Chapter 38

The group relocated to the landmass that Veylan had selected, one that was far larger than Pyre had imagined. The strange old man had called it a Deep Nether island, and Pyre could see why.

Standing along what could only be described as a shore, its edge dissolved straight into the darkness of the Deep Nether, almost as though they had landed on one of the islands off Farreach’s coast. A specific place surfaced in Pyre’s memory: a forest-choked rise crowned by a jagged mountain, one he’d visited twice to clear back the growth.

The comparison unsettled him.

“Good,” the Shepherd said, the towering man already in front of them, his hand gripping his crook tightly. He took a look at all of them, grunted, and began pacing back and forth, nodding faintly as if confirming something only he could see.

“Well?” Ronark asked. “Have you some thoughts you’d care to share?”

“I wasn’t expecting to step out into a nest of shadowryms,” the Shepherd said at last. “Although I suppose that is to be expected when venturing to the Deep Nether. I don’t know if it’s an omen for things to come or entirely random. I usually lean toward randomness, especially here in the Deep Nether, but that was not expected. Did you expect it, Veylan?”

“I did not. I assumed there would be activity, perhaps a pack of roaming mirthbeasts, but nothing like that.”

“You’ve never appeared that close to a nest before?” Balefor asked, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Only once,” the Shepherd said. “And that was ages ago. It didn’t turn out as well. They will keep coming until you completely destroy their nest. If you hadn’t pointed it out to us, Pyre, we might have been at that for a while. There’s even a chance we would have lost a lantern, or worse. So this is good.”

“I’ve come out near a nest before,” Irix told the group. “And only three of us survived. It was brutal.”

Sura lowered her head. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

“It was long ago,” Irix said. “That doesn’t fully reduce the sting, but it does fade the memory some.”

“Yes, there are things better left forgotten.” Ronark glanced at Tallow perched on his shoulder. “You planning to walk at any point, or am I your mule for the whole trip?”

“You rode me into battle,” Tallow replied. “With flair, I might add.”

“That was tactical.”

“So’s this.”

The Shepherd let out a short laugh before his expression settled. “Well, we got our wish, Veylan. You chose this landmass. I agree. There’s something here.”

“As do I,” Veylan said, eyes gleaming with pride. “An island with a treasure.”

The Shepherd motioned to Balefor, Pyre, and Marrowsven. “You three will form one group, as long as they have a chaperone.”

“I’ll lead them,” Sura said immediately.

“Good. Thank you, Sura.”

“That means it’s us three, then,” Ronark said to Tallow and Irix. He looked to the Shepherd. “Unless you’re coming.”

“There are things we must carry out here,” Veylan answered for the Shepherd. “I want to be sure the gate is linked correctly, we need to set a beacon for the others, and we need to map this particular island.”

The Shepherd produced the cube again, the same he had used earlier in the Forlorn Plains. “That’s the easiest part,” he said as the gears locked into place, stone grinding against stone. The relic lifted into the air and took off.

“You map them all?” Balefor asked. “I suppose that would explain all the scrolls you’re carrying with you.”

“We do, yes,” the Shepherd said. “Every last one of them. Veylan’s idea, really.”

“There are countless realm fragments out here,” Veylan said as he ran his hand over his long beard. “If we can map them, it prevents us from exploring the same place again. They do start to look alike after you’ve been out here a few times.”

“So this one hasn’t been explored, then.” Pyre took in the sight around them once more—the illusion of land, the false shoreline, the surrounding darkness punctured by distant, floating masses of broken worlds made it all seem surreal, even more so than what he had already witnessed in Aevum.

“No, it hasn’t been explored to my knowledge,” Veylan told him, his focus shifting to Sura. “And you should know by now how we operate: if any of you find anything, you know what to do. Or rather,” he corrected himself, “you know what not to do.”

“We shouldn’t tinker with any of it,” Sura quickly added for the Unclaimed. “These artifacts from the First Realm can be volatile, and using them incorrectly can lead to situations.”

“Correct,” the Shepherd said as he began laying out his maps. “Situations I don’t want to have to deal with.” He crouched, using small stones to pin the edges flat against the uneven ground, which looked almost comical given his massive size. “Veylan, the signals.”

The older man produced a pair of hourglasses filled with condensed light, which he shakily handed to Sura and then Ronark. “If you come across something, break it.”

“We know how your signals work,” Ronark said.

“I wasn’t explaining it to you,” Veylan replied. “If—”

A sudden whoosh cut through the air above them. A feathery cloud of darkness passed overhead, vast enough to dim the lantern glow as it moved.

No one spoke until it was gone. Finally, Sura let out the breath she’d been holding. “Scavels are on the move.” She glanced toward Veylan. “And you’re sure we’re safe here?”

He squinted in the direction they had flown for another moment. “For now. From my experience having spent considerable time in the Deep Nether, they will be feeding on the shadowyrms for quite some time. But do try to hurry in your search,” Veylan told them. “If we can clear this landmass, perhaps we will have time to move to another before the realm collapse begins.”

“This way,” Sura told the three Unclaimed after securing the small hourglass Veylan gave her in a pocket. “We’ll take the western side,” she called to Ronark, who offered a low acknowledgment without looking back.

Sura moved ahead with her usual confidence as one of the lanterns followed after her, its light tracing along the edge of her perfectly tailored outfit. Balefor quickly caught up with the elven woman, a broad grin spreading across his face as if the mere thought of danger itself energized him.

“Balefor is certainly in his element considering his Domain,” Marrowsven said, sliding in next to Pyre.

“I’ve had to move through the forests around my colony often enough. Those trips could turn dangerous.” He didn’t elaborate on what had happened beyond the tree line. “I don’t know how much that experience will help, though. What about you?”

“Assassins travel,” she said. “But we don’t explore. I would know my target and how to reach them. The rest was execution. Speed mattered. Curiosity did not.”

“Makes sense,” Pyre said as they continued on, the four circling the ridge that jutted from the center of the landmass. The ground here sloped unevenly, fractured into long plates of stone that looked as if they had once been stacked deliberately.

Soon, Sura came to a stop beside a crumbled rampart made of black rock shot through with slow-moving threads of silver. “Ruins,” she told them.

Balefor picked up one of the broken bricks, testing its weight. “I’ve never seen a stone like this before.”

“It’s certainly something,” Sura said. “I always find that part of visiting the Deep Nether interesting—the things we uncover.”

“Is it from the First Realm?” Balefor asked as he handed the brick to Pyre.

Pyre ran his thumb along the edge, and the rock flaked beneath the pressure, brittle despite its weight.

“No,” Sura told Balefor. “The objects from the First Realm are more mechanical in nature, like the cube.” She gestured vaguely toward where the relic had last been flying through the air as it circled the landmass. “They had a form of technology none of the realms born from its ruins have ever managed to reproduce.”

“So you’re saying we’ll know it when we see it?” Pyre asked as he set the brick down.

“Exactly that, yes. But that doesn’t mean that there aren’t interesting things out here. We just don’t really have the capacity to carry them back with us, at least not on this mission. But,” she said, “the Unmoored do happen to have a few more members currently in the Deep Nether looking for First Realm artifacts and other anomalies.”

“So there are more of you,” Marrowsven said.

“Yes. I’m sure you noticed the sheer number of rooms at the manor,” Sura replied as she moved on. “Not all are filled, but most are.”

“Do the others that are out here come through the same way?” Pyre asked Sura. “Through a gate?”

“They do, and they stay behind after the rest of us have left through that same gate. One of the things Veylan and the Shepherd will do while we explore is send up a beacon. Veylan mentioned that. If any of our people are in the vicinity, they can join us on the exit.”

“They could be out here for ages, then,” Balefor said as they rounded a cluster of massive rock formations. The boulders looked meteoric—half-buried, their impact scars radiating outward in cracked rings. “That’s what you’re saying.”

“Yes. There are some Unmoored who have been out here for so long that I’ve never actually met them,” Sura said. “But the Shepherd insists they’re alive.”

“Do you think they’ll come toward this region?” Marrowsven asked, looking toward some of the Deep Nether islands visible beyond. “If that’s how you’d describe it.”

“They may. There are numerous realms, as you know, and the Hunger takes them more often than not. But the one that the Hunger is heading toward now is especially large.”

“And how do we know?” Marrowsven asked.

“Let me guess,” Balefor said. “Through Veylan.”

“Correct,” Sura said. “Veylan sees what others cannot. Some factions use people like him. Others rely on instruments recovered from the Deep Nether that they’ve altered to suit their purposes. But the signs are obvious. The souls of Aevum are restless. A realm collapse does not empty the city, yet the activity on the Outskirts was unmistakable. No spies are required.”

The four came to a fallen pillar of stone bridging a wide gap. It had once belonged to a larger structure, its surface etched with worn channels, its underside fractured where it had torn free. The span was wide enough to cross but far from reassuring.

Sura stopped at its edge. “You,” she said to Marrowsven. “Yes, I think you will be good at this with your claws and flexibility.”

“You want me to climb down into the gap?”

“I do. We will cross over and stand guard from there. You can climb, can you not?” Sura asked her.

“It was something I often did in my former life,” was all Marrowsven said as she approached the edge, knelt, and tested the stone with careful pressure. One claw found a seam; another traced a shallow crack. Satisfied, she swung over the side without hesitation, moving smoothly down the rock face. Within moments, she vanished from sight.

“Look at her go,” Balefor said. “I would have suggested she bounce her way out, but the ground isn’t springy here.”

“No, not like out there,” Sura replied. “But you can jump here and get more height. Which can be helpful.”

As Marrowsven explored ahead, they crossed the pillar over the gap. Pyre slowed once he reached the other side, his gaze dropping to the stone. He crouched, fingers brushing scuffed rock marked by fresh impressions. “What are these?” he asked.

“Those are the tracks of mirthbeasts,” Sura said, her tone tightening. “You’ll hear them before you see them. Loud and careless, they are.” Her gaze slid forward, sharpening. “That changes once they hunt.”

Balefor summoned his greataxe. “So they’re like wolves, yes?”

“Like wolves,” she said, “but worse.”

“Eh, I’ll be ready for them, then,” the lion-man told her.

Sura listened for a beat, then said, “When Marrow is finished, we move. Quietly. Don’t let their shrieks get inside your head.” She tipped her chin toward the pillar and the gap behind them. “If they’re here, they’ll be waiting straight ahead.”