Rivers jerked awake in the darkness. “They’re here!” she screamed aloud in the dark room. “They found me!”
Daring Do braced a hoof against the blue mare. “No, no one’s here.” She reached out a hoof to find the lantern. Her hoof brushed the metal handle and she brought it over to her. Daring let go of the thrashing mare to light the wick. She was very glad she had decided against a firefly lamp. They worked well and didn’t need oil, but after a while the fireflies tended to die, and you couldn’t relight a firefly.
The lantern lit up, bringing both Daring and the panicking mare into contrast. Rivers gazed up at her. The blue mare’s irises were once again swollen to the size of bits and her face was contorted with fear. “I fell asleep,” she gasped. “I fell asleep. I’m dead aren’t I?”
“No,” Daring reassured. “I watched over you, you’re okay.”
Rivers looked around the lantern-lit chamber fearfully. “I’m okay?” She asked in fear and awe. The mare examined herself.
“Yes.” Daring had almost no doubt about it now. This mare was crazy. She must have suffered something incredibly traumatic to be reduced to levels such as this. Rivers jumped at every sound, sometimes when there weren’t any sounds at all. She sat up and looked at Daring. “Are you okay?” she pressed. She layered the word ‘okay’ with unmasked suspicion.
“I’m pretty sure,” Daring replied with a scrunch of her brow, not sure how to react to the question.
“Let me check you,” Rivers insisted forcefully. She stood up and looked Daring right in the eye. Their noses were barely an inch apart.
Daring tried not to shy away, fearful of setting the mare off. “What are you doing?” she asked nervously.
“Checking you,” she replied evenly.
Daring took a fretful step backwards but the mare maintained the uncomfortably close distance. “You’re really creeping me out.” Daring noticed for the first time that Rivers had both a green eye and a blue one. The blue eye had gone cloudy around the edges.
Rivers never blinked. Daring thought the heterochromic mare was going to stare at her forever. Without warning, Rivers jerked forward with a strangled scream.
Daring gasped and backpedaled fearfully. “What the hay was that!?” she asked, clutching her pounding heart.
The blue mare nodded in approval. “I had to make sure.”
“Make sure of what?” Daring gasped. Her heart was beating in her head. She had never been expecting Rivers to leer at her like that. “Celestia, it looked like you were going to try and bite my nose off.”
Rivers spun in a slow circle, examining the beige chamber. “How long ago did you get here?”
“I’m guessing about eight or nine hours ago,” Daring replied. Rivers had slept for a while but Daring had held her word and stayed awake. This mare was off, but all her emotions were real. Whatever was happening—or whatever Rivers thought was happening—was no matter to be taken lightly. Daring didn’t know what to believe, but going along with it was the safe route to take. She was finding it hard to ignore anything the mare was saying. Rivers seemed so sure about what she spoke of. “How do we get out, Rivers?” she asked.
The blue mare tensed. “I don’t know. That’s what I’ve been trying to figure out.”
Daring frowned. “Well by now you must have explored nearly all the tunnels, right?”
Rivers shook her head fearfully. “I don’t know. The tunnels, they keep changing. Every day they’re different. I could feel my way around them in the dark. I measured paces. But every day they were different.” Daring found herself nodding in agreement. The way the corner she had rounded had disappeared, or how the diagonal tunnel had appeared out of nowhere, suddenly made a little more sense.
Daring shook her head violently, banishing the thoughts. “Are you telling me this temple is haunted?” she asked in attempted disbelief.
Rivers shook her head. “Not haunted. This place isn’t haunted... It’s something else.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Daring replied dismissively, “I don’t believe in ghosts.”
Rivers shook her head again. “No, not ghosts. It’s something else. But it’s not ghosts.” She trailed off, looking at Daring’s disbelieving expression. “You believe me don’t you?”
Daring felt almost sickened by the way the mare spoke. She was acting like a foal scared of reprimand. “I don’t know what to believe,” she replied carefully. Setting the mare off right now wouldn’t help either of them. “This place messes with my head. I just want to get out of here.”
“It messes with your head?” Rivers laughed. “You think it’s even come close to touching your head? Nope, not close at all. You want to see a brain touched pony. Look at me.” She smiled with mock cheeriness. Daring found the mare’s smile rather unnerving. Her gums were dried and bleeding. Her tongue resembled a dry dishtowel. Daring thought back to her supplies. She had packed two canteens of water. She had given Rivers a sandwich, but no water. She reached back and pulled one of the two canteens from her bag.
Rivers’ eyes followed the metal container with pure bliss. “Is that for me?” she gasped. Daring nodded. The mare snatched the can from her and unscrewed the lid with her teeth. She was about to take a drink when she stopped herself. More slowly, she took a small sip of water. “Don’t want to slam it,” she voiced aloud. “After severe dehydration, rapid intake of liquids usually induces vomiting.”
Daring nodded approvingly. “Nice to know you know your stuff.”
She took another careful sip of water. “I didn’t survive this long off of luck.” Daring was glad the mare seemed to have more control of herself now. She was no longer spouting nonsense or far-fetched tales, which seemed to be a good sign.
Daring yawned. Her eyes sagged and she wanted to do nothing more than curl up and sleep. But after what Rivers had said about falling asleep, she was scared to do so herself. Daring reached over and tightened the clamp on the lantern wick, restricting the flow of oil. She had brought two extra pots, but saving what she could wouldn’t hurt.
Rivers looked on fearfully. “Please don’t turn out the light,” she pleaded.
“I’m not,” she reassured. “I’m just saving oil.”
The mare shuddered. “I never want to be in the dark again.”
Daring nodded in understanding. This mare had spent days alone in the dark. That would be a traumatizing experience for anypony. She stood up, finding motivation to get moving. “Well, we’ve got to try and find a way out. There’s no way I’m just going to sit around and wait to die.” Daring was proud of how well she handled situations like this. Any other pony would freak out in this kind of a scenario, but not her. She was strong-minded and determined. Something like this wasn’t going to stop her.
“I’ve already tried,” Rivers insisted.
“I know that, but I want to try.” Daring looked at the mare, who was gazing almost pleadingly at her.
“It’s not worth it.” Rivers looked away. “I don’t want to go out there anymore.”
Daring had an idea, it was a little cruel, but it was necessary. “Well,” she said slowly. “I do have the lantern. And if I go without you then I’d be taking my lantern. Then you’d be left in the dark.”
Pure terror flashed in Rivers’ eyes. “You wouldn’t,” she gasped. “You can’t.”
“Look,” Daring bargained. “I’m going to try and find a way out whether you want me to or not. Now I would like you to come with me. But if you refuse to, I will go without you, and I will be taking my lantern.”
Rivers looked around the dully lit chamber. The pain in her expression suggested she was fighting with herself. She looked pleadingly at Daring. “Please,” she whispered. Daring shook her head and Rivers choked back a sob. She lowered her head, defeat showing in every line of her face. “I’ll go with you,” she finally murmured. “Celestia I don’t want to go anywhere. They find you when you move around, either that or you find them. Celestia I don’t want to. But I will, because you need my help. You won’t make it without me.”
Daring Do stood up. She then took lantern and fastened it to the saddlebags on her flank. Normally, when she was walking around alone, she would carry it in her mouth. She never needed to talk to ponies much, given the fact that she usually explored alone. But now that she was with another pony, it wouldn’t hurt to free up her mouth so she could speak freely.
She turned to Rivers. “Now you’ve been wandering around down here for days, what’s the best way to go?”
Rivers lowered herself to the ground. “There is no best way,” she whispered. Daring gave her a annoyed look. “Okay fine.” She pointed a hoof at a section of wall. “That door.”
Daring turned to look at the patch of wall. “What door…” she froze; there was a wooden door directly where the mare had been pointing. Daring found it out of place, considering temples like these normally didn’t have doors. “When did that door get there?” she asked.
Rivers shrugged. “It got there when we thought that it was there.”
Daring deadpanned. “This is really starting to annoy me. I don’t like any of this mysterious nonsense.”
“Me neither.”
Daring groaned inwardly. “Okay, let’s go down the new scary tunnel.” She started off slowly and Rivers, only semi-willingly, followed. This tunnel very faintly resembled the rest. The only difference was that a few glyphs were carved into the beige walls here and there. Daring read a few as they passed. They didn’t mean anything. The markings were nothing more than randomly placed words. She looked back at Rivers, who was trembling.
“Have you been down this tunnel before?” Daring asked.
“I don’t know,” Rivers replied. “You can’t tell in the dark.”
Daring felt bad for the mare. She felt bad for forcing Rivers to come with her. It had been cruel, but necessary. “Come on.” She motioned for the mare to move closer. “Walk next to me. I hate to see you slinking around back there.” Rivers nodded and quickened her pace until she walked in stride with Daring Do. The only sound was that of their hoof-falls.
Daring went over the factors in her head. She had one remaining canteen of water. In her bag was another wrapped sandwich, and four apples. In her current state, the food would last her a good three or four days. With Rivers on the other hoof, she’d be lucky to make two.
Daring wanted to scream. She couldn’t stand the silence anymore. “So how did you end up down here?” she asked Rivers.
Rivers sighed. “Heard about some temple that nopony had ever explored. Somepony was bragging about it, and I happened to be nearby. So I think, too good to be true, right?” Daring nodded. She had thought the same exact thing when she had heard about this place. “So I came here to find it. I heard the rumors about evil spirits and all this other paranormal nonsense. Obviously, I disregarded it completely. The next day I went down into the tunnels.” She hesitated, staring ahead down the passage. “I don’t really know what happened from there. And here I am,” she finished anticlimactically.
“Sounds about right.” Daring checked the lantern. At least she had plenty of oil. “Did this place start screwing with you the second you came down here?”
Rivers nodded. “Yep, at first I thought it was me. Then a wall ate part of my tail and I realized things were a little strange.”
Daring squinted at Rivers. “The wall ate your tail?”
“Yep,” she half-chuckled at the face Daring gave her. “Don’t ask how, but the wall took a bite of my tail.”
Daring shook her head disbelievingly. “Apparently, now walls eat tails… Now I really want to get out of here.” She looked around, disliking the silence. Normally, when she was along, silence was normal. But when two ponies are together in silence, the awkward factor sets in. She started whistling quietly as they rounded a gentle bend in the passage.
“Don’t do that,” Rivers commanded. Daring shot her an indignant look. “I’m listening for whatever there is to hear,” she finished quietly.
Daring Do returned her gaze to the tunnel ahead. “I’m bored.”
It was Rivers’ turn to glare. “Sure, because being bored while trying not to go crazy is perfectly normal.” She shot a nervous look back at something Daring hadn’t seen or heard. She looked back as well, to see nothing. Rivers continued. “I told myself I wouldn’t come back out into the tunnels; I told myself.” Daring realized the blue mare was talking to herself. “They almost got me the last time. Why would I come back out here?” She fixed her gaze at the wall, and then to Daring Do.
Daring had to choke back a gasp. Rivers’ eyes were nothing but black orbs. Her face was twisted and contorted, looking as if it were blowing away like sand in the wind. A low hum filled the air and the blue sand pony version of Rivers opened her mouth nearly as wide as her own head, letting out a scream in a note too low for pony vocals.
“Do you hear something?” Rivers asked.
Daring blinked. It was perfectly quiet. Rivers stood in front of her, head cocked and slightly worried. “N-n-no,” Daring managed to stammer. “Nothing.”
“What was that?” Rivers looked around wildly, having apparently heard something.
“What was what?”
Rivers shushed her. “There was a thing.” The mare lowered herself low to the ground and looked up at the ceiling.
Cobwebs hung from the stone above; but Daring didn’t see, or hear, anything out of the ordinary. “Not following,” she told the mare.
Rivers shrank even lower to the ground. “Hide,” she whimpered.
Daring frowned. “What are you—” Her sentence was cut short by a mouthful of sand. In no less than a second, wind filled the small passage. Daring braced herself against the turbulent force. She spit out another mouthful of sand and took a forced step forward. Forward travel would be impossible at this rate. It was like standing in a wind tunnel.
“Daring!” came the voice of Rivers over the whistling of wind.
She turned to look for the mare. Daring spotted her, huddled against a wall, face turned away from the sand blizzard. Daring closed her eyes against the wind. Sand filled her ears and nose caused her eyes to burn. “Rivers!” she shouted back. “What’s going on!?”
“They found us!” she screamed, turning her head away from the wall. Her face was pale and contorted. “It’s your fault! You made them find me!”
Daring took a step towards Rivers, who scooted away. “You’re dangerous!” she screamed. “You made them find me!”
“What are you talking about!?” Daring took another step towards the mare. A gust of wind swirled around her flank and snuffed out the flame of her lantern. She was immediately cast into darkness. Rivers screamed from ahead.
“Turn it back on!” she shrieked. Her voice was shrill and panicked. “Turn it back on now!”
Daring dug in her pocket for a match; but the hungry wind sucked it out of her mouth. Rivers’ frantic cry sounded again. The wind whipped away her voice, making it sound as if the mare were further down the tunnel.
“I’m trying!” Daring yelled. She fumbled for another match. Finally, she got good hold of it and lay down in the tunnel. She struck the match on the ground and sheltered the fragile flame in the crook of her body. She pulled open the door of the lantern and lit the wick.
“Rivers! We need to get out of here!” Daring stared, wide eyed, at where the mare had been. “Rivers?” Her stunned words were swept away by the noisy wind. “Rivers! Where are you?” She spun in a frantic circle, to no avail.
There was no response. Daring pulled the lantern from her side and swung it around frantically. The wind took hold of the fragile flame and threatened to snuff it out again. She lowered the lantern back to the stone floor and sheltered it with her body. After a moment, the wind subsided to be replaced by stunned silence. A light ringing filled her ears. It was the ringing that could only be heard in a state of pure silence, where the feedback from the eardrum to the brain becomes noticeable.
“Rivers?” Daring whispered, wincing as her voice echoed loudly around the room. She blinked. A room, she was in a room. She had just been in a hallway. Now she was in a large room.
And it was magnificent.
The ceiling loomed a towering fifty feet above. Giant stone arches supported it. Wall sconces all around the large room lit up the walls. Four standing sconces were set perfectly in the floor so as there was scarcely a dark spot to be seen. But the best part was the treasure. Despite her terrifying experience, she cried out triumphantly. The walls were lined with heaps of treasure. Coins, goblets, swords, anything that could possibly be crafted from gold was here in this chamber. She trotted over to a heap of flashy treasure and examined a goblet. The base was encrusted with red rubies.
“Rubies,” she muttered. “It’s always rubies.” The whole worry of Rivers was pushed to the back of her mind with the new discovery. “This is amazing!” she exclaimed, digging through a pile of crafted coins.
A thought struck her. Usually, treasured items were kept in neat order, stacked on shelves or sorted into categories. Everything here had just been heaped into mismatched piles. She looked nervously around the room. Suddenly, this didn’t seem too great. With further inspection, she noticed the markings on the walls and the square outcrop of stone in the center of the room. The rusty remnants of what Daring could tell had been chains were bolted to the top of the stone. To be precise, shackles, the bracing still locked in the closed position.
She also noticed that this room lacked an exit, apart from a square hole in the ceiling above, directly in the center.
“Oh no,” she lowered herself to the ground. This was a ritual chamber, a chamber for the offerings of treasure. But judging from the remains of a pony shackled to the stone table, it wasn’t only for treasure.