Ortai Legacy: Arrival

10.1 - Discovery (L)

Groaning, I shuffled past the grass mat. The steep tunnel and distant monster calls made my skin crawl. Raeve was perched halfway down the ladder, glancing rapidly between me and the one empty doorway in the entrance room.

I urged my graxi out of hiding, but they refused to touch the shifting rays of sunlight. I'd mostly expected this, so I retrieved the rope from Viridian's saddle and tied it to one of the tunnel's support beams. I had basically no experience with using climbing ropes—and putting any amount of weight on it made it creak worryingly—but I trusted my graxi to catch me if the rope broke.

But if it did break, could I leave the ship again? Without Mar'kost's help, it seemed unlikely. More ropes might be enough, but Raeve would have to run and get Cadmus to help. I'd be stuck in the ship, alone, waiting an indeterminate amount of time.

And if it did break, I would fall. The graxi might not be fast enough to catch me. I could shatter into a million pieces, leaving only my brain intact. Raeve wouldn't be able to take me to the Source to recover. She wouldn't even know I needed to go there. She might even bury me, thinking I was dead.

Raeve flew up the tunnel to hover in front of me. "What's wrong?"

I cringed back from the ledge. "I can't- I don't-"

"Mar'kost said you've got to drink arka all the time, right?"

I nodded wordlessly.

"Then it doesn't matter if you're afraid. You either get down there or die."

Of course I knew that! Knowing the truth didn't change the fact that every fiber in my body wanted to run back to Mar'kost and pretend I'd never had this insane idea. Clutching the rope, I forced out two words: "I can't."

"Forget this. I'll explore on my own." She flitted down the tunnel and left the entrance room.

What the hell was she doing? There was no way she was prepared for this kind of dungeon. Mar'kost himself had told me that she was a novice Scout.

He'd never said anything about her doing something like this, even though she'd known about the ship's location for a while. Why now? Was she doing this to show me up? Or was she trying to prove that I was a fraud?

A high-pitched scream made my blood run cold. That wasn't a monster's call. She was dying. She had to be. Despite Mar'kost's reassurances that he could safely navigate the dungeon, he'd nearly died in it because of my influence. It was happening again. She was so small. Nixes couldn't regenerate like shifters. Alone, she was as good as dead. Mar'kost would never forgive me.

My body trembled, and my fingers creaked as I stepped off the ledge. The rope slipped through my fingers, plunging me toward the hard ground below. Black strands leapt from behind me, forming a makeshift catch net. I hung for a split second before willing the graxi to lower me as quickly as possible.

As soon as my feet touched the ground, I drew my polearm. "Kris. Sanas." The room lit up as the invisible barrier dulling my blade shimmered away. I sprinted out of the room.

The hallway was empty. No, 'empty' couldn't possibly describe the smattering of bone shards and viscera—or the creepy plants and bugs eating them—but it was certainly empty of Raeve.

"That wasn't so hard, was it?"

I screeched, slamming my shoulder into the wall in a mindless attempt to get away from the bodiless voice.

"Relax. I don't have enough arkegy to keep the sound barrier up for long." Raeve popped into the visible plane with a grin.

"The hell is wrong with you?" I hissed, rubbing my sore shoulder.