“Who are these kids?” Landry demanded to know.
“They…they…” Lynn stuttered, struggling to come up with a response. “Look, it’s not all that easy to explain to an outsider, come to think of it.”
“Well start figuring out a way to explain, and fast.”
“Landry,” Tomas said, “She’s unarmed. She’s not going to hurt us. We are here to help the Magisters, not kill them.”
Landry glared at Tomas, still breathing heavily at the sight and smell of the dead children. He struggled to calm himself.
“What happened here, Lynn?” Tomas asked, trying to sound a little less confrontational. “Where are the Magisters?”
Lynn fell motionless as her gaze went blank. “They’re… they’re all dead.”
“Excuse me?” Tomas asked.
“They came each night, like scavengers to carrion,” Lynn said, shaking her head. “They broke us down. We tried to barricade ourselves in, but it was no use. They took us one by one until there was no one left. Only me.”
“The Akurai? Was it soldiers who attacked you?” Landry asked.
“All the Magisters…dead?”
“Creatures of the night,” Lynn said, almost unresponsive to the questions she was being asked. Her hands were twitching with fear. “I know not what they were, only that they were unstoppable and always hunting. We stood no chance.”
“What were they, Lynn?” Tomas asked.
Almost like reading from memory, Lynn recited a detailed description of what had attacked the Repository. “Large, about the size of a carriage. Hyena-like body shapes. Quadrupedal with elongated forelimbs. Pale, almost translucent skin. Some form of spiked osteoderms on their rear.”
Tomas did not understand many of the words that Lynn recited. But he was able to pick up on enough to recognise the features of the creatures that had attacked their squad several nights earlier.
“Whatever they were, they were not of this world. And they were built to hunt and kill,” Lynn said.
Tomas looked to Landry solemnly. He too recognised what she had spoken of. “We are familiar with the… things, that attacked you. They attacked our squad as well. Kill half our men. Killed my best friend.”
Tomas could feel the deep, bubbling well of rage and hurt in his stomach, so visceral that he could sense his throat choking up at the thought of what had happened to Rilan.
This girl before him, with her fire-red hair and tricorn hat, was the reason for Rilan’s death, he realised. If the Magisters had not requested aid, they would have never been sent to the mountain.
The girl appeared differently to him, all of a sudden. She was not so innocent anymore, not so much a victim.
There was an air of dishonesty around the strange girl. Tomas could practically smell the deceit behind her words like the foul stench of death which hovers over a corpse.
Lynn sighed, bowing her head in sorrow. “I’m sorry. I know how you feel.”
“No, you don’t know how I feel.”
“They killed all the Magisters. Everyone I have ever known is dead.”
“Everyone but you,” Tomas hissed back. “Why is that?”
“I won’t lie to you. I hid for days down here in the basement like a coward. After they got in, I saw Magister Krainos slaughtered before my very eyes in the kitchens. The beast ripped him in two. I fled, and I hid.”
Tomas recalled the fear he had felt upon seeing the creatures. He could not empathise with her. The woman standing before him was the cause of Rilan’s death in his mind, and he lacked the strength to see it any other way.
He stared at her, trying his very hardest to not grimace or sneer, or even to lash out. He fought with every muscle to control the outburst that was eager to escape.
She stands here before me, while Rilan lies in the dirt.
“You still haven’t explained this,” Landry barked, gesturing to the dead children around her feet.
“This…” she began, “this, I’ll admit, is not so easy to explain. It was a Magister’s doing, not mine. I had no part in it.”
Landry shook his head from side to side, unsure of what to make of any of it, unsure of how to react. “Come speak with our captain. You need to explain to him what happened.”
Lynn was not all that sure about leaving the dungeon they had found her in. She was visibly nervous as they exited back out into the corridor, eyeballing each and every shadowy space for danger.
“They don’t seem to be around here anymore, don’t worry,” Landry said.
The trio got back to the rest of the squad who had reconvened by the entrance to the inner sanctum. The soldiers had expressions of shock on their face, after having found many of the Magisters’ bodies decimated and brought some back for the captain to see.
The smell was atrocious. Their guts hung out through slashed, blackened skin. Limbs had been twisted and mangled. It looked as though they had been mauled to death by savage animals.
Captain Gharland spotted Lynn immediately as they returned. “Who is this?”
“Ser, we found this woman in the basement. She says she’s the sole survivour. Her name’s Lynn Jhono,” Landry said.
Gharland raised an eyebrow. “Where is the Magister Prime, girl?
Lynn looked at each and every pair of eyes gazing upon her, seeking answers from the strange, dirt-covered woman. It must have been intimidating for her, but Tomas did not, could not, offer any words of reassurance.
He stared at his feet, clenching his jaw so tight he thought his teeth would shatter.
He should be here with us, not you.
“Well? Explain yourself- what happened here?” Gharland requested.
Lynn scratched her head, unsure of where to even begin. “I don’t know where the Magister Prime is. I think…
