Page 35 of Katya and the Young God

But with the moisture in the cave, anything that old would have decayed ages ago, molded away until all that remained was putrid dust, but she keeps that to herself.

But instead of freaking out she just takes a deep breath, leaning against the solidness of the pack, stretching her legs out in front of her. Low ceilings always cause people to panic, and she reminds herself of it, tracing out the carved divots on the roof, evidence of long-ago tools, of dedication and time to make this cave into what it actually is.

“The dangerous parts don’t start for another hour or two of walking,” Pieter says behind her, voice carefully neutral. “And besides the seal, there’s no real danger to anyone until then.”

“Why are you telling me this?” Katya asks, tucking a sweaty strand of hair that escaped from her bun back behind her ear.

“You’re the one who’s been fishing for information,” he shrugs, looking absorbed in the protein bar. “If you’re so worried about it, you don’t have to stress until then.”

“Thanks,” she says, and she’s not going to look that gift horse in the mouth.

“And I would prefer the seal to break without sacrifice, if I had my way,” he continues, still looking at the protein bar in his hands, studiously so. “If it requires death, there are bigger problems than just that one person.”

Katya’s done her job for years, and knows when to not push, and this is one of the times. She can’t see his eyes, his lashes obscuring his gaze down, but his shoulders are hunched and his hands clenched tightly.

“And if it does, I don’t think whatever it needs would just need human blood, but...” he trails off, his slate gray eyes flickering up to her before skittering away, “but I have aired those grievances before and they were ignored.”

Her skin crawls at all the implications, because even with whatever self-imposed limits on his powers he has, he’s still most likely the most powerful being in a three-state radius.

“I am woefully underprepared and under informed on this mission,” she says, and he nods, still looking away. “But thanks.”

* * *

After a long enoughbreak that the cool air has chilled her sweat and rendered her utterly cold, Nathan signals the group to take up their packs, to start again, and her legs protest.

Unfortunately, Nathan hangs back with her as the rest of the tour group takes the lead, chatting non-stop about how massage therapy really helps people with messed up shoulders, like Katya hadn’t already tried that months ago. Like it’s not the first thing that people suggest when they see her unable to easily do the things she used to do. Like massage therapy could help fix such a traumatic injury.

The trail gets rougher, gets less even, requiring people to scramble over boulder-sized hewn rocks, like the makers of the cave got more and more lazy the deeper under the mountain they got.

And the bones grow in number, lining the walls, cemented against the hewn rock, pristine and white, not a fleck of decay or crumble among it. Unnaturally so, like they’ve been preserved by the very energy of the magic of the cave.

And Katya’s seen creepier, so she doesn’t discount it.

The deeper they go, the more the non-humans in the group show strain. More than once she sees Feketer take off his cap to wipe the sweat out of his eyes, sees Rory tug along their collar in discomfort, see the Golem stumble in places with no obstruction. Sees the lines around Pieter’s eyes grow deeper, like he’s being pulled apart by the inside. Like the buzz has grown so much it’s in everyone’s skull, in their bones and in their blood.

For Katya, it’s an ever-present thrum, deep in her soul, something impossible to ignore and even more difficult to come to terms with, but, still, a noise.

After more than an hour of walking, they come to a great pit, one that stretches the size of the cavern they’re in.

Nylon rope is strung across it, anchored to the roof by metal pitons, but below…

Glittering crystal, lit only with their headlamps, a million shining facets, beautiful and sharp. Large enough to impale someone, to kill them, deep enough of a fall that the impact would do it for them.

The sides of the cavern, even though there’s no place to stand, no place to decorate, have the bones imbedded in, skulls fixed every few yards.

“Interesting, isn’t it?” Nathan says immediately next to her, like this isn’t a big, terrifying deal. “That they managed to do that to the wall, despite the fall.”

“Interesting isn’t the word I’d use, but yeah.” Katya says, her skin crawling.

The cavern is cool, a steady movement of air drawing deeper and deeper into the cave, like it’s inhaling.

“First time we came down this deep, took us seven hours to rig up the rope,” he says, and he’s bragging, he’s boasting, and it’s so uncomfortable that Katya has to resist the urge to physically shy away. “Now, with these, the entire group should be across in half an hour.”

As he speaks, the largest of the human tour guides hooks himself into a harness, and, using the Golem as an anchor, all but scurries himself across, the rope keeping tension, until his feet hit the ground on the other side and he inclines the carabineer and sends it across.

It’s like a spider, crawling along a rope, and looks to be the most upper body intensive workout Katya will ever have to do outside of basic training.

Once the carabineer makes it all the way back to the group, Nathan gestures at the group of people. “Who wants to next?”

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