Chương 37: “Gerald’s Floor”

He gave Gerald a floor. It wasn't a whole floor, just half of the sixth, the half he couldn't fully reclaim because the geometry had collapsed in a way that resisted his usual methods. He'd been ignoring it. Gerald, who moved through walls for sport, had been spending time down there anyway. Vorrath had noticed. He had not said anything because saying anything would require acknowledging that Gerald had been fixing it. Gerald had been fixing it.

But not the way Vorrath would fix it, not by force, nor by will, not by tearing the wrong angles out and replacing them with right ones. Gerald had been doing it slowly. Moving through the collapsed passages. Settling in the broken places. The geometry, which had resisted Vorrath, had been quietly rearranging itself around Gerald's presence the way water rearranges itself around stepping stones. Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author's preferred platform and support their work!

The half-floor was not what Vorrath would have made. It was lower-ceilinged than he'd choose. The angles were soft rather than sharp, the temperature was warmer than anything else in the dungeon, and there was, inexplicably, a small alcove near the entrance that was exactly the right size for a child to sit in and feel safe. He looked at the alcove for a long time. He told Gerald the floor was his.

Gerald received this information from inside a wall and did not come out, but the warmth in the sixth increased by one degree, which Vorrath decided to count as gratitude. He went back upstairs.

"Gerald seems happy today," June said without looking up from her book.

"Yes," said Vorrath, on her water glass. She looked up. Then back at her book. She was smiling.

"Good," she said.