EPISODE TWENTY-SEVEN:
A WALK IN THE DARK
Sleep didn’t come easily. Vash finally turned out the lantern and wrapped himself in his bedroll. The strange ghost-sounds of the Underlands kept him on edge for a long time. Even keeping his dagger clasped in one hand did little to assuage his anxiety. Finally, exhaustion claimed him, dragging his mind down into a blessedly dreamless sleep.
Vash awoke to the sound of splashing water accompanied by low grunts and growls. He didn’t know how much time had passed, but the glowmoss had bloomed, bathing the Underlands in the strange bruised twilight color that Vash was becoming accustomed to.
The splashing and growls grew louder, like a fight was going on at the river’s edge. Vash peered out from his niche among the stalagmites. He could barely make out vague shapes at the shore. The larger one seemed to be trying to pull a smaller one up onto land.
Gingerly tapping into his Core, Vash felt the warm relief of full mana. With practiced ease, he activated , focusing on his sight. After a moment of discomfort while Vash’s elvish eyes adjusted themselves, the world grew brighter and he could see what had been making all that noise.
Immediately, Vash wished he hadn’t.
Surprisingly, the two large creatures that fought at the riverbank did not make more noise. The first was humanoid, but easily a half-head taller than even Corwin. Thick, night-black scales ran down its back, flanking a decorative frill that adorned the creature’s spine. It wore a kind of skirt made from dark leather, slit up the sides to allow its powerful legs freedom of movement. A thick, muscular tail thrashed behind it, acting of its own accord. The creature’s face was elongated, with a blunt snout and a heavy jaw. That jaw, Vash could see, held scores of sharp teeth that were currently buried deeply in the body of its opponent. Vash had seen a creature like this before, but smaller and far less alive.
A Scaleback, the lizard-men of the marshlands.
Vash thought.
The second creature was a huge, milk-pale flatworm. Its body was long and wide to better help it move through the water. The worm pulsed and undulated in the scaleback’s claws, moving with an unsettling, boneless manner. Suddenly, the worm whipped its “head” around, pushing forward a solid mass from somewhere in its body. The hemispherical mass formed something like the head of a hammer, colliding with the scaleback with brutal force.
A meaty resounded over the splashes. The scaleback let out a throaty hiss of pain and surprise, letting go of the worm and staggering away from the creature. Stumbling and heavily favoring one side, the scaleback retreated to the safety of the rocky shore, trying to get out of the worms reach. But it was too late. The worm whipped itself around again, slamming its solid head into the scaleback. This time, the lizard-man took a blow across the face. Vash could see the side of the creature’s head cave in, leaving behind a grotesque, pulped mass.
The scaleback collapsed into the shallows of the river and the worm continued to hammer it over and over with the strange solid mass it formed within its body. Vash winced when he heard bones snap and the wet slap of flesh being pulverized.
It was over in a few moments. The scaleback stopped moving, and the worm, once satisfied that its opponent was dead, dragged the body back with it into the water. The creature’s grotesque, star-shaped mouth was already elongating to envelop the newly softened body of the scaleback.
When the worm finally disappeared beneath the surface of the water, all that was left of their conflict was a small puddle of blood slowly seeping into the stone.
Vash waited as long as he could, as silently as he could. Waiting for what might happen next. Once he was certain that it was over, Vash relaxed slightly. The battle had been a mere few feet from where he lay. Either creature could have come upon him in the night and killed him before he had time to react.
Shivering from the sudden surge of adrenaline, Vash hurriedly packed up his camp, taking special care to make sure his weapons were clean and moved freely in their scabbards. Within a few minutes, Vash had everything stowed in his pack and he was ready to move on.
But he hesitated.
Vash thought. .
This was different, though, and he could feel it. The Underlands were far beyond anything Vash had ever faced. He was also alone, again, for the first time in a long while. He hated to admit it, but that was something that frightened him to his core. No one to watch his back, no one to watch while he slept.
“Three days.” Vash murmured, eyes drawn to the puddle of blood on the stones. The dim blue light made the blood look black, just like the color of the river water.
The words echoed in his mind. A familiar mantra that Iona taught him in those early days, when the nightmares had been at their worst. It meant more than just fear of the dark. The shadow itself, the embodiment of evil on the mortal plane, the Eth Mitaan did not fear it, scoffed at those who did. For they knew the truth: the shadow was a part of every living being.
Vash thought, tightening the straps of his pack, then taking the first step out from his hiding place.
“I fear not death, for I am death.” Vash said, his voice steadying, the prayer doing as intended, focusing his mind and banishing childish fear.
Vash thought, starting his trek along the river, careful to keep one eye on the calm waters.
“Doesn’t mean I want to welcome death early.”
Progress along the riverbank was slower than Vash had hoped. The way was often blocked by some obstacle that he had to either go around or over. Also, the river twisted and turned, often looping back on itself as it continued to carve its way deeper into the earth.
A series of rapids created a confusing and loud section of his journey. The water sheared through the soft rock, making nearly sheer walls as it descended. Vash had to move onto tiny toe-paths while he tried to follow the river.
He crept along the slick rock, clinging to hand holds while shuffling along. More than once, his foot slipped and Vash quickly summoned Enhance Ability to give him the strength to cling to the rock long enough to regain his footing. The spray from the rapids was soaking into his clothes, making him wet, cold and miserable.
“I really hate this place.” Vash said, gritting his teeth as the ledge of rock that he was inching along narrowed again.
Ahead, the rock ledge ended in a sheer drop-off. Vash approached it warily and peered over the edge. Roughly twenty feet of pitted stone were between him and another ledge further down. The path was too far above the river for Vash to see it clearly. He could hear the roaring of the water, and it was loud enough that the river couldn’t be too far down.
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“Still, a drop like that is likely to kill me,” Vash grumbled. He looked around for any other way forward, but only saw more glistening rocks and empty space filled with roiling spray from the river below.
“Gods-fucking-dammit!” Vash said, his voice coming out in an angry hiss. He gritted his teeth in frustration, unable to come up with a curse vile enough for how he felt. Taking a deep breath, Vash steadied himself. Lashing out and throwing a tantrum wasn’t going to help in this situation.
“Nothing for it but to climb, I guess,” Vash said, gazing down at the climb with a bitter scowl.
Setting his feet firmly, Vash mentally gathered up his frustration, fear, and fatigue. He let those feelings sink into the deep well of his mind, letting calm and focus settle over him. Vash called up , mentally splitting the Talent to fuel his strength and agility. He would need both for the climb down. Mana flowed out from his Core, warming his muscles and filling them with strength and vitality. His balance shifted, putting him on a more advantageous footing. Vash tamped down any lingering doubts and reached around the corner of the rock wall to find his first hand hold.
The descent was long and difficult. Wet stone made footing treacherous and Vash had to keep pouring mana into the strength to maintain his grip. Memories of the mines floated up as the rock bit into the flesh of his hands.
“This is the opposite problem, though.” Vash said to himself as another moment of panic threatened to break through his calm. “In the mines, everything was too close, too small. Here, the danger is that I’m hanging out over a !”
Cursing seemed to help with the old fears, and they went scurrying back to the depths of his mind while he concentrated on the task at hand.
Finally, he reached the next ledge of stone. This one was at least wide enough for his whole foot to stand on. Releasing Enhance Ability, Vash felt every muscle in his arms, hands, and back screaming at him. He hoped that there wouldn’t be another section like that until he had a chance to rest awhile.
The ledge continued along the rock wall and finally began to open onto a wider path. After some time, the path finally widened into enough space to sit. Vash gratefully dropped his pack and sank down, leaning his back against the rock wall. His shoulders and legs ached terribly, and his stomach rumbled in protest. Vash hadn’t had anything to eat since the night before. First the fight between the Scaleback and the Hammerworm had pushed him to get moving quickly, then the treacherous climb had meant stopping for anything other than a sip of water from his waterskin was out of the question.
Vash drank deeply from his waterskin and unwrapped some cheese and travel bread from his small store of rations. He let himself take a moment to enjoy just being off his feet and getting some food into his belly, meager fare that it was.
The path was sloping downwards, back to level with the river. Vash could see the water again, a black surface dappled with the blue-white glow from the glowmoss far above. It moved swiftly past him, sweeping down the way he came towards the cataracts. The river was wider here. He could barely see the opposite bank.
Vash scanned the dim outlines of rocks and cliffs on the far side of the river, searching for the pinprick of yellow light that would indicate Corwin and Jabez were nearby. He hadn’t seen them since their paths diverged the previous day.
“Stupid,” Vash said to himself. “With all the obstacles I’ve run into on this side, if their path is any easier, they’d be half a day or more in front of me.”
He didn’t want to consider the alternative, that the other Wayfarers were behind him, slowed by their injuries or they ran afoul of the Scalebacks. The lizard-men in the marshes on the surface were known to be maneaters, and generally difficult to deal with.
“I’m sure they’re fine.” Vash said, shaking his head and eating the last of his cheese. He tucked the travel bread into a pouch for easy snacking as he traveled, then picked up his pack again.
As Vash buckled on his pack, he spotted motion up ahead, where the river bent and widened into a small lake. He saw dark shapes moving against the glowmoss that grew along the shore of the lake. It was the first patches of the stuff that he had seen that wasn’t on the cavern roof.
Careful to keep still and not attract any attention, Vash watched the dark shapes for a time. The shapes didn’t move like anything he was familiar with, and were too far away to look like anything more than dark blobs against the glowing background.
, Vash thought, .
Though he was still a good distance away, Vash walked slowly and cautiously along the path. He kept close to the wall and made sure that no lights shone behind him to give whatever was up ahead a clear view of his silhouette.
After a hundred feet, the path sloped down to a floor of coarse black sand. Large boulders stood in groups of three or four, making multiple paths along the beach. Vash could see patches of glowmoss in the crevices of the boulders. Wide, shelf-like mushrooms also clung to the rocks. Their color was difficult to make out in the dim light, but they looked similar to fungus that grew in the forests around Ragpicker’s Hollow. Pale flesh spotted with dark blotches on top, delicate gill-like structures below.
Vash was careful not to touch anything as he moved. Some mushrooms he knew of would release spores if disturbed. He didn’t want to find out what the spores of the mushrooms in the Underlands would do.
It took Vash more than an hour to get close enough to really see the bend in the river where he’d first spotted the dark shapes. Huge pillars of rock, where stalactites and stalagmites had fused over the centuries, stood sentinel over a wedge-shaped promontory of rock that jutted out into the small lake. Glowmoss spread from the roof of the cavern down along the pillars and onto the nearby boulders. The result was a kind of glade or marsh where the water had slowed.
Pale white grass stood at about waist-high, and reeds with oddly bulbous tops poked out of the shallows. The shelf mushrooms also grew here, as well as large, wide-capped mushrooms with colorful luminescent patterns.
Vash might have found the scene fascinating, even beautiful, except for what was also in the shallows.
Tents of bone and a strange, pale leather sprung up like toadstools in the high grass. Racks of fish hung off of racks leaning against the boulders. Moving through the plants and the tents, wading in the shallows or working while squatting on flat rocks were Scalebacks.
It was an entire tribe, from what Vash could see. The huge bulls lazed in the shallows, floating with their large yellow eyes half-lidded. Smaller females were busy with numerous tasks around the camp, carefully avoiding where the bulls floated. Small hatchlings clung to their mothers in a clump, squeaky croaks demanding food or attention.
A hatchling wandered too close to a bull that lounged in the damp sand. The large male snapped at it, and only luck kept the hatchling from becoming a mid-afternoon snack.
Vash thought.
Now that he was looking, he could make out the irregular forms of other Scalebacks at a distance from the camp. They crouched, motionless, gripping spears or heavy clubs. Sentries, watching for any threat to their camp.
Vash could see sentries stationed all around the camp. They were at a distance that cut off any access to the shore of the lake or the river.
. Vash thought.
He glanced off into the distance. Away from the river, the terrain became rougher. Caves and tunnels lead away from the river cavern, but he couldn’t tell if any of them lead back to it.
. Vash thought.
Slowly, carefully, he moved towards the closest tunnel that appeared to be going in the right direction. The tunnel entrance was wide enough for three people to walk abreast, but Vash couldn’t see any glowmoss growing anywhere. After a few steps inside, all light faded away.
Vash thought.
He crept inside the tunnel until he was far enough for the light from his lantern to be obscured by the boulders at the tunnel’s mouth. Vash adjusted the knobs on the lantern and a soft, yellow light bloomed inside the alchemical sphere within.
Light pushed back the shadows in the tunnel and Vash felt some relief. Any light stronger than the dim glowmoss illumination relieved some of the anxiety of traveling in the darkness.
A low growling hiss from further down the tunnel brought it right back.
Yellow reflective eyes appeared about ten feet away. A shadow uncoiled itself from where it crouched at the first bend in the tunnel. As it moved, Vash could see the light glinting off of obsidian-black scales. The large, muscular tail swept black sand back as the Scaleback bull rose up to its full height. The reptilian face looked down at Vash with cold indifference.
Vash stared up at the lizard-man. It was a full head taller than Corwin, so it towered over Vash. Crooked, sharp, white teeth stuck out of the creature’s mouth at odd angles, like its jaws were too small to hold so many instruments of death.
“Well, shit.”
