A New Beginning

Blessed are Those who Hunger and Thirst for Righteousness

A beacon can be as much of a warning as it can be a guide to safety and in your case, it is likely the former. As if stirred out of a trance, you come to a halt. Something feels wrong, amiss. You close your eyes. Dots of yellow and white dance before you against a backdrop of pitch black – duplicates of the lantern's flame.

Such lamps only burn for a few hours. Someone must have put the lamp alight recently. Someone that might still be near. Deep breath. You need your brain at its peak, not muddled from the thrall of distant memories, bitter or sweet. You open your eyes and take in your surroundings, fully present this time as much in spirit as in body. You must be at a junction where several tunnels merge. That means a higher chance of Arthur passing by. Both your revolver and John's shotgun are gone and you have no idea where you lost them, and to boot, Nevans' injuries might make him more desperate, not to mention dangerous. You should wait here.

You squint. Is there something over there?

Trepidation stirs. You scurry backwards but the wall that was supposed to be there is but a void. You reel into a small recess, where you are met with a density of shadow against greyish dark – the silhouette of a man. Numbing dread seeps back into your veins, ensued by a pleasant anticlimax when you realize it is a man long dead, slumped against the wall with its arms and legs splayed out. You see no broken bones, bullet wounds, or other signs of injury, and the few, scattered supplies visible in the dim light suggest a huntsman, collector, or gold digger rather than bandit or runaway. Likely a hapless soul who entered the claim in hunt for mineral ore or perchance he was tempted by the high price a perfect cougar pelt will net. Then he got lost within this labyrinth of frozen hell, where his body, frail and weak, eventually succumbed to thirst.

Relieved, although far from relaxed, you stand upright and brush off filth and grime, though a thin layer of dust and lichen remains glued to your skin.

A sound! Behind you – turns trepidation to alarm as the simple, yet wretched realization hits like a pang and dread descends upon you once again as the lean shadow of a gangly man snakes into view, aligning with yours. Nevans! He is here.

With each dull thud of approaching footsteps succeeds a stench apposite of a highwayman with reins in one hand, revolver in the other, who has yet to make acquaintance with the notion of soap, or minds sleeping in his own excrements.

You raise your hands, more so by instinct than intent. His breathing intensifies, either because of rising proximity or by taunting intent, as if he knows that the mere overlay of his shadow onto yours is enough intimacy to bring you distress. A gruff voice that does not belong to Arthur, or his brethren, speaks.

"Well, ain't this a pleasant surprise."

The affected sugary tone has you go into instant revolt, though it is nothing to the ghastly remembrance of moist huffing, puffing, and panting against your ear and the foul slug of a tongue gliding against – to an impromptu gag so vehement you can taste bile, you spin around to a gruesome prospect clad in muck.

"Fancy meetin' you 'ere, all alone. You come 'ere to keep uncle Clive company?"

Nevans looks decrepit, haggard, and gaunt, like a debased version of the monster from a fortnight ago that, despite the lantern's warm, amber glow, looks almost ghoulish in appearance, a dull, orange light reaching just far enough to frame the grim display splayed out before you, a spectacle as tense as its area of display is slight, his face mottled and hollow-eyed with flaccid bags underneath, like an ailing old man, though he is likely no more than thirty-five at most. Gone are the rodent-like cheeks, and the once distinctive lightning bolt is now but a crisscross in leathery, sickly pallid skin. In his left hand, Arthur's gun is pointing square at your head. Its right counterpart is bandaged with a bloody cloth. One or more fingers appear to be missing.