“Well, what do you think?” Herald asked me with a yawn, having stepped away from the camp to ‘relieve herself’. It was mid-morning at that point, and the meat still needed an hour or two according to Herald. She looked badly in need of sleep.
“I think that you were rather unsettling, and that if he were not so distraught he might suspect you of trying to lure him into a trap.”
“Really? I was trying for relaxed and unconcerned. But I mean, what do you think about Barro?”
“He seems as terrified as I wanted him to, which only makes me more annoyed that he did not do as he was told and stay away!”
“What about me inviting him inside the mountain? I pretty much made it up as I went.”
“I am not sure, but I did not and do not have a better idea. At least this way we will have him under control. I will close the gate behind us, and then, as you say, we will make it up as we go.”
“Draka…” Herald fidgeted, her voice uncertain. “If it is possible I would prefer that we do not kill him.”
“Any particular reason?”
“He seems genuine and well meaning. He seems to be protective by nature, and I am using it against him. I feel rather bad about it, even if I think that it is necessary. And if it is true that he is an old acquaintance of Val’s I would prefer to hear from him before harming Barro.”
I sighed. She made a fair point about Val, but I didn’t like having restrictions. And I’d told him what would happen if he came back. I didn’t like backing off on my threats, and even the little voice wasn't complaining.
“I have long suspected you of being a decent person. Really, I am surprised that you tried and succeeded in deceiving him at all. I can promise that I will try. His concern for you does lessen my anger somewhat. I suppose that we could just shut him in there instead of killing him, since I do not see how he would get out, unless he has some kind of magic and figures out the gate. But I would remind you that not wanting strangers in my mountain was the reason I drove them off in the first place.”
“I know, Draka, and I am sorry if my request is unreasonable. I just do not feel that it would be right to harm him unless it is necessary, like if he intends to reveal you or what is inside the mountain.”
“It is not unreasonable. I have become… colder, recently. It is good that you remind me of the human view.”
“It is a relief to hear that. And speaking of relief, I really do need to…” She made a vague gesture into the woods.
“Yeah, go on. Do not torture yourself. And when you’re done, try to discreetly get Ardek out here so I can tell him what is happening.”
It was about noon when the meat was dry, cooled, and packed away. They left the skin on a simple frame. Herald had scraped all the flesh and fat off it, and I figured it was drying or something. I hadn’t bothered to find out. Much like drying the meat it simply didn’t interest me, which… I felt like it should. It’s the kind of weird, useless stuff that would have fascinated me six months ago.
It was, obviously, not the only thing that had changed lately. I could be cold and possessive in a way that I’d never been before. but everything just felt natural. It felt like me, and it was weird knowing that I was different, but not feeling any different, because at the same time nothing had changed at all.
The humans stowed away the drying rack and put out the fire after lighting a pair of torches, then led Barro to the dig and the gate. We kept the gate open for convenience as long as we were right outside, and when they got to the edge of the hole and the gate came into view Barro’s step faltered for a moment, as though he was reconsidering. But he pressed on, and no one else seemed to notice. I stayed in the shadows, not wanting to risk being seen in the bright midday light, so I lost sight of them as they descended. They kept talking, though, and when their voices quickly faded I knew that they were inside. Barro had left his donkey untethered, probably so it could run if something came to try and eat it, and it brayed and backed away nervously as I approached the hole. I ignored it, figuring that paying any attention to it would probably terrify the poor thing. And I was still full of deer, so it wasn’t interesting as prey, either.
I shook my head at the thought. Donkeys and horses were not food.
I gave the humans a moment to put some distance between themselves and the gate, then followed them inside, closing the gate behind me and following them at a distance where I could just hear their voices echoing down the tunnel. When the thick stone slabs folded together there was a finality to it. In the next hour or so, Barro’s life was going to change. Whether that change would be terminal or not depended on what he said and did during that time.
Part of me wished that I hadn’t been so soft, and had just killed him and the scholars instead of scaring them off. My instinct was to correct that mistake immediately and my human side seemed happy to let the dragon take the lead, but Herald had asked me not to, and that complicated things. It wasn’t as though I had to obey her wishes, but she was my friend, and I owed it to her to at least take those wishes into consideration. That, and I had somehow messed with her head, which meant that I owed her even more.
Damn it, I did have to obey her wishes. I really couldn’t kill the guy unless she gave the okay.
It was frustrating, but at the same time I was glad for the excuse. I didn’t want to kill him. It was the smart thing to do, but like Herald had said, it didn’t feel right. It wasn’t fair. As angry as I was with Barro, he didn’t deserve to die for defying me.
If he made himself a threat, though… if he intended to lead others to the mountain, or to tell anyone about me, then I would have no qualms about ending him there in the dark. I knew that Herald would support me. She had made it very clear how high my safety rated among her priorities.
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That pretty much settled it. I trusted Herald to make the right call. Perhaps it was unfair to put that responsibility on her, but in many ways she was more mature than I had ever been. I’d mostly coasted through life, focusing on doing things that I enjoyed and that made me happy. She had struggled, growing up as an outsider, setting goals and working to achieve them. I could probably trust her to consider the consequences of any choice better than I could trust myself.
I should especially trust her over myself when it came to life-or-death decisions now that I found myself needing reasons to not just default to killing someone. I could remember telling myself not so long ago that killing someone for my own convenience was a line I couldn’t allow myself to cross, but the past week it had been hard to feel it. It had been the same with Ardek. When we were leaving the house he was injured, and I didn’t see any further use for him. Why not just kill him? When we were at the Wolves’ base and I had questioned him, and I’d made my mind up to leave, I was pretty sure that the Wolves couldn’t keep him. I couldn’t let him go, and taking him with us seemed like a hassle, so why not just kill him? Problem solved. No man, no problem, right?
When you’re using Stalin’s reasoning, you should probably think again.
“Here we are!” I heard Herald declare loudly from up ahead, and then the vast space of the hub opened up in front of me. I shifted and moved in closer, circling them until I found a vantage I liked, where I would be able to see and hear well but where I’d be completely hidden in the darkness, no matter how closely Barro looked.
Herald was walking around with her torch, a small island of light in the darkness. “Look,” she said, her voice loud and harsh in the stone chamber. “There is nothing here, like I said. Whatever you saw, it is gone now.”
“Like I told you,” Barro said, standing among the piled bags of dried food and other goods, “this system of tunnels stretches for miles and miles. We first saw far from this chamber, in a small set of rooms that my employers were exploring. It followed us here, but it could be anywhere.”
“You still haven’t told us what you saw in here,” Mak said from the darkness behind Barro. “‘The thing in the darkness’ is not the most useful description.”
“Because I didn’t want you to think that I’m mad, though by the way you’re clearly humouring me I see that ship might have already sailed, struck a reef, and been lost with all hands. To be completely honest, I barely saw it, but what I did see – and I beg you to believe me – was a moving darkness, like shadow taken form. I don’t know how else to describe it. The one time I saw it directly it was… it was like an invisible creature passed me only feet away, but all I saw was its shadow on the wall behind it.”
“And it spoke to you. Threatened that the darkness would take you if you returned here, or even told anyone about it.”
“Yes,” Barro sighed wearily. “It did.”
“Yet here you are. Telling us about it, in the place you were told not to return to.”
“I told you that what I’m doing is foolish and dangerous.”
“So you did. Though, if what you tell us is true, ‘suicidal’ sounds closer to the truth.”
“Why did you come here, if it is so foolish and dangerous?” Herald asked, approaching Barro. “And what do you intend to do now that you are here?”
“I had not thought that far ahead, to be honest. If the gate was closed my plan was to set up camp where I found you and see if anything happened. If it was open, well, I don’t know. I suppose I would have had to go in sooner or later.”
“Why?” Herald pressed him. “You still have not answered the question of why you are here.”
“Like I said before, I’d rather you didn’t think that I’m insane.”
“No one here will think that you’re insane,” Mak said, her tone firm. “We’re adventurers. Strange things happen, and sometimes you see something you can’t explain. And I get the feeling that you want to tell us. That you want to tell someone. So go ahead. You say that you know me by reputation. I promise you that we won’t ridicule you, or tell anyone what you tell us. Whatever it is that you’re keeping in, that’s driven you here to a place that you say that you should not go, just let it out.”
“It’s in my head!” Barro blurted out. “Calling me. When I sleep I dream of it, telling me to return to the mountain. Telling me that I belong here. When I’m awake I feel the pull of this place, all the time. I’ve resisted for over two weeks, and I’m proud of it, but I’m tired. I can’t hold myself back any longer.
“Perhaps it’s a message from the gods, or perhaps the thing in the darkness really is calling me back. Or it could just be that my mind’s gone. I have to know. I don’t think that I can really rest until I do. I barely sleep. This is the most relaxed I’ve been since I returned to Karakan. I… whatever happens, I need to face this. To lay it to rest or to face whatever might be waiting for me here.”
“And then what?” Herald prodded. “Once you have faced the darkness, what then?”
“Then, if I’m still alive and sane, I will put this all behind me. I will keep it to myself, trusting Makanna’s word that you all will keep silent, and I will do my best to forget this place. If I’m wrong and there’s nothing here, if the three of us here had some kind of shared hallucination caused by… I don’t know, a gas pocket, maybe? Then there is nothing to tell. But if I’m right then the thing in the darkness is here, and real, and its threats must be taken seriously. I’ve already defied it, coming here and talking to you about it. Once I’ve faced it, if it spares me, I would be truly insane to do so again.”
“That is all?” Herald asked earnestly, getting closer to Barro and looking down at him intensely, like she was searching his face for any kind of deception. “Whatever the thing in the darkness is, you do not want revenge on it for driving you out of this place, embarrassing you in front of your employers and disturbing your rest for weeks afterwards? You do not want to seek fame or glory as the one who revealed a mystery to the world, or slew an unknown monster in a long forgotten dungeon? You risk your life simply to know, and would be content with that even if you die, or it turns out that you are mad?”
“Even then,” Barro replied, his voice soft but carrying across the chamber. His face twisted in a wry smile. “Besides, I swore to my employers to keep this place and what they found here secret. Your sister is not the only one who takes her reputation seriously.”
I could see by the soft set of Herald’s face that she had made up her mind, but the outcome had already been clear halfway through Barro’s explanation. “Then I owe you an apology,” she said. “I brought you in here under false pretences, and I do not like lies or half truths. Do you truly want to know the truth about the one in the darkness?”
“More than anything,” Barro said, his face desperate in the torchlight. “If you know something, please tell me! I have to put this to rest, or I'm afraid I'll snap!”
That was my cue. I stepped out from my hiding place and started slowly and silently making my way towards the group.
“In that case you should speak to the one who knows best. Draka!” she called into the darkness. “Would you speak to this man?”
“Draka?” Barro asked, looking around. “Who is–”
I interrupted him as I stepped into the torchlight. “Hello, Barro,” I said, trying to match my voice from the last time I spoke to him. A familiar mixture of wonder and fear painted his face. He barely had time to realise what was happening, his eyes going wide, as I pounced and drove him to the ground.