“No records I found mentioned any pattern, so I have no idea.”
I finish securing the bandage and test my weight on the injured leg. There’s a sharp twinge, but I can walk.
“Stay here,” he says.
“Castien, don’t–”
But he’s already moving, stepping on different spots along the floor. When his foot hits certain stones, I hear a sound like a single piano note ringing through the air. When he steps somewhere that doesn’t trigger a sound, blades shoot from hidden slots in the walls with vicious speed.
He’s stabbed repeatedly in his wings, his calves, his arms, but he doesn’t flinch or cry out. All I hear is the sound of metal striking metal as the blades find their marks. Some of the impacts are so hard they leave visible indentations, but he continues as if it doesn’t affect him.
After a few more minutes, he turns back to me. I can see the damage – deep gouges across his torso, punctures in his wings, and scratches along his arms where blades caught him at different angles.
“Are you all right?” I ask, horrified.
“Yes.”
“Are you in pain?”
He glances down at a particularly deep scratch on his forearm and shrugs.
“I don’t feel a thing.”
That settles it. He’s a machine, through and through. I shouldn’t even worry about him getting hurt because pain doesn’t exist in his world. He’s built to absorb damage and keep functioning.
“The pattern is a Gregorian chant,” he tells me. “I recognize it. I think I know where to step to get us through safely.”
He gestures for me to come to him.
“Walk directly behind me, pressed against my back. Don’t let go, and don’t deviate from my path.”
I pack up my medical kit and stand, favoring my injured ankle. The cut throbs with each heartbeat, but it’s manageable.
“Permission to hug you from behind?” I giggle.
He hesitates for a moment, and that pause makes me curious. Why would a machine need to consider a simple tactical arrangement? But then he nods and turns around, presenting me with his broad steel back.
I press myself against him and wrap my arms around his waist, and he adjusts his wings to create a protective shield around me. The position puts me in intimate contact with the lower half of his back, not to mention his very firm ass.
We start walking, and I step exactly where he steps, matching his rhythm. The melody that plays under our feet is haunting and beautiful, a sad Gregorian chant that echoes through the corridor like a funeral dirge. Each note hangs in the air before the next one begins, creating an otherworldly harmony that makes my skin prickle.
Halfway through the passage, he takes a wrong step. A blade shoots out and strikes him directly in the side of his throat. He freezes. I gasp and cling to him, my arms tightening around his waist as fear shoots through me.
After a moment that feels endless, the blade retracts back into the wall. He rubs his neck where it hit him, the gesture so human it makes my chest ache, and looks down at me.
“I’m fine.”
“I’m sorry,” I whisper. “I know you don’t feel anything, but it’s barbaric to get stabbed over and over for me.”
“This is the job,” he says simply. “This is what I’m paid for.”
“That only makes it worse.”
We don’t talk after that, just continue walking to the rhythm of the medieval chant until we emerge from the corridor into something that takes my breath away.
The cavern spreads out before us like the inside of a geode, every surface covered in crystal formations that catch and multiply the light coming from my flashlight and Castien’s eyes. The walls and ceiling sparkle and shimmer, creating a light show that makes the entire space glow with soft radiance.
The chamber is massive, cathedral-sized, with natural pillars of crystal reaching from floor to ceiling. Stalactites and stalagmites have grown together over millennia, creating delicate formations that look like frozen waterfalls or elaborate chandeliers. In the center of it all sits a large pool of perfectly clear water, so still it looks like black glass.
