Page 44 of Dark's Savior

Ryziel shifted his eyes around, focusing on the pillars in the distance. "It is muirlemp," he said softly.

"What is that?"

"A type of fungus plant. It glows in the dark."

"I've never seen it before," Aly said. "On Lethe Maws, I mean."

"It can only be found outside the mines," he replied. "It used to grow in abundance closer to the surface until the mining destroyed most of the environment and all the various flora."

"You mean there is a whole ecosystem down here?" Aly said, astonished. Oh, how Kate, their ship bio-expert, would freak at the idea. Such a promising chance to study and extract, if only Aly could tell her anything about it.

"Yes, a whole other world, if you know where to look," Ryziel said.

Aly gazed back across at the glow from the muirlemp. "It's been pretty terrifying so far but...this is rather beautiful. Maybe I'll try to recreate it."

"Recreate it?" Ryziel asked after a short pause.

Aly glanced back at him with a sheepish smile. "Er, draw it, I mean. Though it won't be the same in just my mind's eye. Better to actually have a sample to look at...not that I'm asking you to find me some plants or anything."

Ryziel didn't respond to this, and Aly turned back to following Xilya, who had already made it to the door and was waiting for them.

As they continued their trek out of the Keep, Aly couldn't help studying once more all the strange markings along the door and the bridge. As they passed by a large obelisk-like marker standing within the center of the bridge at its edge, Aly saw carved within it the shape of a woman, faceless, with a sharp crown hovering just above her head.

"Was she their Queen?" she asked as they crossed the river and started through the door.

"Pardon?" Xilya said, turning her head slightly.

"You said this was called Yurza's Keep. And that it was home to a civilization. Was she their ruler?"

"Perhaps so? I don't know much of the lore of this place as the others do."

Aly looked back at Ryziel again, who shrugged. "Nar claims she was an ancient who was guardian to the underground Keep and its city. His people may still have old texts within their libraries about her, but most of what is known is lost. Though some say she still lives, lurking in the passages below, others say it is only a ghost or something else that haunts the Keep, that fools one into thinking it is her."

Aly shivered at that. And here she thought she had gotten away from such things as ghosts and haunts, as if they were mostly an earthly invention. But no, even in the vast reaches of space, there are still the unknown terrors of the dark.

They slipped quickly through the last door and through to the passage beyond without issue. It wasn't until Aly came to their first set of stairs that she realized how far down they had come and how much she would now have to climb.

As she hesitated on the steps, she felt Ryziel close behind her, giving her the strength to press forward.

She kept up with Xilya up to the sixth stair, but by then, she was breathing much more heavily, trying her best to keep up with Xilya's long gait. She stuck to watching her feet as they climbed, trying not to notice Ryziel having to slow at her back.

As they came to a small chamber, Xilya called a halt, and they stopped.

"Let's take a quick rest," she said and plopped her bag down before Aly could protest. Neither the vrisha nor the nillium looked in any way like they needed to stop for a break, but she sure as hell did, and she wished that didn't bother her but it did.

'Damn but if I had used the stairs in the mines more,' she thought bitterly, sipping her water. Her eyes shifted around the cave room, trying to distract herself from her sudden embarrassment at feeling so inferior, when she caught sight of a bright glow along the ground and along the side of a wide crevice. She wondered how she hadn't seen it before, but perhaps her eyes hadn't adjusted yet and her lights had been much brighter when coming down. As the two talked quietly behind her, Aly stole herself over to the dazzling blue light trailing the cave wall until she reached its end. There before her was a budding plant, illuminating a beautiful blue-green hue along its petals like some fairy had sneezed magical glitter all over it.

Deeply mesmerized, Aly crouched down before it and thought to touch its leaves but then decided against it, not knowing whether it might be poisonous. She was about to call to Ryziel to ask him to tell her what kind of plant it was, when something fluttered above her, making her turn her head upward, casting her light along the ceiling above.

And, in doing so, revealing the large, white-eyed, bat-like creature crouching above her.

Aly gasped, stumbling to her feet, falling back against something hard behind her as the thing hissed and went to pounce. Aly shrieked and turned, covering her face against the hard surface that she had run into only to feel said hard surface wrap itself around her and quickly drag her away. Aly heard the sounds of a guttural growl and the shriek of something in pain followed by a sharp crunching sound and a loud shifting and howling before the noise died away.

Aly felt the hard surface that gripped her vibrate, then she heard the sound of another growl. When she dared peek upward, she found Ryziel's face, stone-still, with eyes as cold as ice, glaring down at her.

Aly let out another little gasp and jerked back, but he didn't release her. Not right away.

"Nihl Ryziel..." It was Xilya who spoke. Her voice was low and cautious, as if she were speaking to a man holding someone hostage and about to pull the trigger. Or, in Aly's case, rip her throat out from the look Ryziel was giving her.

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