The caves Rose had run off to weren’t far from the Shatar village. Kreagur pointed us in the right direction, and we set off yet again. I was beginning to wonder if I would ever have a chance to relax again or if my life was doomed to be a never-ending series of dangers. We walked no more than two hours before we came upon the caves that Rose was supposed to be in. What everyone neglected to tell us, however, was just how big these caves were. I was expecting a network of tunnels akin to what Duncan and I had escaped through, and judging by the expression on Duncan’s face, I wasn’t the only one.
What stood before us was not one but a multitude of openings descending into the heart of a mountain. I tried to count them but gave up at twenty-five. How the hell we were supposed to find this girl in this massive labyrinth dug into the side of a mountain was anybody's guess.
“So now what? Are we supposed to just pick one and hope we get lucky?” I asked.
“I mean, unless you have a better idea,” Duncan replied.
“We’re fucked.” Tee said. I couldn’t help but notice Duncan didn’t slap him.
“Yeah, Tee, we’re fucked.” Duncan did, in fact, slap me.
“You two give up so easily. These tunnels must be connected somehow, and they must converge somewhere in there. We pick one and scout in until we find a connecting tunnel. If we go slow and leave a trail behind us, we should find Rose in no time.”
“What are we supposed to drop to leave a trail?” Tee asked before I could.
“These.” Duncan held up a sack of Zoombeans and handed them to Tee. “You take up the rear and make sure to drop one every couple of feet. Brodie, do you think you can control that magic of yours enough to give us some light?”
“I think so.”
I summoned a golf ball into my left hand and began to concentrate. The ball was slowly encircled in fire as I held it. I had never done this while holding the ball before, and I was worried the only thing I would accomplish would be third-degree burns on my hand. To my surprise, I felt no heat coming from the ball, and I was able to hold it as if it were any other normal golf ball. I used my mind to dim the ball a little bit; the last thing I wanted to do was exhaust myself, keeping the ball lit. I held the makeshift torch over my head as we entered the network of caves.
Aside from the light radiating off the golf ball I held, the caves were pitch black. We took our time making our way deeper into the earth. The limited visibility and hazardous terrain kept us alert, and there was very little conversation between us. The silence was occasionally broken by the “thunk” noise the Zoombeans made when Tee dropped them on the ground. The beans faded to nothing in the darkness of the tunnel, but under the light of my torch, they were plain as day. I hadn’t been too sure about Duncan's plan when we started into the tunnel, but when we met up with the first of the connecting pathways, my confidence grew.
The minutes turned into hours as we made our way deeper into the depths of the mountains. We would come across the occasional intersection of tunnels, but much like Duncan had predicted, every tunnel seemed to converge together, creating a larger tunnel that led further into the center of the mountain. I could feel my head starting to get heavy as time dragged on. Despite only using a small amount of my power to create the torch, the continual drain was starting to wear on me.
“Duncan, I’m going to need a break soon; I can't keep this flame going forever,” I said as we walked.
“Ok, Brodie, when we find the next convergence point, we will take a break.”
I sighed and continued to walk forward as Duncan spoke. By the time we came to the next intersection, there was a dull throbbing running along my forehead. I was beginning to get nauseous as well, and my stomach was tied in knots as I sat down.
“I'm going to have to turn this off for a little,” I said, glancing towards the golf ball in my hand.
“That’s fine, Brodie; we have been walking for a while. I think it's probably best if we try and get a few hours of sleep before we continue. I don’t know what we are going to find down here, but I would prefer to be rested and prepared when we do.”
As much as I didn’t feel comfortable sleeping in a pitch-black tunnel in the middle of a mountain, I had to agree that some rest would do us all some good. Despite our lack of vision, we agreed it would be best for one of us to stay up and keep watch; Tee agreed to take the first shift. I let the flames from the magic fade, and the world plunged back into darkness. I laid back on the dirt and got as comfortable as I could considering the situation, closed my eyes, and drifted off to sleep.
I couldn’t have been asleep for more than half an hour when bright light pierced my eyelids, jolting me awake. I jumped up and looked in the direction of the light, and what I saw caused my breath to catch in my throat. Duncan was asleep on the ground, surrounded by five ghastly glowing figures clawing and scratching at his body. I looked to my left and saw Tee was already awake and bringing his flute to his mouth.
“We have to help him!” I shouted.
“I have a song that might do the trick. It's supposed to banish the undead, but I've never had to use it before.”
Tee started to play the song as I grabbed my club and charged towards the apparitions. Duncan was writhing from side to side, screaming now, and I could see the scars on his body opening and leaking blood with every swipe from the ghosts. I hoisted the club behind my back as I closed the distance between me and the nearest spirit. Putting all my weight behind the swing, I sent the head of the club sailing towards the being. I nearly fell over from the momentum of my attack as it passed through the ghost, doing nothing to stop their relentless assault.
Tee’s song blared through the air, but it seemed to have no effect, and the attack on our friend continued. I was at a complete loss; my club was ineffective, and I didn’t dare try and use any fire magic out of fear of hurting Duncan. As I watched Duncan’s body roll and contort in pain, I noticed tears coming from his closed eyes, and that’s when I had an idea. Summoning a golf ball, I charged it with the tiniest amount of power. The flames on the ball were barely visible as I lobbed it gently towards Duncan’s hand.
The ball made contact with Duncan’s hand, and the flames did exactly what I was hoping they would do. The searing pain of his fingers catching fire caused Duncan to scream in pain and bolt straight up, wide awake. As he woke up, the ghosts around him faded away, and the pool of his own blood he was laying in seeped into the ground beneath him. More than a dozen of the scars on Duncan’s body were now a deep red and faintly glowing. A look of horror passed over Duncan’s face as he realized this as well.
“What is happening to me?!” Duncan asked, tears streaming from his face.
I didn’t have an answer for him, and I had never seen Duncan like this before. He just sat there in the dark, scared and crying. I had no idea what to do. I'm so bad in situations like this and tend to have a history of making things worse when I speak. Tee floated down next to Duncan and just sat with him. I decided the best thing to do was to follow Tee’s lead, so I sat next to Duncan and gave him the most awkward hug in the history of hugs as he cried.
Sitting there in the dark was the first time I realized that not only did I look up to Duncan in some strange way, but I also considered him a friend. He and Tee had been the only two people who had been nice to me since I got to this fucked up place. We had to find Rose and get these plans, but more importantly, we had to figure out what these scars were about. I didn’t plan to lose one of my only two friends.
