“If you were here, I’d see you.” She strained her eyes but saw nothing. “It’s not that dark.”
“There is more than one kind of darkness.”
The rope suddenly went slack. Three emphatic tugs followed.
Hoisting her bag over her shoulder, Ashley stood and pulled her sleeves over her hands. “I have to go,” she whispered. “Are you coming, too, whoever you are?”
“I will stay close until your journey is complete.”
She pulled the rope tight and balanced over the opening. “My journey? You mean finding Gabriel?”
“Locating your brother is one facet of your journey, but you will learn that your road is much longer. I cannot stay with you to the end, but I will accompany you through these dark hours.”
Three more tugs came from below. She glanced around the chamber one more time. “Will you at least tell me who you are?”
Ashley waited, but the voice didn’t return. Again, three much more aggressive tugs jerked on the line. She sighed and began sliding down into the empty expanse. With mysteries both above and below, the darkness felt like a vise, adding to the crushing atmospheric pressure of the tremendous depths. She glanced up at the hole as it disappeared in the dimness. The only way of escape lay thousands of feet straight up, and who could tell how much farther down they would have to go?
Elam awoke. As the glow of dawn cast its rays of yellow light over the field, a breeze wafted across the grass, brushing the blades against his cheek. He sat up and stared at the delicate white flower in his hands.
He lifted it close to his eyes. “It was red,” he said out loud.
Scrambling to his feet, he gazed out over the field. A wide path of white flowers stretched in the direction he had come as far as the eye could see. He raised the blossom to his nose and took a long sniff. He recognized the delicate aroma—earthy, yet sweet.
“It smells like Sapphira,” he said, sighing. “I hope she made it out okay.”
He tucked it carefully into his pocket, allowing the petals to stick out. After scanning the field for anything else new, he pulled on his cloak, lowered his head, and skulked toward the edge of the forest. There was no sign of the malevolent creatures that stalked the woods the night before, but he found the strange lump, a crumpled half-naked body, lacerated with long, bloody gashes on its hairy back.
Giving it a shove with his foot, Elam turned it faceup. With skeleton-thin bare arms and legs, it looked more like an emaciated man than a monster, but two sharp fangs overlapping its lips gave the corpse a beastly aspect. It seemed half human and half … something else.
Elam wrinkled his nose. This thing smelled worse than Nabal, even on a bad day. After glancing around, he pulled out the spyglass and peered into the forest. Nothing but trees and more trees.
He collapsed the tube and dropped it in his bag. “No time like the present,” he said as he strode in.
The leafy canopy darkened the tree-filled landscape, reminding him about possibly stumbling over the transparent man he was looking for. He slowed his pace and extended an arm, waving it from side to side as he shuffled forward, but after several minutes, his arm ached, so he let it fall to his side.
He stopped and raised the spyglass again, adjusting it to its maximum magnification. Turning slowly, and listening for the slightest pop or rustle, he studied every detail—gnarled elbows in the lower limbs, fungus-infested knots in most of the trunks, and multicolored toadstools peeking through the fallen leaves. But, other than organisms of decay, there was no sign of life—not a bug or a bird in sight.
Something moved. Elam froze the spyglass on the spot and waited, breathless. It moved again, a short, spindly form that seemed to flow like thick clear liquid.
“The gatekeeper,” he whispered.
Chapter 7
THE GATEKEEPER
When Ashley’s toes touched the floor, Walter reached for her and pulled her to a crouch, whispering, “There’s a girl over by the wall. She’s saying something, but I didn’t get close enough to make out the words.”
Ashley peered through the darkness, picking up the image of a girl standing in a dim light about thirty feet away. She kept her voice low as well. “How old do you think she is?”
Walter shrugged his shoulders. “Maybe fourteen? She’s kind of small for fourteen, but her face looks older.”