Wayfarer (Wanderlust 2)

Chapter Twenty-Seven

When Soren hoisted himself out of the water, he was freezing. His whole body shivered so badly it was almost hard to stand up. He braced himself with one hand on the wall beside him. It was completely dark, and almost completely silent. He took a deep breath and forced himself forward.

He kept one hand on the wall, and one hovering in front of his face, in case the tunnel ceiling dropped suddenly. He just focused on finding Tanden, and putting one foot in front of the other. The boy hadn't said anything about how long the tunnel was, but that didn't matter. Soren was going to keep walking until he found the end.

Walking helped warm him up a bit. After some time, the wall beside him started to feel drier. He hoped that meant he was getting closer to the end. He could have called out. Certainly, his voice would echo down to the end of the tunnel, but he couldn't bring himself to do it. He was too afraid of getting nothing but silence in reply.

He had no idea how long he had been walking when he saw a light up ahead. Such a small light he was half afraid that he was imagining it. Could being cold make him see things that weren't really there? He wasn't sure. He also wasn't sure why he felt so tired. He hadn't been walking that long.

Tanden was waiting in front of him, Jale was waiting behind. Soren forced himself to keep moving. One step at a time. It was a good thing Jale was staying with the boy. She was right, they would never find their way out without him. It wouldn't do any good to find Tanden just to get stuck in the huge maze of caves and mineshafts.

The light was getting bigger, so it must have been real. Soren kept walking, but he felt like he couldn't get any closer to it. Like his arms and legs weren't working properly.

Then he tripped over something and didn't quite catch himself in time. With a groan he tried to push himself back up, but it was too hard. Suddenly it seemed like it would be a very good idea to take a quick nap. There was no way he would be able to carry Tanden out of the caves if he was this tired.

He closed his eyes.

When Tanden heard the thud, he decided that the noises he had been hearing must have been real. An animal, maybe? He didn't want to investigate, but the thud had sounded closer than the shuffling he had been quietly listening to. If it was an animal he wanted to know what it was.

He snugly wrapped one of the bags around an axe handle to create a makeshift torch, and held it to the fire so it would light. He shivered as he kicked aside the pile of bags he had been using as blankets, and stiffly got to his feet. He didn't like using his only free hand to hold a torch when there might have been a dangerous animal nearby, but there really wasn't another option.

Cautiously, he started walking down the tunnel. At any moment, he expected the light to catch something furry. Hopefully something small, if he was lucky. As long as it wasn't a bear he could probably handle himself.

Then he started thinking about wolves. With a weapon, maybe he could defend himself against one wolf. But what if it was a whole pack? Why would a wolf be alone down a dark tunnel? For possibly the first time in his life, Tanden regretted not carrying around a sword.

When the light finally outlined a shape in the darkness, it was decidedly less furry than a bear or wolf. The torch nearly slipped from his hands.

Tanden threw himself to his knees beside Soren. His skin was pale and his lips were almost blue. His tunic clung to his chest wetly, and his hair was plastered to his forehead. Tanden carefully put the torch down and lay his hand on Soren's cold cheek. If it hadn't been for the gentle rising and falling of Soren's chest, Tanden might have thought he was dead.