Warmoon [ONC 2020]•[Shortlisted]•[Honorable Mention List, Stunning Worlds]

18. The Next First Thing

Total Word Count: 28,199

The Robiary door closed behind her with a dull thud of wood on stone, entombing her in sudden silence.

Rhoa paused for a split-second, getting her bearings.

The Keepers' suits hung on their forms, the dark, oiled leather gleaming in the light of the overcast morning. With the First Keeper's helmet perched on the knob atop the form, her father's suit looked like an empty human being standing at the head of an army, the Apprentice suits arranged in drooping ranks behind it.

A shiver crept down Rhoa's spine, settling in a frozen lump in her stomach. Then she began stripping down to her underclothes.

The suit could withstand the power of the monster.

She could only hope like mad it would also be able to withstand the Rot.

°°°°°ººººº°°°°°

The stone stairway that led down into the Alchemy Storeroom was ancient, the middle of each tread worn by countless footsteps. Rhoa knew them like the back of her hand. There was an oil sconce on the wall in the storeroom. It would take about four seconds to get to the bottom of the stairs at a run, and another two to reach the sconce with her lantern candle. The only drawback: to get the candle down the steps without blowing it out, she would have to shutter it. There would be no way to really see what waited for her in the storeroom until she lit that sconce.

She was a Strongcastle.

Strongcastles faced their fear.

Beads of sweat were rolling down her back, trickling beneath the layer of heavy waxed canvas that made up the underrobe of the suit, but she was still cold. It was hard to breathe, and not just because of the fine silk and felted wool sieves over the vents in the face-guard.

Rhoa bent and put her hands on her knees, glaring at the rectangle of storeroom floor she could see through the smoked glass in the helmet eyeholes.

The paving stones looked normal enough.

It was time.

Three. She dragged in a deep breath.

Two. She straightened. Bounced lightly on the balls of her metal-clad feet.

One.

She darted forward, leaving the safety of the well-lit Alechemy Room floor behind. Her iron-studded soles struck the stone steps, but inside the helmet the only sound was the thunder of her own heartbeat as she hurtled downward, counting up, now.

Two. Three. Four.

She landed on her left foot and launched herself to the right, nearly careening into the wall before she skidded to a halt in front of the sconce. Five. Her lantern cast wild shadows as she lifted it, yanked open the small shuttered door and pulled the candle out of its cup, fingers clumsy in the leather gauntlets as she brought the flame up to the sponge wick sticking out of the sconce.

Six. Seven. Eight. It was taking too long, and she started swearing under her breath.

Nine. Fire bloomed on the wick.

Rhoa whirled to face the storeroom, her back against the wall, her heart pounding.

It was everywhere. Hanging from the ceiling like rotting velvet drapes, strung from the walls in stretchy ropes, growing from the floor like a wooly carpet of inky-black mold. It writhed, shrinking and cringing away from the fire, seething and gathering in the dark recesses of the storeroom – but not in a way that could be seen, exactly. It was only an impression, a smudge of a billion tiny insects swarming at the edges of her vision. When she looked directly at it, it went still. Dead still. Like a predator spotted by its prey.