Chapter 8: Whispers in the Dark

The moon was overhead, white light filtering through the village. Wind whistled through the trees and over this a sound, a sound of something, something foreboding. Kael sat on the edge of the village square, knees drawn into his chest, eyes closed watching the darkness beyond the ring of fire. The fire labored weakly at his feet, but the heat could not dispel the cold already creeping in.

Reika had returned to the little hut which she had occupied since they had arrived, and he was left by himself. All of the villagers had been out about their business, some too tired to ask, some too scared to ask. Kael knew that they could never tell them anything, no real news on what was done.

"It's only a matter of time." The notion tormented him, plaguing him like some monstrosity. The monstrosity reportedly was behind bars, but not within his mind. He realized something was not quite right because it ought to have been and couldn't help but question if they were that superior on this deployment compared to how they departed.

"Kael." The voice broke his thoughts, and he looked up to see Finn standing a few paces away, his face drawn in concern.

"You've been staring into the fire for hours. What's on your mind?" Finn's voice was gentle, but Kael could hear the underlying concern.

Kael gave a half-hearted smile, but it didn't reach his eyes. "Just thinking."

Finn stepped closer, his boots crunching the gravel underfoot. "About what?"

Kael staggered, trying to describe the unease gnawing at him. He stood up and zipped and, despite his protests, began waking up. "We did bury it. And I know there's something that makes me think that we just pushed something under the mat. The Core—something is wrong in there about it. The more that I think about it, the more that I am sure we made a mistake."

Finn shoved against the wooden pillar, and pressure shoved him back. "You've done all you can. We have. No one could have anticipated what it costs to do business with the Core. What we can salvage, anyway, we're taking home."

Kael's stride slowed and he turned to the friend. "What if there's no other option? What if there's no way to avoid the inevitable fall?"

Finn's face relaxed into a softer one. "Then we just do what we always do. We fight. We survive."

Kael spat, the anger of the moment rising up in him once again. "But it is not enough. We have kept the abomination at bay, I suppose. But the power of the Core still beneath our feet. It will kill us all, if it decides to."

Finn's eyebrow twitched but he bit down on his tongue harder than ever before. Then, respectfully and humbly, "We've learned the price when you meddle with power like that. But we can't help but remain quiet. We'll require help. And we'll have to know—before whatever is below us does."

Kael nodded obediently. "You're right.".

Even before Finn's mouth could speak, Reika sprang up and strode out of the cabin in a face so contorted she might more readily have been hewn from stone. She glared with revulsion at Kael, and in one moment the next had the universe hanging in the balance.

"There's something you have to see," Reika said in deliberate tones, but under the calm was a worldliness that invoked a millisecond warning off in Kael.

Kael glanced at Finn as he and Reika emerged onto the lip of the village, over to the well everyone could remember. The well had been broken, stone smoothed by wind and sun over the years into a face, rounded but still one did not desecrate.

As he climbed up, Kael's eyes happily landed upon the ground near the well. The ground there had just been spaded over, as though it had been recently dug up. Mud-stained stones had been buried halfway in the ground.

Kael knelt down and looked at the two pieces. The stones were not rocks were. "What is this?" he breathed, reaching out to touch one of the pieces.

Reika's expression froze. "It's from the Core. The magic that keeps it together. it's collapsing."

Kael's gut dropped. "Is it weakening?"

Reika nodded curtly. "Not weakening, but it's running out. The magic is being drained."

Finn drew closer, his eyes appalled. "If the Core is dying, that means.".

Reika half-spoke. She pointed, though, out beyond the edge of the line of the horizon, where the very ends of the dawn's earliest light were fighting to cover the world. Red and purple colored the sky, but atop an odd brightness hung—a quiet light that vibrated ground-up.

Kael's head spun. "The world itself is responding. The Core power is seeping into the world."

"And the land will die." Reika's voice was far and numb beside him, her eyes on the horizon.

The weight of what she'd told him lodged in Kael's chest, something lodged deep inside. "We need to know where it begins," he gasped. "We need to siphon the power out before it's too late."

Finn's eyes widened to white, but he nodded. "But how? The Core energy permeates all of everything. How do we even begin to combat something that's everywhere?"

Kael's face hardened, the muscles in his jaw bulging. "We go where it's coming from. And we burn it to ashes."

Reika's face softened slightly, but she would not fight. They both knew they had no choice. They couldn't wait longer.

"We have no idea what we're fighting," she whispered. "But we can't help but take a chance."

The sun pounded its light into the atmosphere for those few days, and Kael bore the weight of the work that needed to be completed on his shoulders. They had kept the beast at bay, but now they were facing something so much, much worse than that—Core itself.

And the price of failure on this mission would be greater yet again than they could possibly imagine.

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