Kjell's Arc

Chapter 27 of 27

Kjell reached the bottom of the steps. The white bone-light rode above them in Gunnar's hand. It pushed the dark back three paces, no more. The bone-thing sat at the center of the troll graveyard, hunched and still, threads pulsing slow. Kjell knew what killed such things. Fire. Fire and a carved seal, burned to break the binding. He had done it a dozen times on this long road down. "Merlyn. Cut the seal," Kjell said. "Gunnar builds the fire. We burn it like the rest." Merlyn stood over his stone book. His branded hands traced the pillar-carved cover. He read the arch's ward with his fingers, then turned his blind face toward the bone-thing. "This one does not want a coin," he said. "It eats the dark. It eats your fire too." Gunnar knelt and struck flint into his tinder. Flames caught. He fed them slow, the way he always did. The bone-thing's threads pulsed once, hard. The chamber breathed in. Gunnar's fire bent low, then died. Smoke curled up from black wood. "Again," Kjell said. Gunnar struck flint. He got a flame. The threads pulsed. The flame guttered and went out. Gunnar looked at his cold coals. "It takes the light," he said. "Every time. I can't hold a fire in this room." Kjell's gut went tight. No fire meant no burned seal. No burned seal meant the thing sat there and fed while they starved in the dark. The white bone-light still held above them, steady and cold. It did not gutter. It did not bend. Kjell stared at it. "Merlyn. Your bone-light. The dark can't touch it." "No," Merlyn said. "It is not fire. It is bone burning cold. A different sign." "Then carve the seal into a bone. And light it the same way." Merlyn's blind face turned toward him. For a moment he said nothing. "That has not been done." "Do it now," Kjell said. Merlyn drew a bone token from his belt. His knife cut fast. Thorgar moved between them and the bone-thing, an axe in each fist. The threads pulsed harder. The bone-thing shifted. Old troll ribs scraped as it rose. "It wakes," Thorgar said. "Faster, smith." Gunnar took the carved bone. He set it against the white light in his hand, not in coals. The seal caught. It burned white and cold, and the dark could not eat it. Kjell grabbed the burning bone and ran three steps into the graveyard. The bone-thing swung a troll-bone arm. Thorgar took the blow on his shoulder and stayed on his feet. Kjell drove the cold-burning bone into the grey threads at its center. White fire raced along every thread. The bone-thing shook. Troll bones burst apart and clattered across the floor. The threads snapped, black and dead. The chamber went silent. Gunnar lit a torch. It caught orange and held. The dark had lost its teeth. Beyond the fallen bones, a low tunnel opened. Cold air came from it, but faint now. The road went deeper still.