The thing that had been Lorin moved like spilled oil – joints liquefying, thorns clicking like insect legs against damp stone. Mercy dragged Kael's arm upward against his will, the blade humming a high, thin note that vibrated in his teeth and resonated through the black veins beneath his skin. The sword wasn't just a weapon; it was a living hunger given form, and it had tasted something in these corrupted initiates that made it ravenous.
Kael fought against the pull, muscles straining until sweat dripped into his eyes. Not him. Not Lorin. The memories came unbidden – huddled together in the Gauntlet's starvation caves, passing a single moldy crust between them, Lorin's quiet laughter when the proctors weren't listening. That boy had been dead for years, but seeing his face twisted into this thorn-filled mockery made Kael's stomach clench.
Mercy didn't care. The sword completed its arc with the inevitability of a headsman's axe, only to slice through empty air as the corrupted initiate flowed sideways with unnatural grace. The thing that had been Lorin moved like water given sentience, his body rippling around the blade's path in a way that defied bone and muscle. His mouth – that horrible mouth filled with thorns like broken glass – split into a wider grin.
"Still slow, brother." The voice was Lorin's but layered with something guttural and wet, like stones grinding together deep underground. "Still weak."
Behind Kael, Eris cursed, the sound raw and guttural. He didn't need to look to know two more shadows had peeled from the tunnel walls. He could feel them in the way Mercy vibrated in his grip – not with battle rage, but with a predator's recognition. The sword remembered these souls even if their faces were now twisted beyond recognition.
One moved with a loping stride that made Kael's breath catch. Jeren. The other held its hands in a way that sent ice down his spine – scarred knuckles, healer's callouses. Mara, who had stitched his wounds after the Shade trial, her touch always gentle despite the blood and pain.
Mercy flooded his mind with images:
Mara screaming as black veins erupted beneath her skin in the Order's infirmary, Draven watching from the doorway with clinical interest.
Lorin dragged kicking into the Black Hollow, his pleas for help echoing before being swallowed by the dark.
Jeren kneeling willingly before the Hollow King, his brown eyes turning that same sickly green as the thing now leering at Kael.
Prune them, Mercy whispered, the voice like cold metal against his thoughts. Prune the rotten branches. Let the Garden breathe.
Eris didn't hesitate. Her dagger flashed out, quick as a striking snake, burying itself in the Mara-thing's throat. Black ichor sprayed across the tunnel wall, thick as tar and reeking of grave soil and spoiled copper. The creature gurgled, its thorned mouth working soundlessly, but it didn't fall. Its head lolled grotesquely on the ruined neck, held together by sinew and whatever dark will animated it.
"Don't look at their faces!" Eris shouted as she spun to meet Jeren's lunge. Her wounded shoulder was a mess of blood and torn bandages, but her movements remained sharp with desperate fury. "They're not here anymore! They're gone!"
But Kael couldn't help it. He stared into Lorin's eyes – or what remained of them. Beneath the sickly green film, there was still a flicker of something human. Recognition. And a betrayal so deep it stole Kael's breath. Some part of Lorin knew him, remembered him, even as the corruption twisted his body into this monstrous form.
"Kael... run..." The words came out mangled but unmistakable, Lorin's thorned mouth spasming as if fighting against itself. "Sword... lies..."
Mercy struck like a viper, bypassing Kael's wavering control entirely. It wasn't his arm that moved – it was the darkness inside him, the Hollow King's gift, responding to the sword's command. The bruise-dark blade became a violet streak in the gloom, plunging deep into Lorin's chest not with a warrior's precision but with a butcher's brutal efficiency.
Lorin didn't scream. His body convulsed once, violently, and his green eyes flared impossibly bright. Then came the terrible suction – Kael could feel it through the sword, the draining pull as something more than life was drawn from Lorin's body into Mercy's hungry metal. The light in his eyes dimmed, the essence of who he'd been siphoned away. The black veins in Kael's arm flared with cold fire in response, pulsing in time with the sword's feast.
When Lorin collapsed, it wasn't as a corpse but as a desiccated husk, crumbling into gray ash before he even hit the ground. The thorns in his mouth turned brittle and fell away like dead twigs.
Kael stumbled back, gasping. The sword felt heavier now, sated in a way that made his skin crawl. A wave of icy fullness spread through him – not strength, but a numb, alien satisfaction that wasn't his own. Mercy hummed contentedly in his grip, while the black veins on his arm had visibly thickened, branching outward like dark lightning across his skin.
"Kael! Move!" Eris's shout was strained. She was locked in a deadly dance with the Jeren-thing, her dagger a silver blur as she parried claws and snapping thorns. The Mara-creature, despite its ruined throat, was lurching toward her flank, movements jerky but relentless.
The caretaker's laughter echoed around them, seeming to come from everywhere and nowhere in the twisting tunnels. "See? See how she cleanses? How she prunes? The Garden must be tended!"
Kael forced himself to move, the numbness receding into cold clarity. He wasn't just fighting for their lives anymore – he was feeding Mercy, and Mercy was feeding the corruption inside him. He raised the sword toward the lurching Mara-creature, determined to end this quickly.
He lunged, aiming to take its head clean off. But Mercy had other ideas. The sword twisted almost playfully in his grip, altering his strike at the last moment to slice low instead, shearing through the creature's legs at the knees. The Mara-thing collapsed, thrashing silently in the shale and ash. Immediately, Mercy pulled Kael's arm down, the point angling toward the fallen creature's chest, demanding another feast like the one it had taken from Lorin.
No! Kael roared internally, pouring every ounce of will into resisting. Not like this! He saw Mara's gentle hands binding his wounds after the Gauntlet, heard her calm voice talking him through the pain. He couldn't erase her that way, couldn't let the sword consume whatever fragments of her might still remain.
Planting his feet, Kael fought against Mercy's pull, muscles screaming as he forced the blade's tip away. Sparks flew as he ground the sword point into the stone floor beside the creature's lolling head.
The Mara-thing's one remaining eye – less clouded than Lorin's had been – fixed on him. Its thorned mouth worked, struggling to form words around the black ichor bubbling up. "Kael... Spymaster... sold us..." The voice was barely recognizable, but the words struck like physical blows. "...to him... for... Mercy..."
Draven. The revelation hit Kael like a kick to the chest. The Spymaster had traded initiates – his own people – to the Hollow King. For what? This cursed sword? Some twisted bargain?
Before he could process it, the creature's hand – cold and slick with ichor – shot out and clamped onto his ankle with surprising strength. Its single clear eye burned with desperate intensity. "Kill... me... Before... she... does..."
It was Mara's voice, cutting through the corruption's gurgle. A final plea.
Mercy surged in Kael's hand, eager for the offered feast. Gritting his teeth, Kael made his choice. He wrenched the sword free and, with a cry that was equal parts grief and defiance, drove the point down – not into her chest, but through her temple. Clean. Instant. A mercy in truth.
The light in her eye winked out. The hand on his ankle went slack. No draining. No consumption. Just death.
Mercy's shriek of fury was pure metal agony, vibrating up Kael's arm and into his skull like ice shards. The sword bucked violently, trying to tear itself from his grip. The black veins in his arm throbbed angrily, protesting the denied feast.
Eris's cry of pain snapped Kael's attention back. Distracted by his struggle, she'd left an opening. Jeren's thorned hand raked across her already wounded shoulder, shredding what remained of the bandages. She stumbled, barely getting her dagger up in time to deflect a killing blow aimed at her throat, but the impact slammed her back against the tunnel wall, leaving her breathless and vulnerable.
Jeren loomed over her, his thorned maw gaping obscenely wide. "Little brother chose wrong," he rasped in a voice that held nothing of the man Kael had known. "Now he watches you pruned."
Kael moved without thought, pure protective fury overriding everything. He didn't try to command Mercy this time – he simply hurled himself at Jeren, using the sword like a battering ram. The impact drove the bruise-dark blade deep into Jeren's side, though Kael twisted his wrist at the last moment to keep Mercy from fully engaging, from feeding.
Jeren roared – more outrage than pain – as black ichor welled from the wound. He whirled away from Eris, giving her the opening she needed.
"Run!" Kael bellowed, wrestling with both the enraged sword and the snarling Jeren-thing. "The tunnel! Now!"
Eris didn't argue. Snatching up a chunk of fallen shale, she hurled it at Jeren's face with enough force to make him stagger, then bolted down the passage without looking back. Kael kicked out, catching Jeren in the chest to buy himself space, then wrenched Mercy free and ran after her, the darkness inside him howling in frustration.
The caretaker's laughter chased them through the dark, bouncing off the slick tunnel walls. "Running only delays the pruning! The Garden claims all!"
They fled deeper into the earth, the only light coming from Mercy's eerie glow. The sword's rage was palpable – a cold, seething presence against Kael's palm. It felt betrayed. The black veins in his arm pulsed with a dull ache, a constant reminder of the price of resisting its hunger.
Eris ran ahead, her breathing ragged, fresh blood weeping from her shoulder wound. The tunnel branched and twisted, but she chose paths without hesitation, driven by some combination of instinct and desperation. The air grew colder, damper, the sound of dripping water echoing around them, counterpoint to their pounding hearts and Mercy's angry hum.
After what felt like hours of blind flight, Eris stumbled into a wider cavern. Stalactites hung like fangs from the ceiling, dripping water into shallow black pools that reflected Mercy's strange light. The air smelled of wet stone and something sharper – ozone, like the charged moment before a lightning strike.
And there, waiting for them at the cavern's center, stood the caretaker.
No laughter now. He stood perfectly still, his tattered robes hanging limp, his scarred face impassive. His one good eye – that same sickly green as the corrupted – fixed unblinking on Mercy in Kael's hand.
When he spoke, his voice was flat, devoid of its earlier mockery. Cold. Final.
"You denied her. You denied Mercy her due."