Corvan awoke to the scent of lilacs on cool breeze. For a moment, he thought he was stretched out on the front porch swing at home, his mother’s tabby cat curled up against him. A tickle of hair touched his cheek and as he went to brush it away, he recalled where he actually was, in a dark passage deep underground. In spite of that harsh reality, he smiled to himself, for Kate was cuddled up with her back against him, her head resting on his forearm.

  Kate stirred, then rolled over to him and snuggled into his chest, her hand seeking his and the comfort of her medallion. Releasing it into her grasp, he lay perfectly still, waiting until her breathing fell into a steady rhythm. One thing he now knew for certain was that he would never again be bothered by the boys teasing him that he liked Kate. He was no longer afraid to admit it and he hoped she felt the same way about him. He drew the warmth of the cloak over them and dozed off, only to wake up to a cold breeze flowing over his back. He reached for the cloak, then jumped to his feet. Kate was gone!

  “Kate!” he called out, but there was no answer. He stumbled up the passage, but it was too dark for his keen eyesight to pick out any movement in the tunnel ahead. He stopped, glanced back down, and caught a glimpse of green light a long way down from where they had been sleeping. Stumbling toward it, he called her name again, and this time he heard Kate respond with a question he couldn’t quite catch.

  When he reached her, Kate was at the top of a steeper section of the passage. The cloak was loosely draped over her shoulders and the medallion outstretched in her hand as she used its light to stare at a sharp corner in the passage below.

  “What are you doing, Kate?” he asked, wondering if she was sleepwalking.

  She turned her head slowly to him, a quizzical look on her face. “Didn’t you hear him calling?” she asked.

  “Who?” Corvan responded, half expecting the leader of the Rakash to appear from behind a large boulder at the corner below.

  “The old man from the secret room,” Kate said. “He wants me to come back.” She held the medallion up between them. “Sometimes, when I hold this, I can hear his voice.”

  Corvan frowned. As far as he could figure, the only old man Kate could be referring to was Rayu. She must have heard his voice when he gave the medallion back and wanted to see him again. Then again, there was no way to know for certain it was Rayu, given how long they had been separated and all she had been through. Maybe she met someone else when she was being held captive by the rebels, or was referring to the rebel leader himself. “You must have been dreaming,” he said. “We need to keep moving. Are you ready to walk a bit farther?”

  Kate nodded slightly and shivered.

  Corvan tried wrapping the scarf more closely around her neck, but she pushed his hand away and tugged it off. “I don’t like how it smells,” she said, holding it out to him. Corvan took it from her and wrapped it around his own neck. “Let me fasten the cloak for you,” Corvan said, as he buttoned up the front. Taking her by the arm, he turned her about and guided her back up the slope.

  “I’m thirsty,” Kate mumbled as they passed the place where they had been sleeping and Corvan picked up the food bag.

  “If we walk a bit further, we should come across some water,” Corvan replied, but he didn’t have much hope. When they had first left the Cor shield, they came across a few pools of water in deep pockets at the edges of the old watercourse, but lately there were none to be found. The last one had been more than four rests ago, and the effects of dehydration were setting in. Their food supplies in the cloth bag were also almost out, but without any water, neither of them wanted to attempt choking down the dried-out bread that remained.

  As he led the way up the passage, deep fear seeped into his soul along with the darkness that pressed in around them. It was getting colder, and he raised Tyreth’s scarf over his face and breathed in her lingering scent. Her words in the prison cell came back, “be brave and it will be all right.” Was that even true? Right now, he didn’t feel very brave so how could that make anything better.

  Kate stopped, looked ahead, and whispered hoarsely past cracked lips. “Is it much farther? This night is too long and there are still no stars.”

  “We are getting closer,” Corvan replied, giving her hand a squeeze. “How about we count out a thousand steps and see where that takes us.”

  Kate nodded and he began to count. At the end of the thousand steps, they rested briefly, then did it again. Having a goal help keep his fears at bay, but as they moved along the count dropped to five hundred, then one hundred and finally to twenty-five. At nineteen steps, Kate collapsed in a heap. She looked like she wanted to cry but her eyes remained dull and dry. “I’m sorry, I can’t, sorry Corvan.”

  “It’s okay.” Corvan croaked. He barely had enough moisture in his mouth to get the words out. “Rest here. I’ll find water.”

  Wrapping her with the cloak, he waited until her eyes closed and her rasping breaths became more regular. She was so weak that even when he eased the medallion from her grasp, she did not resist. He did not want to leave her alone in the dark but needed some light to explore ahead and look for water.

  This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  Around the next bend, the passage rose even more steeply over stair-like ridges. He began to climb but his strength gave out and he fell to his knees, then slumped onto the next tier. Had they come all this way just to die of thirst? How was that fair?

  His father’s words echoed back from the recesses of his weary mind. Don’t be looking for this world to be fair to you. Fair is what you do for others, not what you expect to receive.

  “You’re right, Dad, I just need to take the next step. I need to get Kate home.” He crawled forward over the ledge. “Come on, Corvan,” he whispered, “you can do it.”

  But he couldn’t.

  In utter exhaustion he fell on his face, his last bit of energy seeping from his body into the cold stone.

  The green glow from Kate’s medallion wavered before his eyes. He relaxed his hand, and it rolled off with a soft metallic ring on the stone. For a moment it was balanced on its points, then it rolled slowly away and off the edge. In the stillness he listened to it bounce down the stone steps, sounding like a small bell fading into the distance. The ringing ended with a soft plop.

  It took a long while for the last sound to register in his mind. It had something to do with wishing or praying. When he was child, he was given three medallions, no, they were coins—and he was dropping them one at a time into a round hole; plop, plop, plop. With each one, he had been making a wish that one day he would grow up to be an amazing superhero.

  Corvan raised his head. The memory was from his parents taking him to the wishing well at the park in Fenwood and giving him three pennies to throw in. Now, the sound he had just heard could only be from the medallion falling into water. He rolled on his side and squinted down the slope where a green light danced from below the ripples of a small pool.

  Crawling on all fours, he made his way down to the light and found a trickle of water bubbling up into a shallow depression, then flowing away under the wall. Dropping on his stomach he drank deeply, picked up the medallion, then made his way back to kneel beside Kate.

  “I found water,” he said, shaking her shoulder.

  Kate’s head rolled to one side, but her eyes did not open.

  Corvan pulled her toward his chest. He didn’t have the strength to lift her, but if she helped . . . He shook her gently. “Here Kate, hold your medallion, put your arms around my neck, and I’ll carry you.”

  Her eyes remained shut, but her head dipped slightly and when he put the medallion in her hand, she reached up further and clasped her hands behind his head. Corvan pushed to his feet and staggered around the corner.

  Kate revived as they rested by the small spring, drinking and finishing off the last of the bread. Corvan let her eat her fill before nibbling on the last pieces at the bottom of the cloth bag. Turning it inside out he brushed off the crumbs, then rolled up the rim. “Look Kate, it’s a toque to keep your head warm.” Kate smiled as she took it from him and tugged it over her head, her eyes moist and alive again. She leaned in to him and he pulled her close to rest against him.

  He let Kate doze until she stirred again. “Shall we try another thousand steps?” he asked.

  Kate nodded and he helped her to her feet, but before long she was stumbling up the steep steplike flow, barely able to lift her feet under the grey cloak.

  “Your cape is too heavy for me,” she said, fumbling with the buttons. Corvan helped her take it off, then fastened it over his own shoulders. Kate tried walking alongside, holding his hand, but she tripped on a rocky lip and pulled him down with her, his knees smacking painfully against the rocks.

  “I’m sorry, Corvan,” she whispered, her shoulders convulsing with dry sobs. “You need to go on without me. Take the light with you.” She held out the medallion and a cold fear swept over him along with a wind that blew in sharply from around the next corner.

  Pushing the feelings of dread aside he got to his feet. “I’m not going to leave you, Kate, not ever.” He reached down for the hand that held the medallion and its light brightened and flowed around their intertwined fingers. Taking her other hand, he pulled her to her feet and took a step back. “Keep looking in my eyes and follow me. We can do this one step at a time.” He stepped backward and she followed, her eyes locked on his.

  The wind grew steadily stronger, Kate bread bag toque was whipped off, she broke eye contact and looked past him. She tried to speak, but the wind whipped her faint words down the tunnel. Shaking her head she pulled feebly on his hands, but he leaned back and forced her to keep coming. If they quit now, they might never get up again. Just one more step!

  He stepped back but his foot found nothing but empty air.

  Kate yanked on his hands; eyes wide with fear before they toppled together off a ledge and into a rushing river below. Icy water cut through Corvan’s cloak as the currents tore Kate from his grasp. The green glow of the medallion slipped away from him on the darks surface of the water. Kicking furiously Corvan swam after her.

  The ceiling swept lower.

  The glow drew closer.

  His hand brushed Kate’s face, then in a roar of foam, she was pulled away as he tumbled over a waterfall.

  Coughing up water, Corvan surfaced off to one side of the falls in a shallow pool. He got to his feet on the rocky bottom. “Kate! Where are you?” he called out, splashing to one side, his hands outstretched. His hand jammed into something hard and he felt his forefinger finger snap. Pain shot up his arm, clearing his mind.

  “Kate!” he shouted, his throat rasping with panic.

  Standing still, he listened intently over the sound of the flowing water and heard a low moan. “Kate? Where are you? Speak to me.” Another moan came from the other side of the rock he had just hit. Falling to his knees in the water, he felt around what was more like a stout wooden pillar until the glow of Kate’s medallion came into view, lying in the water. He lifted the light and found her lying half submerged in a shallow pool, her eyes closed. A gash on her head and a deep cut on her face were turning the water around her pale face deep red. “Are you okay? Say something, Kate.”

  Kate didn’t open her eyes, but a smile touched her lips.

  “I saw the stars, Corvan. We’re home.”