Not slowing down, we shot a glance behind us. The passage the fake Discord had gone into was still within our sight, and a large swarm was already erupting out and coming after us.
“I was really hoping they’d give us a moment longer!” Starlight groaned as we switched to another passage.
“I’m afraid they’re not known for being considerate! It’s a wonder they haven’t set up ambushes in every passage in the area!”
“How far is the throne room?”
“Too far to hoof it,” I said. “There should be another vertical shaft that leads to a couple of levels below it, if we can get to it.”
“Which way?”
“I’m not sure! I only used it once or twice, and that was quite some time ago, long enough for the whole layout of the castle to have changed! I can’t even promise that the shaft still exists, or that it’s in the same place as it used to be!”
“Could the throne room have moved, too?” Starlight’s voice was filled with concern.
“No, its walls and the outer walls of the castle are one of few, if not only, parts of the hive that are fixed in the same state permanently. They have to be for security reasons!”
“How does that work?”
“I think there’s a spell. Whether Chrysalis cast it ages ago and it’s still holding, or it needs refreshing every so often, I’m not- aha!”
At the end of the next passage was the vertical shaft I’d mentioned earlier. I honestly hadn’t expected we’d find it so soon! In fact, with so many guards still on our tail, I’d been sure we’d never get to it at all!
Not bothering with the disguise this time, I grabbed Starlight in an awkward hug and flew her up. As I was leaving our passage out of sight, I caught a glimpse of the guards catching up to us. They had to have seen where we’d gone!
A couple of levels higher, I got into a passage on another side of the shaft and pushed Starlight into a burrow immediately to the opening we’d come through, then got in myself.
“What are you doing?” she protested. “Isn’t the throne room further up?”
“It is, but let’s confuse them a little... make them think we’re still ahead of them,” I whispered as a long buzzing sound filled the shaft.
I risked a peek out. I wasn’t sure if my plan was going to work; they could have realized the shaft was too long for us to have reached the upper end unseen by them, and by the sound of it, there were enough of them to search every passage that connected to the shaft! But, though that could still happen, I was relieved to instead see them fly on ahead without stopping! They hadn’t even asked themselves if they were going in the right direction!
But my relief was short-lived: where would all these guards end up? Either they would set up an ambush in the throne room itself, which would then probably be overcrowded with changelings to the point where they’d all have to turn into mice so they could let any more in, even if there weren’t any guards lying in wait there already, or they would figure out eventually that we’d gone elsewhere and spread out to search for us. I didn’t know which possibility was worse!
If only we hadn’t revealed ourselves to the fake Discord so readily! How could we have been so foolish to take him at face value after everything that had happened?
“Are they gone?” Starlight whispered after the buzzing had stopped.
“I think so, but let’s stay here a little longer in case they decide to come back immediately.”
We waited some more, but either they weren’t going to return, or were taking some other path, possibly in smaller groups so they could cover more passages. Eventually we agreed there was little point in remaining hidden. Our friends needed our help, and we were bound to get caught if we stayed put! Moving on at least felt like we were making progress, even if we were going to get captured anyway!
I flew Starlight the rest of the way up the shaft. We got into the uppermost passage just fine, but that changed after turning just a few corners: we ran into another team of guards, not as big as that swarm from a little earlier, but still of considerable size. They reacted instantly, and we backtracked to the nearest gate, where we switched to another corridor, only to be met with another team of guards! These reacted marginally more slowly, giving us a few seconds’ head-start in an opposite direction, but the ones from the previous tunnel hadn’t given up and were still dangerously close!
Tunnel after tunnel, we picked up more and more guards on our tail. Some of them must have been the same ones from the ambush earlier, I realized. It made little difference, though; we couldn’t outrun them all, and there didn’t seem to be a way around them anymore! We were going to get captured any second!
We were running blindly and randomly by now; with so many guards on to us, no plan would have worked. We were just delaying the inevitable! But when a hole suddenly opened in the ceiling of another of the many tunnels we’d switched to, I grabbed Starlight and flew her through it, fully expecting to end up in the middle of another, maybe even bigger, swarm; but, miraculously, that passage was empty, and so were the few branching off from that point!
Finally!
We weren’t in the clear, though; the hole we’d flown through had remained open and the buzzing of wings suggested that the swarm had followed us to the upper level, but by then, we were out of sight and they had to either take a guess where we’d gone to or split up. Not an ideal situation, but still marginally better than a minute earlier, or so I hoped!
By now, Starlight had gotten pretty used to the hive and seemed to be beginning to understand it, so much that she would sometimes decide to randomly switch to a different passage without needing my input. So when she did it again in one of these passages, I wasn’t at all surprised to see her do it, and went after her… only to collide with a wall. The gate she’d gone through had disappeared right in front of me!
I was momentarily lost. Had she realized I wasn’t with her anymore? Would she have gone far? How would I find her? Would I find her with so many guards hunting for us?
Should I even try to reunite with her? Or would that risk getting us both caught?
Would we actually stand a better chance if we were together?
If only Pharynx were here! If I could ask him, maybe he would tell me what kinds of ambushes and traps he’d set up for us ahead! Maybe he would even give me a hint on how to avoid them!
Or would he? The hive had always been a priority for him; not even protecting me had come above that! Why had I been so sure he would side with me now?
The sound of approaching guards snapped me out of it. I had to get away, but couldn’t leave Starlight behind! She couldn’t have gone far; we may still be able to reunite! She could be looking for me, even!
If I could disguise myself convincingly, it might solve the problem, I decided. I almost became a rock, but stopped myself when I realized that I might get trampled by the swarm and thus revealed when I couldn’t maintain the disguise any longer, or that a guard could take me along in case I might become useful for throwing at… well, at me. A discarded weapon or helmet wouldn’t fare any better: it would likely cause immediate suspicion, and so would a lone soldier!
Only one other thing came to mind, but it would be awfully tricky.
I’d never tried such a disguise, but it had to be possible!
I got up on the ceiling and completed the transformation just barely in time before the swarm of guards came rushing around the corner; all they saw was an extinguished lamp with a snake inside it among many other lamps, most of them still glowing, and none of them paid it a second glance.
Of course, I’d had no time to create an actual cocoon. That was part of me, and the snake had been the first form I’d thought of at the moment. I would have preferred to recreate the glow somehow, too, but I didn’t know of a way to mimic it, other than filling the hole in myself with actual slime, which, even if I’d had enough time to produce enough of it, might have pushed me into unconsciousness and thus removed my disguise, and anyway, my assumption that one lamp among many others was hardly noticeable had proven correct.
I was glad I’d opted against being a rock. With so many guards, I would have been trampled into unconsciousness for sure!
I was about to become myself again when another swarm marched underneath me… and another, and one more. Whether they were there by routine or because of rumors of Starlight and me having been seen in the area, I didn’t know, but it didn’t matter by now. They were there long enough for me to realize that I shouldn’t expect Starlight to come back. Either she’d moved on without me, determined for at least one of us to reach the throne room… or had been captured. It made no difference; she would need my help either way!
As soon as I was fairly sure that no more guards were around, I dropped my disguise, then reconsidered and adopted the likeness of a guard once again. I would stand out, being alone when all the others were teamed up, but hopefully I’d stand out less than in my own form! And though I’d scare Starlight again if I reunited with her after all, I was sure she’d understand and forgive me!
Ironically, now that I looked like one of them, no guards were anywhere to be found in any of the passages I took. At first I was merely relieved to finally be left alone, but over time, I developed an uneasy feeling about it. Had I been discovered despite the disguise? Was I walking into a trap? But what could they have disguised themselves as? No objects were scattered about, and all the lamps were glowing! They couldn’t have blended into a wall!
Where was everyling?
Soon enough, upon hearing muffled voices and tracking them to their source, I knew the answers.