-----------"The abyss births and kills" - Troy the smith--------------
The Bottom Ring never knew silence.
Chains rattled in the prisoner pits. Rats gnawed on piles of bones. Guards barked orders in the distance, their whips cracking like thunder. But in one narrow alley, tucked behind the shadow of a crumbling stone wall, only silence reigned. The only thing that broke the silence was Jalen's heartbeat, pounding in his chest like a drum.
He had been caught.
The guard shoved him hard against the broken wall. The stone scraped Jalen's back, raw from the lashes of the day before. Pain erupted. He staggered, half from pain, half from hunger. The guard's torch ignited, casting the alley in a mix of pale yellow and black.
"You think we don't see you, gutter-rat?" the guard sneered, his breath sour with wine. "Always lurking near the storehouses, always staring too long when the priests count their offerings. You think you're clever. But lurkers don't live long down here."
"I'm not--" Jalen's protest was cut short by the back of a gloved hand striking his cheek. He stumbled and fell but didn't cry out. He had learned long ago the whip was kinder when you gave it no sound to feed on.
The guard's breath drew closer, voice low. "The Hole demands blood. Maybe yours will do. Maybe I will drag you before the overseer or maybe I won't. Depends on whether you've got something worth sparing your skin."
His hand reached for Jalen's collar. That was when it happened.
The spores stirred.
They rose from the damp and broken stones of the alley, a faint shimmer like silver dust. Jalen felt them before he saw them, a tingling in his throat, a crawling beneath his skin. He tried to choke it back, to push the breath down, but the pain and fear they broke his control.
He exhaled and the spores answered.
They swirled out in a sudden cloud, the glittering torchlight illuminating them. The guard cursed and swung his torch, but the motes of light slipped past the flame and started clinging to his mouth, his nose and his eyes. The spores started to go inside him. He coughed, then gagged. His torch clattered to the ground, its glass shattered, scattering in the damp earth.
Jalen watched in horror as the spores burrowed into the guard through his mouth, nose and ears. The guard's eyes rolled white. His body convulsed, spasms wracking him as if invisible chains yanked at his limbs. He clawed at his throat, at his face, but there was no tearing the spores free. A strangled cry tore from his lips before he collapsed, twitching once, twice, then lying still. Black blood started oozing from his chest as his tunic started to get wet.
The spores slowly exited the corpse and went along their merry way.
The silence returned, heavier than before.
Jalen stood trembling, staring down at the lifeless body. He hadn't touched him. He hadn't even meant it. But the spores - his spores - had obeyed.
He bent over, gasping, his hands pressed to his knees. For a long moment he thought he might vomit. But nothing, not even a retch.
'The bastard deserved it' - Jalen thought.
Then he heard it.
A breath that wasn't his own.
He turned sharply. At the mouth of the alley stood a boy, wide-eyed and pale as bone in the moonlight. Darrin - the butcher's boy.
For an instant, neither of them moved.
Then Darrin bolted.
The next day, Jalen expected the priests to descend. He waited for the clack of their sandals, the chanting of hymns, the knives they carried for bloodletting. But no one came. The guard's body was already gone. Whispers of his death had already been twisted into something else. A punishment from the Hole, a natural heart failure, a curse. On and on went the list. Folks really loved to gossip in the First ring.
No one knew the truth.
Except Darrin.
When the sun sank behind the crumbling walls, Jalen found him waiting-the butcher boy. It was not a crowded square, but not a lonely alley either. Darrin had chosen the meeting spot carefully: the edge of an old tannery, where shadows stretched long at dusk, but workers still passed by at a distance. Just enough company to keep Jalen's hands tied.
"Evening," Darrin said, his voice tight.
He leaned against a rotting beam, trying for a casual chat, but his eyes darted like a cornered rat's.
Jalen said nothing. He simply watched him, waiting.
"I saw it," Darrin whispered. His voice shook despite his effort to steady it. "I saw what you did with the spores. The guard choking. The way you filled him with spores and killed him."
Jalen's stomach knotted. He stepped closer, and Darrin flinched. For a heartbeat Jalen considered it - letting the spores rise, silencing him here and now.
But no. Too dangerous. Too close to people. Darrin had chosen well.
"You'll keep quiet" Jalen said, his voice was low.
Darrin's mouth twisted into something that was almost a grin, though fear gleamed behind it. "Oh, I will. I'm not mad enough to scream about it. But you will too Jalen, because if the priests hear, they'll come for you - and anyone standing too close to you."
Darrin swallowed hard. "I don't want that."
Jalen narrowed his eyes. "Then why are you talking to me?"
"Because fear cuts both ways." Darrin licked his lips. "I know what you are now. Or at least what you can do, and what you did. You don't want me whispering that to the wrong ears. So, here's how it goes - you do what I say, and I will keep my small mouth shut."
Jalen's fists clenched at his sides. "Blackmail."
"Survival," Darrin corrected, though his voice cracked. "Don't pretend you wouldn't do the same. We are all rats of the ring."
For a long moment, neither spoke. The tannery's stink of rotten hide and chemicals that stung their noses. Far off, a dog barked. A worker dragged a load of animal skins past them. He never even saw the two.
Jalen looked upward until his eyes met Darrin's. The butcher's boy trembled, but he didn't move away.
"You're afraid of me," Jalen whispered.
"Yes," Darrin admitted, breath shuddering.
"Terrified" he continued. "But you won't use it here. Not where someone might see. Because if you do, the priests will come, and you'll be the one chained on the altar."
And he was right. That was the leash. Jalen's power was not something that could survive the open air. Darrin knew it. And so, though he trembled, he smiled a thin, bitter smile. Darrin has won his gamble.
"See? We understand each other," he said softly. "I keep your secret. You keep me fed and safe. It's better than both of us dying, isn't it? I have plans Jalen. Plans that could go smooth if you co-operate. You will find it best for the both of us"
Jalen's silence stretched, heavy as stone. At last, he turned away.
Darrin let out a breath, shaky but relieved.
But Jalen's eyes burned as he walked back into the night. One day, he swore, the spores would no longer answer only in secret. One day, the leash would break - and when it did, Darrin would regret every word.