CHAPTER 28

“That doesn’t mean your hands are clean in all this either.” Vex tried to gather her strangled thoughts, and the mines around her felt cramped and oppressive.

“They’re not,” Thorn said simply. “Would you not fight to protect your brother?” He got to his feet and wove the long end of his belt through his fingers absentmindedly. He was restless but he kept his eyes on her. He answered her questions without hesitation. “I only do the same thing.”

She shook her head. She would but—

“She made Jorenn safer. You can’t deny that.”

Trinket came up to her, and nudged her with his snout, quietly reminding her of his presence.

“I don’t deny that,” Thorn said. “She fought the cursed dead that were our responsibility. She dealt with other dangers in the hills. She made Jorenn Village a safer and a better place. But only for some of us.”

“You were responsible for the ash walkers,” she said, remembering what the Shademaster had told her the very first day they went out to look for her brother.

“Yes.” The simple admission took her breath away.

“The notebook is one side of the truth,” Vax said, coming to stand next to Vex. “Only one side. We deserve to know what happened with the ash too.”

“Do you?” Thorn ran his hand through his hair. He looked so tired, like he hadn’t slept since the fight.

Vax stared him down. “Yes. I put my life on the line for you—”

“You didn’t have to do that,” Thorn interrupted.

“And my sister was taken in by the Shademaster and the town,” Vax continued, brooking no argument.

Thorn stared at Vex, like he was trying to see straight through her. “Fine.” He sat down hard. “I don’t know what Derowen told you exactly, but I expect most of it is the truth. It makes the lies easier to believe. If you want to know all of it, here it is. We lived in Jorenn long before Derowen came. All of us miners and our families before us. We kept to ourselves, mostly, but we were part of the community in all the ways that mattered. We fought side-by-side with our neighbors when dangers came down from the hills. We danced and drank together during holidays. We shared meager meals when trade or harvest was lean.

“At the same time, we lived a different life than most people aboveground. Mining wasn’t just a business for us, it was who we were. The mines were our home. They were the stories we told and the songs we sang. Every one of us here grew up knowing every drift and every tunnel around Jorenn, and while mining wasn’t always profitable by any means, the mines provided for us. For every fragment of the mine we exhausted, we found places where we could expand and dig deeper. We opened up veins that were easily exhausted, sure, but we also found pockets of silver dust and the occasional nuggets. There was a balance to life underground.

“Until one day, my sister led a group of miners to expand the tunnels. The shaft they were carving collapsed into an older tunnel. She might have fallen to her death, but instead she plunged into the remnant of a long-forgotten drift, where she stumbled upon a large deposit of silver ore. Veins that led deeper than any of us had ever ventured. Tinyn was”—his voice cracked—“Tinyn was by her side. She was Anissa’s best friend. I was still an apprentice then. The way the two of them talked about it when they came back, it was like they found a hidden treasure. They said there was silver enough to draw new miners to town and to ensure we had work for years. It almost seemed too good to be true.”

“And it was?” Vax prompted when Thorn put his head down in his hands and remained quiet.

“There are slightly over two dozen of us left. Of all the people who worked those mines,” he said, his voice rough. “Yes, it was too good to be true. But for a year or so, it was just good. We thought we’d just had a lucky break, and with so many riches at our fingertips we had no reason to push deeper. We simply mined and Jorenn expanded around us. We gave part of our profits to the council, and what we did was good for all. When the town grew, the guard grew, and it helped us find safety. We lived in harmony, even when Derowen came and took over command of the guard. She made us stronger too.”

Thorn glanced up at Vax, as if daring him to say anything. Vax kept his mouth shut.

“My sister, with her nose for ore and veins, became our leader. She’d always understood the mines better than any of us did. She negotiated with the council. She kept them apprised of new deposits. And while they were both outsiders in their own way in Jorenn, she formed a tenuous friendship with Derowen.” He smirked. “Anissa used to say, they bonded over having brothers who were too clever for their own good.”

“I understand that,” Vex muttered. Vax sniffed.

“It was a good time, and we should have been content with what we had. But Anissa—and with her many others—was convinced there was more to the tunnel she’d accidentally uncovered. She wanted to push farther. She was convinced the tunnel was part of an older, perhaps even ancient, mining system. She wanted to know where the entrance to that place might be, and who was mining here long before us. She was also convinced there were more riches to be made. Instead, all she found was death.

“She dug. So far below the surface, even our magical means had trouble dispersing the darkness. She carried lanterns down into tunnels that had not seen light in centuries and found that the walls around her glinted with pure, raw silver, far richer than the ore we commonly found. Nuggets large enough to promise us all a stable future. And not just silver: gems the color of thunderstorms, rarer and richer than anything we’d ever seen, simply embedded inside the veins. Everything was covered in layers of dust—or so we thought when she brought us down there—and ancient. A long-forgotten drift. So we set to work digging it up. We shouldn’t have, in hindsight, but how could we know?” Thorn rubbed his neck, and he stared past them. “We ventured deeper still. We found more than silver and gems. Bones. Skulls. Tunnels, all of them blocked, and once we opened them up we found countless skeletons inside—like a mass miners’ grave—and enough silver to last us a lifetime.”

“Did you excavate it?”

Thorn raised his chin. “Of course. We were arrogant fools, and while all the moldering corpses creeped us out, and we told each other stories late at night about curses and waking the dead, we had no reason to think them dangerous. We thought only of the opportunities those riches could buy us, and the town at large. So we recovered the largest silver nuggets and set to work extracting the ore. We carved out the gems too, and we thought we did the right thing. But once we took those gems and opened up the veins, it was as though we disturbed something deep inside the tunnels. The dead began to wake. The very thing we had scoffed at actually came to pass. Rising up out of the blankets of ash they lay in, all those corpses came to life, and fell upon us.”

Before either of them could say anything, he continued. “They were cursed. All of them. And we opened up the way out for them. We fought. Over half a dozen of us were slaughtered before we knew to run, and the ones that died—they came after us too. By the time we knew what we’d done, it was too late to stop the ash walker attacks, because the dead simply kept clawing their way up to the surface. We tried to block the tunnels. We tried to put the gems back in their destroyed settings. But nothing helped. For the better part of a year, crumbling corpses tore through Jorenn at night. Too often we’d wake to people screaming. Too many others fell when trying to ward them off, only to be claimed by the ash themselves.” He sighed. “You saw the destruction of our mines. We saw the near destruction of a town. Things only improved for the people of Jorenn when Derowen found that ring of hers. Whatever those gems were that we excavated, she had similar stones in her ring, and the ashen dead reacted to their presence. The ring helped her chase them off, somehow. But there was nothing left for us there. She realized she could use Fracture to control the mines and the silver inside so she took them. By force and greed. She took everything from us.”

He cleared his throat and tapped the cover of the notebook. “Those mines were as much part of us as we were of them. I didn’t need these notes to convince me of what I already knew, but now we might be able to convince others. We may be able to find a new home. Because we fled. We followed our underground paths. We took these abandoned tunnels as our own, but who did we harm? The bats? The glowworms? The mines you found us in were almost exhausted, and we needed a safe place, because she kept hunting us down.”

Vex swallowed as her perspective subtly shifted. Still, “The fight in the tunnels. There were ash walkers all over them that day.”

Thorn didn’t reply, lost in the long-gone disaster that had brought them all here. When he eventually turned to her, his eyes were dark and unflinching. “We were not responsible for any attacks after the Shadewatch chased us from our homes. We kept mining, because we needed the funds, but we were careful to stay away from the drifts that went too deep. We all knew too well the cost of Anissa’s greed. But once the Shadewatch found their way to our hideout, I knew we would be overpowered. I didn’t want to go without putting up a fight.”

Next to her Vax flinched.

“You woke more of those cursed corpses, on purpose?” It made her feel ill.

Thorn walked over to her and plucked the notebook from her. He stuffed it into his coat pocket before offering her a hand. “May I show you what’s left of our community? It may help to put things into perspective.”

It wasn’t an answer, and if perspective meant heartbreak, she didn’t want it. She got to her feet regardless. She shared a look with Vax, who fell into step with her, and his shoulder bumped against hers. She stiffened before she leaned into it, while Trinket quietly trod behind them.

“I’m sorry,” he said again. “I know you care about them. And I’m sorry for not telling you everything immediately.”

“Shut up, you idiot,” she grumbled. “You’ve apologized enough.”

Vax guided her to a tunnel that sloped gradually downward. “So what do we do now?”

“Whatever we do, we do it together,” she said resolutely. “No more sneaking off alone. We figure out a way out of this mess, or if it becomes too dangerous—”

“We’ll walk away,” Vax said. It was the promise they’d made each other when they left Westruun.

She glanced down the tunnel, where Thorn walked a distance in front of them, his hands stuffed into his pockets, looking like he didn’t have a care in the world. He couldn’t have sold the act better if he’d whistled a dainty tune while he walked.

She dropped her voice. “Even if that means leaving the ring where it is. I won’t leave this town without any defenses against the dead. It’s not worth it.” She glanced at her brother when she said that, and perhaps it was the low light and the shadows that reflected off the walls, but his eyes darkened. The muscles along his jaw ticked.

They made their way through another tunnel, turned another corner, and the passages around them narrowed over slippery and unhewn slopes. The dim quiet of the halls was replaced by a soft murmur of voices that grew louder the closer they came. The passages weren’t carved out here—though she did see a few markings to show miners had made the hallways wider—but were uneven and raw. And suddenly, the walls opened up, like arms spread wide.

Vex gasped. Bright light illuminated a ledge in front of her, while beyond it, the cave fell into a deep and dark void. Mage light caused an intricate interplay of shadows along the ledge, and the luminescence around the cave’s edges was exquisite. The ledge itself formed a plateau barely large enough for the people it held. Half a dozen children and twice as many teens. Older miners as well, all huddled together and protecting themselves from the deep.

But despite their crowded accommodations, despite the fact that every person here had dark circles under their eyes and grief in their gaze, they found a way to live. In the nearest corner, an elderly human man used a piece of chalk to write letters on a flat section of wall, so the children sitting in front of him could copy them down on their slates. One of them turned when they walked in, and they pointed and gawked at Trinket, eyes wide. In another corner, a group of young dwarves and humans were practicing using hammers and pickaxes as weapons. They were laughing uproariously, a sharp counterpoint to the drawn faces of the people around them. Near the end of the plateau, a middle-aged dwarven woman bent over a teenage girl with bandages around her arms. She whistled a tune that echoed off the farthest walls. A gnomish individual was in the process of slicing up dried fish, their eyes darting over the group like they were counting those present, again and again, and again. Vex tried to wrap her mind around it all. She’d never seen any of these people, but it felt like she understood this place without ever having been here before.

“Welcome to our humble abode.” Thorn stood near the entrance with fierce protectiveness etched in his features. “It’s humbler than our last stay, and we can’t offer you sunlight here. I hope you understand who we are.”

Vex felt the pressure of too many eyes on her, but she also saw the looks of recognition and relief when the people around her spotted her brother. A dwarven man sat against the wall, staring at a book without ever turning the pages. On a chain around his neck, he wore a pair of glasses that were far too big for him, and he kept running a finger along the metal frame. He looked up when they entered, and nodded once at Vax.

The dwarven healer, meanwhile, glared ferociously when Vax smiled in her direction before she turned around and stalked away to the other side of the ledge.

In spite of herself, Vex snorted. Her brother did have that effect on people.

Vax rolled his eyes, like he knew what she was thinking, and dashed off to talk to the woman. When he reached her, she punched him and wrapped her arms around him, causing Vax to tense before he leaned into it.

“Sencha is not fond of patients who do not know how to rest,” Thorn explained. “And she’ll never admit it, but she was worried about your brother. She carries the weight of all those we’ve lost like a stone around her neck.”

Gods. She didn’t want to know all of this. She didn’t want to see the relief and the welcome, the pain and the determination. She didn’t want to know that, despite everything, these were not the people she’d been led to believe when she’d helped set the guard on their path. She didn’t want the void of betrayal to grow bigger.

She followed Thorn onto the ledge.

“How long will you stay here?” she asked through gritted teeth.

Thorn tilted his head, and she saw a flash of helpless anger in his eyes. “As long as it takes for the guards to stop searching for me or for all of us to find a way out. We’ve been on the run for the better part of two years. We know how to make the best of a bad situation. We spent some time up in the hills as well, but Faril is scared of ghosts, so we couldn’t stay.” When he spoke those words, he crouched down next to the dwarf with the glasses and squeezed his shoulder. “I know it’s hard, my friend, but I need your help.”

Faril reluctantly closed the book. “What do you want?” His voice was as flat as the plateau on which they were standing.

Thorn dug Derowen’s notebook out of his pocket and placed it in front of him. “Take a look at this. It might be helpful.”

Faril leafed through, and his eyes grew larger with every new page and set of notes. His mouth set in a tight line, and his pain made way for anger. He set to work with a determination that was mesmerizing.

“He has an eye for code, and he needs the distraction,” Thorn murmured in her ear, and he steered her to another side of the ledge. “And this way, perhaps, Junel might get him to eat today.”

When they were out of earshot, he added, “Faril would steal into town on his own to free those of us who were captured, and frankly I don’t blame him.”

“You’re making grand prison break plans too?” she asked.

He didn’t answer.

Over the next half an hour, Thorn guided her past the many members of his community. Junel, the cook who made every meal tasty, even ones prepared from dried tack and limited supplies. Sencha, the healer who saved Vax’s life and was in the midst of telling him how she’d haunt him for all eternity if he put all her good work to nothing by getting himself killed for no good reason at all.

When Vax spotted Vex and Thorn making their way in his direction, he leaned over and gave Sencha a kiss on the cheek mid-sentence, before he dashed out of her reach and joined the two of them.

“Breaking hearts left and right, brother?” Vex teased.

He grinned self-consciously.

By the time Thorn guided her to a safe place to sit, Vax had been called over by Faril to answer questions about the notebook, and Vex’s head was spinning with all the new faces and names and fragments of information. She sat down at the edge, her legs dangling over the void. Trinket had found a place to lie down too, and yawned. She pulled her hair out of her braid and retied it. “I understand where you’re coming from,” she told Thorn. “That doesn’t mean I agree with you, or that I like you. But I understand.”

The cave did provide perspective. And perspective did mean heartbreak.

Thorn nodded, but he didn’t say anything.

“I’m going to sit here, for a little bit,” she said, pulling up her knees to her chest and staring out into the distance.

IT FELT AS THOUGH THE cavern stared back at her. Eventually, she got to her feet and wandered around the ledge. The small community of survivors noticed her but made no attempt to stop her. The elderly man continued his lessons. Vax, Thorn, and Faril sat huddled around the notebook. She felt her brother’s eyes on her, and waved at him to continue.

Instead she found a spot near a young dwarven man who sat cleaning his warhammer. The weapon was propped up across his knees, and with one hand he used a piece of cloth to oil the hammerhead, while the other arm was tied against his chest in a sling. When Vex approached, the weapon slipped out of his grasp and clattered to the floor.

She picked it up and held it out to him. “Need a hand?”

He wiggled the fingers of his bandaged arm and immediately blanched. “Shit. Fuck. No, I’m good.” His voice was gruff, and his eyes tired. “Thank you.”

“Mind if I join you then?” She gestured at a spot next to him.

He shrugged and resumed his work. “Be my guest.”

Taking out her bow, she sat down. When she grabbed a small jar of wax from her pouch, he nodded at her. “Nice pointy thing. Bit too light for my tastes, but it’ll do.”

She raised an eyebrow. “You prefer to get up close and personal?”

A faint blush crawled across his face, and he scratched his head. “Just saying, far better to smash someone’s brain in.”

Vex winked, and he immediately blushed harder. He held out his good hand. “Davok.”

She clasped it. “Vex.”

He glanced in her brother’s direction. “So is it just the two of you, or are there even more?”

“Just the two of us,” she said, and he breathed an exaggerated sigh of relief. They chatted for a bit, before they fell into a comfortable silence. And Vex couldn’t help but wonder what Wick would make of this. She’d remembered his words about Jorenn. Everyone here knows what it’s like to lose a loved one. Almost everyone knows what it’s like to lose a home. If we don’t stand together, what’s to stop us from shattering completely?

This place was no different. And that’s exactly what made it so hard.

When the lights that illuminated the cavern had dimmed to an afternoon glow, Davok took his leave to stand guard in the tunnels, and Vex returned to the ledge, where a handful of children were pointing and gawking at Trinket from a safe distance.

Vax appeared next to her with a plate full of freshly baked bread and dried pieces of fish. The smell of Junel’s baking had permeated the entire cavern, and Vex’s stomach growled. She didn’t know how the gnomish cook had managed it, but she’d watched from a distance as they had magically heated two stones and used those to bake flatbread with flour from a crate and water from a pail that two girls carried in from another tunnel.

Vax scratched at Trinket’s ear and offered the bear his own plate of dried fish. “The first chance I had to get away was right after the Shadewatch escaped the tunnels. Thorn knew they would be attacked, and I couldn’t leave them to that.”

Vex placed the bread on the ground next to her. “I understand that.”

Vax tore at his bread and ate it with purpose. He stared into the cavernous deep below, and the luminescence from the glowworms reflected in his eyes. “The notebook buys them their freedom. If we leave it here, it’s the evidence they need to convince other mining communities they aren’t a threat.”

“Aren’t they?” Vex shook her head. “Fuck. It’s the same evidence that will destroy Derowen, and with her, the town.” She picked up a piece of bread and chewed without tasting. “If we take the notebook, the miners will have no defenses. And if we steal the ring, the town will have no defenses. I don’t want to choose between them, Vax. I don’t want us to choose differently.”

“Still?” he asked.

She looked at the children who were giggling and nudging each other while pointing at her bear. “There’s a little girl who needs her mother. There are others in Jorenn who should not suffer for what Derowen did. And none of them should have nightmares about monsters in the dark.”

The silence that wrapped itself around them was made imperfect by the rhythmic tapping of the hilt of a dagger against stone. Then an arrow, against a cup. Vex swirled around in time to see Faril put the notebook away and start to sing. It was just his voice at first, lower than she would have expected, with all the pain he carried with him. Sencha joined in next, her voice rich and uneven. It cracked at the edge, but it was the perfect counter for Faril. Then Junel. Some of the younger miners. Eventually even Thorn joined in. The children who didn’t sing took over the rhythm, and Vex felt her heart beat in tandem.

It was a simple song, about a miner lost in the deep with no way to come home. It was a song of heartache and longing and the shadows beneath the surface. And while the song echoed around them, briefly, it was as though the ledge was twice as crowded. Like each and every one of them sang the song to someone they missed.

When it quieted down, carefully, the voices around them softened to a murmur.

And that’s how they heard the rumbling that came from deeper in the cavern. It bounced across the walls, echoing like it came from everywhere around them. Until the sound grew sharper, like a pair of footsteps, tumbling over each other.

The teenage girl with the glaive ran in, her face streaked with sweat. “The Shadewatch,” she panted. “They’re back.”