Healer's Nightmare

The healing left crimson threads beneath Mara's skin, a web of scars that blemished her virgin skin. Each beat of her heart sent a fresh wave of dull pain through her body, but at least she could stand and walk.

"It's time. We should be heading out." Rosemary said.

"Where to?" Mara asked as she swung her legs in harmony. 

"Well, somewhere far beyond Ravencross, but first we're going to Stone Dragon Hill. Finn usually takes an hour or so to finish his job, so I guess it's the perfect time to start now."

Mara gripped the sheets, and her eyes narrowed. The last night evolved too rapidly and was far too hostile for her. She sat, her feet barely touching the floor that was assured to be as cold as her newfound determination. She dressed in new clothes. A finely stitched brown coat, a pair of ebony leather gloves, and she slid into a pair of dark, grey boots that Rosemary retrieved from the wall closet.

Rosemary's lantern glowed with a red, flickering flame, imitating those of the Black Market District, except they were more soulless than its counterparts. The duo left the bunker in the care of shadows. The light caught the hollow eye sockets of countless skulls stacked in neat rows, their jaws frozen in eternal screams. The moist air hummed with a soft tune of melancholy and dread.

"Watch your step," Rosemary said, holding the lantern higher. "The plague victims weren't the only ones who died down here. Some say the tunnel is starving for more."

As if to prove her point, a distant wail echoed through the passageway, too anguished to be anything living. The sound reverberated in the bones of the former healer and in the places where her fresh scars sustained her existence.

"What do you mean, it's starving?" Mara asked, trying to keep her voice steady as they passed a section where the skulls had been arranged in a spiral pattern, all facing inward.

Rosemary's reply came soft as a funeral whisper. "During the plague, they brought the infected down here. Thousands of them. But it wasn't just to quarantine them. They were, um, how should I say this? Experiments! The first attempts to understand what we can do with pain and death. They say the stone walls absorbed all that defined humanity."

Their footsteps echoed as they splashed in the puddles. Something skittered in the darkness beyond the lantern's reach. Mara tried not to think about what might be following them.

After what felt like ten minutes or so, the tunnel began to slope upward. The air grew less stagnant, carrying with it the sharp breath of winter's grip. They emerged into the pale moonlight at the base of Stone Dragon Hill.

The dragon's skeleton dominated the hillside, its massive, skeletal form frozen mid-crawl toward the summit. Moonlight filtered through its ribcage, casting prison-bar shadows across the ground. 

"Beautiful, isn't it?" Rosemary said, extinguishing her lantern. "Thanks to this beast, we're able to access the splendid Elysium."

"You mean the monster that caused the Great Conflagration and started the freakish plagues? You're truly psychotic, Rose."

"Maybe we all have a screw or two loose, Mara."

Mara scraped Rosemary's words off as they climbed.

"So we're heading for the—" Mara started to ask as they could see the summit, but her words died as she spotted the figure standing at the hill's summit.

Finn stood motionless against the sky void of stars. His cloak whipped in the wind like a wild raven's wings. Even at that distance, Mara could see the blood dripping from Venom's fangs and could feel the satisfaction radiating from Finn's mismatched eyes. The snake's tongue flicked out, tasting the air and the duo's approach.

"Ah, our guest of honor arrives at last," Finn called down, his voice carrying an edge of madness that set Mara's teeth on edge. "You've missed quite the show. The orphans were quite a treat. Perfect fuel for my token."

Mara's face flushed red. She lunged forward, her hand curled into a claw, ready to tear Finn's throat out. But before she could take three steps, something cold and burning wrapped around her arms and waist. She looked down to see chains of violet flames holding her in place, their freezing touch binding her to the spot.

"Not yet," Rosemary whispered in her ear, the grip on her chains firm. "I know you want him dead. But we need him as much as he needs us. Don't you want to know who really killed Lily? Who's controlling the shadow-weaver?"

Lily's name was the antidote to Mara's intoxicating rage. She stopped struggling against the chains, but her voice came out as a growl. "When this is over..."

"Yes," Rosemary agreed. "When this is over. But for now—

"For now she can kiss my… You know what? I'd rather die than having her do it." 

Mara writhed within the clutch of the chains, but she couldn't move an inch.

Finn cackled, swaying his head. His serpent sheltered more humane features than its owner.

He led them down a twisting path that circled the dragon's horned skull. Up close, the bone was not the yellowish-white Mara expected, but a deep, oxidized copper color, as if the creature's skeleton had been forged rather than grown. The cave mouth gaped before them—not a natural formation, but a perfect arch cut into the bone itself.

Ancient hexagons lined the entrance, each containing a carved hand with inhuman fingers, claws Mara thought would be more befitting of their worth. In the center of each palm, an eye had been inscribed with painful precision. They seemed to track their movement, and Mara could have sworn she saw some of them even blink.

"The hands of the damned," Finn said, running his fingers along one of the carvings. "Each one belonged to someone who tried to seal the gateway. Now they serve as its guardians." He smiled, showing too many yellowish teeth. "Irony is truly rewarding, wouldn't you agree, Mara?"

Mara brushed the words off, as if they were never spoken.

The inner chamber beyond was vast, its walls disappearing into darkness above and to either side. Rosemary relit her lantern. Their footsteps echoed strangely, as if the space were both larger and smaller than it appeared. At the far end—a blank wall of the same oxidized bone.

Finn reached and yanked the Famine Token from his neck. The crystalline medallion flared to life with a cold blue radiance. As Mara watched, the blaze grew stronger, faster, until the Token blazed with a blinding flash that cast no shadows.

Mara's grip on Rosemary's arm tightened. The air grew thick and heavy with the taste of copper. The token's light shifted from blue to brilliant turquoise and tore a hole open before them.

The portal was a wound in the wall, its edges swirling and weeping a substance that might have been blood or might have been something far worse. The air that rushed out brought with it the stench of burning flesh and a nauseating stench.

"Ladies first!" Finn pushed Mara and Rosemary into the bloody vortex.

Before Mara could respond, she found herself being sucked into the bleeding hole and landed flat on her face on the warm, grainy soil. She got on her feet, dusting herself. Some of the black powder still clung to her face.

Before Mara could snarl at Finn, the sky, stained in the shades of stale blood, seized her attention. It resembled the starless night sky of Ravencross, except for the deathly color.

Is that a sun? Or is it a moon?

"So this is Hell's Elysium?" Mara said, the words barely stirring the silence.

Mara felt her pulse and breathing fluctuate, captivated by the sight of the black sphere that hung in the scarlet canvas. As her eyes scanned the environment, she lost herself amongst the carnage before her. The trees were twisted like desiccated cadavers of lost souls, branches sprouting from their eyeless faces scarred with countless expressions of perpetual fear and hatred. The barks resembled cremated chars, darker than the black of midnight.

"Hey, stop staring at the freaking trees and hop on." Finn ordered.

"What the hell is that?" Mara asked, gawking at Finn and Rose, who were mounted on the back of a titanic, obsidian wyrm.

"Venom's true form. But if you want to cross the Forsaken Forest on foot, then be my guest."

She noticed Venom was missing from its master's arm. The serpent lowered its back, and Mara jumped on, clinging to its jagged, rocky scales.

Finn patted his trusty beast, and it coiled its neck before thrusting itself at blinding speed. As they zoomed past the landscape, the barren, skeletal branches blurred at the edge of Mara's vision. Even the sky seemed to bleed out in its respective shades.

"Can't you slow this thing down a little?" Mara's request barely a distorted whisper in the swishing of the wind.

Finn let the words slip by and gripped harder on the wyrm.