Wild Creatures

Chapter 68

Even the light from the torch could not cut through the thick darkness. Cold air, musty from being trapped under the stone hit them, and Lan Zhan could smell dust notes, the oil used to keep the mechanism well oiled and still working, and something else...just a twinge of vanilla.

Wei Ying shivered behind him.

"We should go down there," he says, carefully keeping his tone neutral.

"Mn." Lan Zhan squeezes their joint hands. He looks up at Da Tuzi. "If we have not returned in one hour, call for help. My brother." He clarifies.

Da Tuzi nods once in acknowledgement, and then Wei Ying and he take their first steps descending into the darkness.

Wei Ying counts the steps as they go down. He's still holding the spear in his other hand, while Lan Zhan is holding his other one, and his left hand has the torch, guiding their steps.

The torch only illuminates a few steps as they go, until they reach the bottom.

They descend slowly, mostly because Lan Zhan doesn't want either of them to trip and hurt themselves on the unforgiving stone, the chiselled steps with their sharp edges already looking so threatening.

"Twenty." Wei Ying says, at the end. He looks up at the now tiny window of daylight, that many steps away, from where they climbed down.

They are surrounded by the smell of damp and cold stone, and their breaths steam in puffs of hot air released inside this cooler space. There's a blank stone wall right in front of them.

And nowhere else to go.

"I can't believe it's a dead end." Wei Ying grumbles.

"It's not." Lan Zhan shines the torch on a single hole in front of them.

There's a sharp point next to it.

"Doesn't that hole look-" Wei Ying is suddenly hit with the sharpest sense of deja vu. "Lan Zhan! I don't trust that! Here, bite my finger." He holds his digit at Lan Zhan's mouth.

Lan Zhan doesn't need to be told twice, and in that instance, he's also understood what Wei Ying is about to do.

Wei Ying feels the sharp prick of Lan Zhan's razor teeth, and as Lan Zhan shines the torch on the locket, Wei Ying lets one drop fall on the coat of arms. Then he slots the heart into the hole made specifically for that shape.

The locket is a key, in more ways than one.

It clicks into place and there's a sudden whirring noise. Wei Ying is pushed behind Lan Zhan as he licks his wound closed.

The stone door eases aside on some kind of wheel mechanism, a feather touch as if it didn't weigh tons.

Electric lights spark into life illuminating a circular room with two coats of armour in glass cases on either side. A wooden bench hugs the stone wall upon which there are a vast array of weapons. And then Wei Ying sees a book.

He leans the staff carefully against the glass case, so his hand is free to touch the book.

The cover is dusty so he blows on it, and the writing is revealed.

WEI YING

For a second, Wei Ying doesn't know what to do.

His hand flutters uselessly over the book, his mind incapable of processing that this is something for him.

Only for him, only for Wei Ying, from his parents.

The kiss at his temple provides a warmth that spreads all over his body, and finally, his hand stops shaking.