The Cleansing (Book One: The Folara Chronicles)

028:Crevan

Inside Sentinel, air filtered into tunnels where stillness reigned, and the eerie sounds of wild screeches and screams could be heard. Inside the living stone, its own vibrations could be detected. Much like the subtle wind that curled around the outside of the mountain, the Shadow Eaters slunk.

Indigenous to the planet's surface, they had once been at the top of the food chain, predatory and lethal. They needed two forms of sustenance to survive. Ingesting vegetation kept the blood in their bodies pure and toxin free while ingesting the life force of their prey kept their intelligence sentient. Without life force, the creature could continue to exist, but sentience dissolved.

Humans were divided, an antagonistic and dis-unified people. They came with their unusual hunger for colonization and intolerance for any interference and took over. Using their superior intelligence they ranged the planet's surface and undersurface, changed the laws that governed, and usurped the dynamic. What had been natural was now unnatural.

Sentinel opened to allow passage for sentient Shadow Eaters who served as natural predators. The plentiful harvest of humans made the darkness and warmth a rich environment for the survival of the indigenous species. Along with the sentient and threatened group, there were those who had already been assimilated by the Foemen, whose natural abilities being usurped now simply existed to guard the Talisman from searchers. While they understood that the Searchers were human, they refused to help the Foemen, retaining their will to the degree that they managed to find ways to evade Quildor's complete control.

So it was that when Crevan entered the mountain he came first to the dead Shadow Eater and was highly perplexed. In a moment, he had called a squad of Quarso to remove the remains and scour the area for an explanation. They came dashing around the tunnels, making very little noise, examining and fanning out, until suddenly there was a gasp and one of his men went down.

Crevan was in defensive posture, muscling through the tight formation that configured as soon as the man was hit. He knelt, one hand on the man's chest as he lay dying. He gave orders, and the men around him flattened and shrank into the folds of the tunnel. Another hand joined his.

"It's an arrow." Crevan pointed out the obvious. "Shadow Eaters do not use arrows."

Rion's hand was there, examining the protruding instrument as the warrior gave up his last breath, and Crevan closed his eyes in disbelief. They hadn't lost a Quarso in a very long time. "Searchers do not use arrows." Rion felt along the shaft of the arrow, determining trajectory, then stood, following the path the arrow had taken. It led straight to the wall of the tunnel. He placed a hand there, searching for an opening. There was no discernible fissure in the solid stone face of the wall, which meant nothing if the arrow had come from an initiated searcher. He straightened, feeling along the stone with his palm.

What arrow had the power to shoot through solid living stone? Organic material he understood, the melding of element. But an inanimate object? He strode purposefully over to the dead man and Crevan, who had pulled the Quarso shroud over his comrade. As Crevan bowed his head and lifted the man's identifying belt pack off him, Rion knelt and gripped the arrow in both hands.

"Brother. Do not disturb him." Crevan warned.

Rion jerked on the arrow and it came free with a sucking sound not unlike the sound they'd heard when it had entered. A gush of blood and tissue joined the weapon in Rion's hand. 

"I have never seen its like." The crystal and tawny shaft gleamed in the faint light. His eyes rose to meet Crevan's. The Quarso Captain stared back at him coldly. Crevan wasn't one to breach tradition, or show disrespect to the dead.

"Do you think it came from our friend?" Rion's voice was deadly mocking, his eyes flickering in the light from Crevan's eye coverings. In the short time since they'd met Kahlest, they had both decided that her presence was an indeterminate decoy, and not to be trusted.

Crevan's face immediately showed his anger and concern. "It can't be!"

Rion's eyes rolled and then rested squarely upon Crevan. "It is a possibility. We know absolutely nothing about her people, their skills or capabilities, or their... weapons."

"You believe that they have the capability to shoot an arrow through the stone?" Crevan yanked the shroud back into place, nodding to the men who had appeared to remove the remains.

"Why not? They can transform into birds and fly." Rion fingered the longer than normal arrow, the sleek smoothness of it, the gentle bend to its craftsmanship.

"A few." Crevan covered his mouth in disgust as several warriors completed their tasks and made their way up the hallway to the rendezvous place. The area had been secured, no evidence of an intruder, inside or outside of the stone. Crevan shook in bitter anger. To lose a man now....

Rion's brows rose again. "Searchers." He strode angrily to the wall of the tunnel, feeling it with his hand where he felt the arrow had originated, looking for any slight deviation. "Searchers can walk through stone, I'm not aware that the people of Valdemar can walk through anything."

"A Shadow Eater can walk through crystal." Crevan stated, coming close to Rion so as not to be overheard.

"We are discussing three separate and distinct species." He reminded. "Whose side are we on?"

"We fight for Etrusia, our rightful home." Crevan stated bitterly and Rion let out a very harsh laugh.

"Etrusia! A place neither you nor I have ever seen, and probably won't ever see. How would we even know if it still exists? For all we know Galantyne's people have destroyed it."

"I think we would know if a disturbance that great had occurred." Crevan had both hands on the rock, examining it carefully.

"We have never seen Valdemar either. A place where women are half-bird."

"Are you having second thoughts brother?" Crevan concluded his examination and dropped his hands in annoyance. "I'm for a drink and a tumble in the hay. I want to forget this ever happened."

"Go on ahead, then." Rion urged, in a distracted voice. "If you can forget, by all means, do so. I will not."

"Don't make me seem so callous, brother." Crevan slapped him on the back hard enough to cause a stagger and his fist came up reflexively. Anger mirrored in both of their eyes. Rion knew Crevan wasn't callous to the death of a fellow Quarso. They had been trained to go on, move forward. Not let anything hold them back.

"I am not myself." Rion conceded, not believing it, but using the words to pacify his brother who thought more literally.

"I will attempt to console you after the session then." Meaning the session inside the mountain.

Rion nodded as Crevan moved off silently down the tunnel hallway.

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