Heart of Darkness

Chapter 14

There was a light breeze blowing, making his hair dance lightly on his cheek. It was enough of a tickle to lift him from his dreamless sleep, to cause his eyes to flicker open, focus shifting from the moss-covered wall that stretched up high above him. Hell of a fall, that. Little wonder he was lying there, feeling for all the world as if something large and heavy had fallen from a great height. Oh. Right. Something had. Himself.

It nagged at him for a moment. If he was made of stone, then how was it that he was so broken? Memory flashed, somewhere dark and cold, something gripping him with breathtaking force, nearly crushing him in the attack. The memory flashed away almost as soon as it took shape. He must have been fighting when he fell. Was that why he fell? Or had he been thrown to the ground and left for dead? Chasing… he was chasing? Chased? A flicker of red flashed through his mind, taking the intangible memory with it, leaving him grasping a dissolving nothingness.

Zelgadis concentrated, calling that weak echo of his magic to him, using it to sense around and discovering that he had managed to heal very little of the injuries that he did recall. Damn. It meant that he still couldn’t get up and walk away. He was stuck here for a while longer. His magic receded, falling quickly into the shadows of his mind as he considered. How long had he been here? Hours? Days? He wasn’t hungry, but there was a growing awareness that he was thirsty. He knew the law of threes. Three days without water, three weeks without food… and he wasn’t certain how long had passed. Time to go about things a little more mundanely. Hadn’t he just been telling someone to do that? Red. Something about the color red… the memory went up in a mental ball of flame, and he cursed himself for trying too hard.

He took several slow deep breaths, aware that he couldn’t just lie there unprotected. He had to move, had to at least get himself somewhere that might have access to some water… a puddle or something that would provide some semblance of sustenance as he tried to force his battered body into recovery. His left hand and arm twitched, a blinding white pain shooting through him. He had to do this, had to get to water, so he took a deep breath and ignored the pain, struggling to roll over and onto his side. The pain was exhilaratingly breathtaking, flooding him with energy and yet leaving him feeling exhausted at the same time. He reeled in the strange duplicity of the feelings, the contradictory senses leaving him baffled and disoriented for a moment before he pushed through the swirling emotions and clawed his fingers into the dirt to pull himself along.

It was excruciating, exhilarating, each motion bringing a fresh flash of pain that shot along him like electricity. He clenched his jaw against it and managed to move a few more feet before he had to stop and collect himself. To collapse would mean another indeterminate period of time lost, and the nearest thing that vaguely resembled shelter was still a good twenty feet away. Gritting his teeth, Zelgadis dug his fingers into the ground and pulled, feeling his fingernails bite into the ground, dragging himself along another foot. His hip caught painfully on a rock, and jerked him to a sudden stop, wrenching a hoarse cry of pain from him. It grated a harsh and desperate sound of anguish that echoed off between the buildings.

It had a rather surprising side effect. He felt somewhat better for having yelled, as if somehow, even more of the pain had been transferred to exhilaration by the vocalization.

It had another completely unexpected effect as well, for a feminine voice called out in surprise from the near distance. “Hello? Is someone there?”

A voice? He held his breath for a moment, not daring to hope that he had heard that voice until it called again, uncertainly. His heart leapt. Someone was nearby! Maybe they had water, and could aid… “Here… I’m down here. In a…” Where was he? Was this an old atrium? A garden? “Clearing,” he decided, using the exhilaration of pain to his advantage, using the jolt of what he had decided was false energy to reach to pull himself up a little further and free of the rock that his hip had slammed into. He grunted with the effort, feeling the stone of his skin split, the pain shooting up his arm and piercing his awareness. It made him gasp, breathless with that strange duality of sensation.

“I see you!” Her voice came from above and behind him. “By the Great One, what happened to you? Don’t move, I’ll come help you. Just give me a moment to figure out how to get to you. Hang in there, okay?” There was a clatter, a sound of footsteps accompanied by the sounds of falling rocks as the potential rescuer began to make her way down and around towards him.

He managed to grunt a response, floundering for a moment before he decided to give up and wait for her, whoever she was. What was likely only a few minutes seemed like hours to Zelgadis as he struggled to roll over so that he could look to his rescuer as she approached him. He shifted his weight, putting too much stress on his newly injured hand, and in a flare of white-hot pain it gave way. His arm buckled underneath the combination of strain and pain, and he felt himself fall backwards. Zelgadis groaned as his head struck the hard ground underneath him, vision gone hazy at impact. Haloed by a swirling grey tunnel, a brunette in tan travel gear swam into his view. If she said anything, however, it was lost to the rushing onslaught of darkness as he slipped once more into oblivion.