Chapter 30: Embracing the Darkness

  The Thief’s Corridor was as dark as ever. The only difference was that the one under Xanadu was completely devoid of life. Water dripped relentlessly from the jungle above as we made steady progress under Alariel’s guidance. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I worried she was leading us into a trap. She was the daughter of my old enemy, after all.

  “You’ll have to go in without me,” Alariel explained, worsening my apprehension. “Grandmother will be alerted to my presence if I enter the dungeon. Kiki should be in the in the big room past the cells. Grandmother was running experiments on her blood. Free her first before searching for your friend.”

  “Sure thing,” I lied.

  While I would free her if I saw her, finding Jericho and getting to Pi was my top priority. It wasn’t my fault Alariel couldn’t come in and get the job done herself.

  After walking a bit further, she stopped. “It’s just up ahead. There should be an entrance into the lower level. I used to sneak out through there as a kid. Don’t worry, it’s abandoned.”

  “Are you sure it’s still there?” Primith asked.

  Alariel shrugged. “Even if it’s not, it shouldn’t be hard to break in. That axe isn’t just for show, is it?”

  Vince brandished the weapon with a huge grin on his face that looked out of place on Nax’s wiry frame. “You got that right, Sister!”

  The tunnel she pointed to was half flooded. I was waist-deep, and Isa was submerged up to her chest. Bori turned into a fish and swam ahead.

  “Don’t worry, Daddy. I’ll make sure it’s safe,” she spoke in a language I could only describe as dolphin.

  “Don’t go too far,” I said despite myself.

  Primith giggled.

  We trudged after her, and I said a silent prayer that the water wouldn’t get any deeper. Even though I had a Waru-Nu, none of the others had the ability to shape-shift.

  “Daddy, I found it,” Bori’s chirp echoed through the tunnel.

  When we got to her, we found her in human form, kneeling beside a small hole in a stone wall. It was barely big enough for a child to fit through. Fortunately, I was a Terramancer. I touched the wall, and it expanded to the size of a respectable doorway.

  Beyond was darkness. The only sounds coming from the dungeon were the constant sloshing of water and faint screaming in the distance.

  “I got this,” Primith whispered as she walked past us.

  A plant grew through cracks in the stone, and she plucked a tiny budding flower. A glowing light rose from the bud and floated in front of her. It shed eerie green light on the walls of the dilapidated cell we passed through.

  “I guess we go toward the screams,” Vince said, squeezing his axe tightly.

  “It’s as good a place to start as any,” Primith agreed.

  Alariel was right. The floor we entered was abandoned, likely because of flooding. While not as bad as outside, the water still rose to my knees as we followed Primith’s light toward the source of the screams. After several winding corridors with empty cells on both sides, the path eventually led to a stairwell.

  “Get back in your core,” I instructed Bori.

  For once, she complied without question.

  Someone brushed past me. I did a double-take before realizing it was Carlito. After hearing he set off alarms in Alariel’s house, he’d abandoned his stealth skill. It was odd seeing him visible.

  “Let me scout ahead,” he whispered. “Even without invisibility, I can still do this.”

  Nobody objected, so he snuck off into the distance, seemingly unbothered by the darkness. I wondered if he had a skill for that, too. I shivered while waiting in the icy water. Up ahead, the wailing continued. I was unsure if someone was being tortured or if the dungeon was just haunted.

  “Let’s find a place to get out of this water,” Primith said, directing her light up the stairs.

  “Thank you!” Anna said, clutching her soaked robe to herself.

  So we snuck upstairs while we waited for Carlito. The upper dungeon was fairly similar to the flooded one, only without any water on the floor. It made me wonder where all the water was dripping from down below.

  “Do you think this place has plumbing?” I asked.

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  Primith smirked. “Have you seen plumbing of any kind on Gaia?”

  I shrugged. “Well, no, but that doesn’t mean they don’t have it here. Maybe Altara is a magic plumber or something.”

  “Doubtful,” Primith snorted, trying to hold back a laugh.

  Isa shuddered. “I’m still freezing.”

  “I can help,” I offered with a grin. “Do you remember that time by the lake with the mud?”

  Her eyes glazed over for a second, then she shrieked. “Do you mean when you covered my body in mud? That was so gross!”

  “But it was warm,” I countered.

  “You can do me!” Anna let go of Vince and held out her hands.

  “You can’t do my mom!” Isa squealed. “Or Zelle for that matter. They’re both off limits.”

  “Relax, Sweetie,” Vince said. “It’s just a little mud between friends. Nothing that won’t rub off.”

  “No rubbing either!” Isa snapped.

  I laughed as I mixed just the right amount of stone dust with the water to make a rich creamy mud that ran itself under Anna’s robes and all over her body.

  “This feels so…” she shivered in delight. “So good. Honey, you have to try this!”

  She wasn’t talking to Isa. Anna shoved Vince in front of me and grinned. “Do him next!”

  “Okay,” I chuckled, applying the same mud coat to her husband.

  He flexed his bicep as the mud coated it. “Hmm, it is functional. I suppose this will do. Thanks.”

  “You can do me next,” Isa sighed, resigned to her embarrassment.

  She held out her arms as though she was going to hug me. I accepted and wrapped my arms around her, covering her body in mud as she tried to pull away.

  Primith backed away when I turned to her.

  “Don’t look at me,” she warded me off. “I can do myself.”

  Rather than coating herself in anything, the water from Primith’s clothes gathered in tiny drops like dew on a flower and dripped to the floor. She patted herself down and gave me a satisfied nod.

  “Well, my way has added camouflage,” I said, covering myself in a coat of mud to match the others.

  “Camouflage?” Primith asked. “You do realize what makes the best camouflage, right?”

  Without warning, her clothes and armor took on a green and black pattern I was used to seeing in the military. While it didn’t exactly match the dungeon’s mud-caked walls, it did hide her from all but the most discerning eye in the darkness.

  Just then, Carlito appeared as though he had previously been invisible. “Up ahead there’s…what the heck happened to you guys? Get attacked by a muck monster?”

  “No,” Anna giggled. “Alex mudded us.

  Isa groaned but didn’t complain.

  “What did you find?” Primith asked, trying to keep the conversation focused.

  “Well…” he began. “I’m not really sure what I found but I don’t think there’s any actual people down here. There is a pit with swirling shadows in it and several cages, but they are all empty.”

  “Lead the way,” I said. “Some of those shadows might be Nax and Zelle.”

  “Let’s hurry!” Isa exclaimed, rushing ahead.

  “Wait for us,” Anna howled, reaching for her daughter as she rushed after her.

  Nax followed and Primith and I brought up the rear. It didn’t take long for Carlitos to lead us to the room in question. As advertised, it was devoid of life apart from the pit of swirling void in the middle of the room that reminded me of the cultist’s church back in Exui.

  “Are those wraiths?” Isa asked.

  “Sort of,” I said, taking a few steps toward the pit. “Those are the souls they use to make them.”

  Isa gasped. “Do you think Nax and Zelle are in there?”

  “I doubt it,” I replied, kneeling in front of the swirling vortex. “I think I can capture them, though.”

  “What do you mean?” Primith asked.

  “I don’t know how to explain it,” I said, picturing the feeling I got every time Pi liberated someone possessed by wraiths. “I think I can dominate the dark ones.”

  The trick was actually doing it. If I wavered even for an instant, the tsunami of darkness would overwhelm my core and I’d be taken over by whichever soul was most dominant. Pi never had any doubt. That was the trick to it.

  With that in mind, I reached out and touched the swirling darkness, inviting it to infuse itself into a willing host. The feeling was overwhelming at first. Hundreds of hungry souls flooded my mana channels as they sought out my unprotected soul. Little did they know, I was prepared. I pulled my consciousness into myself and set up a trap surrounding my soul; a sticky place to trap the darkness.

  When the wraiths got there, they swirled around my core, looking for an easy way to penetrate and impregnate my very existence. One by one, they succumbed to my trap.

  I looked one over as it lost the will to fight. “Name?”

  “I am Wilfred,” My lord.

  “Do you know a Zelle or a Nax?” I asked.

  “None in the pit bore those names,” Wilfred replied.

  “Where did they get you from?” I asked.

  “I was from Dabia,” he replied. “I was captured and then I don’t know what happened. Everything went dark.”

  “Where is your darkness?” I asked. “Do you have one?”

  “I am here,” a voice hissed.

  “Do you have a name?” I asked.

  “I am Spes,” it replied.

  I remembered the many hours Pi wasted interrogating Wraiths but decided to try anyway. “Why is your master collecting souls?”

  “There are many masters now,” Spes replied. “The Puppetmaster wishes revenge for what was done to her kind.

  “The Elves?” I asked.

  Spes’s laugh sounded like a wheeze. “They are called Ancients because they live longer than most. The Vestara family is the last of them.”

  “What other masters are there?” I asked eagerly. “Do you serve Pi?”

  “Pi is one master, yes, but we do not serve him,” Spes explained. “The other is far more powerful. Our dark lord found a host with a powerful bloodline. If he manages to unlock its secrets, this planet will not be the only thing blessed with eternal night. The entire universe will be blessed by his dark radiance.”

  “Who is that?” I asked.

  “We call him Donn, of Tech Duinn,” Spes went on. “He is the lord of night, and will lead us to snuff out the light. It is only a matter of time now.”

  “So you serve Donn?” I asked.

  “We all bend the knee to Lord Donn,” Spes chanted.

  Nearby shadows caught in my trap echoed the sentiment. “Lord Donn. Yes, we serve!”

  Armed with as much information as I needed for the moment, I pulled myself back to reality, releasing a breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding.

  “How did you do that?” Primith demanded. “You sucked up all the darkness.”

  I shrugged as I pulled myself to my feet. “I don’t know. All I know is that Zelle and Nax weren’t in there.”

  “What was?” Isa asked, looking disgusted.

  I looked down at the cold stone floor where the swirling vortex used to be. “A bunch of dark creatures who serve someone named Donn. Oh, and some guy named Wilfred”

  “Donn?” Primith asked. “Is that someone from Earth?”

  I held up my hands helplessly. “All I know is he’s the king of the night and is going to plunge the universe into darkness. He also said something about a bloodline.”

  “That must be that Kiki person,” Anna supplied helpfully. “You know, Alariel’s wife.”

  “You really need to get more specifics,” Primith said, rolling her eyes.

  “Later,” I replied. “First off, we need to look for Nax and Zelle.”

  “Carlito is already on it,” Primith replied. “He’s checking upstairs as we speak.”

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