“Can’t you just use magic?” Konrad said, giving another bone-weary shiver.

In the last few hours, he had discovered the limitations of his resistance to cold. Either that, or the bitter wind that seemed to creep into every place on the mountain was not a natural type of cold.

“I’m a witch, not an arcanist. I need components to use magic, and this soggy ash is no good,” she replied, prodding at the mushy dirt.

She continued trying to light a pile of wet tinder with a piece of flint for a moment before throwing the small rock to the floor in frustration. "Oh, very well.”

Konrad watched as Serena’s eyes went completely white. Her lips moved soundlessly, and her body was rigid. One of the boys in Fallow Vale had suffered from seizures, and it looked exactly the same.

When she finally spoke, she seemed to be having a conversation with someone that only she could see, in a language that Konrad couldn’t understand at all. Serena snapped an angry reply, and the small pile of twigs beside her exploded in a fountain of flames that blackened the roof of the cave.

“That was amazing; how did you do that?” Konrad said as the flames died down and the wood cracked merrily.

Serena threw some larger sticks on the fire. “Everything wants something; you just have to know how to negotiate.”

The light of the flames created a glow around them, but it wasn’t enough to penetrate far into the long tunnel that led away deep under the mountain. Before she had left to look for Rolo, Spirit had investigated the darkness behind them and hadn’t reported anything immediately threatening.

“She’s been gone for a while,” Konrad said, gazing out of the cave entrance and straining his eyes for any sign of movement on the rocky shore.

“She’s a strong animal, and this is more like her home; if anyone could find survivors, she can.”

The words didn’t make him feel any better. Of all the people he could have been stranded with, Serena was the last on his list. Rolo clearly didn’t trust her, and that should have been enough. But the voice also said not to trust her, so should he be following the advice of whatever madness had managed to draw him all the way here?

Finally, Spirit entered the cave and flopped down beside the fire, breathing out a sigh of pure exhaustion.

“Thanks for trying,” Konrad murmured, scratching behind the ear.

Spirit tried to lick his hand affectionately, but even that movement seemed beyond her, and she let her head fall.

“We should rest here for the day at least, then move deeper into the mountain,” Serena said.

“We can’t go anywhere until we’ve found Rolo. Renau and Briarstone are out there too; they might need our help.”

“We were lucky to make it this far; we can’t wait for the others. We don’t have any food or water.”

“How do you know that we are going to find those things in there?” He replied, looking into the darkness behind them. The cold that penetrated from the rocks wasn’t at all inviting.

“We don’t have a choice; at some point, the sea out there will freeze, and us with it.”

Serena laid down close to the fire and rested her head in the crook of her arm. Her wet clothing gently began to steam, and she quickly settled into the rhythmic breathing of sleep.

Konrad knew that he needed to rest, but first he needed some answers. He realized just how much he had relied on Rolo for guidance, and now he would have to call on another source.

Moving to the mouth of the cave, he called out softly. “Casovan, Lyran, Avram. Are any of you there?”

The silence was only broken by the sound of the crackling fire behind him and the crashing waves ahead of him.

“I don’t know which way to go,” he whispered.

A movement out on the rocks caught his eye, and he scrambled to his feet, peering out. A figure was picking its way slowly over the rocks. But it wasn’t the northman in his great fur cloak, and it wasn’t the dashing captain or the old sailor Briarstone. It was the waif-like small god who had given him the use of his leg back.

The figure walked right past Konrad as if it didn’t see him and stepped into the cave, looking around as if admiring someone’s home. Of all the help Konrad needed, he wondered if this had to be the least useful.

“I suppose you did mend my leg; that’s pretty impressive.”

The waif bent low over Serena and sniffed her. Its expression softened, and its smile revealed small, pointy teeth.

“What are you—?" Konrad began as the figure held out its hand.

He fell silent as the moisture in Serena’s hair and clothing seemed to seep out into the air above her and collect into a ball that spun in the air. She sighed in her sleep, and the ball of water floated just past Konrad and abruptly fell out of the air, splashing over his feet.

“Thanks for that.”

The waif opened its mouth wide, and its eyes crinkled with silent laughter as it hugged its little round belly.

“How about you dry me now?” Konrad asked, but the waif ignored him, moving towards the darkness at the back of the cave.

At the edge of the circle of light, the figure squatted down, and Konrad mirrored him. Now that he was close, he could see that the figure had faintly pointed ears that had little tufts of hair on them. There was a small glimmer under the thin shirt he wore, and Konrad thought he saw some kind of golden pendant hanging there. He didn’t look like any god that Konrad had ever seen or heard of, and he remembered that even Casovan and the Lyran didn’t really know what he was.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

“Can I trust you?” Konrad asked.

As if to answer his question, it held out a hand that was strangely graceful, with long, slender, clever-looking fingers. His palm hovered over the barren cave wall, and sprouts of plants and mushrooms began to sprout. Moss crept over the rocks, and a shining ribbon of seaweed grew from a crevice. The waif’s hand moved higher, and a trickle of clear water bubbled out, pooling gently into a hollow in the rocks.

The figure stepped back, clearly pleased with his work.

“Who are you?”

The waif appeared not to hear him, or perhaps chose not to hear him, preferring to wander off deeper into the cave. Here and there he stopped, hand outstretched, and more plants sprang forth as if he were redecorating the barren cave.

Konrad dipped his cupped hands into the cool water and brought some to his lips. It was clean and refreshing, and he drank more and more, washing away the foul taste of the salty seawater.

When he stood, the figure was gone from sight. He walked to the back of the cave until he was enveloped in darkness, but he couldn’t see anything at all.

“Thank you,” he whispered.

Having collected all of the edible plants he could, he filled up his canteen and made his way back to the fire. He roasted the mushrooms on a stick and ate them hungrily before filling himself up with the spongy moss and seaweed. Finally, with his belly full, he fell into a deep sleep.

Serena was still sleeping soundly when he woke, and he slipped out with Spirit in tow. The entrance to the cave was bordered by a stone archway that, at one time, must have been impressive. Here and there, Konrad could see carvings in the stone, but time and the elements had worn everything down. The remains of gigantic flagstones could be seen under the archway leading into the cavern, as if there had once been a road here. But where could it have led except out into the open ocean?

They traveled as far as they could on the rocky shore until the way forward was blocked by towering rocks that were razor sharp to the touch.

“There’s no way we can climb that,” Konrad said, sucking the slice on his thumb he had gotten from trying to grip the rocks. If Spirit tried, the soft pads on her paws would be shredded.

“Let’s try the other way.”

As they neared the far end of the beach, Spirit began to bark loudly and ran ahead, scrabbling furiously at something.

Among a pile of twisted driftwood and rope was Rolo’s fur jacket. It was so waterlogged that Konrad could barely lift it.

Spirit was searching the area, her nose close to the ground, and she darted off in the direction of the mountain. A groove had been left in the stones on the beach, marking the path where something heavy had been dragged, and they followed the trail up to a bare patch of rock ten feet high.

“Good work, Spirit. Is it Rolo? Did he go in there?” Konrad asked, his heart leaping.

In answer to his question, Spirit began to scratch furiously at the rock, growling and whining.

Konrad searched the rock with his fingers, exploring each minute crack and crevice, but he couldn’t sense anything that would signify a doorway.

There was a gentle crunch of stones behind him, and Serena approached, wrapped tightly in her blue cloak.

“What are you doing?”

“We found some of the wreck from the ship and Rolo’s coat. Spirit followed a trail to this wall; it must be a door of some kind.”

Serena stepped up to the door and began touching it delicately, trying to find some kind of seam in the rock as Konrad had done. She mumbled words that he couldn’t understand, and he waited patiently for a burst of magic, but nothing happened.

“It is a door,” she said. “But we won’t be able to open it. It’s an exit. We have to go in to come out. If your friend is in there, we’ll find him.”

“But why would he go in there? I can see the cave from here; he must have seen the fire.”

“Perhaps he didn’t have a choice, but if he were dead, they would have left him.”

“You said they. You know what’s in there, don’t you? You know about the voice that spoke to me.”

“What’s important here is that we move into the mountain. We can look for your friend inside.”

“No,” said Konrad. “I don’t trust you, and you seem awfully keen to get into this place. You knew about the voice as well. I’m not going any further with you until I get some answers.”

Serena held his gaze for several moments and shivered. “Very well, but let's go back to the fire.”

Rolo’s coat was hung to dry, and Serena cooked some of the mushrooms and ate the food that Konrad had foraged.

“You did well to find food and water,” Serena said as Konrad built up the fire with the largest pieces of driftwood. “It’s a miracle that anything was alive here.”

She left the question unspoken, and Konrad didn’t reply. She hadn’t shared anything with him, and the waif was a mystery he didn’t know if he was ready to share with anyone.

“I can’t tell you everything, but I’ll give you what you need to know; hopefully then you will trust me more. I live with my sisters, close to the Lost Coast.”

Konrad's curiosity was instantly piqued. Alice’s books often talked of the Lost Coast. “What’s it like there?”

“I can promise you that I know a lot more than you do about a lot of things, Konrad. If you want answers to everything that pops into your head, we’ll be here for some time.”

Konrad pursed his lips, and Serena continued.

“We witches don’t generally mix with each other, preferring to either live alone or in threes. But despite this, there is a common goal for our kind that has united us for hundreds of years.”

Konrad opened his mouth, but Serena raised a finger to silence him. “You may not ask about this; it is for witches only.”

When she saw that he was not going to speak, she nodded and continued.

“To fulfill this aim, my sisters traveled to the far north, to Montdun. But it was for nothing; they searched everywhere but could not obtain what they were looking for. Then one day they told me that they had been contacted by an entity that could give them what they wanted.”

“How did they contact you from the north if you were on the Lost Coast?” Konrad asked.

“We have ways of communicating.”

Konrad blinked. Serena’s lips hadn't moved, but still, the words had traveled into his head without taking the time to pass via his ears. If he had this power, he could speak to his parents whenever he liked.

“Can you speak to Rolo or Renau?”

“I have already sent them both a message, but this particular ability has limitations; they cannot reply, and there is a word limit depending on distance.”

So Rolo might know that they were here. It was some kind of comfort.

“My sisters traveled to this place three weeks ago and spoke to me from this very cave. Then I lost contact with them.”

A thousand questions burst into Konrad's head. He was desperately curious to learn what the witches were working on, but he sensed that Serena wouldn’t tell him, so he settled on the immediate issue.

“You said it was an entity; what does that mean, and what do they want with me?”

“As for its interest in you, I couldn’t say, but I did warn you about getting mixed up in the pettiness of the gods. Perhaps this is the reason.”

Konrad reflected on his previous conversations with the voice. It was true that it had spoken about Casovan with a venomous hatred, and Casovan in turn had sent him to the fishing village; did he want him to defeat this entity?

“As for what it is, that’s more simple. He was perhaps a man once; I don’t know how long ago, but now he’s become something much darker.”

“He’s a demon?”

“No, it’s not possible to become a demon, but those desperate enough for power can make bargains. This individual has given much, perhaps his very soul, in exchange for his power. If we can discover why that might help us.”

Konrad couldn’t even begin to imagine why anyone would make a deal with a demon, but one thing he did know was that now he was glad that Serena was with him. Taking on a demon on his second ever quest was much more than he was equipped for.