"I don't know. I found bricks. Iron bars."
Alaric shifts, reaching out into the dark. We fumble for our clothes. They are wet, miserable, but better than the air. We dress in the dark, helping each other with buttons and zippers. "If there are bricks," he says, his voice gaining strength, "there is a structure. If there is a structure... there is a way up."
He stands up, using the wall for support. He reaches into his pocket. "The flare gun," he realizes. "I still have it."
"You have a flare?"
"One left. From the cabin."
"Light it," I say. "I need to see where we are."
Alaric raises his arm.Click.HISSS.
The red flare ignites, bathing the cavern in a blood-colored glow. I blink against the sudden harsh light. Shadows leap and twist. And then I see it.
We are not in a cave. We are in a crypt. The "river" flows through a stone channel in the center of a massive, vaulted chamber. On either side, there are alcoves. Cells. Barred with rusted iron. And inside the cells... Bones. Piles of them. Skulls grinning in the red light. Femurs stacked like firewood.
"My God," I whisper, covering my mouth.
"The Sanatorium," Alaric says, his eyes scanning the architecture. "The original one. 1890. They threw the bodies of the indigent patients into the foundation. To save on burial costs."
He turns in a circle, the flare sputtering sparks onto the wet floor. "This is the root, Elodie. This is what Hallowed Halls is built on. Bone and misery."
"It's a mass grave."
"It's history." He points the flare toward the far end of the chamber. There, looming in the shadows, is a staircase. Stone. Spiral. Leading up into the ceiling. At the top, a heavy iron trapdoor.
"There," he says. "The way out."
We move toward it. The flare is dying, the red light pulsing like a failing heart. We step over debris—old chains, rusted medical instruments, things I don't want to identify. We reach the stairs. They are steep, slippery with moss. Alaric goes first, holding the flare. I follow, my hand on his back.
We climb. Ten steps. Twenty. Fifty. The air gets drier. Stale, but dry. We reach the top. The iron trapdoor is rusted shut. Alaric pushes. He grunts, straining his injured shoulder. "It’s... stuck."
"Together," I say. I squeeze in beside him on the narrow step. I place my hands on the cold iron. "On three. One. Two. Three!"
We heave.SCREEEEEECH.Metal grinds against stone. The hinges shriek, echoing like banshees. The door lifts an inch. Dust pours down on our faces. "Again!" We push. It slams open, falling back with a deafening clang.
We climb out. We are in a room. It is pitch black, but the air is different. It smells of... formaldehyde. And floor wax. Alaric holds up the dying flare.
We are in the Morgue. Stainless steel tables. Refrigeration drawers. But this isn't the old morgue. This is modern. This is the current Hallowed Halls morgue.
"We're back," I whisper. "We circled back."
"The river runs under the mountain," Alaric says, dropping the flare on the tiled floor and stepping on it to extinguish it. "It brought us home."
Home. The asylum. The place we fled. The place where the mole is.
"We have to be quiet," Alaric whispers. "If Sterling is the mole... or if the Syndicate has breached the perimeter... we are walking into a trap."
He moves to the door of the morgue. He cracks it open. The hallway is empty. Night lighting. But there is a sound. Footsteps. Heavy. Boots. Many of them.
"They're here," Alaric breathes, closing the door softly. "The Syndicate. They didn't just hunt us in the woods. They took the facility."
He turns to me. He looks wrecked. His clothes are wet rags. His bandage is soaked. He has no gun. I have no gun. We are in the basement of a building occupied by an army.
"We need weapons," he says. "The armory is on the third floor. In my office."
"We'll never make it to the third floor."
