They trekked through the vast subterranean palace for hours without stopping, following the flickering flames of the little Fire Mote. At times Hyren entertained his prisoners with more stories of his interstellar exploits, but for the most part very little conversation passed between them. Hyren supposed this was due not only to their drive to get out, but to the interest his two companions had in the architecture. They passed through vaulted halls covered in murals depicting lavish scenes of celebration, rooms where decaying furniture sat under a thick draping of cobwebs, and corridors whose walls were inlaid with precious metals in the shape of maps of the night sky.
As their march wore on, Terra appeared less and less interested in their surroundings, sometimes merely glancing at something of interest before pressing onward, and brushing off Blynn's attempts to call items to her attention. The girl's movements became increasingly stilted and jittery, and Hyren caught her frequently looking upward, almost as if she expected to see a sky there but found only oppressive rock.
"Let's make camp here for the night," Hyren said, setting down his bundle of weapons in a room with a few scattered tables and benches pushed against the walls. It had probably once been a dining area for palace staff, he inferred by the presence of toppled storage urns, scattered ceramic dishes, and the large, open-air fireplace on one wall. "Oh, how nice," he grunted. "They left us enough fuel for a fire." He pointed to the meager stack of chopped wood next to the stone hearth.
Blynn dropped her pack and set the lantern on the edge of the fireplace. "Don't worry, little guy, you'll have some fun soon! Terra, help me out, here!"
"No," Terra said. "Let's keep going. Please." Her voice was shaky and on the verge of breaking.
"We've walked enough for the day," Hyren said, easing himself to the floor to massage his sore feet.
"We can camp as soon as we get outside," she said. "Please, please. I just…" She clasped her hands. "I just need to get out of here."
Hyren looked over at her, remembering their conversation the day they had met. He didn't like seeing her like this, but he couldn't compromise the reason they were traveling together in the first place. "You need to keep up your strength," he said," and walking all night without sleep won't cut it. I'm not really in a hurry to get you to Sloth, so I can afford to keep you healthy, and I mean to."
"You—you could carry me!" she said. "I can't spend another night in here, I just can't!"
Hyren's stomach twisted at the fear in her voice, but he tried his best to push the emotion down even though that just seemed to make him sicker. "I told you I would protect you," he said with a frown that he tried to make into a menacing scowl. "Do you distrust me that much?"
Terra bowed her head. "N… no… I trust you."
"Good." He nodded. "Now let's get some sleep. We'll reach the surface tomorrow." They were very close, he knew it. The faint whisper of air he had first detected under the throne room had steadily grown into a perceptible draft, cold and dry. He wouldn't be surprised if they'd start to see daylight around the next corner.
She mouthed a silent "okay" and slowly turned to aid her Neopet in lifting firewood. Blynn shot him a nasty glare over her shoulder, and Hyren looked away. He still felt ill.
The two girls built a stack of wood on the metal grating, and Blynn tilted the open lantern over it once they were done. "Come on out, little fella," she said.
The Fire Mote rolled lazily out onto the stack and immediately blazed up anew, nestling itself into the wood which began smoldering and smoking. Soon, a roaring fire was going, perfect for staving off the eternal cold of the cave-fortress.
"Where d'you suppose it goes?" Blynn asked, watching the smoke twist up the stone flue.
"Out on the side of the rocks somewhere," Hyren said, sitting with one knee raised and his elbow propped on it. "No sense in a fireplace without a proper ventilation system."
"How far do you think we've come?" Terra asked, setting up her bedroll nearby.
Hyren cast his gaze at the dark hallway they'd entered the room from. "Pretty far. I wonder which direction we've been traveling in." Too bad his helmet was nonfunctional, as the HUD included a compass. He figured the girls had a magnetic compass, but they'd taken so many twists and turns by now that just knowing where north was wouldn't be much help. "Maybe we'll end up back in the Lost Desert."
"Or on the other side of Neopia," Blynn said, staring into the fire. "I wonder what's there. Probably some super awesome things, stuff we can't even imagine!" She spread her arms wide as though doing so created a vision of far-off lands that only she could see.
Dinner was brief, partly because they'd had a large lunch and partly because Terra barely ate anything, even at Hyren's and Blynn's coaxing. To try to keep her mind off of her situation, after dinner Hyren began teaching her the very basics of swordplay. "We're going to start with some stances and types of attacks for now," he said, pacing around her with his arms folded.
"Okay," Terra replied, her brow furrowing as she pulled her blade from its sheath and held it in front of her.
"First off, you're holding it wrong."
"Oops."
"You're right-handed, aren't you? You want your right hand on top," the commander explained as she switched the position of her grip on the hilt. "Good, good. Remember that the dominant hand guides the strike while the other provides leverage. It's basic physics." She nodded. "Oh, and bend your knees, there you go. Keep your weight on the balls of your feet, be ready to move at any moment."
Once she had gotten the hang of the ready stance and some rudimentary blocks, parries, and strikes, Hyren began using his own sword to spar with her, very gently and very slowly, just so she'd get used to the rhythm of swordfighting and begin to understand the strategy involved. As this ponderous kind of practice was a no-brainer for him, he took the time to notice Blynn going around the room picking up small potsherds and storing them in her belt pouch, and then shooting them at a spot on the wall she'd carved a small X into. She was a disconcertingly good shot.
A sudden impact on his forearm bracer brought him back to the task at hand, and he looked back at Terra to see her clutching her sword close. "Oh no! I'm so sorry, did I hurt you?" she asked, chewing her lower lip. "I think I got carried away…"
"What? No," Hyren said with a laugh, inspecting the bracer. There was a new nick in it, but she didn't have enough strength to actually injure him. "I'm fine. I should have been paying attention—you saw the opportunity while my guard was down."
She stowed her blade absently and nodded, not looking fully convinced. Her eyes wandered down to his foot. "Is your ankle okay?"
He glanced at it. He'd forgotten it was even injured. "Yes, it's all better now. I heal fast. Don't worry about it."
"Okay… good." Terra seemed to hesitate a moment before taking a deep breath. "You know… even after everything we've been through, even though I know where we're going after this… I'm glad we met you."
Hyren stared at her incredulously. He no longer had the desire to tell her off, even though he knew she still harbored a vain hope in her heart that he would let them go. He wasn't sure what to say, but before he could stop it, the truth came to the surface. "I'm glad I met you, too," he said.
His statement was punctuated by a loud snap as Blynn's latest shot hit unusually far from its target and closer to the commander's head.
Hyren quietly piled more wood around the Fire Mote, who seemed quite content at being out of the cramped lantern for a while and in the midst of a real blaze. Terra and Blynn had fallen asleep to his stories again, and now the Grundo could feel himself starting to wear down as well. Letting out a yawn, he eased himself to the floor, taking off his helmet and laying his head on his muscular arm, alone with his thoughts for a while.
Perhaps Sloth wouldn't keep them prisoners forever. Maybe by the time they got out, they would have forgotten about the Grundo who once told them stories and then turned them over to a diabolical sociopath. Somehow that thought didn't comfort him as much as he wished it would.
"Now it's too hot in here," came a whispering complaint.
Well, so much for being alone. Hyren rolled over to see Blynn staring at him from on top of her sleeping bag, sprawled out on her back with her paws folded behind her head.
"Seriously, I feel like my fur is singeing," the Zafara said, scratching her belly.
"You're supposed to be asleep," Hyren said.
She rolled her eyes. "Can't sleep. I'll have to wait until the fire dies down again. You're spoiling that Mote, you know. It won't wanna go back in the lantern."
The commander watched her for a moment. "I think I like you better when you're not intolerably zany," he said.
The Zafara looked over at her owner, then back to the Grundo. "I try to keep her laughing," the magenta Neopet said. "She worries too much and it makes her sick sometimes. I don't wanna see the worry in her eyes."
"You're a lot smarter than you let on," Hyren said.
She grinned. "Yeah, that's the idea." They were both silent for a while, listening to the fire crackle. "I think I've been jealous of you this whole time, Hyren." Blynn let out a sigh as she shifted onto her side, propping up her head in her hand and letting her tail loll back behind her. "I've always been an only pet. It's weird seeing Terra give someone else attention." She traced abstract designs in the dusty floor. "She's really fond of you, you know."
Hyren felt his face heat up in embarrassment and he nodded. "Yeah."
She brushed away her patterns and looked up at him. "You don't really want to take us to Sloth, do you."
He swallowed hard and looked away. "I don't really have a choice, Blynn," he said. "This is my job. When it comes down to it, my job is what matters most. I can't betray everything I am for people I just met yesterday."
The Zafara grabbed her long toes, rocking back and forth. "Did Sloth send you specifically to capture us?" she asked.
"Well, no… I don't think he knows if I'll ever return," Hyren said. He paused and grimaced at his slip of the tongue. He hadn't wanted them to figure out that he was just a cosmic castaway scrambling to get back to his master with whatever prize he could muster.
"So don't go back," Blynn said. "He doesn't have to know."
Hyren rolled over so he was facing the wall. "Go to sleep, Blynn," he said with forced harshness. He heard a sigh and the rustle of a sleeping bag. Truth be told, the idea had snuck into his mind several times lately, but he was not about to let either of them know that. He couldn't give up everything he had built for himself out in the cosmos, could he? And he still wasn't about to betray Sloth, the man who had given him all of this strength and clout.
Not to mention, the doctor's words from the day he had mutated Hyren still echoed in the Grundo's memories. It would not surprise Hyren if Sloth did have some way, somehow, of retaliating against Hyren if the commander were ever to renounce loyalty to the overlord. It was not really something Hyren wanted to test.
Blynn's voice cut through the silence again. "Just so you know."
Her tone was serious enough to make him twist around, to see her glaring at him, her deep blue eyes suddenly hard as ice and her paws clutching the edge of her bedroll. "Terra's my best friend in the whole world," Blynn said. "I swear I'll never let you hurt her, Hyren. I'm watching you."
The commander paused for a moment before nodding, turning back over to escape her piercing gaze. It was evident now that she took her job just as seriously as he did his. And he was struggling to remind himself that their two jobs had to be in conflict.
