Benjamin Tate - Well of Sorrows

… not far now, not far…

Colin began to wheeze, his breaths coming in strained whistles, and his heart began to stutter, to shudder, as the ice sank deeper. He gasped, collapsed to his knees, and saw the light that had spoken to him earlier flare before him, saw that the trees had given way to the amorphous shapes of white buildings, hidden in the gloom, that the ground beneath was patched with stone, like cobblestones. But all of that was peripheral.

… get up!… almost there!…

He clawed at his throat, sucked in another thin breath of air, and flung himself forward, tripping at the top of a set of stairs, then falling and rolling down their length before coming up hard against a lip of stone. Not white stone, like the buildings, but rough stone, rounded like river stone, with all the colors of the earth.

… drink!… drink now or the Shadows will take you!…

Colin reached for the edge of the stone, pulled himself up, his breath lost completely, his lungs no longer working, his entire chest a pit of numbness, of bitter cold, all except for his heart. He could no longer feel the base of his throat. He dragged himself up the stone wall, hung over its edge and realized that it held a wide pool of utterly clear water; but he didn’t pause to reflect on its clarity, on its stillness. He dipped his good hand into it and cupped it to his mouth, swallowed it greedily, felt it spilling down his neck, staining his shirt, burning against the harshness of the vow. He drank as much of it as he could before the frigid claw at his heart squeezed tight, before the struggle to breathe sapped his strength, and then he sank onto his back on the edge of the well.

He stared up into the sunlight above, into the blue sky that seemed so distant. He strained for another breath, but his chest would not work.

The claw around his chest squeezed hard, and he felt his heart stop.

Darkness closed in at the edges of his vision, crept in slowly. He gazed into the deep sky as it began to recede, growing brighter, the gold deeper, its edges fine and brittle. As the darkness closed in tighter, as the muscles in his good arm and his legs relaxed and he sagged down against the river stone beneath him, two of the lights drifted into his sight.

… were we in time?… will he live?…

And then the sky, the lights, and the golden sun went black.

Colin woke with a start, eyes flaring wide, a moan escaping his lips, the sound torn with grief. He choked it off, coughed into the darkness of his room, then raised an aged hand to rub at his face. He wiped away the tears that wet his skin and sighed-a tired sigh, a weary sigh-and his hand closed over the crescent-shaped pendant on his chest.

He’d been dreaming again. The same dream he’d had these last long years, since he’d drunk from the Well, since he’d choked down the cold, sweet waters of the Lifeblood.

How many years now? He couldn’t remember. Too many. And yet apparently not enough. Not if he could still wake with the feel of tears drying on his skin. Although he knew why the dreams had returned recently, knew why they seemed so fresh.

He grimaced and sat up on his cot, moving slowly, letting the pendant go. His feet touched the cool white marble of the floor, and he shivered, the sensation running down into his arms, tingling in his fingers. He shrugged, stretched the muscles in his back, wriggled his toes, and then stood, leaning on the cot for support as he yawned and reached for the robe tossed on the chair beside the bed.

He stilled when he saw the black mark on his arm, felt the familiar frisson of fear, followed immediately by anger. He pulled his arm back and covered the mark with one hand, rubbing the skin over his wrist, as if he could massage the mark away. But when he withdrew his hand, it remained. Like a bruise, but deeper, darker. The discoloration was beneath his skin, not on the surface, and it swirled like oil, as if black blood had pooled there, pulsing with his heartbeat.

And it had grown, was now nearly the size of his thumb. Seven years ago it had only been the size of a grain of sand. He’d almost dismissed it as a mole or freckle, but when he showed it to Osserin and the rest of the Faelehgre…

He grunted, reached again for the robe, the motion laced with anger. He pulled the robe up over his head, settled the folds with a disgruntled jerk And his stomach clenched with pain.

He paused, closed his eyes, and pressed one hand against his side as the pain intensified. Through the cloth of his robe, he could feel his aged skin grow hot, as if with a fever. But then the pain peaked and faded.

He let his held breath out in a sigh and straightened, massaging his side as the heat in his skin dissipated. The pain hadn’t been this bad since those first few years in the forest, when he’d begun experimenting with the water and its effects, with its powers. He’d gone almost a year without going to the Well then, to see how long he could last without drinking it, how long he could suffer through the pain. A year.

He’d have to go much longer than that this time.

He frowned at the thought. How long had it been since he’d been to the Well? Two months? Three? More?

He didn’t know. The days blurred into one another in the forest, weeks and months passing without notice. But it didn’t matter. Not anymore, not now that the black mark had made its appearance. The Faelehgre had warned him that this would happen, that eventually the Well would claim him. He hadn’t believed them, even when the first pains had begun. He’d ignored them, ignored all of their warnings. He’d stayed, certain that they were wrong, that he’d be able to resist, that he could remain here, within the forest, near the Well, unchanged. Or if not unchanged, at least human.

Then the black mark had appeared.

He had to leave. Now. But leaving was proving to be difficult. He didn’t want to go.

And the Well was more powerful than he’d thought.

Troubled, he reached for the cedar staff that leaned against the end of the bed. His fingers closed about the worn wood near the grip, and he unconsciously reached out and touched the remnant life-force that imbued the staff, felt it twine around his own. The scent of cedar overwhelmed him, and he closed his eyes and breathed in deeply, drew the scent into his lungs. For a moment, he literally felt the tree that had sacrificed part of itself to form the staff, felt the wind brushing through its needles, the roughness of its bark, the musky earth that fed its tangle of roots…

Then the sensation faded.

He exhaled with a huff, scanned the confines of the room he had claimed for his own decades ago here among the Faelehgre ruins, running through what he’d need to bring with him. He moved to the corner and dug through layers of discarded clothing; he tossed most of it aside but chose a few pieces to take with him. He’d wear the robes if he could, but he packed a shirt and breeches, sandals, boots, stowing it all in a satchel he could sling across his back; he’d need them once he reached the Escarpment and the edge of human lands. He’d take the staff, of course, and his sling, but what else?

Standing, he surveyed the room, spotted the bowl he used to hold tinder, the flint beside it. A lantern he’d salvaged from the wagons after the Shadows attacked so long ago sat next to them. He shoved the bowl and flint into the pack, then began sorting through the rest of his supplies. Most of it he’d had no use for in the forest, although he hadn’t known it at the time. But some of it could be used for trade-pots and pans, brooches and other jewelry. He’d need some coin once he passed beyond the plains and dwarren lands. Everything had come from the chests and crates stacked in the wagons. He’d taken nothing from the bodies of those the Shadows had killed except the vial of pink-tinged water he’d found in his father’s pocket. He wrapped this in cloth and stowed it away.