A radiant orb appeared in Clara’s palm. Soft light burned the darkness away for one minute then faded out like a candle flame snuffed out by a gathering wind. She tried it again but the orb didn’t last longer than a few seconds.

Clara squinted in the dark. She adjusted her eyesight, making everything sharper and clearer. It worked at first. A podium stood sentry over the arena, elevated above the enclosing walls. Beyond the walls were thousands of tiers of seats, all divided by aisles and low wedges.

Her vision grew blurry until she could see nothing but a black void. She closed her eyes. Pressed her fingertips over her temple in small circles. When she blinked her eyes open, nothing changed.

“Eryx, what’s happening?” She fished out a flashlight.

“I don’t know.” Eryx created a ball of cerulean light. It flickered, small as a pebble and weak as a dying ember. “My power is fading.”

She could feel it too. A blossom of unease flourished in her stomach. She tried to channel her power to her hand, to feel warmth in the core of her chest but there was nothing there but emptiness.

A crack split the air. She directed the beam of her flashlight at it. Rai had stepped on ancient bones. Broken ribs and a skull. There were more skeletons strewn on the sand, large piles of blackened jaws, spines, collarbones, kneecaps, shoulder blades and other parts she couldn’t name.

Rai poked the fossils with the sole of his shoe. “The shape of the skull looks different.”

She passed the ray of light over the seats. There were writings carved on them. Numbers from a language erased by the passing of time.

Tamer had taken out a scimitar, a torch in his other hand. He squeezed the hilt. “It won’t ignite with fire.”

The breeze returned, a melancholic keening in the vast chasm. Clara flicked her flashlight left and right, up and down. Something whirled in the shadows, a hunched silhouette that disappeared behind the seats. She inched back, closer to Tamer. His fingers skimmed her shoulder, strong and warm.

“There’s something out there.” She waved her flashlight at the seats.

There was a low groan in the darkness, a scuffling of feet and a crunching of bones. She would have blamed the noise on mice if she hadn’t seen the silhouette.

“I sense an evil presence. It’s not safe here,” Eryx said.

Clara reached for her magic. Nothing. Not even a drop of it remained. She felt bereft. A shrapnel of her soul had gone missing. Without her powers, she had nothing to protect herself with. What was happening? Did Naaji’s entity deem her unfit to wield such power?

Another groan, louder and gravelly. More shambling of feet. Voices came next, mutterings of garbled words. She caught glimpses of the passing shadows. Stooped creatures, humanoid yet beastly.

Fear threaded through her body. The whistling wind awakened, a shuddering breath from the walls of the coliseum.

“Yumah’s mercy!” Rai pointed the light at one of the shadows.

It was a creature long-limbed and skeletal. Brittle hair dirty with grime stuck to its long neck. It stood on all fours, a bloated stomach expanding out of its torso. Pale skin, cracked and bruised, hugged its frame so tightly, she could see the outline of its skeleton.

Clara swallowed down a gulp. The humanoid creature moaned at them, face pulled taut and nose flattened between its cheeks. There were two black holes in place of its eyes. A pink tongue darted out of its mouth.

It was hungry. Starved. And it watched them with the eyes of a fox marking a rat. It crawled across the seats, shifting closer to the arena.

“Such a lovely welcome,” Rai said, his voice caked with sarcasm. “I believe we are the feast.”

“It’s not safe here.” Eryx chafed his brow with his hands.

Rai brandished his steelguns. “Yes, we heard you, old man.”

“I cannot heal you,” said Eryx. “Clara and I have lost our powers.”

Hearing it from Eryx made it worse. She watched the creature’s progress along an aisle. More of them emerged out of the shadows, drawn by their scents.

Tamer circled his beam over a pillar, to the farthest ends of the coliseum. “Look at that.”

There was an obelisk made of a dark stone speckled in white patterned crystals. Perhaps it was twenty meters high. It was difficult to tell. The white flecks flashed in the light. If she wasn’t so nervous, Clara would have taken the time to imagine the pillar as a chunk of star-studded sky and make up shapes of constellations.

“That explains it. This is bad.” Eryx gave a resigned sigh.

“Really bad,” Tamer said.

She eyed the men with apprehension. “I—I don’t know what to say.”

Rai scowled. “I know. Shit.”

“How many are they?” Eryx asked.

Clara followed Tamer’s beam as he counted. There were six obelisks. They poked out of the shadows like long fingers clawing their way out.

“What are they?” she asked.

“Blackstones. They drain aether from the surroundings, including any persons or objects infused with magic. It drained us of our powers. Tamer’s scimitars can’t emit fire because there's no aether left inside them,” Eryx said.

Clara felt a flake of relief as she clasped her necklace. She sent a silent apology to Naaji’s entity for losing faith in it.

“We need to destroy them,” Tamer said.

A chorus of feral moans and unintelligible words silenced them. The creatures were crowding around them. She’d seen ten of them but the number had increased to fifteen.

“I’ll take those three.” Rai showed them the pillars he had chosen. “You handle the rest. Here.” After giving his steelguns to Tamer and Eryx, he opened a pouch from his belt. He took out three small discs. “These are timed bombs. Pull out the flap behind the discs, stick them on the obelisks and press the button in the middle. You have ten seconds to get away before they explode.”

Tamer and Eryx each took a bomb. Rai gave the last one to Clara.

“If you get blown up,” Rai said to her, “I will not be responsible for picking up your remains.”

She took it. “That’s very kind of you.”

“Don’t mind him. He’s just as scared as the rest of us,” Eryx said.

None of the men sounded terrified. They were calm, exchanging words with confidence and practiced ease. If they were scared as Eryx had said, they hid it well.

One of the creatures howled, a reminder they were still approaching.

“I can come with you,” Tamer said to her.

“I’ll be fine,” she replied.

He gave her one of his scimitars. Her fingers curled around the hilt. It felt heavier than she had anticipated. How ironical. A few hours ago, she had asked him to train her and he had declined.

The blade trembled in her grip. “I don’t know how to use a sword.”

“You swing it. Like this.” Tamer swung his scimitar in an arc, the sharp edges slicing the air with a hiss.

There was more to it than a simple demonstration. Proper stance, sword techniques, suitable grip, sword movements and target points. She had no real experience with any of that but that chunk of metal in her hand was her means of survival. She would make use of it.

His fingertips bumped against her ear, fumbling in the dark before grazing her cheek. “Don’t be afraid.”

It was a fleeting contact but it left her feeling better. He slipped Rai’s steelgun into the pocket beside her hip. He didn’t say a word about it but she knew what that meant.

Tamer walked to Rai. “Ready?”

Rai stretched his neck, placed his heavy rifle on one shoulder and nodded. “Go ahead.”

Putting the torch between his lips, Tamer held out his left hand aloft. He used his scimitar to cut his palm. Blood oozed out of the wound, swooping down on the sand.

The beasts moaned, pinched faces snarling.

 “You want a piece of me?” he taunted. “Come and get it.”

With a collective growl, the creatures rushed towards them in a frenzy, teeth snapping and spit dripping over their chins. He was acting as the decoy, distracting them so that she could run in the opposite direction.

“Clara, go!” Tamer yelled.

She took to her heels, climbed up the wall and vaulted to the other side. Her feet landed on the ground. The aisle to her left would lead her directly to the obelisk. She ran, hot breath whooshing out of her mouth.

Gunshots swallowed the growls. Heavy thuds resonated, emaciated creatures falling down.

An encompassing darkness closed over her, shadowy hands squeezing her neck, her ribs, her face, her limbs. Clara had never found the dark so terrifying.

Almost there. Almost there, the words whirled in her mind.

A crunch behind her. A moan to her right. A snarl to her left. She didn’t stop to look. Clara jumped over a low wedge, moving from one tier of seats to the next, the beam of her torch bouncing over worn stones and dry sand.

The pillar stood only a few feet from her, shiny crystals blinking at her. The gunshots stopped. A roar floated behind her.

Rai!

She looked over her shoulder. Tamer and Eryx had left but Rai was still in the arena, his skin rippling, his upper body growing bigger and taller, claws branching out. Three creatures circled him, sizing him up. She’d forgotten he could transform.

Clara stumbled, hands flailing out to regain balance. She had stepped on a pottery shard. Grabbing hold of a seat, she straightened up and ran. The balls of her feet were sweaty in her boots and a dull ache throbbed in her ankles.

An explosion echoed in the coliseum. Soft tremors danced below the ground. One obelisk had fallen. It was either Tamer or Eryx’s doing. She bumped her flashlight against her trousers, feeling the bomb prodding out of her pocket.

Five more remaining.

More growls behind her. Just a few more feet left. She was nearly there. A hand slapped her back. Pain racked her spine. Clara flew in the air, landing flat on the ground. The flashlight rolled out of her grasp. A wash of dizziness altered her vision.

Unthinking, she turned behind, slashing at a pallid hand. The creature mourned and drew back. She’d cut off its wrist. A second beast leapt over its wounded companion. Spine teeth opened and closed, slicked with drool and blood. The two creatures wrestled, one struggling to live and the other, fighting to destroy. They forgot she was there.

Snap! Snap! Snap!

Clara grabbed her flashlight, pushing down a lump that had formed in her throat. The smell of death and decay polluted the air, oppressive and vomitous. The second beast was feasting on its companion, teeth buried deep in mashed flesh and tongue lapping at slick bones.

“Cannibals!” she spat out.

They were cursed beings, so consumed by hunger they had resorted to feeding on their own kind. The creatures had been trapped in the underground for thousands of years, losing whatever sanity they had possessed. No food, water and sunlight. She now understood why Vanguard Naaji had chosen to hide a seal in the coliseum.

Rising to her feet, Clara ran on. Her ankles protested, her toes felt smothered. Wisps of darkness coiled around her ribs, like a python crushing her body. She was panting for breath. She jumped over another wedge, moving up the last tier.

There were no more stone seats. Splintered benches littered the ground. A jagged piece of wood snagged on her trousers. She had no time to pull it out. She was closer to the obelisk. She could almost touch it.

A clawed hand clasped her left leg. Her feet slammed on the ground, air punched out of her lungs. Pain shot through her body. An awful stench suffocated her nostrils. The beast had come for her.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

TCH is so close to hitting the bright red numbers. Help it get there? Come on, light up that vote star. I'll send a fairy down your way to grant you a wish! :D

And here's a little something I wrote! It's not part of the chapter because the language doesn't fit. The scene happens after Clara leaves.

Tamer: (sees a horde of humanoid monsters approaching. Silently panics) Rai, give me the rifle.

Rai: No way in hell! I’m not sharing her with you. We’re not up for a threesome. (pats the rifle lovingly)

Tamer: Don’t be selfish, you moron.