five: ashes.

I could tell you that the Dark is organized in blocks, simple and effective, but this is not entirely accurate. Sure, streets and alleyways crisscross and intersect and split the shops and buildings, but the actual makeup of these areas is in no way uniform. Roads are crooked, buildings are crooked; they are all shapes and sizes, some stacked up like so many layers on a wedding cake and looking like they are a splinter away from total collapse, whilst others consist of only a box with a door leading to stairs that themselves open up to a similarly messy underground maze.

What isn't black or gray can be painted in one of hundreds of garish colors, but even these hues were muted with the present drizzle. It was persistent and cold and dripping into my eyes and down my shirt. The weather, the atmosphere, my wet clothes that stuck to me like a second skin – everything, coupled with the queasy feeling in my stomach, left me second guessing myself a hundred times a minute. I wanted nothing more than to close my eyes, sit down in the middle of the street, and just give up. Just throw up my hands, shrug my shoulders, and wake up in my bunk at the Lodging House for breakfast and an apology. Sorry, boys, I just couldn't do it. Sorry.

Neither the drizzle nor the silence showed any sign of abating. I paused and looked quickly around after we reached an intersection. Dutchy almost ran into me, he was so caught up in trying to see everything at once. His eyes were wide behind his glasses, which he wiped periodically with his shirtsleeve. I couldn't really tell if he was in awe or just terrified. He watched me as I took in our surroundings, obviously expecting me to say something. I pretended not to notice.

To my right, identical brown shacks solemnly faced each other across a narrow street. They were low to the ground and decrepit and the road they sat on curved away and faded into a dark mist. Straight ahead, the buildings gradually rose in size and in the distance I could see some, almost impossibly tall, reaching up into the thick mass of clouds overhead.

We went left. The streets had no markers, but this one I would have recognized with my eyes closed. Trees grew everywhere, some stunted, some with branches that went through windows and roofs, their roots reaching across the street and tangling together with cobblestones and signs. Everything except the trees was whitewashed. It was my favorite place to be.

Now Dutchy's eyes were filled with wonder as we picked our way over the roots, finding a clear path every once in awhile and peering into shop windows if we got close enough.

"We're almost there," I said, my voice sounding strange and alone. Dutchy nodded. I still couldn't shake that feeling, that "wrong" feeling. I had never been on this stretch without there being movement, noise, and general busyness. But it wasn't possible for a whole world to be deserted, so… what was it?

We were almost upon it before I noticed anything, and for that I would later chastise myself. I climbed over one particularly obtrusive branch and all at once it hit me; Smoke and noise billowed up so fast and so complete that I was overwhelmed and almost fell backwards onto Dutchy and the street below. I recovered quickly and ran to the side of the road, beckoning for Dutchy to follow me. The road took a sharp angle to the right, where I knew it opened into a large square. I stood pressed against the wall at this corner, and, once I could will myself to, inched forward and looked around.

In a word, it was chaos. A crowd of thousands filled the square to overflowing, and more continued to come from various other points of entrance. I tried but failed to locate the source of the smoke.

I should have known it wasn't going to be easy. I grabbed Dutchy and we merged with the mob, despite his protests. It was a riot on the grandest scale, with people and creatures from every corner of my imagination screaming and cheering, bouncing off walls and starting fights whenever they had a mind to. As I tried to blend in I kept a firm grasp on Dutchy's wrist and together we wove through the masses toward the opposite side of the square.

Suddenly the crowd joined together into one cheer. I could feel the excitement in the air. I spun around and followed the gaze of everyone surrounding me.

"SHIT!" I yelled in surprise, my voice lost completely in the crowd. Dutchy didn't even hear me, but his head tilted up like mine and, like me, he froze. In the center of the square was the biggest tree of them all, and hanging from a high branch was a human. "Sofia…" I murmured, but quickly dismissed the thought. The figure, I could tell even from where I stood, was tall, skinny under a dirty and charred smock, and black. I felt a flash of recognition, but then it disappeared, and I was left confused and clueless. Dutchy came to his senses first and tugged at my hand. The crowd dissolved into jeers and started throwing cobblestones and things at the hanging figure so it swayed from its noose. I turned away, feeling physically sick, and once more we headed for the back of the square and the source of the smoke.

The ruins of the small building were smoldering when Dutchy and I reached it. There were several small fires in the back, and a couple flames could be seen in neighboring structures, but for the most part the damage was done and the cold drizzle was slowly beating back the fire, if increasing the smoke and steam. We stood in the midst of the wreckage, which had by this point been abandoned by the rioters, and my heart sank down to my feet.

"Race? Race? Are you still here? Hello?"

I blinked up at Dutchy as if seeing him for the first time.

"Race? What's wrong? Where are we? Why are we here?"

I didn't answer for a minute, just kicked around the ashes until I found what had originally caught my eye, even from ten yards out. It was still hot to the touch when I picked it up, but the heat felt good in my hands; it felt real. It was the charred wooden remnants of the corner of a sign, one that had formerly been painted with gold leaf and for me had hung like a beacon in this gloomy world.

"Sofia's," I murmured. Dutchy heard me but didn't seem the make the connection. "This was our destination, Dutch." I continued. "This was it. Now there's nothing."

He stared dumbly down at the ashes covering his feet. "What?"

I dropped the sign. Nothing looked salvageable. "Come on," I said, "let's get out of here… I don't know how safe it is, even now." The mob was beginning to disperse and looters had already picked through whatever remained in the ruins.

"What do we do now?" Dutchy asked, his voice rising as he began to realize the true consequences of what we had just discovered. "Race! Stop!"

I turned, still edgy. "Let's go," I hissed. He opened his mouth to say something, then let out an exasperated breath and hurried after me. I led the way north, dodging in and out of the throngs of people with Dutchy close in tow. Part of me was relieved to be in a more normal setting, with people and voices all around me, despite our current situation. Normalcy in a quite un-normal place, I thought grimly. We cleared most of the crowds and continued walking on the side of the street.

"I don't know what happened," I admitted, feeling a headache coming on. "Maybe it was something she did…" I didn't believe that. "Or maybe they knew we were coming."

"Who is 'they'!?" Dutchy was even more frustrated than I.

"I don't know, ok?!" I quickened my pace. "It could be anyone! I don't know, you don't know, Sofia most likely didn't know, maybe Specs didn't even know. I don't know." Thinking of Sofia, probably burned alive, made me feel even worse. "But if someone… if something can send a curse that strong to a place and person that far away from the Dark, they are sure as hell powerful enough to know that we were coming and to even know where we were going."

"I don't believe it," Dutchy said softly, mainly to himself, but still I stopped and spun him to face me.

"Believe it," I said, staring him down. My gaze softened. "We don't have to lose hope. It just means that things won't be as easy as we first thought." In my heart I'd always known it would be a challenge, but still, seeing it play out in front of my eyes unnerved me. And despite what I had told Dutchy, I felt a fair amount of disbelief myself. How had they known? And – of course – who were they? I wondered, not for the first time or the last, exactly what Specs had gotten himself into.

When Dutchy next spoke, his voice was small. "Where do we go from here?"

I quickly took stock of our surroundings. It was around mid afternoon and the rain at least had let up, though the sky was still one solemn shade of gray. There were puddles covering the streets, which were once more alive with activity. The street we were on now was for the most part residential, or so it appeared. I looked down further and once again recognized in a flash where we were. I realized then that my feet had taken me this way with purpose, whether or not my mind had known it at the time. I had half a mind to disobey my subconscious, but…

"There is somewhere we can go," I said, and started off again. Dutchy fell in to pace easily beside me. "There is… someone who may be able to help." Able, I thought, but willing? Dutchy breathed a sigh of relief, one he probably hoped I didn't hear. "Don't relax just yet," I said. "This is sort of my last resort that we're using." If we walked fast, we would get there just before dusk. When night falls on the Dark, it is not a pretty sight. "Don't get your hopes up," I added after a few beats.

Dutchy chuckled. "Friend of yours?" he asked dryly.

I cringed. "You could say that."