Cain flinched as dust or sand sifted down from above his head and something large and black skittered along a beam and disappeared. It was too large to be a spider, and no rat could have clung sideways to the beam like that for long.
Better not to look too closely at such things . . .
In the center of the room, something sparkled in the light. The dust had been brushed away here, exposing an intricate, circular pattern of runes carved in rock. A portal, to where Cain could only guess. Set at its center was a jewel the color of blood. Someone had tried to remove it, scratching the floor with deep grooves, but had apparently given up. Cain knelt next to the stone, studying the runes carefully. What he read made his heart race. Then he spoke several ancient words of power to release the jewel and slipped it into his sack.
He made his way across the floor, following the footprints to an alcove in the far wall. Rotted boards clung to supports, the last remains of an ancient library. This had been a ritual chamber, many centuries before, used to summon things from beyond the human world. A portal to the Burning Hells themselves, perhaps. The shelves were empty now. He saw a speck of yellow underneath a splinter of wood and bent to pick up a corner of parchment paper, curled and speckled with mildew.
Something moved in the shadows to his right.
He whirled, holding the light up. For a moment it appeared as if the shadows themselves were alive, bunching and swirling like ink in water. At the same time, a voice like the distant moan of wind drifted through the empty room and raised the hairs on the back of his neck.
“Deckaaaaarrdddd Caiiinnnn . . .”
Cain felt a strange doubling, a memory of a night many years before, when he was just a boy. A whispered voice calling to him, just like this. He backed away, fumbling in his rucksack with one hand, holding the lighted staff with the other against the darkness. Already he was doubting himself: had it just been the wind moving through the broken remains of the building above him, a trick his mind had played after so long in the sun?
The voice came again, a sound like bones scraping together in the grave.
“Your ghosts are many, old man, and they are active.”
A grating of metal over rock seemed to come from everywhere at once. Once again a pool of black smoke thickened and then dissipated, only to reassemble somewhere else: a shape carrying a sword, the form of a man, but with eyes that glowed red with the fires of Hell.
Cain knew what this was, yanked from the depths of his own mind and used against him: the image of the Dark Wanderer himself, conjured up to weaken his resolve. The smoke-shape swirled and shifted, reforming into two indistinct human shapes, one taller and clearly female, one small and delicate. Shock raced through Cain’s limbs as an older, familiar memory fought to surface. He closed his eyes against the darkness as the yawning pit of despair opened within him, threatening to pull him in.
You must not listen.
“A storm is coming,” a voice said, from the direction of the stairs. “We need to seek shelter—”
Whatever lurked in the chamber gave an audible hiss of pleasure as Akarat stepped onto the stone floor, blinking in the light, a look of confusion on his face. “Get back!” Cain shouted as something uncurled from the shadows and flowed across the chamber toward the young paladin.
But Akarat rushed forward instead like a fool, pulling his sword from its sheath and slicing down with a two-handed thrust that split the shadow in two. The sword hit the stone floor with a shower of sparks. He lifted it and swung the heavy blade sideways to no effect. The darkness flowed like smoke around the young paladin, swirling around his legs and moving upward as Cain knelt in the dust and set his staff down.
The paladin began screaming.
Cain’s scrolls spilled onto the stone. Where is it? He fumbled through them frantically, finally found what he wanted, and unrolled the delicate paper, shouting the words of power with all the strength he could muster.
The demon shrieked with anger, an inhuman sound that was cut off at its peak as the scroll crumbled to dust in Cain’s hands. The chamber grew brighter, glowing with its own emerald light as a spell bubble formed around the two men. Thrust outside the bubble, the shadow writhed, swirling around an invisible barrier that would not let it pass. Cain caught a brief glimpse of multijointed legs, something insect-like about the seething form as it coalesced and drifted apart again.
Akarat crossed the floor to Cain’s side, gathering the older man’s scrolls and helping him to his feet, then looked at the writhing blackness that now seemed to batter itself against the emerald shell. The young man was breathing heavily, covered in a sheen of sweat. “How . . . how did you do this?”
“An Ammuit spell,” the old man said. “A matter of illusion, it will keep us safe for only a few moments.”
“You are a true sorcerer, after all!”
“I’m only a scholar who has learned how to use what others have given me.”
Akarat turned back to stare at the thing that had attacked them. “What is it?”
“A servant of a Lesser Evil, sent here to guard whatever had been kept in these chambers. You must not listen to what it says or it will begin to twist you inside until you break.”
“I . . . I saw things. Terrible things.” The paladin shook his head as if to clear it. “About you . . . and about me.” He turned back, and his eyes were haunted.
“You must not believe them, my son. We need to leave this place, and quickly.”
“I . . .” The young man’s face grew dark. “That thing is evil. We have to kill it!”
“It’s not flesh and blood—”
“I can defeat it. I must try, for the sake of everything holy. The Zakarum faith teaches us to resist all evil things, to fight against them to our last breath. Creatures like this corrupted the high council and murdered Khalim, and turned our temple to darkness! The Zakarum is in shambles because of them.” Sweat plastered Akarat’s hair against his brow as he raised his weapon and turned back to the wraith. “The archangels will support me in this, I swear it.”
He is already lost. Cain’s heart sank, and a deeper chill settled into his bones. He reached out to touch the paladin’s arm. “There is a way to fight demons like this one, but it is not with the sword—”
The shadow congealed into a blackened face with empty eye sockets, mouth gaping wide, hovering just out of reach. Akarat gasped, his entire body tensing as the face began to melt into a mirror image of the young man’s own, its features showing shock and then terror as a gaping wound appeared in the specter’s throat. Its head tipped backward off the stump of a neck as smoke poured out like black blood.
With a strangled cry, the young paladin leapt at the thing still seething outside the emerald shell. A brilliant flash of light illuminated the chamber as he passed through the spell’s protective barrier, and Cain threw his arm up to protect himself and fell back, but not before he caught a glimpse of the paladin’s sword slicing through empty space.
The light crackled like a lightning strike as Akarat screamed again and was suddenly silenced. It seemed that the world had stopped for a moment, that time had shifted back upon itself again, sending Cain hurtling backward to other days that he did not want to remember, dreams filled with the shrieks of a young child lost and alone. The spell broken, darkness filled the room until the old man held up his staff again and slowly regained his feet. The orb had lost some of its brilliance, as if the shadows themselves had begun to absorb the light from it.
The blue glow revealed the paladin still standing upright, his back to Cain, his body slumped. He had dropped his sword on the floor, his arms hanging motionless at his sides.
“Akarat,” Cain said. He took a step forward, consumed with dread. The young man did not respond; only his shoulders moving slightly up and down indicated he was still breathing.