Lastlight's Revenant #19

The sun hung like a molten coin in the sky, its glare searing the cracked stones of Vaeldrith’s old courthouse. Time had gnawed at its grand facade—columns chipped into jagged teeth, the once-proud crest above the entrance eroded to a shapeless blur.

The city kept it standing out of some stubborn reverence for history, though its halls now housed only dust and the whispers of dead verdicts.

Garran wiped the sweat from his brow, his gambeson sticking to his back. Seven hours of searching. Nine hours of kicking through rubble-strewn rooms, of prying up cellar doors with rusted hinges, of listening for the telltale click of hollow stone beneath their boots.

Two soldiers had turned back hours ago, their faces gray with exhaustion. The third lay in an alley two streets back, his throat a ruin of blood and splintered bone where a duskhound’s spine-spear had found him.

Carelessness. One moment of distraction in the wrong shadow.

Kaelvar spat onto the courthouse steps, his tattoos dark with grime. "This had better be worth the corpses," he muttered, fingers twitching around the hammer in his hands. "Or I’ll have words with that scribe. Loud ones."

Garran shot him a look. "Steady yourself." His voice was rough as the cobbles underfoot. "We’re here. Let’s finish this."

The doors groaned like a dying man when they pushed inside.

...

The air inside the courthouse was thick with the weight of forgotten history. Dust swirled in the slanted sunlight, settling over gilded furniture and faded murals of long-dead magistrates.

A scholar might have marveled that King Vaelric the Unbroken himself had once stood in this very hall, his voice shaking the rafters as he passed judgment on traitors.

Garran and Kaelvar did not linger.

They moved with single-minded purpose, boots scuffing through decades of undisturbed grime, straight for the stairs leading down into the basement.

The torches along the walls flared to life one by one as they descended, their flickering glow revealing a chamber lined with sagging wooden shelves—each one crammed with scrolls yellowed by age, their edges crumbling like dry leaves.

Kaelvar put down the hammer and plucked a particularly ancient-looking document from its resting place. The parchment disintegrated between his fingers, scattering fragments like dead skin. 

"You civilized folk and your love for ink," he muttered, wiping his hand on his thigh. "For all the good it did you."

Garran didn’t answer. He strode to the farthest wall, gripped a shelf laden with mildewed ledgers, and yanked. Wood splintered. Scrolls cascaded to the floor in a cloud of dust and decay.

He didn’t so much as glance at the wreckage as he raised his fist and began rapping against the stone—once, twice—listening for the hollow echo of secrets buried beneath.

Kaelvar grinned, watching Garran’s methodical destruction before joining in, tearing shelves from the walls with reckless abandon. Wood splintered, scrolls exploded into clouds of dust, and the musty air grew thick with the scent of decay.

Then—thud.

Garran’s fist struck stone, and this time, the sound was different. Hollow. A muted echo beneath the surface. He exhaled sharply, the breath he hadn’t realized he was holding escaping in a rush.

"Here," he called to Kaelvar.

The Varekai warrior snatched up his hammer from where he’d set it aside, the boar tattoo on his forearm flexing as his grip tightened. "Step aside."

Garran moved without hesitation.

Kaelvar swung.

The wall shattered like rotted bone, stone crumbling inward in a cascade of dust and debris. Behind it, a staircase yawned open—narrow, steep, descending into absolute blackness.

Garran wrenched a torch from its sconce and thrust it forward, but the light barely penetrated the gloom. He could see only the first few steps before the darkness swallowed everything else. With a grunt, he tossed the torch down the stairwell.

It tumbled, end over end, flames flickering wildly as it fell—farther, farther—until the light winked out entirely. A second later, even the sound of its clattering vanished, as if the abyss had simply consumed it.

Kaelvar let out a low whistle. "Might owe that scribe an apology after all," he mused. "Maybe even a thank you."

Garran’s jaw tightened. "We can thank him by finding shelter away from the demons."

"Fair enough." Kaelvar tilted his head, peering into the void. "Should we—"

Then they heard it.

Footsteps.

Rapid. Clattering up from the depths.

And getting closer.

Kaelvar and Garran exchanged a glance—silent, instinctive—before falling into fighting stances, weapons raised toward the abyss. The footsteps grew louder, frantic, skittering up the unseen steps like a swarm of beetles.

Then—

A pale shape burst from the darkness.

Four-legged, its skeletal frame barely covered by sparse tufts of greasy fur. No eyes, just smooth skin where they should have been, but ears—massive ears—slicked back like folded parchment. Its buck teeth jutted from a twitching mouth, yellowed and jagged.

It screeched, a sound like nails on slate, and lunged.

Kaelvar sidestepped with a warrior’s grace, his hammer swinging upward in a brutal arc. The blow connected with the creature’s underbelly, lifting it clean off its feet. It slammed into the ceiling with a wet crunch before collapsing to the ground in a heap, limbs splayed at unnatural angles.

Blood seeped from its ruptured body, pooling black in the torchlight.

Garran stared at the corpse, brow furrowed. "What in the Five’s name is this thing?"

Kaelvar knelt beside it, his tattoos shifting as he prodded the carcass with his hammer. "Never seen its like," he muttered. He leaned closer, nostrils flaring. "No stench of the Maw. Doesn’t reek of rot or ichor."

Garran waited, watching as the Varekai warrior’s calloused fingers traced the creature’s eyeless face, the grotesque ears, the chipped teeth.

"Lives underground," Kaelvar said at last. "Ears like this? For listening in the dark. No eyes because it doesn’t need them. And these teeth—" He pried the jaws open wider. "—for gnawing through roots. Stone, maybe."

Garran’s grip tightened on his sword. "So it’s natural."

"Aye. And there's probably more of its kind."

Garran eyed the grotesque corpse, then turned to Kaelvar. "Will these things be a problem?"

The Varekai warrior nudged the dead creature with his boot. "Not much food grows where the sun doesn’t shine," he said. "Creatures like this? Territorial by nature. This one was just defending its hole."

Garran’s expression didn’t shift. "That doesn’t answer my question."

Kaelvar smirked. "They won’t be half the trouble Maw-spawn are. Stay sharp, watch for ambushes, and they’ll learn to avoid us soon enough." He crouched, tilting his head as he studied the beast’s emaciated frame. Then, almost as an afterthought: "Besides, they’ll be a good source of food."

Garran’s gaze flicked back to the corpse—the wrinkled, pallid skin, the sparse tufts of coarse hair. He’d eaten worse during his years as a Repentant. In the Maw’s shadow, where crops withered and game grew scarce, hunger had a way of making even the most unappetizing things palatable.

Still. He had to ask. "And you’re sure of that?"

Kaelvar shrugged. "Where food’s scarce, you learn fast. Underground, it’s roots, mushrooms, cave beetles—things that live on such fare are usually safe to eat." He tapped the creature’s buck teeth with his hammer. "This one’s no different."

Garran exhaled through his nose. "Good."

It was good. A problem solved before it had fully taken root. The survivors in the church were already rationing what little food remained. Another week, maybe two, and hunger would start gnawing at discipline just as fiercely as the demons outside.

But now? Now they had meat.

Kaelvar straightened, rolling his shoulders as he eyed the abyss. "Should we scout ahead? Clear the path first?"

Garran stared into the darkness a moment longer, then shook his head. "No time." His voice was gravel scraping bone. "We move everyone now. Whatever’s out there—" He jerked his chin toward the world above, where the Maw’s horde lurked. "—it’s playing with us. I’d rather not learn the rules."

Kaelvar grunted in agreement. "Been feeling it too. Like a knife between the ribs every time I breathe." He spat onto the stairs, the moisture vanishing into the void. "Whatever’s down there can’t be worse than what’s waiting up here."

Garran didn’t answer. Instead, he reached into his breastplate and pulled free a smooth, palm-sized stone etched with jagged symbols. Without hesitation, he crushed it in his fist.

A pulse of crimson light erupted between his fingers, streaking upward like a shot arrow, piercing through the basement’s ceiling and vanishing into the sky.

Kaelvar’s tattoos twitched as he flinched. "The hells was that?"

"Sylrithiel’s work," Garran said, brushing stone dust from his palm. "She’ll know we’ve found the way. The others will be ready by the time we return."

Kaelvar rubbed the back of his neck, scowling. "That elf witch sets my teeth on edge. But I’ll admit—she’s got her uses."

Garran shot him a sidelong glance as they turned toward the exit. "So it’s ink and elves you’ve got a problem with?"

The Varekai warrior’s grin was all teeth. "Just black ink and the elves who look at you like you’re a bug they can crush anytime."

Their banter was short, sharp—a brittle sound in the corpse-strewn dark—as they climbed back toward the light.