“Looks like this place does fill with water,” he said.
“And it’s got gates,” Mullins added, pointing up toward a seam in the ceiling. “We’ve passed two so far.”
“Why would there be gates?” David asked.
“They’re old,” I said. “From a time when sirens were too busy fighting each other to worry about man.”
We continued walking on and on through the quiet corridor when something prompted me to glance over my shoulder, like a murmur no one else could hear. I peered into the darkness in our wake, my footsteps slowing when a portion of the wall seemed to move before my eyes.
“What is it?” Meridan asked.
Too many times, the remnants of my nightmares skewed reality. I stared at the dark, but it was still. Quiet.
“Nothing,” I said, turning back around.
Maybe it was foolish of me not to tell the others, but how could I know whether something was amiss or if it was my flawed mind playing tricks?
I put all my faith into the latter possibility and my skin crawled at the idea of my being wrong. Perhaps we weren’t alone.
Up ahead, a sliver of blue light caught my eye. We picked up our pace, uplifted by the thought of getting out of that seemingly endless hallway. Finally, the passage opened up into a staircase that ascended onto a higher platform. It led to a large, open chamber that was mildly illuminated by a cascade of moonlight from a skylight above. Images from my mostly forgotten dreams started to trickle in, reminding me that I’d been in that place before. Not just because I was born there, but because it was where I found Lyla in her dreams. That chamber was circular, surrounded by a mote where seawater sat stagnant, likely from additional passages that wound beneath us.
In the center of the room was a dais and sitting atop it was a stone table with small grooves carved into the otherwise flat surface. I slowly stepped up to it as the others explored the empty chamber. Staring down at the slick table, I imagined all the bodies that had been lain upon it before my time. I ran my fingers along one of the narrow trenches and could practically smell the blood in the air as if the events were fresh.
“Why am I not surprised to see something like this here?” Vidar said.
“From the things my mother told me, sacrifices were willing. A way to feed the father below and appease his wrath. That was before he had a name. Before anyone knew what he was. They only knew the quakes and the horrid weather, all of which they attributed to him.”
“Do you think he controls the weather?” he chuffed.
“I think this place is between worlds. Whether he is responsible for the anomalies or not, we were never meant to build a city here. This,” I peered up at the moon hovering above. “This is where the roots of our madness spread from.”
“There’s another chamber through here,” Mullins announced, peering around a corner.
We moved on from that room and into another one where the walls pushed out further. A vast space stood before us, lit up equally by a hole in the ceiling through which the moon could cast her gaze. Every wall was littered with images, both carved and painted. They crowded every surface, overwhelming my eyes, but the walls were not the thing that made my gut clench.
Standing in the middle of the chamber was a large, black statue chiseled out of basalt. The base was a misshapen slab of obsidian that looked liable to cut anyone that got too close. As my eyes panned upwards, the knot in my stomach tightened, bordering nausea. A dozen tentacles spiraled upward, forming a vague figure that stretched three men high beneath the beam of moonlight. As my gaze climbed, I could see what I assumed was supposed to be the creature’s face. Eyeless. Long and distorted. I could not tell exactly what I was looking at. Only that it made me sick to stare too long.
“What. The fuck. Is that?” Vidar said, lighting up the slick surfaces of the tentacles with his torch. The light pierced through the obsidian base, casting glassy, orange distortions on the floor around us.
“We should look at the walls,” I said, unable to stare at the statue any longer. “They will have information.”
“Provided we know how to read it.”
“We’re here to try,” I said, heading to one of the many clusters of images.
Everyone split off in different directions, each of us choosing a section of the wall to investigate. I found myself staring at a tall,carved image of a siren, her tail curled into a long, intricate knot beneath her like a throne. Her hair fanned out around her head and held in her conjoined hands in front of her was a round object. I couldn’t figure out what it was. Time had eliminated much of the detail, but to me, she was a centerpiece, so I moved on from her and started skimming the wall slowly in search of sense.
After what felt like an entire day of everyone staring at those walls, I had found women praying. Men with spears in boats. Bodies on alters. Red paint that had chipped and faded illustrated rivers of blood that wove between one scene and the next. When I found myself standing next to Meridan scrutinizing a crowded scene of bloodshed and war, I stopped, sighing.
“There is nothing on this wall that isn’t violent,” I said.
We stared at the small figures clashing like two waves against each other, one side like shadows, the other like ghosts.
“Kroan and Naros,” Meridan said. “I don’t even recall us being at war.”
“This place is older than both of us. Older than our mothers. I’m sure there were plenty of wars before our time that no one talks about.”
“When did it all go wrong, though? I’ve been searching for that answer above all else.”
