On the other side of the wall, the creatures start hollering. I don’t wait to see if they understand what happened. I just turn and run.
Sweat breaks out on my brow. I tuck my dagger into its sheath and sprint along the passageway with an arm outstretched, leaves whipping against my fingertips, thorns slashing at my wrist. The hedge is a solid mass of vegetation. Until suddenly…it isn’t.
My arm lurches into nothing, my entire body pitching sideways. When I recover my footing, I find myself staringat a stretch of wall that looks like any other, except for the cluster of orange mushrooms huddled at its base. I consider them, then the crushed fungus still clinging to my boot. It’s almost as if…
Shouts pepper the air behind me. I stomp the mushrooms from existence and plunge into the hedge, chilly air washing across my skin as I pass through to the other side.
In the next corridor, I scan for more mushrooms. There. I bolt toward them, testing my theory by grabbing at the leaves and thorns above.
Nothing but cool, empty space. An illusion, signposted by these mushrooms.
I kick this cluster into dust, too. I won’t leave any trace. I won’t give those toad-things a path to follow.
I plunge through that wall, then do it five more times. Ten. I dart around corners, following the lighted mushrooms that lead the way. The creatures’ shouts fade behind me, until, at long last, I spot an archway in the distance. The exit.
I pelt toward it, arms pumping. I’ll find a new doorway beyond. Ihaveto.
I sail beneath the arched greenery, the maze spitting me out into?—
Oh. Oh, goddess.
I wheel madly, my boots skidding to a stop atop the lip of a sheer ravine. A single pebble launches into the abyss, and I watch it fall, watch it bounce across the jagged rocks below. My chest heaves, my heart thrashing so hard I can taste it.
I stopped just short of taking that plunge. Now the castle looms beyond the ravine, a little closer, a little bigger. I can’t see a way across, but a swaying rope bridge leads to an island in the middle, perched atop a pillar of stone. A single tree sprouts from amid the greenery, and in its trunk…a door.
Thank Ishanna. I dart to the head of the bridge, grateful for my gloves as I grip the rope guardrails with both hands. Wooden boards creak and wobble beneath my boots.
Voices darken the air behind me, coating my insides with ice. Those creatures are catching up, but I force myself forward, step afterterrifying step. Don’t look down. Don’t think about the drop, or what brand of evil these oversized toad-things plan to inflict.
I’m halfway across, now. Three quarters.
Shouts erupt, telling me I’ve been spotted. I hurry faster, the bridge swaying, my stomach pitching along with it.
A thump, behind me. The boards shiver and jump, the ropes tugging in my grip, as if one of the creatures has joined me on the bridge.
I strain toward the island ahead. If only I can get there, I can strand myself on it. Cut the bridge and take a moment to think, instead of hurtling through that door and into the next trial.
Ten steps left. Five. The bridge bucks beneath my feet, the ropes yanked this way and that.
I jump.
My boots hit solid ground. I spin, plucking the dagger from my belt. My pursuer has already made it halfway across, and I attack the nearest rope, fibers bursting beneath my blade.
Goddess, this thing issharp. I offer up a silent thank-you to the Shadow.
The rope snaps with an explosive crack. I’ve already gone to work on the second, sawing so hard my shoulder burns. Slice, slice,snap. The bridge lurches sideways. The toad-creature screams, nearly thrown by the recoil. He clings to what remains, spouting curses at me, but I just grin, already hacking at the third rope. He can’t possibly get to me now. I’ll pitch him into this ravine. Reduce him to a puddle splattered across the earth.
My blood hums a savage song, my vision tunneling down to the flash of my blade, the creak of the rope. The third one gives way with a thwack. The toad-thing shrieks, begging for mercy as he clutches at his last remaining hope. He hauls himself back toward the far side—the only safety he can reach anymore.
I slice and slice, my arm aching. I watch my hands as if from afar—the fingerless leather gloves, the dirt beneath my nails, the weapon in my grip. All of it looks so strange, sounfamiliar, as if these hands belong to someone else, and…wait, what are they doing? What amIdoing?
If I cut the rope, this creature dies. Not because I acted out of self-defense, but vengeance.
I pause, words rippling across my memory, like whispers carried on a breeze, so faint I can barely make them out. But they’re words I know backwards and forward, words I learned to write in childhood alongside my name.
No hand shall be raised in violence. As water cannot be gathered again once spilled, life cannot be restored once taken.It’s a passage from the Book of Disciplines, widely cherished, lauded for its mercy.
Goddess, I… Who am I? What have I become? Not a murderer, surely. Not brutal or merciless or unforgiving.
