Chapter 26

The grim darkness was as deep as the pitch of the castle dungeon, and Link could feel the same phantom fears looming at his peripheral vision as he had in that forsaken place. The difference was, this time they might be real. He cursed the loss of his sword, feeling more vulnerable than he had in what felt like ages without the weapon at his side.

The passage was impossibly long, though he was glad to feel that the stone walls had not left him. It was only after about five minutes of traveling that he had turned around and realized the winking light of the city streets had vanished, and he was not certain that he could return to Kadath even if he wished to do so.

He shrugged off the uncertainty. What had he been certain of so far anyway? He had gotten this far by stumbling through the dark. He would stumble on, and if he tripped on something he would deal with that then.

A smile curled across his lips, despite the oppressive darkness. For a second he had been thinking in a way that reminded him distinctly of Scarlett. The pirate may have been gone, but she had certainly left her mark on the boy.

His sentimental musing was shattered as the sudden sound of electric lights crackling to life surrounded him. The world lit up in marvelous electric blue, veins of silver-blue energy erupting from the stone walls, which he could now see were pearly white in contrast to the darkness that had blanketed them.

The hallway he was in opened into a circular chamber, its high ceiling fraught with arches which connected tall pillars that were situated in a circle around the center. Shafts of light began to illuminate the spaces between the pillars as great blue gemstones set in the ceiling began to glow. Link saw the silhouettes of ravens scatter from the piercing glow, seeking refuge in the corner shadows, their lost feathers fluttering silently to the floor.

There was a flash, momentarily blinding him. He winced against the hard light, letting his pupils adjust to the sudden luminous assault. In the center of the chamber, a pillar had lit up glowing blue, its light bright enough to illuminate the rest of the strange chamber. Ravens were gathered in throngs about the ceiling, looking like broods of feathered bats, huddled together with their wings over their sparkling eyes.

"Nyarlathotep!" called Link, stepping into the room, "I've come to see you! I'm not afraid, so come on out!"

Suddenly, the cloud of ravens about the ceiling stirred. Their wings stretched wide, and many of them screeched and cawed angrily at him. First one bird swept down, nearly crashing into his head, and then a hundred others followed suit, until the air about the boy was full of the sounds of flapping and squawking. He felt their talons brush his skin, tearing holes in his tunic, and covering him with stinging cuts. He threw his arms up to shield his face, screaming into the swarm of feathered attackers.

They could have likely consumed him, but they did not. Instead, the avian assailants gathered on the floor, until the stone was carpeted with their feathered forms. Link opened his eyes, watching as the mass of creatures in front of him churned together like a swirling black cloud. Ravens were scrambling to climb on top of one another, clicking and squawking and clawing, standing on the shoulders of each other's wings, and biting each other's legs and clutching each other's feathers, until they were linked together in such a way that they made a small tower in front of him.

This tower grew as more of the birds piled on, carelessly tearing and grasping at one another so that Link was sure they would draw blood. He watched as the ugly mass of feathered things grew before his eyes, until their twisted and unnatural forms took on the shape of a man in a black cloak. It was like a man, but headless, and made of ravens, like a living statue constructed from the rent corpses of a thousand of the obsidian creatures.

The thing was revolting. Link watched with disgust as one raven, larger than any he had yet seen, clawed his way up the side of the strange pile and inserted himself upon the shoulders like a blasphemous head. The wings were pulled in tight, and the enormous black beak clicked at him. The beady, dark eyes watched him in a way that seemed to bore into his soul. He remembered Nyarlath's hideous gaze, the first time those eldritch purple eyes had rested on him, and how sick it had made him feel inside.

"Golden One, Courage of Men!" screeched the bird. The many beaks that blanketed its bizarre body twittered and hooted at this.

"Kill him!"

"Consume him!"

"Destroy him!"

Each of the voices was different. Only the first had issued from the mouth of the large bird at the head of the entity. The others had been shriller, less intelligible, and more malevolent.

"Lamb and lion, calf and boar, goat of the woods and carrion buzzard; Which are you, Courage of Men? Which are you?" shrieked the head.

Link felt dizzy with nausea. His mind swam through a thick fog. He felt more than ever the oppressive blur of dreaming thought, and it seemed to him that he was stuck somewhere in that kaleidoscopic shift that marked transition between the two worlds. Something was horribly wrong about the place he was in, and it was difficult to ignore the fear.

Yet he had to!

Zelda was depending on him. He shook his head, focused.

"I seek the one called Nyarlathotep!" cried the boy, glaring at the raven-thing's dark eyes, "Show him to me!"

"Kara barida! Kara barida! The dark birds of dead Kadath!" the evil thing replied, "We shall test you, Courage of Men, and we shall find you wanting, we black birds! Light shall not shine upon the black pharaoh!"

"Woe and madness!"

"Kill him!"

"Consume him!"

The horrible voices invaded his skull, shaking him to his core. The raven-thing seemed to sense this, its myriad wings fluttering, and its looming form growing taller and nearer to the boy.

"You want to test me?" cried Link, "Fine then! Test me! I won't back down. I came to see Nyarlathotep, and I won't leave until I do."

"You will be tested, Courage of Men!" screeched the sinister head, "A riddle and then a foe, up three times the tower you must go."

"Fail and die!"

"Do no try!"

"Kill him, rend him, and pluck out his eyes!"

Link ignored the shrieking voices, pushed the thought of danger from his mind. He needed to be like the pirates, he needed to forget about fear and worry about survival.

"You want me to solve a riddle?" said Link, "Okay, fine. I'm not much good at that stuff, but if that's what I have to do then I will. What is the riddle?"

The raven-thing rose to its fullest height, puffing out its strange chest of folded wings. It began to speak, and so many mouths were uttering that Link could not keep track of which was which. The riddle came to him one line to one voice, and the shrill titter of the ravens made it hard for him to concentrate.

"Smells of sage!"

"Tastes of chamomile!"

"Does not grow in any field!"

"Born of age!"

"And mistakes made!"

"Expensive prices dearly paid!"

Link waited for a second before he realized there wasn't any more.

"What that's it?" asked the boy, feeling a little stupid, "That isn't anything!"

"It gives up! It gives up!"

"Consume!"

"Kill!"

"No, wait!" cried Link, "Just give me a second!"

His mind was racing, the raven's strange words swirling inside his skull like swimming fishes. Smells of sage… sage had a strange, musty aroma, but not unpleasant to him. Tastes of chamomile… He remembered the warm and bitter tea he sometimes drank on holidays at the orphanage. The unsweetened taste of chamomile was parching and sour, but strangely soothing and full of comfort. What did that have to do with age or mistakes though? He felt frustration, confusion and horror railing against logic in his mind. He had to think of something!

"Time is up, Courage of Men!" cried the raven-thing, "You fail!"

"No! Wait!" said Link, backing away as the feathered monstrosity bore down on him, "Goddess be damned, if only I had Zelda's wisdom!"

The obsidian beak was only inches from his face when the creature suddenly stopped. It glared evilly from its twinkling, dark eyes, and hooted at him in the most unpleasant way. Then, it drew itself up to its full height once more.

"Wisdom!" squawked the beast, "Clever, clever, Courage of Men!"

"Curse him!"

"Kill him!"

"Pluck out his eyes!"

"You have solved our riddle, Courage of Men," the head went on, "Now make wisdom your ally. Defeat your foe and meet us on the upper level."

There was an earsplitting cacophony of shrieks as the raven-thing split into a thousand individual ravens, the winged monsters taking flight into the shadowed corners of the room, and dissipating into darkness like a black-feathered fog. The blue lights of the room dimmed, and the pillar in the center of the room darkened all together. Suddenly, link was alone in silence; the only noise his own ragged breath. All at once he felt as though he hadn't caught his breath since he had left the jail cell back in the city.

Link turned round and round in the misty darkness.

"Hello?"

He listened attentively to the darkness. There was a sound somewhere distant, like the tapping of fingers being drummed on a desk. Link could barely perceive the shadow growing around him. He realized what was happening at the last possible moment.

"Hyaa!"

The boy screamed and leapt forward, rolling on the rough stone floor. He could feel something heavy cutting the air behind him. He heard something land, and twisted around to peer into the dark. He was only able to catch a small glimpse of the thing, retreating into the shadows of the ceiling. It had long, spindly limbs like a spider, but there was something strange about it. Its horrendous shaped seemed simultaneously alien and familiar, so that Link could not quite be sure what it had been. His eyes scanned the shadowy ceiling in horror.

There came the pattering sound of something drumming its fingers on the stone. Link turned and ran aimlessly into the dark, sure that he didn't want the thing dropping down on him, whatever it was.

He ran until he came to the gently curved wall of the room, where he pressed his back against the stones and sucked down air as calmly and quietly as he could. The monsters in this temple were more horrendous than anything he had ever seen, and here was Link without a weapon. The raven-thing had said that he must defeat a foe in order to advance through the temple, but how was he supposed to fight a monster with no sword?

Stopping to think had been a mistake. Link saw the shadow growing around him again, and had to somersault painfully across the rocky ground to avoid being snatched. This time, he landed on his backside on the cold stone floor and when the creature came down he saw it in full.

It was like the severed hand of some rotting, leather-skinned giant, the nub of its broken wrist bone protruding grossly from the meat stump at its top. It landed on the floor, splayed out on its fingertips like the many legs of a crawling insect. Link watched in terror as it raised two of its massive fingers like a threatening spider, the black nails at their tips glistening like venomous fangs.

The boy leapt aside as the gruesome digits came at him like striking spears. He could hear them chip the stones with horrible force. The beast was strong! Link turned to the darkness and ran as fast as he could away from the monstrosity. A moment later, he found himself leaning against the darkened pillar at the center of the room, panting desperately for breath, hearing his heart jackhammer in his ears.

He had to keep moving. Ignoring the burning of his lungs, he took to the darkness once more at a jog, aimlessly darting here and there with his eyes turned to the black ceiling. Several times, he fancied he could detect movement in the shadows. The thing must have been very swift, leaping from crevasse to crevasse, and crawling between the dark arches.

After a moment he needed to rest. He stopped for just a second, watching the space above him, straining to listen over his own panting. The telltale shadow began to grow around him, and he knew that the creature would come plummeting at him at any moment. He counted under his breath. 1… 2… 3… !

Link hit the floor, rolling acrobatically out of the way of the beast. It hit the ground with a smack, then leapt to its fingertips and began to grope around for him.

Bravely, the boy faced the beast, keeping out of reach of its fingers but near enough to watch its erratic movements. He back pedaled as it blindly grasped for him. Apparently, fast though it was, its vision was somewhat limited. Link wondered if it was somehow triggered by sound or motion. He took very careful steps away, watching the monster with horrified fascination.

Eventually, it trundled over to one of the pillars that dotted the room and went skittering back into the shadows overhead. Link was beginning to understand. It had to drop on him. Somehow, it couldn't find him unless it was on the ceiling. An idea struck the boy. It was risky, but what other option had he got?

He sprinted to the pillar at the center of the room.

"Hey, ugly!" shouted Link, "Come on and try that again! I'm right here!"

Link pressed his back against the pillar, his eyes locked on the shadowy ceiling. The adrenaline in him made it hard for him to keep his legs still, and his whole body was trembling as the shadow began to grow around him. He held his breath, counting silently in his mind.

On three, like clockwork, down came the creature. Link hit the floor, sprawling out as flat as he could. He knew the hand was coming, and expected any minute for the hideous fingers to wrap around him. Instead, he was greeted with a terrible squelch, and then a long and high-pitched scream which made the boy have to clasp his hands over his ears.

The walls sprang to life again, and the jagged pillar at the center of the room lit up electric blue. There, skewered on it like a kebab, the horrible monster hand was squirming and thrashing, its palm completely impaled. It was screaming mouthless, the sound otherworldly and deeply disturbing. Link scooted back as fast as he could; using his palms and heels to push himself away from the beast. He backed up until he was pressed up against one of the room's many pillars, and there he sat and watched with morbid curiosity as the creature flailed, twitched, and then stopped moving for the last time.

It was quiet again.

Carefully, the boy stood up, letting his fluttering heart slowly subside to its more regular rhythm. He stepped closer to the awful thing, inspecting its corpse the way one might regard the road kill of an unfamiliar animal. In the brighter light, he could see that its flesh was scarred and gangrenous, and the fingernails, which he had supposed by were naturally black, were actually caked with a thick, dark layer of dried blood.

Link's attention was drawn away from the terrible dead thing by a noise from above. He looked up. Unfolding from the darkness of the ceiling, a snake of cold metal and smooth white stone was unfurling, become more and more like a spiral staircase. Link watched as it unfurled in a whimsical fashion, seeming to magically become more than it was a second ago. Once it had touched down by his feet, an ornate stairway twisted up to the shadows above.

"Up three times," Link repeated the Raven thing's words to himself, "Okay, two to go. Let's do this."

And up the stairs he went.

In the lonely little prison, the sound of click and pecking was causing Zelda to stir from her dreams. It was a shame. She hadn't dreamed so pleasantly in quite some time. She had been in the castle, in the garden during summer, picking flowers. She was making a wreath, as she often did, to offer to her guest as a present. Who else was there?

She'd seen him through the veil of the fountain water, its cascade blurring his forest green tunic and peachy skin. The memories were shaky, as those of dreams often were: His hand in hers, a pleasant smile, lips…

There was still a smile on her face as her eyes slowly opened. It took her a moment to remember why she was in a jail cell. She sat up, the ruined white dress she wore feeling mucky and dirty on her skin. She had been sweating. The harsh stone floor was even less comfortable than her bed on the pirate ship, and paled in comparison to the cushy mattresses provided by the Gorons of Diamondhearth. She sat up, feeling the stiff pain in her neck and shoulders.

Her smile became a frown. She glanced around the room. Gwen was sleeping, huddled into a fetal ball in the center of her cell. Zig had his hands folded in his lap, and was sitting cross-legged and upright, but seemed to also be asleep. There was something amiss, however. The door to Link's cell stood wide open, as did the one which belonged to the solitary re-dead that had been the original occupant of the little jail, and both beings had utterly disappeared.

"Link?" said Zelda, confusion suddenly mounting. She didn't feel groggy anymore. The pit of her stomach seemed to drop out of her, and she felt herself trembling.

"Link!" she cried louder. One of Zig's eyes slid open. Gwen began to stir.

"Whatsamatter?" slurred Gwen through half-sleep, rolling over so that her mane of black hair stuck up in all directions.

"He is gone!" cried Zelda.

Zig's eyes snapped open. The old pirate stood, going to the bars between his and Link's cell. He inspected the empty cage, finding no trace of the missing boy.

"What do you mean gone?" said Gwen, sitting up. She saw the empty cell and cocked one eyebrow in confusion, "Where the hell can he have gone? He wouldn't have just left without saying anything."

"No, he would never!" agreed Zelda, getting to her feet, "That re-dead is missing too. Oh, Link! I hope nothing terrible has happened to him."

"Maybe he is in the Dreamworld?" offered Gwen.

"It can't be that simple," replied Zig, placing one hand on his chin in contemplation, "Every other time he has entered the Dreamworld he has left his body behind. His magic doesn't work that way. This is something else entirely."

"Well, what are we supposed to do?" asked Gwen.

"There is nothing we can do," said Zig, simply, "Like it or not, we are still trapped in here. Wherever Link has gotten off to, we have to just hope he is okay and that he is coming back for us."

Zelda heard Zig's words, but could scarcely believe them. Her eyes were locked on the spot where, mere hours ago, Link had been sleeping. She couldn't bear to lose another person. Not now. Especially not him. She turned her eyes to the little window above Link's cell, seeing that the sun had yet to rise over dead Kadath. There was a kind of mania in her blue orbs, her mouth pointed down in a furious frown. Under her breath she said, "You had better not break your promise."

Far and away, in the little crevasse with the many giant cocoons and the pleasant saltwater falls, by the light of the moon Scarlett was becoming the world's first moth rider.

The huge insect ambled about at a gait which felt impossible to get used to, its clumsy legs tossing Scarlett about as it explored the little gorge which had been its place of birth. Scarlett was comfortable gripping its soft mane, but nauseated from the erratic way the beast jostled her as it walked.

Eventually, the cumbrous creature came to the wall of the little gorge, feeling the sheer surface with its antennae before cautiously testing it with one hairy foot.

"No, you daft beast!" cried Scarlett, "If you go that way I will fall!"

She pulled and tugged at the creature's soft silver hair, but it didn't seem to notice. The big bug lifted up its other leg, placing it higher on the rock. This tilted Scarlett so that she had the terrible sensation of hanging free from a great height, and she clung to the creature for dear safety.

With a jerking motion and a single gust of air, the massive wings of the creature were suddenly extended to their limit. It flapped them lazily, and Scarlett could see by the moonlight that they were dry. She clenched her grip involuntarily.

"Woah, wait a second!"

Without warning, the powerful wings began to beat more fiercely. Scarlett felt a sudden lurch, and the bug took to the air. The pirate let out a shrill scream, clutching the silver mane of the moth as tightly as she possibly could. The salty spray of the waterfalls and the crags and caves of the gorge went flying past in a blur. Suddenly the air became cool and windswept, and the jagged tops of dead trees were zooming past.

Then they were in sky! Stars, for miles and miles!

The moth's wings went flat, and Scarlett could feel the razor chill of the wind cutting through her. She hunkered down in the moth's mane, trying to seal in whatever warmth she could.

Peering over the moth's shoulder, Scarlett saw the ocean stretching away to the dark horizon. The creature drifted in the air currents, dipping out of its magnificent glide to turn further inland.

Something shined at Scarlett from over the forest of dead trees, away over a hill and close to a peninsula which jutted off the coast. A light, sickly and green, like a star come too near to the world and therefore trapped on its surface. The moth must have seen it too, because suddenly that was where they were headed.

"Hey, where are you taking me?" Scarlett asked the moth, who did not respond, "Oh well, I guess it will have to do. Not like I have a choice at this point."

She did not have a choice. Onward they went on gossamer wings, drawn to distant and portentous flames. Scarlett watched the winking emerald star on the horizon, and smiled. Destiny would bring her to the right place, this she knew. Her mother had told her so. A Shiekah was never anywhere other than where she needed to be.

She gripped the silver mane and howled at the shining moon like a wolfos from hell. She didn't know if anyone had heard her, but, if anyone did, she hoped they were smart enough to be afraid.