Scavenger of Souls by Joshua David Bellin Page A

stepped into the light.
    Despite Asunder’s words, I couldn’t help stopping in shock.
    My first thought was that I’d walked through a gateway into another world. As far as I could see, thousands of multicolored lights floated in the air a hundred feet above my head, and I had to stamp on the ground to convince myself I hadn’t drifted off into space. I craned my neck and squinted at the soaring vault to try to make out what these lights were and how they hung at such a dizzying height, but they dazzled me and made it impossible to tell. Gradually I realized the light came from the ceiling and floor and distant walls of a cavern so huge I couldn’t see the end of it. An arrayof luminescent colors spilled from the rock itself: blues far brighter than any sky I’d seen, pinks that put the healthiest of the little kids’ cheeks to shame, yellows and greens and purples that shimmered like the curved bow the old woman told us used to come after a rainstorm. In the approximate center of the cavern lay a pool, its surface dotted with countless points of light, the water kept in constant motion by a bubbling fountain that seemed to harbor a pure white radiance of its own. Reflections from the water swung lazily across the room, keeping time with the soothing sound of the fountain. So much light poured all around me I half expected to look at my own hands and see them glowing with an inner fire.
    And there were people seated on brown mats throughout the cavern. Lots of people. I’d been hoping the twenty or so warriors we’d seen were the total of Asunder’s forces, but I counted close to a hundred more, scattered in groups of five to ten. Most of them were warriors, but some were women like the ones I’d seen last night, wearing brown wraps around their chests and brown bands around their throats. Like the warriors, they mostly appeared young, possibly no older than Nessa. But while the men lounged on their mats, talking quietly in their own language, the women worked noiselessly on one job or another, heads lowered to their tasks. Some mended mats, others stirred pots over a small fire, others washed brown garments in the fountain, wrung them out, and draped them over another fire to dry. Two women sat with a circle of children, heads lowered as if they were leadingthem in some sort of prayer. Studying the group more closely, I realized with shock—but also with relief—that some of the children were our own, except they’d been clothed in the cave dwellers’ uniforms. Their bellies showed pale and scrawny next to the bronzed bodies of our captors. But they didn’t seem distressed. In fact they seemed to have found new playmates among the children of the cave dwellers, all of whom, it appeared from their hair and clothing, were boys. Only Zataias kept a wary distance from the cave-children, and when he caught my eye he nodded slightly as if to show me he was still on my team.
    I searched for the adult members of our colony, and in a moment I found Tyris and Nekane, sitting under the guard of a group of warriors. Unlike the children, whose hands had been freed, theirs remained bound. The only people missing were Aleka and the old woman, and my heart dropped at the realization.
    â€œWhat have you done with the others?” I asked Asunder.
    â€œThey are well,” he answered in an unconcerned voice. “Their needs are tended by our healer Melampus.”
    â€œTake us to them,” Nessa demanded.
    I glanced at her, but Asunder didn’t appear to take offense. At a silent signal from him, two warriors broke away from one of the groups and led us to a much smaller cave that branched off from the main cavern. There we found Aleka and the old woman, resting on brown mats while the bearded man hovered over them. I couldn’t tell if my mother’scolor looked any better, but her breathing seemed easy and her forehead didn’t feel feverish. Neither she