Blood trickled freely from the cut on Ben's chin, trailing over skin left marred and torn when he fell face first into the caverns. Judging by the dull ache which had taken up residence in his right side, he had broken, or at the very least bruised, one of his ribs. But, sitting with his back pressed up against the cavern wall, his hands and feet hogtied in front of him, he could not deny there was light to be found in the darkness he had unwittingly stumbled upon.

Two short candles illuminated his immediate exiguous surroundings. Though narrow, the inside of the boulder appeared to be wider than the thoroughfare outside of it. The glow of the candles did not extend far, and what existed in the darkness beyond remained a mystery. The trio of elders could be lurking, keeping careful watch over him, or the passageway could have continued, leading away from the hidden entry point into the boulder, throughout its innards, and toward whatever lay on the other side of it. Whether that be a dead-end composed of impassable rock, or another claustrophobic pathway etched into land as stony and narrow as Malice's thoroughfare, Ben neither knew nor did he immediately care. While the candlelight was too dim to allow him to truly evaluate his surroundings, it permitted him to confirm what he already suspected.

It was the midwife's crazed laughter that tormented him when he fell into this place; it was the weight of her body as she sat perched upon his back that immobilized him; it was the threat of her hands—so large, harsh, and calloused, feeling so strangely, threateningly, masculine when she eventually used them to prompt him first to turn over, then to sit against the wall while she bound his hands to his feet. When she finally grew bored of the darkness, she had lit the candles, empowering him to identify her.

She looked odd in the cavern–somehow both older and younger than he recalled her to be. She was impossibly thin and frail. Her once gray hair was still wiry, but it seemed almost blonde in the candlelight. She looked taller, her shoulders and waist boney and narrow, their angularity emphasized by the sturdiness of the familiar gun belts she wore diagonally over her shoulders, the leather crisscrossing across her chest, the holsters containing the pistols belonging to Ben and Hoss, hanging low for easy access at her sides. Dry lips curling over sharp teeth, she peered down at him with dark, black eyes, brightened by an unholy gleam.

Aching rib forgotten, a shiver slithered up Ben's spine, the chill of it chasing away all rational thought as his mouth fell open and he gave voice to the only thing he could think to ask. "What are you, some kind of witch?"

The midwife's smile widened, the glimmer in her eyes becoming so unsettling that Ben was forced to look away. Leaning over, she took hold of his chin, the blood flowing from it staining her fingers an angry, accusing red as she forced him to look at her again. "Not what," she reprimanded, her voice low and hissing.

Deeply bothered by the gleam in her eyes, Ben found he could not begin to successfully negotiate her games. He could barely conceive of words to say, let alone consider if they were ones that would be positively received.

"Where are we?" he asked.

Something was very wrong here; something had been wrong from the beginning—quite possibly since the moment when this boulder and the land surrounding it had been originally forged.

"Not where," the midwife said.

"Why are you hiding in this place?" Questions were falling freely now; impetuously forming on the tip of his tongue, Ben was helpless to silence them.

"Not why."

"Then how–?"

"Not how," the midwife said, her voice cold, firm, and dangerous—only the slightest hint of what she was truly capable of unleashing. Squeezing his chin harder, she leaned ever forward to harshly whisper into his ear. "I do not desire to be asked obvious questions."

Struggling beneath her draconian grip, Ben helplessly wondered what it was that she specifically desired, another obvious question that, mouth hanging open, he felt he had no choice but to ask. The inquiry died on the tip of his tongue as a firm voice rang through the dank, moist air to echo forcefully off the cavern walls.

"Stop engaging her."

The certainty of the voice, so calm, composed, and familiar was as welcome and comforting as the midwife's sudden shift of attention. Letting go of Ben's chin, she appraised her blood covered hand in a pleased manner. He watched, captive to disgust and shock, as she began to vulgarly lick her fingertips. Cleaning the blood, she was careful to leave the liquid covering her index finger untouched. She smiled at him, her sharp teeth stained crimson, her dark eyes locked on his own, and took two backward steps before bending to retrieve a candle with her dry hand. Turning her back on him, she walked further away, her feet seeming to move too quickly and slowly at the same time. The candle she held cast more light on the cavern, allowing him to see that the passageway did, in fact, continue to lead further into the boulder's center, and provided him gracious light to finally locate his missing son.

On the opposite side of the cave, Adam's predicament nearly mirrored Ben's own.

He sat on the ground, his back pressed against the wall of rock. Oddly, his arms and legs had been left untied. Strangely, he did not look at Ben; he kept his hazel eyes fixed on the approaching midwife. There was an absence to his stare, a glazed sheen to his eyes, and an unsettling evenness to his tone as he opened his mouth and spoke in a voice that was a little too deep to be recognized as his own.

"This is a place where nothing matters," he said. "If you cannot stop yourself from asking questions, then it's much better not to talk at all."

Kneeling on the ground in front of Adam, the midwife put the candle down and extended her unsullied hand to run her fingers fondly through his dark hair. "Intelligent boy," she purred approvingly. "I always knew you were going to be my favorite."

Lifting her bloody index finger, she cast Ben a provoking glance and grinned. "I do not desire to be asked obvious questions," she repeated. "Men tirelessly asking for the knowledge they refuse to understand. It was not what you saw that brought you here." She looked at Adam fondly. "It was what you could not."

Staring at the midwife, Adam appeared as calm and disinterested as he had been the day the fateful telegraph from Malice had arrived; he seemed as unaffected by his current environment and position as he had when he had been sitting behind the bars of the Malice jail cell. Something was very wrong here—Ben had always known that—and worse: something was very wrong with his son. There was nothing comforting and familiar about this man, nothing welcoming about the sight of him, his demeanor a little too calm and composed as he displayed a disposition that could only be described as foreign and unnatural—at least for the Adam Ben knew so well. How had this man summoned the desire to speak with such authority and firmness, commanding both Ben's attention and that of the midwife mere moments ago? It seemed so impossible, so inconsistent. How had this Adam done that? How had he commanded anything other than confusion and despair?

Clenching Adam's dark hair in a fist, the midwife pulled his head back and leaned over him, her face hovering inches away from his own. Glancing back at Ben, she grinned and lifted her bloody index finger to stain Adam's lips before shoving it into his mouth. If Adam was disgusted, he gave no indication. In fact, he did not appear to be bothered by being on the receiving end of such a revolting act at all. When the midwife finally removed her finger, Ben's stomach turned sickly as he noted its wet sheen. In the candlelight, it no longer gleamed with his blood but with the clear saliva of his son's mouth.

"Now," the midwife whispered, "you tell your father why and how,where and what. You share with him what he does not want to know."

Still looking at her, Adam opened his reddened lips to reveal teeth smeared crimson. "I wasn't brought here to deliver cattle," he said, his voice flat and emotionless.

"If you weren't brought here to deliver cattle," the midwife prompted, "then what were you brought here to deliver?"

Adam's eyes remained absent and glazed as they gleamed with a newly acquired unsettling, unholy sheen. "Blood," he said.

Ben was horrified.

TBC