You say that a Resonant can experience the memories of their victims? Apparently, there is more hidden in one’s tendons and muscle fiber than I thought. Truly, what an absurd notion. To think that a man can learn of the women I’ve bedded just by tasting my wrist. These Resonants and the Great Devourer you speak of are nothing more than fairytales written by madmen. That fools such as yourself choose to believe in these things is an obvious reflection of your upbringing. Saint Iranol is a star, nothing more.
Felix jolted awake. There was something in the walls that howled. A lonely cry that echoed like a lost whale in a vast ocean. It made the hair on the back of his neck stand up.
This place wasn’t like the dungeon cells in Bruma’s capital or the scum-covered sheets of that sleazy tavern on fourth street. No, this place was dark, and the walls seemed to heave, warm and moist. The Astralarium stood at the bottom of a tremendous chasm. So deep was the gorge that light faltered, forming the abyss. It took him two days to get to the bottom.
The scholars of the sunken valley brought him and four others to the edge of that ravine nearest a narrow winding path that led into the darkness below. They gave each a mule, three cantinas of water, a bushel of grain, and a blindfold.
“You have to learn to see without the light,” they said, tying the scarf around Felix’s head.
“But how am I to find the way?” Felix asked. “What if I fall?!”
“Trust the mule,” Ilene whispered in his ear. “And whatever you do, don’t remove the blindfold.”
She’d been repeating that since his pilgrimage began, since she revealed the scar across her face and the kinship they shared in Saint Iranol’s betrayal.
“This is ridiculous.” Felix shook his head, remembering how the scholars stood on the streets of Bruma preaching like madmen.
“If you wish to turn back, now is the time,” Ilene said.
“Screw it. I’ve come this far.” Felix held the reins of that mule tight, stepping away from the edge.
A leap of faith, that’s how it started, and, for some, that’s how it ended.
Only four of them descended. The fifth threw his blindfold in the dust.
“No way in hell am I trusting some beast over my own two eyes,” he spit, leaving them behind and never looking back.
Felix had half a mind to join him, but there was something here that stayed his hand. A voice coming from the throat of the world itself. It was like a familiar tune dancing at the tip of a bard’s tongue or the sound of his mother’s voice repeating god’s blessing.
“When the path leads you astray, Saint Iranol will know the way.”
No, mother, you’re wrong. Felix thought, wishing he could tell her that.
Thankfully, Ilene was right. The mule seemed to know the way. Felix stuck close to the beast’s side, his hands growing steady on the reins. Something was oddly reassuring about the mule’s movements; stable, firm, and without a hint of doubt. An hour in, and who knew how deep they had gone? Perhaps it was better for him not to know.
“Careful now,” came the snickers from behind. “We wouldn’t want the thief to fall first.”
Ah, Felix the sly, his reputation had preceded him. The other three initiates came from more respectable professions; A debt collector with crooked fingers and unpaid bills, a doctor with a shaky left hand and a scar on his cheek from a widow’s blade, and an innkeeper with a red scalp, deep pockets, and a habit of leaving the doors of occupied rooms unlocked.
Felix had shared a cell with them once, each an outcast, whether by choice or mistake. In prison, it rarely mattered. They were brothers in this profession and the next, but they hated him all the same.
To be a scholar of the sunken valley, who was more qualified than a man who counted pennies, a man who sowed skin, or a man with many open doors and a warm hearth? Indeed, not the man who skulked in dark allies stealing jewelry from Mrs. Finch and tossing stones at the temple guard for a free meal and an empty cot.
Yet, why was it that Ilene whispered advice in Felix’s ear when they turned their backs? Why was it that the scholars gave him bread when their stomachs growled? They embraced the thief as if he were already one of them.
Who was the fifth man who tossed his blindfold in the dust and stormed off, never to return? They’d already forgotten but had half a mind to join him before Felix took his first steps down into the darkness.
“Screw it. we’ve come this far already.”
They followed close to Felix’s heel, driven by a growing pain in their right sides, a scarlet fever, jealousy.
Felix felt none of it, not the jabs about his mother being a whore or the brief remarks about the scar on his hand.
Thief, heretic, bastard, heathen. He’d heard it all before, but that voice, that howl coming from the throat of the gorge, that was new.
The calling was faint before, like the whispering wind, but eight hours down, and it was the dull roar of a thunderstorm. There was an echo now, a forlorn cry of an orphan. Felix had to know what it was, had to know why it sounded so familiar.
He could almost make out a syllable or two, and it was like his mind just filled in the blanks, creating sentences out of nothing.
“Look at me,” the voice said. “Look at me.”
Felix felt something touch his hand and then crawl up his sleeve like a roach creeping under the kitchen counter.
Then came the smell; a pinch of ginger, an ounce of cloves, something his mother used to make on chilly nights and rainy mornings.
His stomach growled as he licked his lips.
“Are you hungry?” asked the voice. “Look at me.”
Felix felt something tug at his blindfold. He reached up to find his own hand teasing at the fabric.
“Whatever you do, don’t remove the blindfold,” he heard Ilene’s voice repeating in his head.
Near ten hours down and the mule finally came to a stop, exhausted. So, Felix decided to rest there for the night. Like a blind man, he felt around his pack of supplies, finding a metal bowl, and filling it with water from the first cantina. He spread several handfuls of grain before the mule with the water dish.
Resting his back against the jagged stone wall, he took sips from the third cantina, just enough to get by. Then he tasted the grain, bland and dry.
“You must temper your appetites,” the scholars’ words kept repeating in his head as a breeze passed through the gorge, bringing with it the smell of cloves and ginger.
“You must be cold,” he heard his mother’s voice, “come in and have a bite.”
“I think I will,” Felix said, dozing off upon the cliff face.
That night he had a dream, a dream about a man collecting pennies from the poor. They lowered their heads as he passed with crooked fingers, a sickly smile, and a thick book of names and debts.
The debt collector walked with his head high and one hand behind his back, tapping copper coins on a tiny bell.
“Please,” said a child, all gristle and bone. “It’s all I have.”
“It’ll have to do,” The man said as the boy dropped a silver coin into his palm.
“Please,” said a man in shoes so worn moss grew in the soles. “My child is sick.”
“I will send the corpse cart next week,” the debt collector said, feeling the weight of the copper between his fingers.
“Please,” said a woman in a dirty satin gown and a bleached ribbon. “I have nothing gold to give.”
“Then I shall summon the guards,” he said, turning to ring the bell once more.
“Wait!” she cried. “Is there nothing else I can do?”
The man stopped, turning towards her voice and licking his lips. The woman pressed herself close, letting him run his fingers along her thigh.
“Don’t you want a taste?” She asked, licking his ear.
“I do.”
“Don’t you want a peak?” She said, lowering the straps of her dress.
“I do.”
“Shhhh,” the woman whispered. “Our little secret.”
“Our little secret,” He repeated as a shadow crept up from behind him and slit his throat.
All went black then, and Felix heard something in the distance, a piercing wail, and a sudden wet crunch.
He jolted awake, crying out and clawing at the stone wall. Under his feet, something gave, a rock tumbling over the edge of a cliff, and he heard it bounce from left to right, deeper and deeper until it was gone.
Felix was so close to the edge the wind kissed his ear. His hands shook as the mule nudged his back, bringing the reins close.
There was that voice again, that orphan’s wail that carried as far as the wind and beyond, an undulation that rattled his feet, causing pebbles to bounce. Suddenly, he could hear a chirping noise and then came a whistle; not sharp but soft, distant, and lonely.
Felix grabbed hold of the reins, his heart steady once more. There was no turning back.
He missed the jabs now, the snickering at his back. The others must have fallen behind. He waited for them once, hoping to hear the scuffing of boots against the stone; ten, twenty, no thirty minutes later and still nothing but the whistle of a lost whale.
The mule tugged at the reins—time to go.
Halfway through the second day, he could smell cloves, ginger, and something new, something thick like porridge that made his nostrils stick together; sweet like vanilla, savory like a glazed roast, sour like a fresh cut lemon. His stomach growled, and a line of spittle dripped from his chin.
There was something about the feel of those jagged walls that set him off. The fine grit beneath his fingers felt like salt. He had to have a taste. Felix licked the stone, rough, dusty but with a hint of flavor. He sucked on the mortar, drawing fine minerals from the pores in the rock.
The mule tugged on the reins, but he had to have one more taste.
Felix licked the walls over and over. One stone was sweet, another savory, and the pebbles were like melted candies in his mouth.
Suddenly, the mule tugged hard, causing him to stumble and hit his head. What was that in his mouth, that sharp pain in his jaw? He coughed, dislodging a stone and pieces of his teeth from the back of his throat.
All he could taste was iron now, a metallic film that coated his tongue and tickled his throat.
Something was wrong with this place, so very wrong. Felix had to get out, but the mule plodded along slow and sure.
If only he could see, maybe he could find his way out, climb the walls or crawl along the path back to the surface. His fingers touched the blindfold.
“Our little secret,” said a voice in the dark.
Felix stopped short, his hands trembling, cold sweat across his brow.
Ten hours in, and the mule stopped once more. Felix wasn’t as steady this time, spilling the water and scattering the grain across the ground. He emptied the second cantina and took a long sip from the third. Just enough left to reach the bottom.
Sleep wasn’t as easy this time. Felix stuck close to the beast, its belly warm and fur soft. The grain was bland and tasteless, and he chewed on his left side, his right still tender. Stuffing a roll of cotton into his nose, he closed his eyes, drifting off to the sounds of a distant whistle.
Tonight, he was a doctor—a man with a gifted needle who sewed skin like a painter tracing canvas.
A split knee? He reset the bone and stitched a smile in the cap.
A punctured lung? A flick of the wrist to tease out the rib and plug the hole.
A fit of madness? Dice the blades and split the brain front from the back.
This doctor was a musician; the knife always knew where to cut and the thread where to flow. He never flinched once, even as he split open his patients’ ribs and touched their hearts.
“Doctor,” said a young girl. “Please make me beautiful.”
He ran his fingers along the ridge of her crooked nose, gaunt cheeks, and wrinkled brow. The doctor tapped his knives, a flash of inspiration. Now he saw her with golden-brown hair, a smile that smelled like lavender, and a tiny dimple at the corner of her chin, shy with a red blush and quivering lip.
She was his masterpiece.
“What have you done to me?!” the little girl screamed with a mirror in hand.
“I don’t understand,” the doctor said, his hands clammy and cold.
“Look at me!” she shouted. “Look at what you’ve done!”
“This cannot be.” His voice was hoarse, fingers trembling as he ran from the room.
“Look at me!” The girl dug her nails into his wrists and sunk her teeth into his throat as the world went black.
Felix could hear a slurping sound, tepid sewer water sloshing in a bowl. There was a gurgle, a sudden crunch, and then the dripping of something heavy and red.
He woke screaming, pushing himself hard against the stone wall and kicking his feet. His heart beating like a drum, brow slick and moist.
The taste in the air was different. A scent that seeped through the cotton in his nose, staining it black; the smell of burning hair and curling flesh.
“Help me!” Felix heard his mother scream.
“Witch! Heretic!” the crowd shouted back. “Burn her! Burn her!”
“Look at me, son!” she cried. “Look at me!”
“No!”
Felix pressed himself as close to the walls as possible and made his way down the ravine. How narrow was the pass? He no longer cared, and nor was he waiting for that damn mule.
The walls were sticky, moist and warm. Felix could feel them heave, the air heavy, damp, and foul. Then came that ghastly wail once more, that undulating pitch now a dull roar that threatened his footing.
Felix slipped, catching the edge of the jagged pass, rocks tumbling down over the side. His breath caught in his throat, fingers slipping one by one. That’s when he heard it, the sound of stones striking the bottom, a blessed chorus.
Felix made it.
He let go just as his strength gave out, plummeting a short distance before striking the rocks below, out like a light.
One last dream, one final torment. He was an innkeeper now. A man who took pride in open doors and paid pennies to Mr. Crawford, who sang songs by the fire and tapped for the children.
“A room for two, please,” said the rich man, laying three gold coins on the innkeeper’s desk, a young woman clinging to his shoulder with a deep red blush, staggering gait, and a quiet hiccup.
The innkeeper knew this man, a lord’s son, taking time to roll in the mud with the other pigs. If memory served, this little lordling was already married to an older woman, not this child melting in his arms with trembling eyelashes.
He knew just the room to give them, 152. They took the keys, skipping up the stairs, the straps of her dress already below her waist before the door was open. Perfect.
How much would he pay to keep a secret? The innkeeper smiled, trailing close behind them and feeling the walls until his fingers touched a familiar doorknob, gilded steel with an ivory flourish, room 150.
It took him ten years of savings to afford that photobox, but it was worth it. He positioned the tripod in front of an oval hole in room 150, a hole that led straight into 152; a hole that looked like a misshapen pupil on a painting with an odd gloss coat that shimmered in the light. Even sober patrons struggled to notice the ruse.
The innkeeper turned the handle, but the door wouldn’t budge. Strange, he thought he had unlocked the door. Fishing through his pockets, he pulled a ring of keys as thick as a miser’s wallet.
Which one was it again? He couldn’t remember. No, not this one, or this one, and certainly not this one.
He flipped through the keys quickly, his hands sweating and slipping on the ring. The keys crashed to the ground, scattering across the floor.
“No, no, no!” he shouted, dropping to the ground, and accidently pushing a few keys under the door.
“Damn it!”
The keys scattered further beneath his frantic movements as a shadow of a man crept up behind him and stuck a knife in his back.
Felix heard a scream, a sudden crack like the parting of ribs and the drip of flowing maple from a split tree.
“Make it stop,” Felix said, his blindfold moist and back aching, but his head rested on something soft and warm.
“I knew you’d make it,” said a woman who parted his hair.
“Who are you?”
She took Felix’s hand and rested his fingers on her cheek, and he could feel curled folds of a wrinkled scar.
“Ilene?” he croaked. “Is that you?”
“It’s me.”
“Where are the others?”
“They’re gone, Felix, but I knew you’d make it,” she said with a gentle whisper.
Felix heard that undulating cry once more, that wailing banshee that ebbed and flowed like the ocean’s tide.
“What is that?” he asked, grabbing hold of her robes.
“One of the Leviathans,” Ilene said, holding a white stone close to his cheek. “Sitis, the Claw of Ursa Minor.”
“A brother of the bear joins us,” said one of the scholars behind her.
“What is this Leviathan saying?” Felix asked as she helped him up.
“You can’t tell?”
“It sounds lost, a child trying to find its way home.” He squinted in pain as Ilene wrapped his arms around her shoulders. “What do you hear?” Felix asked.
“Dinner time,” she said with a smile and a laugh. “I hope you’re hungry.”