Mud

  “Put…me…down. We…can neg…ho…tiate.” Each syllable raw like guzzling gravel.

  And then he smiles. That awful crooked grin, a taunt.

  “We’d never negotiate with a traitor like you,” Miriam bellows. “Why do this? You were already getting the box. You just had to do your part.”

  “Mud brain might have,” the Keeper coughs out. “But…you, don’t trust…you.”

  His face twists and darkens as he gasps for air he can’t force down. He can’t die, but he feels the pain, the struggle of the life he should be losing. And he’s weakening from it. I squeeze his neck tighter.

  Miriam steps closer, folding her arms over her chest. “I keep my word!”

  “Maybe. But with realm creeping into your mind?” He gasps for air again with a strange rattling sound. “Already picking away. Creepy… crawly. Know you feel i—”

  But before he can finish Miriam dives under my arm punches him in the gut. “Put it down!” she screams.

  “No.”

  She wrestles against his arm, struggling to pry the box loose from his grip. With every flinch or twist he makes, the pain digs deeper into my shoulder, the desperation settles deeper into my chest. It’s too much. It has to stop.

  Something in me erupts. I hit him. Then I do it again. And again. Because I can think of nothing else to do.

  He writhes from the pain. My heart races, and with every throb a haze of red edges in, closing in on all sides of my vision. I dig my fingers in harder, bring my other hand to his neck, and I shake. Miriam steps back. I shake him hard, with all my might, rattling every bone of his limp form, a desperate guttural cry escaping from me as I do it. The sharp pain shoots through my back, reminds me of the pain I’m causing him, and it is deep, terrible, and satisfying. I shake. I shake until finally, his grip loosens and the box drops to the ground, lands among the golden coins with a soft chink.

  Miriam rushes to pick it up, cups it gently between her hands.

  I toss the Keeper aside like a heap of rags.

  Relief floods in. The pain in my shoulder subsides to a dull ache.

  But the Keeper isn’t done yet. He rushes at Miriam, coughing and gagging, and claws at her arms for it. She hits him square in the jaw and he keels back and tumbles into me. The struggle is a blur of fists and kicks and tearing cloth, splashes of gold. This time when he breaks free, he runs, darting back through the mountains of treasure we came through. I grab for him, but even now, he is quicker than me. He ducks away, and instead I get a fistful of cloak and hear the tear of threads as I try to yank him back.

  He’s gone.

  I’m left kneeling on the ground, heavy limp cloth from his cloak in my hand. Too late I remember how desperately we need him. I’ve only my blade for protection, and no idea where to go.

  “Oh Gods.”

  I start to rush after him.

  “Where are you going?” Miriam calls to me. Her cheeks are flushed. She clutches the box close to her with both hands. My hands itch to snatch it away—the box is mine—but I press them against my sides instead, resisting the angry beast inside me.

  “We need him. We’ve got to get him back.”

  “It’s no use,” she sighs. “We couldn’t catch him if we wanted to, he’s too fast. We’d only get lost looking for him. Even if we did, what then? He’ll only try to take it again.”

  She hands box back to me. Just like that, as if it were nothing. As if it were any other object. I close my fist around it tight, tight, tight, and its pointed corners dig deep into my palm. I trusted her before, but now I’d let her hold my very life in her hands.

  She’s right. Going after the Keeper would just lead to another struggle.

  As always, the box’s curse has infected everything. I tuck it back into the breast pocket of my cloak. Take my time, give extra care, and make sure it’s secure. Because the Keeper could come back for it. Because once I’m done putting the box away, I have no idea what to do next.

  Finally, I look up to face her.

  “We need to get out of here,” she says.

  “Yes.”

  Miriam turns around and starts walking back the way we came.

  “Wait,” I call to her. She stops and turns to me. “The Keeper was taking us the other way.”

  And the gold. It’s strange and utterly dazzling. Mesmerizing. Something in it calls to me, invites me to go further in.

  “No. We need to get out of here as fast as we can. Who knows how deep it goes. Who knows if he was even leading us toward the Pit or not,” she says.

  But I dig in my heels. “No backtracking. I need to get to the Pits.” And we are losing time. Miriam is slipping away. I see it edging in around her eyes, the realm tugging away at her. The gold shimmers, whispers to me that I am right. We need to keep moving. We need to keep going deeper.

  “You will get to the Pits,” Miriam snaps. “But if we don’t get out the trap will lure us to stay. Then you’ll never find her. Don’t you feel it?”

  The gold whispers that she is wrong, don’t listen, don’t listen. But that’s what it is, it’s the trap. Through the pounding fear of the shadow-thing, the gold’s call winds through me with a stillness, a desire to sit and watch it forever. I force it into the back of my mind, and the fear rises again.

  A dark fluttering shadow rushes at the corner of my vision—the same as whatever I saw before.

  I whip around toward it, a thick panic pulsing through me.

  Nothing.

  I try to pull its image back up from my mind and take a closer look, but all I get is a dark blur. A shadow. Hardly even that.

  It could be anything.

  Or nothing. Maybe it’s the realm getting in my head, like the whisper of the gold. I stand locked to the spot, staring, straining, searching for any hint of movement.

  “What are you doing?” Miriam demands.

  “Did you see that?”

  “See what?”

  I turn back to her. “That… that thing. That shadow.”

  “I saw nothing,” she shrugs, scanning the horizon. “Just piles of—” She gasps. “Over there!” She points behind me, and I spin around to see, but I’m too late.

  Something bursts in me, red—alarm red, panic red. It bursts from every particle of my being. I can feel it settling into the creases of my fingers, behind my ears, along my spine.

  We’re being watched.

  “You saw it? What is it?” I ask. My fingers drift to my blade.

  But she isn’t listening. She twists side to side, her eyes darting up and down, searching.

  “We need to get out of here,” she says.

  Another whoosh of movement. I turn to it and catch just a flash of wispy shadow like the swish of a tail in the corner of my eye. By the time I’m facing it, it’s gone, darted off into the abyss.

  We’re exposed and vulnerable out here in the open. My lumbering dullness surely stands out against this endless glitter. Whatever is out there, we’re an easy target for it here.

  My mind drifts to my room in the temple. My body craves the safety of enclosure, of the darkness. I want to be tucked away, for the earth to swallow me up and protect me.

  “We will figure out another way to get to the Pits. But right now we just need to get out,” Miriam says. “Follow me.”

  She turns again to go back the way we came.

  I almost follow her. But I can’t stand to go back, farther from Rona. I take one last look around. And that’s when I see it. My chest swells with relief.

  “Wait!”

  Miriam turns again with a heavy sigh. “We have to get out.”

  “I found another way.” I point to show her.

  Beyond the mountainous coins, the roughness of rocky wall. Coated in shimmery gold that blends into the coins. It’s no wonder we missed it before. But there it is. A mountain. And tucked into its side, an opening. A dark gap in the bright gold, an escape.

  It’s just what we need. A place to hide. A place to shield us from the
strange looming things of this realm.

  She nods. “Go.”

  We break off from the path and wade toward the cave, our feet dragging through the coins. The piles grow deeper the further on we press, and we are all but drowning in the heaps of gold, pearls and gems.

  Finally, we reach the cave’s mouth. I stretch my hand out and touch it. Cool and rough. The gold flakes away on my hand, revealing its truth underneath, earth and rock. It releases the flinty smell of stone. I want to press into it, wait for it to grow around me and make me a part of it. Instead, I push myself up into the cave, grab Miriam’s cold arm and pull her in after me.

  The release is immediate. Even as I set Miriam down, I feel the gold’s hold over me dissolve. The cave’s enclosed darkness wraps around me and I am home, I am safe.

  Miriam stands next to me panting, her face flushed. A twinge of worry quivers through me—she wasn’t like this after fighting the beast in the river. She was strong then.

  And her eyes, a distance is creeping into them. Creepy crawly. Like the Keeper said.

  I’m huffing a little too, the gash in my shoulder biting deep into me. I’ve never been out of breath before.

  “What’s that?” she asks. She nods to my cloak’s side pocket. I look down to it.

  A torn piece of fabric. “It’s from the Keeper’s cloak.”

  This stray fabric is of no use to me. I take it out and am about to toss it aside when I notice its unusual weight. I hold it up to examine more carefully.

  I didn’t just rip off a piece of the Keeper’s cloak. I ripped off his pocket. I reach inside and pull out a smooth white stone.

  “It’s the glimmer stone!” Miriam exclaims. “If we can find another glimmer, we can get to the Pit. We just need to find a glimmer.”

  She laughs.

  I’ve never seen her laugh before. It’s airy and free. It lights up her face and suddenly she looks so much like Jordan. It tugs at me and makes me homesick for the shore, but all the same, I feel the corners of my mouth pulling up into a smile back to her.

  Maybe not everything is against me.

  Chapter 18

  WE PAUSE AT the cave’s mouth before moving on. Miriam pants, bent over and leaning on her knees. My own breaths heave, too. It gnaws at me, to think what it might mean. How tired we are from such a short climb. But I can’t do anything about that right now.

  At least we’re safe. For now.

  Safe and enclosed in the cave’s cool darkness, I let it all fall away. Tuck away my defenses and ease into the cool cloak of the shadow.

  This is right. This the way we need to go. I can feel it.

  Miriam pants, “We need to keep going.”

  Weariness and cold are seeping deep into my bones.

  “Rest a little longer. Catch your breath. Then we’ll go on.”

  I lean against the wall and pull out the box. Open it up—the top lifts so easily now—and stare at the strange green jewel inside. What is this necklace, that it demands such protection? That it causes so many to want it so desperately?

  More questions, nothing but questions. Even here, where I am unbound from it, it has brought nothing but troubles. I almost wish I’d never opened it at all. Almost wish I could disappear back into my temple tower, before any of this started. Back into its shielded protection, I crave. It feels so far away, so long ago.

  But no. That was not real security. The Hunters kept coming and coming. The box kept me from any kind of happiness.

  But even that was so much more than what I have now. The bottomless unknowing of this realm, the surprises and twists. The gnawing pain.

  I ache for that simplicity again. I ache for the shore, for Jordan.

  I close the box and put it back into my pocket, where it belongs.

  What is he doing right now, I wonder. Playing with the other children along the shore? Training, maybe?

  My eyes drift back to Miriam. Can I really leave her, after all this? She turned down eternal peace to be at my side. Maybe I can at least help her back to the Crossing.

  And there’s only one way back to Jordan. Only one way I could stay there. Not Miriam. Rona. She is the only way this will ever stop, the only way to any sort of end for me. Bring her back. Get my soul.

  I close my eyes, and I can almost feel the warm breeze caressing around me. Almost hear the soft waves brush the sand. The sun on my skin. Almost hear his voice calling for me, waving to me to join them.

  My eyes whip back open. My ears twinge.

  I did hear him. No. It’s impossible.

  But then it comes again.

  “Adem!”

  His laugh bubbles in echoes from deep within the caves. With it my spirits float and the pain, the weariness, the cold is forgotten for a fluttering moment. My mind brightens, as if a warm light were swelling within me.

  “Did you—” I start, but Miriam is already on her feet.

  “Yes,” she says. “It sounds just like him.”

  We listen intently. Nothing.

  I step deeper in toward the tunnel. “Jordan!” It echoes away without response.

  The quiet leaves a vacuum behind, a craving that must be filled. Frenzied thoughts flood into it. He shouldn’t be wandering this strange realm by himself. He could be in danger. What is he doing here? Fear edges in on me from every side. The light tugs at me, urges me to race down into the tunnels.

  “We’ve got to go find him!” I exclaim.

  I start to run, but Miriam lunges at me and grabs my arm, dragging me back into the cold. “Wait!” she cries.

  For a flash I am flooded with a feral anger, a rabid desire to lash out against her. Doesn’t she understand? Jordan is here. We have to get to him. The light tugs at me again, begs me to follow Jordan’s voice with a frantic urgency.

  “He needs us!” I growl.

  “He sounds fine,” she says. “And we don’t know that it’s him.”

  Her words won’t process. Of course, it’s him. It sounds just like him, she said so herself. Boiling frustration mixes with the light and my head starts to spin. There’s no time for this.

  “Adem!” Jordan’s voice bounces through the caves to me again. He’s calling me.

  “We have to go! We have to find him!” I yell at Miriam, pulling away from her.

  She grips my arm tighter. “Wait! Listen to me! Doesn’t this seem strange to you? Don’t you think—?”

  “It doesn’t matter, he needs us!” I shrug her away and run down the path toward him. My steps unsettle the ground, filling the air with dusty earth. I hear Miriam’s footsteps trailing behind me, hear her call for me to come back, trailing farther and farther away. But the light washes over me and I feel strange and lightheaded and it tells me I have to, I have to, I have to get to Jordan, and Miriam can wait. I can come back to her once I have him, and she will see. We will all be together again.

  Jordan. I’m coming.

  ****

  “Jordan?”

  I race through the cavernous tunnels, determined to find him. Miriam’s voice stretches after me, her voice the only sign of her left through the twists, turns, and dark tunnels. Dim bands of light seem to travel with me as I move through them, helping me to see ahead. The light comforts me—I will come back and find Miriam once I have him, and she will see. She will be glad I went for him. And so I press on, deeper and deeper into the cave.

  Until I reach a split in my path. Jordan is down one of these tunnels. But through the rocky twists, I see nothing, and the echoes of his laughs have floated away. I need him to show me the way.

  I call for him, listening, waiting. Desperate to hear him again.

  I must be going mad.

  But he sounded so real. So close. And I have to find him.

  I will.

  I must be deep below the ground by now. The air is tight and pressured, buzzes against my skin. I take another hesitant step forward.

  “Jordan?”

  The dark ahead breaks down my call to nothing. The air inflates w
ith hope. But it is too still. Dead.

  I wait.

  And then, “Adem!”

  It twists down the tunnel and runs through me in quivering thrills.

  He’s here.

  “Jordan!”

  I chase after his echoes down the path. The light still runs with me, keeps my way lit, as if it were part of me. It spreads through me and reaches in thin strands, mixes in with my eagerness and excitement, and a sweet warmth spills through me. Tells me this is right. This is the way. I’m getting closer.

  Again, the tunnel splits, and I have to pull to a stop. Wait for some kind of sign. “Jordan?” The light nudges at me, wants me to go on. “Where are you? Jordan?”

  A pause, and then there it is again. Jordan. Calling for me.

  I go to him, let the light guide me closer.

  How much farther? Already I’ve come a long way and still no sign of him. Too far. Even I could not have heard Jordan from the cave’s mouth if he is this deep in its depths. Maybe I should go back and find Miriam.

  But the light pulses within me, reassures me, stills my mind to a warm hum, basked in the promise of Jordan just around the next corner. His voice is close. The light surges and my head gets light and giddy. I don’t care how he got here, I just need to get to him.

  “Adem!”

  His laugh spills out in bubbles and bursts over the rough cave walls and I want to catch them, I want to hold them in my hands and stash them in my pockets.

  The light swells. I break into a run.

  Closer. I’m getting closer.

  I am drenched in the light like a soaking sponge. It’s rooted deep within me. My anxiety stills as it quiets my doubt and loosens my shoulder’s ache. It is so strong it practically pulls me forward.

  Jordan calls again and it is like a beam of sun stretching out to me, so real I could reach out my hand and hold it. I’ve never felt so warm, so light, so full and giddy.

  I burst into a large opening, a break from the tight tunnels. Wide stretches of rough rock reach over and around me. The light surges over the walls and dissolves away, leaves just enough to see through the darkness. The kind of darkness that wraps around me like a blanket and tucks me away from the world, the kind I could pull around me and hide in for years and years and years.