. For Shadow, life quickly came to be measured in how long it took for him to become hungry or how long it took to become tired. When he was awake, he explored. It wasn't only because he felt the need to escape, or perhaps even find the beast which may not exist. He had to explore, because if he didn't, there was nothing to keep his mind from unraveling. His sanity was like a handful of snakes, wriggling and trying to get free; every time he loosened his grip for even a moment, he could feel more slip away. So he focused on the task, unwitting adopting many of Ben's habits.
In the back of his mind, he was always counting steps. He became familiar with the feel of the walls, the smell of the different caves. With each sleep-wake cycle, it became more mechanical, more innate. Soon he could identify a tunnel by the sound of his footsteps echoing off of its walls. The step count ceased to be a number and became something of a new sense. He simply knew how far he had gone.
The tunnels etched themselves into his mind, and in time he came to notice differences from one visit to the next. As before, many of the caves and tunnels had ended in water. One in particular, despite being a long journey from the bat cave, seemed to have the coolest and cleanest water. He made it a point to return there regularly. It was almost a treat to refresh himself with water that wasn't tepid or stagnant. Slowly, it be
came clear to him that the water was a few steps farther each day. It was a puzzle, and thus a welcome distraction, so he returned more and more, filling his stomach as much as he could so that he could linger there.
With each inch the water retreated, the stone it revealed felt smoother.
Finally, there came the day that, as he began the trek toward the water, something was new. He couldn't place his finger on it at first. When he did, he realized that it wasn't something his fingers or his ears or his nose could tell him. It was his eyes. They'd been useless for so long, relying on the spark of the flint to do any good, even his dreams had become little more than sounds and sensations. Now he was seeing the dim flicker of light. For an instant, there was fear, as though this glimmer could not be natural, could not be real. When the moment passed, he rushed down the slope as quickly as its glassy surface would allow.
Without his notice, a deep longing had begun to form in the back of his mind. Sunlight, a fresh breeze, the sounds of nature and life. They were such small things, but he had been denied them for so long that a craving had formed. Lurking faintly in the back of his mind, always present, it had grown steadily into a gnawing and desperate hunger. At the sight of what might well be the outside world after all of this time, the desperate need leaped to the forefront and would not be denied. His lungs screamed for a proper breath of air. His stomach raged for something besides bats and insects to eat. His eyes demanded to see color again, to see the world in more than flashes and moments. Everything else—the beast, his purpose, caution, everything—was thrust aside as the promise of an open sky called.
As he drew closer to the point of light ahead, his darkness-adjusted eyes ravenously drank in the details. The walls were a marbled gray color, polished smooth as fine marble. He drew in a whiff of air and found hints of things he'd been without for so long he almost didn't recognize them: grass, trees . . . people.
