The runeknight who brought the chains—a third degree from squad two—leads me and a few others up over the boulders to the twitching remains of the white jelly. While we climb and clamber he tells us what happened:
With what must have been truly incredible effort, the jelly, in a final desperate attempt to destroy the beasts and us dwarves tearing it to shreds, raised up huge sections of its body to smash down and crush its attackers. The technique worked, as evidenced by the conspicuous quieting of the cavern: things that walked were crushed, and things that flew were knocked from the air by the shockwaves.
But the cavern had never suffered such violence before. The final, most violent slam, to crush the creatures pulverizing their way toward its most precious organs, brought rockslides tumbling from the walls and stalactites plummeting from the ceiling.
The collapse killed the jelly. Only a little life remains in it: tentacles slap weakly at us as we make our way into the sticky, pulpy wound Cathez and his elites created, but nothing more. Those predators that survived the collapse are gnawing into its carcass freely.
The collapse killed many dwarves too. Most of squad six and their leader are missing, presumed crushed. Two in squad one and one in squad two were killed by the jelly’s tentacles before they could climb into its wound—which opened into a hollow digestive tract, fortuitously allowing nearly thirty dwarves to shelter within the beast and be protected from the falling stones. Squad five lost four in the rockfall. Squad three was the only squad which suffered no fatalities, though several members have broken bones.
All this, on top of those killed by the whipper beast, Othol who fell, and those killed by other beasts, brings the total number of dead and missing to around thirty.
How long will it take for the killer to equal that number? Our foolish mission has cost nearly ten times the lives he has.
I feel very bitter indeed.
At least now it seems to be over. We’re given sacks and told to climb into the jelly’s digestive tracts and up to the scent glands where I can see, as if through chalky water, most of the rest of us scraping out the glowing almergris.
Sticky pulp coats my boots and dripping liquid makes dark streaks on my dusty armor. It stinks in here of rotten citrus wine mixed with fermented meat and vegetables. Each step I take makes a slopping sound, and the walls of the digestive tract press closely, disgustingly, against me.
Some of the dwarves squeezing back past me with sacks already full have pieces of armor missing. I hope they do not catch some awful infection on their exposed skin and bring the death-toll even higher.
After several long minutes squeezing through the jelly’s guts I make it to the scent organs. They’re not as huge as I expected, merely the size of small rooms; the almergris is stuck to the walls in thick layers. I get to pulling it off and stuffing it in my sack. It’s very greasy, and extremely pungent, making the air taste like fire. It has a jelly-like consistency, wobbling as the walls shift and shiver from our movements; it’s not waxy and hard like the almergris I’ve seen in the fort. For crafting use I imagine it'll need to be cured or dried somehow.
Its pungency has the effect of destroying my sense of smell so that I don’t have to choke on the gut-stench as I make my way back out. Once I’ve exited the jelly, I walk about thirty yards into the rubble-field and deposit my haul into the already large stockpile there. Cathez is standing over it, looking down at the sacks—I wonder what expression he wears.
Maybe one that says: thirty dead, just for this?
I make my way back to the jelly, receive another sack to fill and, after having a small amount of rations and a swig from a beerskin—not my own rations and beer, for my pack is still buried—I push my way back into the wound. Three times I fill up my sack with the pungent yellow, then Cathez calls a halt to the operation and we are ordered to start organizing for the journey back.
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This means digging duty. The first stage of this is to clear a path between squad four and the rest. We exert our strength on one of the smaller boulders and roll it out of the way. Then we divide and start combing through the rubble. I manage to find my battered pack: the hard-tack is dust and most of my water gone. I help dig out a few more dwarves, whose armor is crushed and crumpled, caked with dried blood. My feeling of disgust toward the Runethane grows with each we pull out.
“It’s time to depart,” Cathez finally orders. His voice his hoarse and subdued, its vigor drained. “Squad two are rigging up the ropes. I’m afraid we probably won’t have enough for all of us to make it down in one trip. More rope will have to be brought up to help shift the wounded, so we’ll make camp in the entrance cave for now. Leaders, organize your squads.”
Barock calls for us. “Pick up the wounded,” he says. “Take a dwarf each, and be gentle. Two to a dwarf for the worst ones.”
“Who’ll take you, leader?” someone asks.
“Don’t worry about me. Get the worst wounded up to safety first.”
We nod in understanding and make our way to where they lie. Many are groaning, but most are silent. Galar is one of those who's been guarding them. His expression is serious and somber for once as he stares vigilantly out into the darkness.
I kneel down beside Fjalar with another dwarf.
“Wait,” Galar says. “I’ll help carry him.”
“Are you sure?” I ask, half wondering if he plans to drop him halfway.
“Yes. He’s my brother, even if we don’t always get along. It’s my duty to help him.”
“All right,” I say, and step back.
There is a scream of terror. I spin to face the threat, Heartseeker ready, yet the shaking, shivering dwarf backing away from the wounded dwarf next to Fjalar is not fearful of anything that Heartseeker can slay.
“The shadow!” he screams. “It’s here with us! Look!”
Someone shines their mace over the wounded dwarf. My eyes widen in shock. There are more cries of horror and disbelief.
His pauldron and breastplate were removed so bandages could be applied to his wounds. His blood-drenched underclothes are still on, so that his skin is not visible, but I can see the shape of his ribs, shoulder joint, and clavicle vividly, as if between fabric and bone there is nearly nothing.
“Pull the fabric off!” someone barks. “We can’t tell—”
Someone already is, and our fears are confirmed. The skin is dry as parchment and the flesh beneath shriveled to dust. Someone pulls up his visor and his face is skeletal, his eyes shrunken and cracked.
“What’s going on?” Cathez shouts, hurrying toward us. He looks down on the corpse in horror. “The shadow is here!” he yells. “Those with maces, come immediately! You lot, find what torches you can and try to relight them! Hurry up! Hurry up!”
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I am in the brightly lit entrance cave now, standing guard over the wounded with a torch burning in one hand. Most of dwarves are now descending with the sacks of almergris while we up here wait for squad two, which was the first to hurry down, to come back up with reinforcements and the rope and nets we need to safely transport the wounded. I hope they do not run into any whipper beasts.
We’ve been waiting for a long while, subsisting on what remains of our jerky, as well as dithyok meat seared by our torches, and drinking water polluted by blood.
Most of the water remaining in our skins we used for washing out wounds. No one is unscathed: I myself have hundreds of minor scrapes from where my armor has been beaten in.
My comrades, most of them senior runeknights with maces of light, are silent. Occasionally their eyes flick to me. Maybe they suspect me—is that the real reason I’m being kept up here in the brightness, where they think I won’t dare to strike? Barock told me I was to stand guard over the most vulnerable because I excelled myself, but I am starting to doubt that reason.
Galar is here also. His face is as grim as Fjalar’s is peaceful. I look from one to the other.
It can be no coincidence that the dwarf taken by the killer lay next to Fjalar, with Galar close by. One of them is the killer. I’m sure of it. One, or both.
Yet we stripped Fjalar bare to make bandages for his many wounds and, surreptitiously, I’ve already inspected his armor. He carried no strange weapon. And as for Galar—why would he risk slaying with so many others around? He also had little opportunity to do so: if he’d stepped back from circle guarding the wounded, he would have been noticed.
Maybe someone did notice him do that. More investigations are needed.
At too great a cost, the Runethane’s foolish expedition has brought forward the first signs of truth, the first hint of a conclusion to the terrible mystery that haunts us.