Ral ran towards the tree he saw up on the upper level of the canyon. The Wisdom had pointed to it and called it the entrance, so he had fully expected the Gate to be there. The talisman’s glowing runes even led him to the spot, but when he reached the tree he found nothing was around it. No Unseeing, no Somas, not even the odd animal.
Dusk had fallen quickly and he was surrounded by darkness with only the talisman in his hand for light. It was sufficient to light his way, but it was definitely a poor substitute for a torch or lantern. He could see the faint outlines of rocks and could just barely make out five, six paces in front of him. Ral felt his heart leap to his throat as he thought he saw a leering face in the shadows. The darkness played tricks on his mind, making faces where there were none.
Eyes of liquid green flashed before him, then disappeared. It seemed real enough to make Ral come to a halt. As he had made it to the place where the Wisdom indicated the Trial would happen, it was only natural that other Somas were there, vying to be champion. But he didn’t know anyone with that shade of eye color. He strained to hear some noises but of course, if it was a Somas stalking him, they would be well trained in the art of stillness and wouldn’t be making any noise.
Unsettled, Ral continued on. The tree had grown on a small mound that jutted out from the canyon. It defied all odds as the ground was rocky and dry yet the tree still grew, albeit stunted and sparse in foliage. North of the tree was a passageway cleaved out through the canyon. The rocks overhead occasionally merged together to form an arch but for the most part Ral could see the stars forming between the rocks from below.
The feeling of unease was magnified by the strange external feelings of despair and restlessness of the Gate. It made Ral’s stomach turn, much like the sea sickness he suffered when Rask took him and Aris to the Academy on the island across the Aortic strait. He shoved the feeling aside and kept running.
Ral ran closer - he knew he approached because the talisman grew brighter and the feeling worsened. This was his chance. He had to go see this Gate and find out how or why it opened. It would be the only one that’s recorded so far South and in Yscian territory. He had to do something to help Rask, Aris, his lost home - he had to do something because he’s failed at everything else.
He gritted his teeth, running faster. He tried not to think about it, but it could also be a chance for him to prove himself to the Somas again. It was a chance Mikol gave him, he could not squander it. Bette needed to know it was a mistake to keep him back. The rest of the Leaders needed to know he could be one of them. He just… he just…
Ral heard the sound and instinctively moved to the side. A boulder the size of his head narrowly missed his shoulder and smashed into the ground. Bright blue eyes shone out from the dark and he dodged again as Calkin lunged down from somewhere above him to strike him.
“You dare to be here, blood-head,” Calkin snarled.
Ral cursed and swerved again to dodge another strike. He tried to retaliate but the more experienced Somas was too quick for him to land a hit. “No fight,” he panted out, rapidly trying to find the right words in Yscian. “I want to see… doorway. Just doorway!”
Calkin spat out some swear words and Ral assumed his plea was either not understood or ignored - he would bet on the latter. It suddenly occurred to him that this was what Bette was so afraid of - during the Trial, no Leaders would observe it and there were no rules against fighting. Who says that the other Somas vying for Champion wouldn’t try to sabotage others? Calkin was using this opportunity to kill him.
Ral hastily drew out a strip of cloth of the wrappings around his waist holding up his trousers, threaded it through the hole of the talisman and tucked the end of the strip back in place to hold the talisman there. He then ran northwards down the canyon pathway, avoiding more rocks smashing down from above. The momentum of running flung him up from the ground and he briefly ran the sides of the canyon before jumping heavily back down. He grasped at the rocks almost blindly, praying to the sun that the walls didn’t change unexpectedly.
But the Somas caught up and struck him between the shoulder blades and he stumbled down to the dirt and rock floor. “No fight!” he shouted, his voice bouncing off the canyon walls. “No fight!”
Ral could feel Calkin hurtling towards him, his fury as heavy as the strange despair the Gate gave off. He couldn’t see the glow from the talisman Calkin should be holding, so Ral assumed the Somas had either discarded it or hidden it away. Ral rolled to the side and sprang to his feet as fast as he could and pivoted, clutching his fists together and aimed at the projected spot where the Somas would be. Unlike last time, his aim wasn’t perfect and it glanced off Calkin’s arm. There was a rush of air as the Somas spun around from the glancing blow to aim a kick at his head. Ral was only just able to block with his forearms and he grasped Calkin’s kicking leg and flung him as hard as he could away. He heard the Somas land lightly somewhere in the dark many paces away.
“No fight!” Ral said angrily.
“We fight,” Calkin hissed. “Until death.”
Swearing, Ral pelted away from him. He didn’t want to kill Calkin. In fact, Ral has never killed a person before. This wasn’t the time. He kept running, thinking he was faster since the Somas didn’t strike him. But then he felt the man approach again at high speed and he pivoted again to avoid the strike. It was strange because Calkin was probably fast enough to nail the hit but then his back foot didn’t make contact with the ground and Ral realized what he was doing - he was purposely made to lose balance.
The ground dropped off to a steep cliff he didn’t notice as he was too busy avoiding Calkin. Ral twisted, trying to grasp something on the side of the cliff to break his fall. He had no idea how far the drop was. The rock tore at his fingers despite them being toughened and calloused from his time training. Ignoring the stinging, he climbed down as swiftly as he could, barely feeling out the rocks until Calkin’s whole body slid down. The maneuver separated Ral from the rock face and he was forced to continue falling.
He hit the ground painfully. It was his shoulder again. He cried out as he tried to stand but the sound was quickly drowned out by a terrible trilling sound. Ral froze, recognizing it.
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The unseeing slowly revealed itself to him, the dim glow of the talisman at his waist barely able to show him the monster about fifteen paces to his right. Calkin was no longer approaching him. Ral curled the hand attached to his good shoulder into a fist - did the Somas do it purposely? Was he rushed into a pit of Unseeing strategically, or was this revenge?
Whatever the reason, he had to live. This was a Trial, he thought. He had to prove to himself that he was worthy of accomplishing something. He picked up a rock with his good arm and winced as he tested the movement of his bad one. Stillness. He needed that right now. In stillness he could achieve speed. He clenched the rock in his hand and waited.
Making a louder trilling sound, the Unseeing bounded forward, a huge mouth open towards him. In the dim light Ral could still see the seemingly slick surface of its too pale flesh. He unleashed the speed at the same time, surging forwards, rock arm reared back. It crashed into the Unseeing’s skull and it howled in pain, staggering back. Ral had left a dent in its head that bled profusely.
It fell onto its side and Ral quickly took the chance to make a killing blow. He had no qualms killing monsters - back when he still traveled with Rask he had to take out a few when they ran into unfortunate villages overrun with them. Of course, back then, Rask did most of the work. They had found the monsters had a brain and a heart - attacking either resulted in a swift death, like in people.
The second hit didn’t render the Unseeing motionless. A third, gore splattered one did.
Panting with exertion, Ral threw away the blood slicked rock and motioned wildly around him. “Fear?” he hollered out as loud as he could, voice echoing off the walls. “You fear monsters?”
He could feel Calkin’s fury again, roiling through the Solvent. Bette had always advised against goading people, but surely this was the exception. Surely even someone as conceited as Calkin could see how much of a cowardly piece of shit he was being. Too proud to lose to a Gaian again, he left Ral to fight off an Unseeing with his bare hands.
Making a disgusted sound, Ral took off yet again towards the source of the gut curdling feeling of despair, the talisman on his waist shining brighter with every step. He thought that it was because of the talisman that it became easier to see, but then he glanced up and saw that there were torches now installed on the canyon walls.
The passage down the crack of the canyon drew together to a narrow opening and Ral tensed up when he saw Yscians with familiar faces standing around in the cavern it opened to. Young Somas men that Mikol regularly train with, all around his age. Too-pale white bodies of Unseeing lay strewn around the cavern floor, bleeding out with limbs torn off and skulls caved in. Of course the Somas trained scouts and soldiers were able to take on Unseeing. Seeing the bodies there made Ral consider that perhaps Calkin wasn’t afraid of the Unseeing, but rather left one for Ral in the hopes it would do the dirty work of killing him. It would mean Calkin wasn’t cowardly, just an arsehole.
At the far end of the cavern was a strange sight. Red runes splayed out from a blood soaked scene. A body lay at the middle of an explosion of red and runes, a circle of strange dark fire burning on the cavern wall above it. But the runes on the floor looked strange, the glowing lines uneven and wonky. If they weren’t glowing, they would probably be mistaken as simple blood splatters. The body was mangled, like something had ripped off the face, throat and belly of a body. Ral’s eyes widened when he noticed a lock of hair not soaked with blood.
It was obviously a bronzed brown color, a warm color. All Somas had dark cool toned hair, varying from jet black to a slightly blue or purple. It became streaked with white with age. None of them ever had brown, blond or red hair. The corpse that lay there was obviously Gaian. A strange sound came out from the Gate; he wasn’t sure where exactly the noise was coming from.
A few objects scattered the cavern floor - a single knife sheathed in a scabbard with a gold handle, a bag made of leather adorned with red thread. These were all indications that the corpse was Gaian. Why would they be so far in Yscian lands? “What did you do?” He demanded to the stone-faced Somas.
None of them answered him. They all watched him, blue and green eyes glowing in dark blue skin.
“Why Gaian dead?” Ral tried again. “Who is it?”
“A dead Gaian is a good Gaian,” a voice laughed. Calkin appeared in the passageway he used to enter the cavern. He now held his glowing talisman that was previously hidden from view. They needed to do something to prove they completed the Trial: Ral assumed they had defeated all the Unseeing monsters and now they were able to return in glory. But all the talismans glowed bright, unchanged from how they looked before.
“You killed them?” Ral demanded in his rudimentary Yscian, pointed at the destroyed corpse. Perhaps the Somas were brutal fighters, but he had never thought they would be cruel enough to desecrate a corpse like that. “You did this?”
Calkin gave him a disgusted look. “They are dung ignored by the scorching sun,” he snorted. “I did nothing.”
Ral never heard that saying before but he understood all the words. He could extrapolate what the sneering Somas was saying: they didn’t care. The first Gaian he’s seen for years were bloody pieces on the floor and it spoke to him harsher words than any names he’s heard hissed at him in Yscian. He thought he would be fine; he had thought one day he would meld with the rest of the tribe. Maybe he had begun to believe it over the past few months while keeping his head down and physically training his body. But now confronted by the utter contempt for a dead person that looked like him, Ral realized it.
He would never be one of them.
Devastated, he made towards the corpse. Ral had no idea what he wanted to do, but he knew he wanted to move closer and find out what exactly happened. He had never been so close to a Gate. Would monsters come forth? If that was the case he had to close it.
That was the only thing left for him, wasn’t it? He had to find a way to close Gates so he could help his homeland and Rask. Before he could approach the bloodied mess on the floor, someone shoved and tripped him. He fell painfully onto his injured shoulder, the pain a heat that permeated his body. He gasped and tried to roll off the injury but more hands and feet shoved at him.
In a panic he realized that any liberties given to him while he was under Bette no longer applied here. He had hoped - he had believed they would at least do the honorable thing. “It is unfair,” he grunted with what words he knew in Yscian. “Unfair to kill me.”
“It is unfair to not,” he heard Calkin say. “Finish him.”
Snarling, Ral moved as quickly as he could. He surged towards the exit of the cavern but he was easily overtaken by ten Somas, all of them holding the expression they took before slaughtering an animal. One of them held his injured arm and he screamed in pain wrenching it out of the iron grip. Another pulled violently at his hair and he cried out at the jolt in his scalp. Hands scrabbled at his throat, scratching and searching.
He was going to die. He was going to die. He had been stupid, reckless, prideful and ignorant but he didn’t want to die. He just wanted to see his parents and sister again. Ral screamed and fought against the hands and feet seeking to tear him apart. He just wanted it to be the way it used to be.
He just wanted to be happy.