The Blackstar Legacy - Chapter 8

Osric breathed a sigh of relief as he and his companions finally moved out of sight of the teeming mass of moths. They might not be able to cross whatever invisible line had stopped them, but the very sight of them unnerved him, along with the scraping clicking sound they made with their awful-looking maws.

As they ventured deeper into a small collection of mountains, it was impossible not to notice the stark contrast to their previous surroundings. The jagged, blackened peaks with their loose rocks and masses of chipped stone had given way to smoother, tarnished stone formations. It was also less barren, with vegetation, though seemingly dead or dying, clinging to small fissures and cracks all along the rock face.

He wouldn’t call it lush, but it didn’t look quite as scoured as before either.

“This is... different,” Talia said as they climbed even higher.

Grace snorted. “Different, but no less creepy if you ask me.”

As they pressed on, Osric noticed the same strange flying shapes he’d seen in the distance before they began to climb, although he couldn’t tell if they were closer than before or not. Unlike the aggressive moths, these beings seemed content to observe from afar, never approaching the group. They remained far enough away that it was difficult to even tell what they were other than that they were large. Often, they seemed to blend into the landscape in a way that made Osric’s eyes hurt if he tried to focus on them for too long.

At least their progress was markedly easier now. The ground beneath their feet was more stable and the tremors that had plagued them earlier had all but ceased. Even though it was safer, at least from the constant threat of rockslides, it would have been all but impossible for anything here to feel normal.

As they crested a slight rise in the terrain, Osric looked back and noticed Rowan, who was bringing up the rear, slowing. He lingered further and further behind the group, continually looking toward the distant abominations. It was impossible to miss his uneasy expression.

After ten minutes of continually looking to his friend, who seemed unusually oblivious to being observed, Osric stepped off the main path, allowing the others to continue ahead while he fell back, matching Rowan’s pace and walking beside him. Their eyes met briefly but for a while, neither said anything.

“Something on your mind?” Osric asked finally.

At first, he thought the Ranger hadn’t heard him, and then his shoulders sagged ever so slightly, like he had a weight bearing down on him. “I can’t shake this feeling. These creatures, this place... it’s all wrong.”

“I know what you mean. It is a strange place.”

“No. It’s more than that. These abominations, they’re an affront to nature. To everything Wyndra stands for. How can she allow such things to exist?”

Osric had learned over the last few months how devout Rowan really was to the god of the wilderness. It made sense, and he was pretty sure most Rangers worshipped the Queen of the Forests. She was, after all, the god that oversaw the wild places of the world. The forests and rivers and animals.

He could also see how a place like this would put her most devoted followers ill at ease.

“Did you know,” Rowan said after they walked a while longer in silence. “I can’t feel her anymore. In my prayers, I’ve felt nothing but silence. No guidance, no reassurance. It’s as if...”

Rowan trailed off, looking out again at the flying shapes.

“As if what?” Osric prompted gently.

“As if she’s has abandoned us. Or worse.”

“Worse?”

“What if she hasn’t abandoned us? What if this is on purpose and this is some sort of test? A cruel game?”

Osric frowned, considering Rowan’s words carefully. “I don’t think it’s that simple, Rowan. The gods... they can’t directly intervene in our world. It’s why we had to go to such lengths to even find out what the Veilguard wanted us to do. If they could interact directly, they wouldn’t need to send us on this quest. They’d handle it themselves.”

“Or they just didn’t want to do it and handed it off to the first people foolish enough to sign up. Or maybe... What if Wyndra is deliberately allowing this corruption? What if she’s complicit in some way?”

He was spiraling, that much was clear. Concern that something was amiss, that Osric could understand, but Rowan was now jumping way past that. He was afraid. And angry. A bad combination.

“Why would she do that?” This place, it’s from beyond our world, yet it was allowed to come here. They allowed it to come through into our world. They have this power... you’ve seen what Jasper has been able to do. And that is just a fraction of their power granted to one believer. Maybe... maybe this is some form of selection, cruel as it may be. They see who is strong enough to live and weed out the rest.”

Osric didn’t reply right away. What could he say?

“I’ve dedicated my life to following Wyndra’s teachings,” Rowan continued. “But now, I’m questioning everything. Do I even want to follow a being capable of allowing such horrors? What if it isn’t deliberate? What if this place is beyond Wyndra’s reach? Or worse, what if she simply doesn’t care? The thought that such might be the case terrifies me more than any creature we’ve encountered.”

Osric felt a pang of sympathy for his friend and placed a comforting hand on Rowan’s shoulder. “I understand, Rowan. Truly, I do. Questioning the gods, questioning your faith... it’s not easy. I question what I’m doing every day we’ve been on this quest.”

Rowan looked at him, surprise momentarily replacing the fear in his eyes. “You have?”

Osric nodded. “After everything we’ve been through, how could I not? But from what I’ve learned, especially from my interactions with the Veilguard, the gods aren’t all-powerful or all-knowing, at least not in the way most people believe. It’s clear a lot of this has caught them off guard. I think they want to see the right thing done, but like I said, they can’t act directly. It’s why they need us, why they guide and inspire rather than intervene. This place, these creatures... I don’t think it’s something Wyndra would allow if she had the power to stop it directly.”

“I hear what you’re saying, and it makes sense, intellectually. But... I don’t know,” he said with a sigh.

“I get it. Faith isn’t always easy, especially in places like this. Maybe you should talk to Jasper about this. He might have more insight. I mean, I’m just a blacksmith’s apprentice. What do I know, really?”

“Don’t sell yourself short. You may be a blacksmith’s apprentice, but you were chosen by the gods. In some ways, you’ve had more direct contact with them than any cleric in this world.”

“Maybe,” Osric conceded. “But I think he might still have more insight than I do. I’m just making this up as I go.”

“You and me both. Thanks for listening, for understanding.”

Osric smiled, giving Rowan’s shoulder a squeeze before letting his hand fall away. “That’s what friends are for. Now, shall we catch up with the others? I’m sure they’re wondering where we’ve gotten to.”

Rowan gave one last look to the figures in the distance and picked up his pace. I was pretty sure his crisis of conscience wasn’t over, not with everything he’s seen since he joined them.

Osric just hoped he wouldn’t let those concerns overwhelm him.

They spent the bulk of the day traveling up and then back down the first peak. Osric had no idea how many miles they'd gone, but he was exhausted. As hard as the climb up the pass between two peaks had been, the path down had almost been harder.

The jagged, weaving path followed narrow, crumbling ledges that had been brittle to begin with and then chipped away by time and the elements. Several times, parts would crumble as you stepped near the weakened edge, nearly sending one of them tumbling down the mountainside.

Reaching the bottom wasn't the end of their journey, another set of towering peaks rose up in front of them. They had been making good time though.

In spite of their concern over why the moths had stopped, they hadn't run into any other creatures, which was the thing they'd thought would slow them down the most.

Not that it made them feel any better. While they didn't see any living creatures, they saw a lot of them dead. No bodies of moths, reinforcing they couldn't go past a certain point, but all kinds of other creatures lay scattered across their path. Twisted, malformed wolves with extra limbs jutting at odd angles from their bodies. Strange, elongated deer with too many eyes dotting their flanks, their antlers grown into impossible spirals. Most disturbing were the humanoid shapes, things that might have once been people, but were now warped beyond recognition. The sight made Osric's stomach churn.

They hadn't died peacefully. They were hacked apart, gutted, and stabbed. The way their bodies were bloated, Rowan said it had maybe been a week since they were killed, although that was a guess since even the well-traveled Ranger had never seen or heard of creatures like this. What had done it, though, was impossible to tell. Unless they did it to themselves, there was no sign of any bodies of the people, or maybe things, that had done the murdering.

"The light's fading fast," Rowan said as they got about a quarter of the way up the next mountain face. "We need to find shelter before the night sets in. There's a chance whatever has been killing everything along this path is nocturnal."

That was all Osric needed to agree with him. The problem was, a safe place to camp seemed in short supply. There was very little vegetation and what plants were scattered around them were twisted, without much in the way of leaves or cover.

Anywhere they slept, they would be in the open and uncovered.

"Is that a cave?" Talia said, looking up the cliff face and a little to the east.

It wasn't on the path they were taking and some of the terrain between them and it was very rough, but it did, indeed, look like the mouth of a cave.

"Let's check it. Even if it's shallow, it'll offer us some protection," Rowan said.

It was even slower going once they got off the path, having to watch every step as they crossed the side of the mountain, careful to not start a rockslide.

The entrance to the cave was narrow, forcing them to duck as they went inside. The air had a thick mildew smell to it, along with a hint of something even worse that assaulted Osric's nose. A kind of sickly-sweet rotting smell.

It wasn't until they were all the way in, descending down, that Osric caught another, much more alarming smell.

Smoke.

Looking back at Rowan, the Ranger nodded. He smelled it too. Osric switched the torch he'd lit at the entrance to the cave to his other hand and pulled his sword. Seeing everyone ready, he started down the sloping path again, careful to watch his step.

As they rounded a slight bend and the ground started to level out, he saw the glow of the fire before he saw the actual flames. What was surprising, however, wasn't the fire, but the small figure hunched over it.

It was a man wrapped in tattered rags with strands of matted white hair that framed his gaunt face. He was filthy, with longish dirt-caked nails that looked almost like claws and he was holding a stick with some kind of meat skewered on it over the fire.

Even with the torch Osric was carrying and the sounds they were making, the man didn't seem to notice them right away. He was mumbling to himself, almost like he was having an argument, but softly enough Osric couldn't really make it out.

They stood there, frozen for a minute, unsure of what to do as the man just muttered, staring into his fire, completely oblivious to their presence.

Suddenly the man froze in place, cocking his head to the side like he was hearing something. He nodded once, then twice, before looking directly at them.

Osric stiffened, ready for anything, but instead of screaming or laughing at them, the man's face broke into a wide grin, revealing rotting teeth.

"Friends. What a surprise! Yes. Yes, please come in. Sit. Sit," he said, gesturing at spots around the fire. "Join me for supper. It's rude to not feed guests. Come. Eat. Eat."

Osric looked to his friends, who all looked as surprised and confused as he was.

"Come. Come," he said again, waving more emphatically.

"That's a rat. You're eating a rat," Grace said.

"And why not? Feathered beast, crawling beast, what does it matter? All bellies grumble the same."

"Who are you? Why are you here? How are you here?" Osric asked, unable to contain his curiosity anymore.

"Here? Yes, yes. Here I am. Because I was called. The song, the stone—it sings, it hums, but not for me, never for me. The doors closed behind me. Always closed. Always locked."

"Called by what?" Talia asked.

"Called here! Called here!" he said before his words trailed off and his grin faltered as he took in Talia, as if seeing her for the first time. "A daughter of the lost. So sad. So sad."

Talia froze. "What did you say?"

"No, no. Too late, too late," he said, and then turned quickly to the fire, as if reacting to something, squatting down and shaking his finger at it. "Stop listening when you shouldn't!"

"So this guy's just crazy," Grace said flatly.

"Don't judge him too quickly. He's managed to survive in this place all by himself for who knows how long," Osric said to her before asking. "We're looking for a tower, in the center of these mountains. Do you know of it?"

The man began to rock back and forth on his heels, agitated as soon as Osric mentioned the tower. "Tower, yes, tower holds the shadow. Shadow that eats the light, whisper that steals the mind. Things move in cracks between. They come, they go, they take. Shouldn't go. Never go."

"What things? What moves in the cracks?"

"Metal men. Men of Iron and steel. Oh yes, yes, they broke the quiet. They woke the little ones. The little ones listen, always listening, always hungry. Can't say, can't say!"

Rowan frowned. "Metal men?"

"They clanked and rattled, they shouted and bled. They woke the little ones. The little ones do not like being woken."

"Men in armor?" Osric asked Jasper.

"Who knows. His mind is obviously wild and off balance. It could mean anything. Or nothing."

"But someone came, right? He said they came and left. And we saw all those bodies. Maybe they killed the creatures when they passed through," Osric said before turning back to the strange man. "How many men were there?"

The hermit rubbed his fingers together, as if counting something, but he kept switching fingers out and getting lost in it.

"Many. More than fingers, more than toes. They marched, they climbed, they screamed. Some left. Most stayed. Didn't want to go."

"Have you ever gone to the tower?"

The old man jerked his head violently. "Never near. Never near. Stay out of its home. Screams. Screams."

Grace snorted. "So that’s a no then."

It was clear to Osric they weren't getting an answer from him. He wasn't even sure if the guy understood them.

"Do you mind if we camp here tonight?" Osric asked.

"Friends, friends! Yes, yes, stay! The fire is warm, the cave does not listen. Stay, stay, stay..."

Both Talia and Grace looked at him like he was crazy, but Osric did not like the idea of spending the evening outside in this place.

"He's right," Rowan said softly to the others. "Better here than out there. One of us will keep watch. Besides, look at him, he can barely stand on his own."

Talia and Grace looked like they didn't buy it, but grudgingly agreed.

"Okay, let's get settled," Osric said, dropping his things.