Chapter 3

Scorio moved out and to the side, quickly as he could, and stared down a short, irregularly illuminated hallway that ended after some twenty yards in a blank wall.

There were no immediate signs of danger. Scorio glanced sidelong to make sure Lianshi was there, and she was, pressed hard against the wall, eyes wide, breathing deeply as she studied the space before them.

Which was… disorienting at first. A narrow path of fine gravel led from their door down the length of the hall, flanked on both sides by raised slate walkways, and passed through six bands of alternating light and darkness to end at a pair of steps. These rose to a miniature landing set against the far wall, where their exit would no doubt appear.

The illumination came from six transverse slits in the ceiling, one every three yards, each allowing a distinct wall of light to pour down the angled walls and across the floor, creating the glowing outline of a trapezoid. The hallway subtly narrowed as it progressed, so that each outline was smaller than the previous one. From Scorio’s perspective, the six trapezoids thus seemed nested, with the space between them lost in darkness.

“No monsters,” said Lianshi nervously.

“Not yet, at any rate,” agreed Scorio. “Odds are the door appears once we reach the far end. Which means we’ve got to get there.”

“Which means the place must be trapped.” She bit her lip as her brow furrowed. “The light, perhaps? Passing through it will kill us?”

“That’d be impossible to evade. But sure. It’s not like this place has been merciful thus far.” He glanced down. They stood on a duplicate of the far platform. The slate walkways were only a couple of feet wide. He relaxed, eased off the wall, and took a step forward.

Nothing happened.

Leaning down, he peered up at the first angled slit of light that crossed the ceiling. “Should we take the gravel path or one of the raised walkways?”

“Without any information, they’re both a valid choice. We can’t know which is best.”

Scorio lowered himself into an easy crouch, continuing to study the hallway. His arms throbbed painfully, a deep and insistent drain on his focus.

Lianshi joined him at the platform’s edge. “The walls. You see? They’re covered in thin tracings. Black lines.”

Scorio peered at where the closest band of light flooded down the angled wall to see that she was right. Curling incisions, thin as a spider thread. “How did you make that out?”

She shrugged. “You think that’s part of the trap?”

“Must be.”

For a moment they remained still, studying the dark hallway, the nested outlines of the receding trapezoids. The walkways at shin height above the neat central path.

“Perhaps we can just live on this platform forever,” said Lianshi. “If we don’t step forward, we won’t die.”

Scorio looked back and saw that the door was gone. Just smooth gray stone behind them. “An attractive plan. My company is its own reward. But…”

“Yeah,” sighed Lianshi. She’d been holding the last strip of outer robe in one hand, and now placed it between her teeth as she reached back to gather up her thick mane of hair. She twisted it expertly into a thick tail, then tied it off with the strip of cloth. Giving it a couple of yanks to make sure it was secure, she frowned at the hallway again. “Should we go at the same time?”

“I should go first. That way you can see what happens to me and learn from it.”

She leveled a flat stare at him. “Why should you go first?”

“I don’t know.” He shrugged. “Just feels right.”

She raised a finely arched eyebrow.

He considered. “Maybe I’m getting tired of seeing people die.”

“That I can understand. I say we go together. If there’s one trap, or enemy, that might increase the odds of our getting through.”

“All right. Why not? The walkways?”

“Sure. That gravel path looks too obvious.”

“The walkways, then.” He moved to the far right so that he’d be able to step down with ease. Flexed his fingers, which were growing stiff, the blood that coated them, sticky. Forced himself to ignore the pain that was growing ever more insistent along the length of his arms.

“You know,” began Lianshi, then hesitated. “Well, maybe you don’t. But several times while going through these rooms, I’ve done what Asha mentioned. Reached for something. Something within me. Like I expected something to be there.”

“Did you find something?”

“Nothing.” She frowned, plucked at the bandage around her left arm. “Have you felt that invisible breeze? Since the first time, I mean?”

“Haven’t thought about it.” He closed his eyes and focused, trying to sense it. The passage of that silent pressure, the swell of it moving around him, through him. For a second, he thought… but no. “Nothing.”

“I thought I did in the last room. But… I’m clearly just grasping at straws. Ready?”

He smiled at her. She looked nervous, blood smudged across one cheek, tall and gangly and young. “Hey. How old do you think Leonis was?”

She blinked. “At first, I thought he was older, but then I realized not. My age, perhaps? However old I am?”

“Same with Asha,” he said. “Same as me.”

“You’re right.” She bit her lower lip again. He was coming to recognize that habit. “I wonder if… never mind. But yes. Interesting.”

“Just a thought. We going to run?”

Her smile was grim, determined. “Like the wind. On the count of three?”

Scorio stared ahead. The walkway was but a couple of feet wide. Almost too narrow for a sprint. Almost. “On the count of three,” he agreed. “One.”

“Two,” she said, leaning forward, flipping her ponytail back over her shoulder.

“Three,” they said together, and burst forward.

Scorio leaped down to the walkway and plunged into the first band of brilliant light.

No pain. The light was harmless. But immediately he sensed movement, heard a metallic whisper, glimpsed something whipping out from the black slashes in the wall.

A gleam of steel, thin as paper, rippling fluidly as it curved out at him, slashing up in a great arc from the shins to the waist.

He hurled himself forward into a dive. Down into the dark, to hit the walkway roughly, crashing down over one shoulder and rolling up onto his feet, momentum carrying him forward and right into the next band of light before he could stop, could process what had just happened.

The black whisker-thin lines came to life as another blade was triggered. The urge to cross his arms before his face to block it was overwhelming, but instead, he dropped to his ass, falling backward to slide under the shelf of wicked steel that flashed out, nearly taking off his head.

He crashed down to the floor, slid out of the light, and cracked the back of his skull as he did so against the stone.

He lay there, dazed, then sat up, lost within the dark band between the second and third bright gashes of light. He blinked, then stared over to check on Lianshi.

She stood, hunched over, hand on the wall, having made it past the second band of light as well.

Something was wrong.

“Lianshi?”

No response. She was shuddering.

He swung his legs over the edge of the walkway and tried to stand. Only then did he see how the blood was soaking into the slashed fabric of his lower robe. Strange. He felt nothing. But the cut was deep, a diagonal incision down his calf.

“Lianshi!” This time his voice was a bark, demanding, refusing to let her just stand there like that, her braid slowly sliding, slowly sliding down her shoulder.

“Keep going,” she whispered, still not looking up. “Keep… going.”

He grimaced and forced himself to stand. His left leg felt as if it were stepping into a bucket of mud, sinking beneath him when he tried to put weight on it.

Nothing happened when he stepped onto the shadowed section of graveled path. He hobbled over to her, fighting the shock that was stealing over him, then paused, hesitant, before touching her shoulder.

She lifted her face at last, smiled bravely. She was so pale, her skin a bone-white blur in the dark. “Don’t… don’t think I’m going to get much further.”

Her hand was pressed futilely to her hip. Scorio couldn’t understand what he was looking at. Everything was red, the cut descending from just below her ribs straight into her pelvis.

He blanched, felt his bile rise up hot and thick.

There was no way he could bandage that.

Lianshi turned around, resting her full weight on her good leg, leaned back onto her shoulder blades, then slid down to the walkway.

Her wound gaped open.

“Don’t feel much,” she said. “Don’t worry.”

Tears burned his eyes. There was nothing to be said. No comfort he could give. This wound would claim her in a matter of moments.

“Keep going,” she said, voice low. “You can… make it. Stay on the walkway. I know…”

Her eyes rolled up and she leaned her head back.

“Lianshi,” he said, reaching down for her hand. All he could do was stand there, watching, waiting, as her breathing slowed and then stopped.

A moment later she disappeared, and he was left alone with the blood-soaked walkway.

He let out an explosive breath, almost a cry, and wheeled around to face the remaining four bands of light. The thin carvings that whorled across the walls.

The urge to just stride down the gravel path was overwhelming. But she’d told him to stick to the walkway. Why?

He stared blankly at the walls, and then realized. They’d each been attacked while running down, but only from one side. Perhaps moving down the gravel path would trigger both attacks at once.

Snarling against the pain, he hobbled back to his side and levered himself up, then bent over to examine his wound. It was deep. His thin boot was already soggy with blood. With a grunt, he tore a strip off his underrobe. Binding it around his calf as tightly as he could, he then straightened and stared right ahead.

The four trapezoids of light were pitiless.

And a deep resolve formed within him. A desire to get through this trap, to reach the far wall. To find out what lay beyond. To understand the logic of this place. Their imprisonment. To confront someone, anyone, and shove his fist as deep down their throat as he could manage.

He just had to get through the remaining four bands.

Carefully, he edged up to the next one and studied the black whorls. They interwove a complex path down the wall. If blades came out from every curve, he’d be cut into a hundred quivering chunks.

Turning, he studied the whorls through which he’d passed. Just as complex, but only a single blade had emerged.

Which meant not every black curve gave birth to a cut.

But how to guess which would?

He forced himself to breathe in deep, measured breaths. Then, on a hunch, following some blind instinct, he closed his eyes. Sought within himself. To reach for that emptiness he’d sensed before.

In his mind’s eye, he saw Lianshi shuddering against the wall, head bowed, propped up by one hand. Saw Leonis grinning at him in the burnished light of that amber beam, the warmth and easy sincerity of his expression. Asha as she’d lain on the floor, the bolt in her gut, her breath coming in ever slower hitches.

Come on, he thought. Come on. Whatever’s inside you, find it.

There. The impulse. Like turning in your sleep to reach for someone who has long been gone. The blind, native reflex.

But reach for what?

He tried to follow it. To go through with the motion, barely understanding what it was he was trying to accomplish.

To reach for something within himself. Something that should have been evident, should have been easy, something he felt he’d done a thousand times before.

Sweat ran down his face, dripping off his chin. He imagined his interior as a great dark space. And there, hanging in the center—what?

Again he felt that instinct, that reaching, and this time he thought he felt—or saw—a density. A mass. Cold. Ridged. A lump of something so dark it seemed to drink in the night.

Scorio realized he was holding his breath. He fought to stay focused a moment longer. To visualize this object, to see it with just a little more clarity.

His head was swimming, his mind feverish, but just before he let out an urgent gasp, he caught a flash, a sense of something the size of his fist, carved crudely from a black stone, all sharp edges and smooth, curved planes.

And then it was gone.

Scorio sagged against the wall, panting for breath. He was soaked through with sweat. His left foot was planted in a puddle of blood.

What had he seen? What was he supposed to do with a rock? Or the ghost of a rock? Confused, angry, he straightened.

He wished that Lianshi were still here so that he could share his discovery with her.

No matter.

He’d get past the blades the hard way.

The faster he was going, the less time he’d spend in the light. The smaller his profile as he ran through, the less surface area the blades had to hit.

Which meant his best bet was to dive through at a sprint.

He backed up as best he could against the second beam, took a deep breath, then burst forward, three long, limping strides and he dove, folding his bandaged arms against his chest, fists under his chin.

The black swirls came to life, a snicker-snack of living blades rippling with oily smoothness into the air.

He tucked his head, fell into a rough roll, the ground sweeping up and around to press him from his left shoulder to right hip, then he was up and diving again.

This time the blade was right there, flashing out just below his face, a startling split-second of death inches below him.

It passed under his chest and caught him down the thigh.

No roll this time. He just crashed full long onto the walkway, then slid off to fall on the gravel path.

Scorio hissed in pain, levered himself up, and saw that half an inch of flesh had been excised from the length of his thigh.

“Go,” he growled, knowing that if he stopped, if he stared any longer at his raw flesh, he’d freeze, sink into a stupor, and never get back up. Clenching his jaw against the pain, the perpetual flash of lightning that consumed his entire leg, he clawed his way upright, stood hunched for but a moment as he glared at the fifth trapezoid of light, then hurled himself forward.

He crashed through the light as one might through a window, a headlong collapse, and again blades whispered out.

He didn’t even feel where they cut him. He hit the ground, the wounds in his forearms exploding into pain, but though he screamed he kept going. Edged forward to the last trapezoid, the smallest.

Fixing his eyes on the steps leading up to the platform, like a worm he crawled into the light.

Wicked movement stirred above, and he got the impression of two saw blades blurring out, passing through each other in a great “X” cut, then retracting once more.

On he crawled, feeling as if he were stuck in a state of constant inhalation, and only when he was through did he allow himself to believe he’d actually made it.

But he couldn’t stop. Scorio toppled off the walkway to the gravel, and then, through sheer bloody-minded perseverance, dragged himself up the steps, his body aflame, the pain too generalized for him to tell where he was wounded.

When he placed a bloody hand on the platform, an outline of a door sprang to life as if painted across the wall by a thick, black-inked brush.

Growling continuously, legs no longer working, he hauled himself up, his vision narrowing to a slender tunnel. Across the platform, to press himself up and reach, straining, for the handle.

He grasped it just as he collapsed and yanked the door open as he fell. Beyond—black shimmering nothingness. A perfect rectangle of absolute ink.

For a moment Scorio just lay there, bleeding out.

He knew he’d not survive another room; he could barely cross this platform. But then he thought of his fallen companions.

For some perverse reason, he felt like he owed it to them to keep going.

So, with the very last dregs of his strength, he crawled forward and into the inky night.