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  I feel invaded. Doesn't matter right now. The growls are growing louder, too loud. Something draws near. I'll scrawl a note and shove it into Daelis's hand. I don't have time to wait for him to read it. Yana has her chunk of quartz, good. I've got my sword in hand. Time to find out what lurks in the dark.

  Daelis,

  I forgive you. Now pick up that letter opener and prepare yourself to fight. I'll go first, you protect Yana. You're stronger than you think.

  Rin

  Day 10, part 2

  "Where are they, where are they, where are they?" Daelis's voice was a raspy whisper as he held up his lantern in one hand and the letter opener in the other.

  "I... I don't know." The growls and shrieks and groans were all around us, swirling in the murk like eddies riding the dust. Shadows danced upon the walls. Large and small, humanoid and animal. I couldn't see the casters anywhere. Not below in the chasm, not on the ridge ahead. The shadows didn't seem to belong to any corporeal form. "Yana?"

  "Dead dance. Souls lost, never home." Yana lowered her quartz cluster and sat on a large, flat rock. She grinned at the nearest shadow. "Lost forever in the dark. Only shadow. Not hurt us."

  They were unnerving, even if harmless. I couldn't listen to them any longer. Their cries were those of agony and despair, fear and confusion. "Let's get out of here and leave the ghosts to their deaths. I want to make as much distance between us and them as we can before we run out of energy for the day."

  I think I'll leave my sword in hand for a little while, at least until I no longer hear the cries of the dead.

  Day 10, part 3

  We walked until we couldn't anymore, until our legs trembled and Yana had to be carried. The screams of the cave ghosts were still audible, though faint. I would have liked to limp on a little further, but it was clear the other two couldn't. Yana was nearly asleep in my tired arms and Daelis stumbled every few steps.

  We were in a mushroom filled hollow and that seemed as good a place as any to rest for the night. Is it night? Does it matter?

  "We'll stop here," I said. I lowered Yana to the ground. She embraced my leg and closed her eyes.

  Daelis yawned. "I can carry her for a bit if you can't anymore."

  "No you can't. You're as exhausted as she is."

  "Walking keeps me warmer."

  "No. You're going to totter yourself right off a cliff if you keep going." I sat next to Yana and reclined against the wall. The mushrooms made for an almost pleasant pillow. Yana draped herself over my thighs and I ran my fingers through the tangles of her moss-colored hair. "Sit with us. Sleep. It's warmer and safer if we stay together."

  "Nothing is safe." Daelis sighed and his knees gave way. He sank into the wall and leaned against my shoulder. He traced his fingertips over the stars on my bracelet. It was a simple, wide leather cuff with three silver stars fastened to it. Each star was imprinted with a different letter. S T A. "What does sta mean?"

  I tapped my fingers on each star in turn. "Shan, Tessen, Alon. My sons. Tessen made it for me. He's a silversmith apprentice. This was his first project, so it's a little rough, but I love it. Tes told me if I ever had another child, I'd need to use an R name so he can add a fourth charm and complete the word. As much as I'd love to have more children, it's not likely to happen. I'm already considered nothing but a harlot. Three sons, each with a different father. Wasn't what I hoped for my life or theirs, but I love them and I hope they know I don't regret having them."

  A long silence, punctuated by distant howls and a slow, steady drip of water on rock.

  Daelis shook his head as he rubbed his weary eyes. "I'm sure they know. Shan spoke quite fondly of you when we met. I worried about you after we parted, and I admit I watched you from afar. I was surprised when you had a second child just a year after the first. You surprised me again when you started working for Mordegan Vale. You did well for yourself, though, and I stayed as far away as I could. I considered sending condolences when your little Alon died, but that felt intrusive. We would have opened old wounds with each other then, just as we are now. You didn't need that on top of your grief. Sorry, I seem to be rambling."

  "I already knew you to be a rambler when exhausted. So, you threw me out, then stalked me for seventeen years. I know you didn't think of it in such terms, but that's what it sounds like." I knocked his hand away from my wrist, then pulled my journal from my rucksack. Daelis wasn't the only one surprised at the odd turns my life took. I was somewhere around five months along before I realized that Tessen existed. I had little love for his father, Rohir. Rohir was a casual friend who became my lover because I was heartbroken and afraid of raising Shan alone. The fantasy didn't last long. Two weeks after Tessen was born, Rohir stole my money and left me to raise two babies alone. I'm frequently grateful that neither Shan nor Tessen inherited much from their fathers beyond some physical resemblance.

  "I..." Daelis started, but whatever he was trying to say was interrupted by a yawn and a sharp nod of his head.

  “Go to sleep, damn it."

  I was able to restrain my tears until I was certain he was asleep. I can't think of my children right now without being homesick for them. I can't hear Alon's name without being shown the rift in my heart that my baby left when he died. I need to be home. I need to hear my sons laughing over dinner, hear them bragging about what they learned today. I need to sleep in my own bed, holding the soft, worn doll that was once Alon's favorite. I need my parents and my sister to remind me that I'm not a failure, remind me without ever saying a word. I don't need Daelis or his concern. I only need to keep him alive long enough that I can go back to not being concerned about him being alive. I need to stop wanting to knock him into a chasm. I need to... I need to stop inking my internal rants into this journal and go to sleep. Damn it.

  Day 11

  I'm not sure where Daelis is. I hear him humming to himself, so I know he's close, but I can't see him. My mind is not easily swayed by my heart's insistence that I should panic. He is not a child and I need to trust him to be a little bit capable of looking after himself.

  His absence is making me restless. It shouldn't. I'd be perfectly happy never seeing him again. That sounds worse than I intended. I don't want him dead, only out of sight. At least that's what I thought I wanted. Now that he's out of sight, I want him to come back.

  I don't know how Yana sleeps so easily while I hardly sleep at all. She's exhausted, I'm exhausted, and no amount of sleep relieves that for either of us. It's the hunger and the fear and the endless dark. It takes a toll on both the body and mind. It dredges old memories and throws nightmares into my face. Even the more pleasant, mundane dreams become nightmares when I wake and realize they aren't real.

  I dreamed of Alon and Ragan, back when we were all content and together. Ragan and I took the boys to the coastal forests west of Jadeshire. Alon was three, and my older boys were ten and eleven. The older two were busy climbing trees and chasing squirrels. Ragan, Alon, and I reclined on a blanket and watched the clouds drift between the redwood boughs. Alon was happy, healthy, and cheerful. That's how I want to remember him. My sweet, vibrant Alon, not the gaunt and ashen shadow he became in his final days.

  Alon held his yarn-haired rag doll up to the sky and said, "See! Pretty! I told you Mommy said it was pretty." Alon carried that slightly stained, threadbare doll with him everywhere. Now it lives on my bed in Jadeshire. I sleep better when I have it with me, but I'm afraid it will get lost if I take it out of the house, so it stays home when I'm away.

  "Mommy and Daddy have been all over the realms and we're going to take you to see all of our favorite pretty places when you get a little older," Ragan said. His voice was soothing and melodic. Sometimes all he had to do was speak and I forgot about his more irritating qualities. Despite being Mordegan's son and a mercenary, Ragan Vale Dannis was not a violent or angry man. My memories are flawed but my dreams reveal the truth. Pretending Ragan was a loathsome bastard makes his absence easier, but that is noth
ing but a lie. I loved Ragan. We were together for nearly six years. If Alon hadn't died, I'm certain we'd still be together and we would have had more children by now. We almost did, but I miscarried twice when Alon was still alive, and once again several months after he died, when Ragan and I were still trying to find a path forward together.

  I'm bitter about losing of the future I expected for my family, and about Ragan abandoning the two adolescent boys who thought of him as a father. I'm angry at both of us for not trying harder to repair our relationship before he left. It's three years in the past now. It's over and it burns like wildfire when my dreams force me to pine for everything I lost.

  Anyway, back to the dream. Alon rambled about the clouds and the adventures he had with his doll. He eventually fell asleep in the crook of Ragan's arm. Ragan followed him into dreamland shortly thereafter. I just sat and watched them sleep while Shan and Tessen laughed nearby. I watched them for an infinite time, while the light faded into stars and then back into daylight again, while the seasons shifted and my older boys grew and changed. Ragan and Alon never changed, never aged, never woke. They slept on. Peaceful, alive, and together.

  So blissful, so mundane. Such a lie. I woke as far from that life as I could possibly be. Daelis is not Ragan and Yana is not Alon. I can't pretend the stalactites are tree boughs on a still day. I can't find the clouds or the stars when there is no sky. All former dreams are nightmares, and all former nightmares are flesh and living shadow and despair.

  "Is she awake yet?" Daelis's voice shakes me free of my memories. He's nearby, just on the other side of the low rock wall.

  "No."

  Yana's shoulder twitches, but she remains soundly asleep with her head on my thigh.

  Daelis clears his throat. "If you want to wash up, there is a little drip pond thing over here. Just water dripping down onto a big rock, but it's been going on long enough to round it out into a natural basin." He slips around the wall. Well, that's not what I expected. His long hair is gone, replaced by a short, choppy mess. I've never seen a full-blooded elf with such short hair before. Even the lowborn elves keep theirs long. "Look okay?"

  "Now why'd you do that? How'd you do that? With your letter opener?" A laugh escapes. He looks ridiculous.

  He shrugs and rubs his nose. "I borrowed the scissors from your med kit. Hair was in the way so now it's gone. I see why you've kept yours short. Less distraction, especially in a fight."

  "Less for an enemy to grab onto." I admit I'm staring at him, but how can I not? The attempted haircut is horrible, but his resemblance to our shaggy-haired Shan is now amplified. I was a fool to hope that no one would guess their relationship. "Our son looks too much like you, especially with your hair gone."

  "Rin?" Yana's whisper rises from my lap.

  “Well, now you've woken her up," I say. I shiver away a chill and smile down at her. Her eyes are only beginning to flutter open. "Give me a minute to stretch out, and I'll try to fix your hair. I don't think I can give a proper haircut with those little snips, but anything I do has got to be better than what you've done to yourself. Might be wasting time, but if I don't do something, I'm going to keep laughing at you and give away our position."

  Day 11, part 2

  I don't know where to go. I'm supposed to be the strong one here, but it's taking all of my willpower not to rage at my companions or cry into the darkness. This is agonizing and infuriating. Confusing. More than anything, confusing. We keep finding dead ends or passages too small for even Yana to squeeze through, and then we have to double back and try a different direction.

  We were stuck, one option. We tried five different routes today and all of them failed. Now we're on the one path we didn't want to take. Down. Not just a slight incline, either. This path was steep and rough. Daelis and I each took a couple tumbles. Yana navigated like a mountain goat and looked on in concerned confusion every time we slipped.

  Now we're nursing bruised joints at the bottom of the hill, or at least this part of it. I'm certain both the mushrooms and the occasional quartz crystals are bigger here. Or, maybe that is the first symptom of madness. Wouldn't surprise me. Each day is more difficult than the one before it. Each descent is a heartbreaking reminder that we may not escape alive.

  The air is heavy and so are our thoughts. It has been at least an hour since anyone last spoke. Yana gathers mushrooms into a pile, then pulls them off one by one to build a second pile. When the first pile is empty, she starts the process again. Daelis flips his pendant between his fingers. Over and over, endless rotation. I don't like finding him in my peripherals. My mind automatically assigns him the identity of Shan and then I'm both sorrowful and relieved to remember that he is only Daelis.

  I'm confused about Daelis's identity and about the sizes of objects around me. Is this fatigue, the beginning of starvation, or newly-onset insanity? All three? Nightmares and mushrooms and growls in the dark and... is any of this real? Maybe it isn't. Maybe I'm unconscious in an infirmary bed somewhere and this is my fever dream. Wouldn't that be wonderful? Maybe my sons are holding my hands and reading to me, and my mind is interpreting fiction as reality.

  "Rin not cry." Yana's whisper cracks the silence. She creeps over and crawls into my lap. She's warm and smells like dust and botanic decay. She feels real. Is she real?

  "I keep wondering if I'm stuck in a nightmare, if I got hit in the head or something and none of this is real."

  Daelis lets his pendant fall from his hands. He looks up at me and shakes his head. "I assure you, this is real. It may be a nightmare, but it is a waking one."

  I hold Yana close and rock her like I did with my own children when they were her size. Her weight is real on my lap. Her hair tickles my face. Am I capable of dreaming a child as strange and wonderful as her? I ask her, "Are the mushrooms bigger down here, or am I going mad?"

  "Bigger." Daelis returns his attention to his pendant.

  "Bigger. Lot bigger. Things is bigger down deeper." Yana strokes my face. She's real. She has to be. "Sleep, Rin. Rin need sleep."

  One more sleep, more dead ends tomorrow. "Good idea. Don't let me dream."

  Day 12

  I woke feeling a little more grounded, a little more real. The other two were already awake and looked like they had been for a while. I slowly sat up and stretched. My muscles were stiff, but I felt more alert than I had in a while.

  Yana and Daelis sat nearby, hunched over small piles of stones and quartz crystals. She occasionally slapped his hand away or pointed to a pile.

  "Not touch purple. Purple water makes dead everything." Yana grinned at him. "Bears go here. Uldru not can hop ice."

  "Where did you learn about bears?" Daelis asked. He set a mushroom on the top of a stone pile. I was too far removed for this game to make the slightest bit of sense, but that was fine. Maybe they will teach it to me after we escape. No, not they. Just Yana. All I want from Daelis after this is for him to tell Shan the truth, and I'm content with never seeing him again.

  Yana stretched her lanky arms over her head. "Stories to scare children." She drew her arms down and curled her fingers into claws. "Boo! Bears is tall than forty Uldru. Eat people and stars, drink oceans. Oceans bigger than whole world." She tilted her head and smiled at me. "Old people stories from then. Not real."

  Daelis swept her hair away from her luminous eyes and smiled. "I assure you bears are quite real. But most of them are only a little bigger than Rin or me. They can be mean, but they are animals, not monsters. Jadeshire has a few small bears in the zoological park, safely contained in their enclosures. I'll take you to see them when we... when we get home. Would you like that?"

  "Yes!" Yana chirped. She dropped a mushroom onto a quartz pile. "I win. I go find food for everyone now."

  "All right. Remember, Rin likes the blue mushrooms better than the green ones. I like the ones with the pink spots best."

  "I find." Yana bounced to her feet and disappeared around a boulder.

  I slowly stepped to
ward Daelis. The ground was uneven and I was afraid of twisting an ankle. I stood above him as he stared down at the game pieces. I was tempted to touch his shoulder, but I restrained myself. "She likes you and I can see you've taken a liking to her. You would have been a good father, you know."

  "I wanted to be." He sniffed as he held his hands over his mouth and nose.

  "Then why weren't you?"

  He lowered his brow into his hands and his shoulders shuddered. "Because I was selfish and terrified. Because I am the only child of two only children in a family with hereditary power, and I was raised to believe that if I fell, so would Jadeshire. I was reckless—twice—and my father had me convinced that the future of the entire Jade Realm was in my hands. If I failed him, the people of Jadeshire would suffer. He hates me, but I'm still supposed to succeed him someday. I'm supposed to be the shining example of Jadeshire's potential, which is why his ideals forced me to toss you aside and writhe in silence instead of acknowledging my children. He's always hung responsibility over me like a golden shroud, and he doesn't understand that I became a spectacular failure when I failed my children and their mothers. I failed all four of you because of my own selfish desire to keep Jadeshire in Goldtree hands, and none of you deserved that. That's why I deserve to remain alone and I have found some irreconcilable fault with each of the young women my mother has tried to convince me to court. I may be competent with a city or even a realm, but I can't reduce any of that success down into the smaller scale and be a decent person."

  "I think you're trying to. Maybe you'll even succeed someday soon." I sat down next to him, but didn't touch him. I wanted to lay my hand on his knee or dab away his silent tears, but I didn't.