The darkness inside the cavern was absolute.
Not the ordinary darkness of a moonless night or a shuttered room. This was a hungry darkness pressing against my skin like cold water. It swallowed the light from Kai's staff almost completely, reducing the warm golden glow to a feeble flicker that barely illuminated three feet ahead.
"Stay close," Kai murmured, his voice unnaturally muffled. "Something in here is dampening my magic."
"Comforting," Des muttered. "Very comforting."
The tunnel sloped downward, the floor worn smooth by centuries of water drip. Our footsteps echoed strangely, bouncing off walls we couldn't see, creating the unsettling sensation that someone else was walking alongside us in the dark.
I kept one hand on the rough stone wall to my right, using it as a guide. The rock was cold and damp, and more than once my fingers brushed against carved surfaces. More weeping faces, I realized. Even here in the darkness, Napherius had left his mournful guardians.
