Rasp awoke to horrific squawking. Or maybe he’d dreamed it. Perhaps he was still dreaming. Real, dream, hallucination, whatever it was, it didn’t matter. His body demanded more sleep and was willing to ignore whatever in chaos was going on around him to get it. Rasp’s heavy eyelids closed the same moment a feathered monster descended over him, beating the back of his head with its wings as it screeched and roared. It demanded he rise and deal with the intruders.

Intruders?

The word stirred Rasp from his sleep in the same way a toothpick might disturb a giant vat of cold molasses which, suffice to say, was not much at all.

Intruders. His confused thoughts clung to the word as his mind slipped back under. It was an important word, he knew that. It meant something…something…fuck it. He was too tired to remember.

The feathery beast stabbed at his head, drawing blood.

“Bad!” Rasp shot upright, clutching the wet spot behind his ear. “It meams something bad!”

Faris was curled on the ground beside him. The faun stirred, still groggy with sleep. “What?”

“Intruders!” The rest of Father’s warning tumbled free of Rasp’s mouth as he shook Faris awake. “Get up! Dad says we’re not safe.”

Faint blue-green light filtered in from what might have been a window across from them. The only other light available was the random spattering of bioluminescent algae that coated the interior walls of the room. Regrettably, neither were bright enough to help Rasp pick out any discernible shapes amongst the gloom.

“Anyone got a match?”

“No fire,” Hop said from further down.

“Alright, Mister Artificer,” Rasp snapped, stifling the embarrassment of having forgotten Hop’s number one rule already. “A little light please?”

A split second later, the brilliant blue from Hop’s headlamp cut through the surrounding gloom. Rasp jumped, not at the sudden light, but the myriad of stout, dark shapes that lined the far side of the room.

“Fuck,” June hissed between her teeth.

Rasp waited, nearly three seconds in full, before having to ask the obvious. “Someone want to tell me what we’re looking at?”

“Dwarfs, I think,” Faris said.

“What do you mean you think? Are they dwarfs or not?” A thought occurred to him that Rasp didn’t necessarily cherish saying out loud, but did so anyway. “They’re not ghost dwarfs, are they?”

“Very much alive. Just a little different in appearance than what I’m used to.” Faris added, a little louder, for the benefit of the ghost dwarfs, probably, “But very friendly and nice, I’m sure. They probably don’t mean us any harm and just want payment for crossing into their land, yeah?”

A gravelly voice responded in an unfamiliar language. It rose in volume, growing more fast and fervent by the second. The speaker carried on with gusto, her intensity building, building, building, until the oration finished with a dramatic flourish. A multitude of voices echoed the speaker’s final words in perfect unison.

The whole thing reminded Rasp of his cousin twice removed, who’d turned into something of a zealot towards the end of his life. The man had a similar manner of speech and could whip an entire crowd into a blind frenzy relying simply on the power of words and superstition. Why Rasp’s mind felt the need to recall Cousin Vernon was not a simple misfiring of internal synapses, but to help him identify the reason he suddenly wanted to scrub his skin with a copper scouring pad.

Stolen novel; please report.

“Great,” Rasp muttered with a shudder. “We found an underground cult. Just what we needed.”

“I’d argue that the cult found us,” June whispered back.

One of the dwarfs stepped forward, distinguished himself from the crowd. He was courteous enough to address them in the common tongue. “Our ancestors have long foretold the arrival of the Kriegaar. The priestess welcomes you, great warriors, to the world below.”

No one dared correct him. A shame, really, as it left the honor to Rasp. “I think you might have us confused with someone else.”

“No mistake has been made,” the dwarf assured him. “Priestess Oreword senses the Kriegaar amongst you.”

“The what?” June said.

There were some hushed mutterings between the translator and the priestess before a suitable answer was proffered. “The Kriegaar is the savior of our people. The legend has been passed down from generation to generation since the time of the great flood, telling of a warrior destined to best the great beast in battle and free our city from its reign of terror.”

Great, more prophecies. And not just the typical ‘chosen one’ bullshit, but a prophecy that involved monsters and underground cults, too! Just what they needed. Rasp shot his hand over his head and waved it about, as if he were an impatient student eager to be called upon by the class instructor. “And what if the great warrior refuses?”

“They will not,” the spokesperson said with the unwavering confidence of one who had grown up in a cult and, thus, never learned to question anything.

“What if they do?”

Irritation bubbled over the spokesperson’s previously confident tone. “You are not the great warrior. You wouldn’t know.”

Ouch. Not that Rasp wanted to be, but still, it wasn’t fair to just count him out like that. Ignoring the way Faris was using his elbow to dig deep into his ribs, Rasp kept poking the proverbial bear simply for the hell of it. “What if I am?”

“Then that is for our priestess to decide. Be still while she assesses you.”

Another shape shuffled forward, lit by the ominous glow of Hop’s blue headlamp. Rasp squinted at Priestess Oreword’s shape, trying and failing to determine whether the dwarf walked with a hunch or was naturally hump shaped. The priestess started at the far end, chanting under her breath as she passed over Hop, and then June, Faris next, and then stopped over Rasp. She pressed so close he could practically taste the crushed rose petal incense and tobacco smoke wafting from her musty clothes.

The chanting ended as a pair of leathery, wrinkled hands seized him by the head and explored his face. Rasp tried to pull away but the priestess was terrifyingly strong and held him in place with ease. The rough face fondling lasted a few uncomfortable seconds more before Priestess Oreword released him, tsking her disapproval.

“Told you I wasn’t him,” Rasp grumbled.

The priestess shoved him aside and, from the sounds of it, was in the process of searching his bedding for the missing warrior. She let out an exalted cry and the crowd of cult members lining the wall echoed her words in unison.

“Faris?” Rasp was unable to make out what the priestess held aloft for the rest of the clan to see. “A little help?”

“She’s got your pack.”

He didn’t mean to, but a harsh bark of laughter escaped his mouth all the same. “Is their salvation my dirty underwear? There’s nothing in the pack except…”

Oh fuck.

“I assume from your stunned silence that you’ve finally caught on,” Faris said.

“Gods dammit! Why couldn’t the dwarfs have been ghosts?”

“I would argue that these people are ghosts,” Hop ventured, from further down. “I suspect, given their clothing, they are the remnants of what was once Kalikose. It’s like we’ve traveled back in time.”

Rasp crossed his arms, issuing an irritated sigh. “Why do you sound so excited about it?”

“I think I’m just relieved it’s not a monster.”

“Did you miss the part where they said the Kriegaar was supposed to defeat a beast?” June demanded.

“Oh, that. Right.” The relief drained from Hop’s voice like liquid from a burst wineskin. “I think my self-preservation may have glossed over that tidbit, actually.”

June’s voice dropped, not so much a whisper as it was a growl. “I don’t know about you guys, but my self-preservation is telling me it’s time to make a run for it.”