Ramus closed his eyes and it was no darker. He sighed. His mind felt full, ready to spew what he knew.

“Nomi said—”

Ramus spoke the words. They sounded just as unfamiliar as the last time he had uttered them, and equally unwelcome in his mouth. As the final word trailed off the darkness seemed to sigh.

“What's that?” the Serian shouted. “What speaks? What shouts?” Ramus heard movement to his left and there was a brief shower of sparks as metal slashed against stone. “Away!” the man shouted. “Come no closer! Ramus, run!”

It was those last two words that made Ramus close his eyes and hold his face, as if to clasp the pain pulsing behind his eyes.

The Serian shouted again, a word that turned into a pained, disbelieving growl, and then fell to the floor. More sparks came as he swept his sword left and right, and all they illuminated was the stark, wide-open eyes that held a dark fear that nothing could illuminate.

Ramus could not move. He should flee now, he knew, but his body would not obey.

The Serian stood again, growling instead of speaking, and started scuffing along the wall back toward the entrance. Ramus heard the Serian's labored breathing, the sound of leather against stone, metal clinking here and there . . . and then a single loud crack. Stone against stone.

The Serian cried out. It sounded as though his voice came through gravel.

Ramus listened to the agonized retreat, and when he could hear no more movement, he followed. The sound of flowing water led him around a corner, and then he could see the weak ocher illumination of the death moon fingering through the entrance hole.

What have I done? he thought as he climbed. But there was something other than guilt plaguing him. Something very much like excitement.

“OH, RAMUS,” LULAH called. “What have you done?”

“Ramus!” It was Ramin, roaring into the night yet not moving a step from where Konrad lay sprawled at his feet. The Serian must have rolled from the cairn and landed below, close to where Ramin and Lulah argued by the campfire, and the rain now splashed from his wide-open eyes.

Ramus walked from the darkness and into the fire's light. “I gave him the words Nomi seeks,” he said. “Now he can carry them back to her.” He was aware of Lulah and Ramin staring at him but they were only shapes, shadows beyond what he really had to look at—Konrad, squirming on the ground. A continuous low groan came from his mouth, changing tone every few beats, and Ramus realized it was the sound of the Serian's breathing.

“He's dying,” Ramin said. There was disbelief in his voice, and then anger as he stepped around his fallen cousin. “He's dying!”