I looked away from Elmidath, back to the shrouded, motionless figure. This was her father? “Are you sure?”

She nodded. “I can’t be certain, but it’s what the map says.”

“Uh. Did he always look like this?”

She looked at me like I was an idiot. “Of course not.”

That made sense but… “Then what happened to him? And why is he even down here?”

“How am I supposed to know? For now, let’s just get him out of there and see if we can do something about that stuff on him.”

I prodded his foot with my index finger. The darkness clinging to him wasn’t like what we’d encountered before, it was tangible. Not only that, but touching it was a very strange sensation. Where my finger contacted it, I couldn’t feel anything. There was no texture, no sense of pressure.

There was clearly something there stopping my finger from moving, but as far as my sense of touch went, I may as well not be touching anything. I withdrew my finger and inspected it. There was nothing unusual looking about it and my sense of touch otherwise seemed unaffected. Which was good and all but was it actually safe to handle whatever was encasing her father? “Do you think you can use your magic to bring him over?”

“Sure.” She formed something roughly arm-shaped from her blood and pulled him by his foot. For a moment he didn’t move, then whatever had been holding him in place stopped resisting. His body skimmed across the water to arrive at our feet. I knelt down beside him, though I avoided actually touching the darkness around him. “So, do we try to get this off him or what?” Not that I had any idea how we were supposed to do that. Pull it off? Cut it? None of the options sounded too appealing given its strange nature and the person who was beneath it.

“I think that would be best. Lift him up and hold him steady.”

Steeling myself, I set aside my weapon and lantern and lifted him up against the wall. The complete lack of sensation made me shiver; I couldn’t shake the feeling that my hands had disappeared even if I could still see them. Elmidath formed a small blade and poked the darkness covering his chest. The tip easily passed through the outer layer and she went to work cutting away at it.

Working slowly, she cut out a small square and pulled at it. The piece came free, revealing a patch of red skin. It was paler than Elmidath’s, but not by much. Taking a deep breath, she went to work around his head. It took a little more doing, but she pulled free the darkness and revealed his face. Between the wrinkles and the sunken cheeks, he looked far too old to be Elmidath’s father. Even his grey horns looked dry and flaky. In fact, was he even alive? It didn’t really look that way. “Is he breathing?”

Closing her eyes, she held her cheek just above his mouth then nodded.

“Is this how he looked before?” I tried to keep my tone as neutral as possible on the off chance that it was.

“Sort of. He looks a lot worse than the last time I saw him, but he’s definitely my father.”

Elmidath gestured for me to put him down and kept cutting until she’d freed his whole body. Tossing aside the pieces of the cocoon of darkness that had enveloped, she left them floating on the water’s surface. Free of confinement, the rest of his body was in no better shape; little more than a skeleton covered in skin to which some of the solid shadow still clung.

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He’d been a big man once judging by his proportions, but in his current state he could scarcely have weighed more than forty kilos. I hadn’t the slightest clue how he’d ended up here in this condition, but I felt a twinge of sympathy. He must have been through a terrible ordeal. Taking off her coat, Elmidath wrapped it around his waist to provide some modicum of dignity.

“Are you sure we should have taken this stuff off?”

“No. But we could hardly leave him in there.”

“What if it was keeping him alive?”

Elmidath looked away for a moment, then shook her head. “It’s too late to worry about that. What’s done is done.”

“I guess. Should we try to wake him up at least?” Judging by his condition he wouldn’t be able to move much on his own, but if he were awake it would still make things a lot easier than hauling his limp body would be.

“I suppose we should.” She looked down at him for a little while. “How do we do that?”

“Um, we could try splashing his face with water, I guess?” Though I didn’t know how much good that would do, it seemed like he was in a deeper state of unconsciousness than mere sleep. Clasping her hands together, Elmidath scooped up some water and poured it onto his face. His body jerked and he gasped. Moving ever so slowly, his eyes opened. Black and grey, they focused on his daughter. “Elmidath?” His voice was hoarse and scratchy, but there was no mistaking his pleased bewilderment.

The Demon Lord’s façade finally broke down and tears streaked down her cheeks as she clutched his hand. “Father, I- “was all she could get out before she was too choked up to continue.

He squeezed her hand. “It’s okay, just take it slow.”

Nodding, she took a deep breath. “I never thought I’d see you again.”

“I know. Neither did I.”

“What happened to you?”

“I died. Or so I thought. That was the last thing I remember.” He groaned. “I feel so weak.”

“We’ll get you back to the manor. You can rest there.”

Elmidath’s father seemed to notice me for the first time. “Who is this?”

“Cathal, my bound servant.”

“Your bound servant? How long have I been gone?”

“Only a few months.” She cleared her throat. “Oh, and um, I killed your brother recently.”

He chuckled. “I can’t say I blame you; I’d thought about it a few times myself. What happened?”

“He took control of Sarinknell. Of what was rightfully mine. I’m sorry, I should have done things differently but I let things get out of hand.”

He put his hand on her arm. “It’s okay. I’m sure you did the best you could. So, you’re Lady Sarinknell now, eh? It happened a bit sooner than I would have liked, but congratulations.”

“Thank you.”

He nodded. “Now, help me up, would you? And let’s see about getting out of here.”

Elmidath gripped his right arm and shoulder, while I moved over and did the same with the left. Between us we got him to his feet, and helped him along back the way we came. We were closer to carrying him than he was to actually walking, but he was no great burden. Nor could I complain about the effort, the man clearly needed help. Not wanting to embarrass him about his infirmity, I used my link with Elmidath. “How are we going to get him up? It’s too high for us to pass him.”

“I’ll handle it.”

Once we were underneath the hole a tide of blood spilled forth from Elmidath’s gauntlet, more than I could ever remember having seen her use. “Father, please hold onto Cathal and I’ll carry the both of you up.”

He did as he was told, clinging to me with his scrawny arms and gave me a wry grin. “Sorry we had to meet under such trying circumstances.”

“It’s no problem, sir. It’s an honour to have met you.”

“That’s what you’d call it, eh.”

In a series of jerky motions, Elmidath lifted us off the ground and onto the level above. The moment we were on solid ground, her blood lost all cohesion and splattered across the ground. Setting her father down on the ground, I looked back down. Elmidath was leaning heavily against the wall with her head bowed. Concerned, I hopped back down. “Are you okay?”

“I’ll be fine. Just give a moment.” She didn’t look fine. Her skin had turned a far paler red than usual and her voice was weak. With no easy way of getting her up myself, I returned to the upper level. Lying down in the water, I stretched out my arms to her. “Here.”

She frowned, looking like she wanted to refuse, but nonetheless she handed me her lantern, and after I’d set it aside, grasped my hands with her own. Pausing to make sure she was ready, I hauled her up. Though she had a bit of a trouble getting over the lip, we got there in the end. Once she was up, I let them both get a bit of rest while I kept watch on the plant-creature above us. Just as before it shied away from the light and made no moves toward us. It wasn’t long before Elmidath stood up behind me. “Let’s go.”