Heatwave

Part 13

The cave was dark, darker even than the dead of night. My only sense of direction was guided by the cool, damp air which rushed ever forward as I followed. The mountain pass moved steadily downward and to the right as I stumbled over my falling feet. The walls were cold and slick with wet moss; I let my fingers run over it unendingly so I wouldn't run into anything in the dark. The moving air smelled green as it moved toward my face, out of the place to which I was headed.

After a while, my sense of time faded and I couldn't tell what was minutes and what was hours in the dark place. Yet sooner or later, light began to find its way in from the other side.

It started out slow, I was barely able to tell there was light at all, but as I kept moving it grew brighter and brighter until I had reached the opening at the other end. The green smell was indeed from this end of the pass, the opening was covered in heavy green vines thick with leaves hanging from above.

I lowered to the ground and carefully parted the vines without disturbing them too much. Beyond them was a clearing like a courtyard with only the sides of it covered from top to bottom with thick green vegetation. The floor was uneven stone, just as was the rest of the Fellspire path and crude buildings were forced into the face of misshapen clearing.

It was a secret. If the men in black and silver uniforms were indeed working with the government, then this could not be of public knowledge. There were no signs out in the open which allowed things to be obviously labeled and before this moment there was no outside awareness of this place. The government was doing something here that it shouldn't be; they were hiding here because they know they're wrong.

After making certain that I would not be seen, I crawled out from between the vined opening and snuck around the green wall to the right. Without knowing where to look first, I simply followed the side of the clearing; after all, a portion of it was blocked to me by the strange size of the space.

A number of the sharply placed buildings were obviously housing, dozens of men garbed in black and silver moved freely in and out of them with personal belongings. Books, clothes, sheets, objects of no importance. A few of them, however, I recognized from the night Darpik was taken.

Walking smugly around their illegal base as if they truly belonged, one of them I saw was the one who had run after me. When I was going to save Darpik in vain on the night I first saw Rahnthrangir, a man ran after me with the intention to kidnap me as well. This was the man I decided I would follow, if anyone would go to where Darpik was, he would.

As I followed, always in the shadows, I noticed other buildings which look like places such as mess halls, mailing houses and offices. I wondered briefly if they could be worth looking into, but the man I was following kept moving, so I rounded to the Northward end of the rounded-angle shaped base with him.

There was a building I identified as a jail, cages within housed man-sized shadows, shuffling and my heart leapt with anticipation, surly Darpik was in there.

It was darker now than when I first entered the clearing and fewer men paced about. I left alone the man I was following and carefully crept into the jailhouse. Darpik was at the far end of hall of cages, with other boys of his age sitting uselessly on either side. Hardly checking for men in black and silver who might still be wandering about I was so excited, I went to his cage.

He was wearing the same clothes he had when he was kidnapped, only now they were torn, muddied and rank with sour body-odor. My chest tightened with excitement when I finally found him, although I couldn't get to him exactly, just seeing him finally meant that I didn't do all of it for nothing. The Rackam didn't crash for nothing; I didn't learn to fly for nothing. I had that feeling again from when Darpik first came back home to Ironmark, the feeling that everything was going to be alright even though it was far from over just yet.