Deepest, Darkest

by William Ritter

  Cole hesitated. “I . . . I know. You’re my . . . You . . .” Cole took a steadying breath and tried to refocus. “Listen. I had to grow up my whole life without a father.”

  “I’m so sorry to hear it, kid,” Joseph interjected. “Looks like you turned out all right, though, eh? There’s a lot of different paths up the mountain. I’m sure your mother worked very hard.”

  “She works harder than you can imagine!” said Cole. “She shouldn’t have to work so hard. That’s the whole point. If you—”

  “That’s what I like to hear. Respect your mother, kid. My Annie just became a mother. Still hard to believe we have a son.”

  “You . . .” Cole floundered. “You have two sons.”

  “Nope, just the one. Well—it’s complicated. I’m working on that. That’s sort of why I came down here in the first place.”

  Cole’s mouth hung open.

  Joseph didn’t seem to notice. “Annie is a better mom than I am a dad, that’s for sure. But I’m picking it up as I go. There are lots of exciting moments I’m looking forward to. First steps. Hearing him say Daddy for the first time. I’ll figure out the fatherhood thing eventually.” He began to hum to himself, absently.

  Cole stared at the man for a solid minute. “How long,” he managed at last, “do you think you’ve been down here?”

  “Oh!” Joseph started, as if surprised Cole was still there. “Hello, young man,” he said genially. “You look so familiar. Have we met?”

  Twenty-One

  Evie’s hands shook as she raised them meekly above her head. “You caught me,” she said.

  The acolyte’s crimson robes brushed the dusty ground. “Yes,” he said. “Um. Yes, I did. I caught you. And now I’m going to take you to my leader.”

  Evie rolled her eyes. “You’re not going to say it like that, are you?”

  Tinn sighed. He swished his robes. “How about you play the part of the weird underground cult member and I can play myself as a kidnapping victim.” He stretched his shoulders and swiveled his head this way and that on his neck. His changeling magic had worked smoothly, but the acolyte’s head still seemed too big for his body, and it made Tinn feel off-balance. “Are you sure this looks right? I didn’t get a very long look.”

  “Shh.” Evie put a finger over her lips. “I think someone’s coming.”

  Voices carried down the zigzagging tunnel. “The Low Priest is gonna feed your bones to the kobbs,” someone snarled in the distance.

  “This is not my fault,” barked another.

  Tinn looked at Evie nervously through his overlarge eyes. Evie nodded resolutely.

  “Just find the brat,” said a third voice, nearer.

  Tinn cleared his throat. “Get moving, you,” he ordered, more loudly than was really necessary.

  Footsteps rounded the corner, and in another moment three figures came hurrying into view. They all had the same squashed, bat-like faces. Two of them were acolytes, dressed in the same red robes as Tinn—the third was clad in workman’s clothes. On his head sat a miner’s helmet.

  “Hey, look,” said one of the red robes. “Korvum’s caught the little rat. Good work, Korvum.”

  “Erm, yeah,” mumbled Tinn. “I just caught this, erm, nasty child hiding in the caves.” He felt sweat run down his new, leathery skin. He was not getting the accent right, he just knew it. The acolyte he was copying had sounded slightly more nasal, hadn’t he? Did he have a hint of a lisp also? Ugh. Changing was hard.

  The man in the mining helmet scowled and looked Evie up and down. “That’s not the same kid,” he said.

  “No?” the first red robe grunted. “How can you tell? Uplanders all start to look the same after a while.”

  The one in the miner’s helmet threw up his hands. “He was a boy, you clod. This one’s female. I told you there were more of them snooping around.”

  “Watch the tone,” spat the first robe. “I’m not the one who let the boy run off.”

  Tinn’s heart thudded. They had to be talking about Cole. And they hadn’t caught him yet. That was good.

  “Well?” The one in the helmet turned back to Tinn. “You taking this one for conversion or what?”

  “Uh. Yeah.” Tinn nodded his heavy head. “Conversion.”

  “I thought you said you were going to take me to the Low Altar,” Evie said meaningfully.

  “Right,” said Tinn. “That’s right, you dirty human. Low Altar first, obviously. To watch the hob, erm, the sacrifice. Then I’m taking her right over to conversion after that.”

  “Serpent’s teeth, that’s right,” the red robe said. “Forgot you got yourself on the shortlist for Low Order. The priest will be starting any minute now. You should already be there.”

  “Yup,” Tinn said. “So I’ll just be going, then.”

  “You can leave her with us,” said the other acolyte. “We’ll run her through the mist with the other one, once we track him down.”

  Evie’s eyes widened.

  “No,” said Tinn abruptly. “No, um, I’m the one who found her. So, I should be the one to, erm, convert her. I’ll do it. I’m fine. Thank you.”

  “You sure you can keep her under control?” said the helmeted one. “Human children can be surprisingly scrappy.”

  “I’m very small and weak,” said Evie, adding a raspy cough. “And sickly.”

  The red robe leaned his face close to Tinn, his beady eyes narrowing. “Don’t want to share credit? Trying to curry favor from the Low Priest before the final offering?”

  Tinn felt a bead of sweat run down his neck. “Pretty much,” he managed.

  The red robe nodded. “Respect that. Fair enough. All right. Let’s go find that runner.”

  The two red robes and the one in the miner’s helmet plodded off down the tunnel while Tinn and Evie stood in shocked silence for several seconds.

  “That should never have worked,” whispered Evie.

  “I think I was very convincing,” said Tinn. “So, are we still doing this?”

  “My uncle Jim has a saying about nasty chores and other stuff you don’t wanna do,” said Evie. “Sometimes the only way to get out of it is just to go through with it.”

  “Somehow I don’t think your uncle Jim was thinking about walking into the middle of a murderous cult’s secret ceremony when he said that.”

  “Mostly it was about horse poop,” Evie admitted.

  “Well, we’re in the thick of the poop now. Let’s go through with it.”

  Evie nodded. She took a deep breath, and then the two of them plunged into the shadowy passageway.

  The deeper they went, the hotter and muggier the air in the tunnel felt. The corridor wound back and forth a dozen more times before it opened up into a truly enormous cavern. Thick clouds hung fifty feet above them, churning and swirling, making it impossible to see the ceiling of the massive cave. Halfway across the yawning cavern, a broad stone column rose from the ground until it disappeared into the clouds.

  The ground under their feet was black and lumpy, like the bottom of a pan left to ruin on a hot stove. It steamed from tiny fissures that spider-webbed across the surface. Where the cracks were widest, Tinn could see ripples of heat and a red glow that emanated from somewhere beneath the crust.

  “Is that lava?” Tinn whispered from out of the corner of his wide mouth.

  “Magma,” whispered Evie. “When it’s underground it’s called magma.”

  “We can’t possibly be far enough down for that to be real, actual magma, can we? We would have to be miles beneath the surface.”

  “I have no idea,” whispered Evie. “I’m a little more interested in the creepy cult guys.”

  Hundreds of crimson-clad acolytes were amassing near the base of the central pillar. The whole congregation seemed to be glowing as the light from below met their robes in ripples of bloodred fabric.

  Somewhere within the group, the frightened hob was crying. Evie took
a deep breath. “Let’s get closer.”

  Tinn pressed forward, one hand gripping Evie’s shoulder tightly.

  They made their way to the edge of the crowd. Hundreds of robed figures all had their eyes turned toward the base of the central pillar, where a broad half-moon had been cut into the blackened earth. It was at least twenty feet across at its widest points, and it opened into a pool of roiling liquid rock. Tinn could feel the heat pouring out of it. It was hotter even than the heat he had felt back when the Fenerty’s Paper Goods building had burned down. The way the surface of the glowing pool churned and bubbled, Tinn could almost imagine something just below the crust, weaving and twisting like an eel wriggling in cloudy waters. The patterns changed constantly, darkening in patches to a burnt brown and flaring up now and then to an almost blinding yellow. Gazing into the pit was like trying to stare at the sun through shifting clouds, and in the end Tinn had to look away. A crescent-shaped altar of black stone overlooked the magma pool, and it was onto this platform that the Low Priest was now rising. Two acolytes rose behind him, the simpering hob held between them. The Thing came gliding up the steps last, hovering to a stop beside the priest. Where its shadows met the light of the pit, the air rippled and warped.

  A hush fell over the assembly as the Low Priest took his position, and the only sounds that remained were the gurgling crackle of the pit and the sniffling cries of the hob.

  “Loyal acolytes,” the Low Priest called out ceremoniously, “it is time.”

  Twenty-Two

  “Hello, young man,” said Joseph. “You look so familiar. Have we met?”

  Cole took a deep breath. “Yeah. We’ve done this part. A few times now. Can you remember anything at all?”

  “Of course. I remember the important things,” said Joseph. “I have a son, did you know?”

  “Two sons,” said Cole.

  “Mm.” Joseph scowled. “Not exactly. The other is—”

  “My brother,” said Cole.

  “Brother?” Joseph blinked and focused on Cole with some effort.

  “Yeah,” Cole said. “I have a twin brother.”

  “That must be nice. Is he just like you?”

  “Mostly.” Cole sighed. “He worries more.”

  “Don’t you worry?”

  “I don’t know. I guess. I try not to.”

  Joseph nodded. “Nothing wrong with worrying. I worry all the time.”

  Cole caught himself watching the man’s eyes. Beneath the beard and the matted hair, those eyes looked a lot like Tinn’s.

  “Heck. I don’t think I’m ever not worrying,” Joseph went on. “I have a son, did you know?”

  Cole sighed. “Two sons,” he repeated.

  “Mm? Right, yes—there is a second one now. A changeling. Wicked thing, or so I’m told. Twice as much to worry about there. I don’t like leaving Annie alone with them, but she insisted—and I can’t afford to stay home.” Joseph’s fingers fidgeted unconsciously with the cuff of his jacket.

  “He’s not wicked,” said Cole. “He’s good. You should know that.”

  “Mm.” Joseph nodded, but his brow was creased and his gaze had drifted off down the empty tunnel.

  “Do you understand me? I know you were scared and probably super confused about the second baby showing up, but Tinn turned out to be pretty great, actually.”

  “Mm? Good. That’s good.”

  “So . . . you can stop worrying about the whole changeling thing,” said Cole.

  Joseph glanced back at him. “Oh, I was worrying well before the changeling arrived.”

  Now it was Cole whose brow wrinkled. “What else are you worried about?”

  Joseph shrugged. “What was I not worried about? I was worried I wouldn’t know what to do when my baby cried. I was worried he’d get sick and I wouldn’t know how to make him better. I was worried we wouldn’t have enough money to get him nice things. That’s why I took on all the extra shifts. But now that I’m working so much, I’m beginning to worry that . . . that I won’t . . .”

  “What?” said Cole.

  “I’m worried I won’t be there,” said Joseph. “I’m worried my kid is gonna grow up not really knowing his dad.”

  Cole’s throat felt tight.

  “I don’t want that.” Joseph’s voice was heavy and tired. “I don’t want to not be there for my son. I don’t want him to not know how much I love him.”

  Cole’s eyes stung. “Then why—?” His voice failed him and he cleared his throat to try again. The words that emerged came out weak and brittle. “Then why didn’t you come home?”

  Joseph tilted his head, his gaze falling in and out of focus on Cole’s face. For a fraction of a second their eyes met, and a wave of painful recognition flicked across the man’s face. He shook his head and closed his eyes, swallowing hard. After a moment his head sagged and his shoulders slumped.

  “Dad?” Cole tried.

  Joseph lifted his chin slowly. Cole could see his eyes were glistening and rimmed with red. “Hello, young man,” he said. “You look so familiar. Have we met?”

  Cole stared at his father.

  Joseph gave Cole the sort of smile a substitute teacher gives a student they’ve never seen before.

  “I can’t take this,” said Cole. “We need to get everyone out of these stupid tunnels and get home.”

  “Not just yet,” said Joseph. “There’s something I need to do first.”

  “What could possibly be more important than going home with your family?”

  “Saving them,” said Joseph.

  “Ugh. They don’t need saving—the changeling isn’t wicked. We’ve already done this bit.”

  “Not saving them from the changeling,” Joseph said.

  Cole’s brow creased. “Then saving them from what, exactly?”

  “From the end of the world, of course.”

  Twenty-Three

  Fable held her breath as she drifted down into the rocky floor, a kobold perched on either shoulder. According to Madam Root, who had melted into the earth first, it was possible to breathe the stones just as the kobolds did—but it was important to exhale all of them before emerging, because the rocks were still rocks whether you could breathe them or not.

  It was impossible for Fable to judge how far they had traveled by the time they emerged, feetfirst, out of the ceiling of another chamber. If Madam Root had been telling the truth, they were now somewhere beneath the cloud layer in the heart of the Low Order’s territory.

  Fable looked around. They were not in the huge cavern they had seen from above, but in a much smaller chamber about as big as the Burtons’ front room. The walls here did not have the knobby, natural texture of the tunnels. They were carved and sanded smooth and were etched with pictures. The same glowing blue gems that had naturally speckled the corridor above had been carefully planted within the lines of each etching, so that the light in the room came from the pictures themselves.

  “This is a sacred chamber,” said Madam Root. “Only the lowest of the low priests are allowed in here. They’ve nearly caught me once or twice, but they will all be at their awful ceremony right now.”

  “You’ve snuck in here before?” said Fable. “Why?”

  “Because I wish to understand what drives them. These carvings were made generations ago. Can you read what they say?” She gestured at the first glowing illustration. It depicted a big snake coiled within a circle, and beneath it were letters that did not look like any language Fable had ever seen.

  Fable shook her head.

  “It says: In fire, beneath the Delvers’ Deep, long does the coiled serpent sleep. More or less. It sounds more formal in Ancient Delver. The Low Order worships the fire serpent. It is a primal, elemental creature. Very old magic.”

  Fable nodded and followed Madam Root farther down the wall.

  “Let’s see, here it says that the serpent sings to them. This bit is about the fir
st priest summoned to dig here.”

  “I recognize this one!” Fable pointed to an image a little way down. “A prophet gave this symbol to my friend. It’s why we’re down here. What does it mean?”

  “The temple walls and hallowed halls must be complete before the fall,” said Madam Root. “This is their entire way of life. Their kind have been preparing this temple for generations. There was always the promise that completing it would bring about the end, but I had allowed myself to imagine that it was all a metaphor—that there would never be a fall.”

  “What’s the fall?”

  “When the earth collapses into itself and the serpent awakens to cleanse the world with its fires.”

  “Wait—what? The whole world?”

  “Pretty standard apocalypse, really.”

  “Why would anybody want that?”

  Madam Root shrugged. “Perhaps because hating everybody else can be easier than taking care of yourself.” She skipped over a few more pictures and stopped in front of an image Fable didn’t understand. “This depicts the first portent of destruction. It is an omen that the delvers’ apocalypse is finally at hand. The delvers carved it centuries ago. It came true this year.”

  “What is it supposed to be?”

  “Don’t look at the lights,” said Madam Root. “Look at the dark spot in the center.”

  Fable tilted her head and suddenly found herself looking at something like a big wolf made from the empty bit where the lights weren’t.

  “With night’s descent and shadows bent, beware the darkling’s discontent,” read Madam Root.

  “The Thing,” whispered Fable.

  “The Thing?” said Madam Root. “You’ve encountered the darkling before?”

  “I guess. Sort of. It snuck into my forest a while back and set up a nest of creepy black brambles,” Fable explained. “But we fought against it last summer and scared it away after it tried to eat one of my friends.”

  “So you sent the darkling underground?” Madam Root raised an eyebrow. “You’re the ones who delivered the delvers their first portent.”