Chương 64: Wisps in the Dark

"At your service," the lead Wisp said with an exaggerated bow. He was stringier than Solas and had a wide nose where the other Wisp had none at all, but otherwise the similarities were striking. The other Wisps had the wide variance in appearances she had learned to expect from their kind.

"We got a few rules. You give us what you got, we only kill one of ya. You don't, we kill both of ya, then take what you got." Miriam looked down with contempt at the bandits.

"What makes you think you can even kill one of us?" Instantly all the lanterns flashed off and the cave was in total darkness again. Miriam screamed as something wickedly sharp tore through her upper thigh, even as she spun her spear around her, only to hit nothing. One by one, the lights flicked back on slowly, as if taunting her with their control. Miriam looked down to see a small stab wound in her leg.

"Damn it!" she clenched her hand, filling it with Blight, with an eye on that smug toad in front.

"How are you even here? No one else is supposed to even be in my little slice of reality. He's an exception," she said, nodding at Sol. The lead Wisp clicked his tongue scoldingly.

"Some things even the boy upstairs don't understand about this island. The rules change as you go deeper. We are clever ones. We hide. We wait. Sometimes we hear ones like you climbing around. We make traps! Dig holes. We get more than you'd think! So when we feel someone moving down the Second Web we come lookin'! And here you are."

"The rules change? You mean other people can be in the same reality if you get deep enough?" Sol asked.

"Only if you're born here!" The Wisp cackled.

"So the secret won't help you none, wood boy!"

"Do you know what's happening up top?" Miriam clenched her spear tightly.

"The island isn't going to be safe for anyone much longer." The Wisp shrugged.

"Bad things, yeah? Bad things. But we're safe here. A Wisp might change his face," he looked pointedly at Sol, "but underneath he's still a Wisp. Island's the same." Sol frowned, disturbed.

"What do you - " Miriam cut him off. No point in going down that rabbit hole.

"We have a way to get you off the island. That man there - he can get you enough material fórsa to remake yourselves. All the other villagers from Láthair Maol are on their way to do it right now." The Wisp scratched his chin.

"They are, are they?" Another Wisp, a tall, thin one, croaked "We could leave? For real?" The lead Wisp bellowed back "It's a trick, you gobsmacked idiot. They just want to steal our homes." Miriam blinked.

"What?" The Wisp leered at her unpleasantly.

"You seen the chaos upstairs. Now you see us, tight and cozy in here with no worries and you start thinking you'll trick us out of what is rightfully ours! Lead us up and out where we'll fade to dust or get eaten by some beastie. Ain't never been a Wisp born that would fall for a con like that!" Miriam sighed.

"Sol, we don't have time for this." He nodded.

"I agree." Then he vanished in a cloud of fórsa. The Wisps gasped and readied their weapons - mostly knives and short blades. But Sol was nowhere to be seen. Mirim grit her teeth. Did he run out of her fórsa again? She began readying a technique - the Wisps would be caught off guard for long. Then Sol appeared behind the Wisps, two fórsalocks drawn. In an instant he fired two lashings at the closest Wisps, pinning them to the floor. Then he holstered one pistol, seized a lantern from one of them and vanished again.

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"Teleporter!" The lead Wisp roared. He glared at Miriam, the only target still actually there, and pointed at her with his knife. Miriam activated Waterfall. This time she overloaded it with triple the amount of fórsa it really needed, widening the effect to forcibly shove the group in front of her into the stone wall. She spun, ready to deal with the seven or eight of them behind her when Sol popped back into view, still holding the lantern.

"We can go now," he said. Miriam grew a fence of vines behind them and they took off running deeper into the tunnel, lit now only by Sol's stolen lantern. They might have been able to overcome the Wisps - they were many but weak individually - but their time was running out. Every moment they waited things likely grew worse up on the island. ✧✧✧ Cormac waited nervously at the edge of Scior. Even by his terms, he'd had a lucky run through the jungle past Domhain.

He'd stuck to the shadows, and he found that in spite of Cian's advice his Luck really did work best from the back. He snuck through the jungle, around man-like rabbits, some strange sort of doglike strider creature with skeletal legs and a simple giant spider. None managed to hear or spot him. He was just in the right place in the right time. This was a High Luck area, he realized. About damn time he found one. It could have come at no better time.

Scior was full of tired villagers, still scared to death but determined to press on. After vanishing into the jungle, Cormac had lost sight of the darkness enveloping the island, but he had no doubt it persisted. Scior was the most like an actual bald spot than either of the other two, not much more than a large hump of stone jutting from a clearing in the trees.

There wasn't much room for villagers to congregate, so most just gave themselves a few moments rest, then picked themselves up and continued moving on towards the beach. Then there was the hole. The villagers all swore the hole had not been there before - a ragged wound in the hill easily six feet deep. There was nothing at the bottom they could see but darkness.

Many villagers swore immediately that this must be the cause of the trouble and volunteered to explore the cave, but the elders among them quickly forbade it. Anything powerful enough to damage Cian would make short work of any of them. So now Cormac just waited for Róise, nervously sending out his Luck seeking for her into the jungle as best he could. Hey, it was a high Luck area - many things could be done that were impossible elsewhere.

Finally, far longer than he was comfortable with, Róise stumbled out into the clearing and quickly collapsed onto the ground. He rushed to her side, water in shaking hands to offer her. She was covered in blood, soaked through her shirt, ripped in so many places that it seemed impossible she could still be alive. Róise took the water weakly and poured the entire skin down her throat.

"I… had a little trouble…" she said, breath heaving. Cormac held her tightly and asked the villagers if anyone had an extra shirt. That was how Róise ended up with a pink child's tunic that he would not dare make fun of, if he valued his life.

"There were Fifths out there," she said.

"I killed one. Injured two more and managed to get away. Would have been dead if it weren't for Sol's material fórsa." It seemed that Cormac had at least learned discretion during his time on the island, so he didn't mention how he'd walked completely unbothered through. It seemed uncouth. Though, would have been only fair, given how she'd done the same thing on the way to Domhain.

"No sign of Miriam or Sol?" Róise asked, finally staggering to her feet. She was running Róisín Dubh again to help reinvigorate her and the villagers around them.

"No," Cormac said.

"I… wasn't sure about Miriam, but I am surprised Sol wasn't here waiting for us. Could he have gotten lost?" Róise had no time to give an answer before a series of shouts and screams started to ring out from the hole. ✧✧✧ The tunnels below the jungle were subtly beginning to change. The passage was narrowing and somehow the light from the lantern seemed to cast out a little farther. Then abruptly the tunnel opened into a huge cathedral-sized chamber the lantern was not strong enough to fully illuminate.

Near to them was a stone table, the only seemingly intentional furnishing they had seen down here. Into the table were burned-in rings and runes, but nothing else. The dust here had clearly been recently disturbed. It wasn't until they left the table behind that they noticed the light coming from the ceiling - a small hole showing the blue sky above.

"Could we get out that way?" Miriam wondered. It was so high up, though." Miriam?" Miriam spun, a vine spear manifesting quickly into her hand. There was something in the shadows in the far depths of the cavern, huddled against the wall. Sol tentatively brought the lantern closer. Whatever it was was monstrous, a hulking form with four arms, one of which seemed continually seized in a trembling fist. The other three jerked and spasmed, as if the creature didn't know how to properly control them.

Its skin seemed to be blackened and gangrenous, pulsing with every heartbeat. On its swollen and misshapen head was a familiar bandana. Miriam recoiled in horror.

"Maitiú?"