Another Mother

by Croabadrake

Prologue: Arriving Alive

Electricity crackled lightly through the air in the dark, damp tunnel. After a few moments, a dim blue glow lit up the surroundings: in the darkness there was naught but stone and dirt… but there was something just outside the reach of the gathering energy. Something was embedded into the wall, and as the field of blue grew slowly the electricity eventually reached the small gem that lay untouched in the rock, barely visible sticking out of the wall.

The energy reacted and the field quickly moved to center itself on the gem. As though using it as a focus point, the energy gathered in closer to the gem, shrinking to cover it more densely with the energy. After a few moments, the field had expended itself to cover the gem in a solid ball of light. There was silence…

Lightning suddenly began flashing from the gem, striking the nearby walls and rocks. It homed in on other nearby gems that had not been dug out of the walls, and before long there was a small network of arcing electricity; a web of blue energy. The lightning stopped flashing and instead formed a solid, steady connection between each gem.

There was one final clap of thunder as the energy in the web suddenly drew inwards, into the tunnel. There was a bright flash and a series of thumps and thuds as a number of things were dropped into the dark tunnel. The light faded on a series of fourteen unconscious beings, all lying on the damp, cold stone floor.

Silence and darkness reigned in the tunnel once more.

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“Mm…… wha… what?” A voice broke through the silence of the tunnel, some time long after its owner’s arrival.
“What is… where am I!?”

The being rose, startled by the sudden change of scenery. It raised its left hand and extended its pinkie finger. Powerful magic began to emanate from it, and after a few seconds the being was cloaked in flames that lit up the large tunnel. As the flames began to die down and a steady glow settled in their place, the being looked about and got a hold of its surroundings.

It appeared to be in a tunnel. A mine of some sort? There were small chunks missing from some of the stone walls, indicating that someone had been digging there. Where…? A sound interrupted the being’s thoughts. There was groaning from the floor nearby. It moved to the familiar shape, startled by what it saw.

The being on the floor opened its eyes and looked up at the one standing over it. It reacted with shock at first, gasping at the sight.

“Mother?” It said in disbelief. Then… it began to smile. A huge grin broke out across its red face.
“Mother, is that you?”
“Yes, my child,” she replied. She had been as surprised as the being on the floor was at seeing it, but chose to spend her shock in silence. “Ichabod…”

The being on the floor leapt up and embraced its mother, lifting her off the ground. She was suddenly glad that the tunnel ceiling was high.

“Ichabod, you can put me down now,” she said smiling. It had been a long time since she had seen her son, and she had never expected to do so again.
Ichabod set his mother down on the floor and looked around at the other beings lying on the floor. “My brothers and sisters…” he said, confused. “…mother… are we…?”
His mother shook her head. “I don’t know. Does that mean that you, too…?”
Ichabod flinched when he realized that she didn’t know. “…yes” he replied after a shameful moment of silence.
His mother shook her head again before replying. “It doesn’t matter. We’re all together again, and that’s what matters.”

Ichabod nodded, smiling again. Together, the two began to wake Ichabod’s siblings. Most drew back in shock and fear at seeing Ichabod again, but his smile and their mother’s presence calmed them down before anyone reacted violently. When they were all awake, they all filed into an odd line in front of their mother as she looked over them.

“Hello again, my children…” she said after looking over the group. She seemed very happy to see them all, and that made them happy as well.
“So…” she said after a moment of happy silence. “Does anyone here know where we are?”
One of her smaller children spoke up. “Hell?”
His twin brother replied, “Hell’s supposed to be hot you idiot, and there’s no fire here!”
The first one reacted. “Oh yeah? Well aren’t you the smart one? Didn’t see that much cleverness in the fight with Ichabod!”
“What!? You died at the same time as I did!”
“Yeah, I was relying on YOU to watch my back!”

Their mother facepalmed as the argument continued. She had almost forgotten how much they all liked to fight with each other, a trait that was now showing itself once more as the rest of her children gathered around and encouraged the two to break out into a fist fight. While the two proceeded to try and beat each other senseless while shouting insults, their mother looked around the tunnel.

Upon observing the walls, she discovered that they had not been dug by ordinary tools, which surprised her as she had thought the tunnel to have been dug by dwarves or such. Instead, it looked like the walls, floor, and ceiling had all been shaped by claws. The claw marks were more visible in the spots where things seemed to have been dug out of the walls.

“You lame muddlet!” *smack!*
“You did NOT just call me that!” *pow!*
“Enough!”
The two fighting siblings stopped fighting and grumbled as they separated into the crowd of children.
“We’ll have to find our way out of these caves,” their mother continued. “Is everybody ready to go? We don’t know how far these caves go.”

There was a quiet murmur of agreement. “Then let’s get started,” she said as she began walking down the tunnel, having picked a direction at random and with her small herd of children following her.

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The group walked for several hours, taking breaks as needed. The herd followed their mother closely so that none would get lost intersections, and they talked amongst themselves in the meantime. The glow of her magic was enough to light up at least forty feet out into the darkness, which was more than enough to light up the width of the large tunnel as well.

“What do you think they mean?” one of the twins from the fight before asked his brother.
“What do you think what means?”
“What? What… mean?”
“What do you mean, what do you think they mean?”
“Mean? You mean… oh. You mean, what do you think.”
“No, I mean, what do you mean, what do you mean, you think?”
“…”
“…”

There was a moment of silence as the two contemplated the butchered conversation before the first one spoke up again.

“The pictures on the walls.”
“What?”
“The walls. Some of them have pictures carved or painted onto them.”
“Oh, those.”

The group stopped at a large clearing. Their mother intensified the glow to encompass the entire intersection of four tunnels and turned to her group.

“We’ll take another rest here. I think we’re almost out, so we should be well-rested by the time we exit. We don’t know where we are or what awaits us, so we should be ready to deal with anything.”
She looked upwards. “If we are indeed in the underworld, then what is above us will need to be dealt with with force, if that can even be done. If not, we may still be in Deltora and will have to deal with what I presume to be the united tribes. If that is the case, we’ll find a hiding place and come up with a plan later.”

She then waved for her following to disperse in the room and sat down, conjuring a small fire in the center. Several children sat down near her, warming themselves on it while the twins from before observed a wall.

“See?” The first one pointed out a carving on a wall.
The carving depicted a group of horse-like creatures, some with horns and some with wings. There were long lines cut through the picture, parallel to each other and running down the entire scene.
“Yeah, I see. It’s creepy.”
“Why do you think that?”
“I don’t know, it’s just something about those lines there. See how they rake across all of the horses?”
“Rake?”
“Rake.”
“We’re in a tunnel. Rake… shovel?”
“Shovel… digging. Digging the tunnels with a rake?”
“Rake cutting stone?”
“Shovel cutting stone.”
“I thought there was a rake.”
“Raked the stone with the shovel, you idiot!”
“Ohhhhh…… unless it wasn’t a shovel.”
“Not a shovel?”
“Maybe a hoe.”
“Nah, it had to have been a rake.”
“Why?”
“Rakes are sharp.”
“But rakes aren’t THAT sharp.”
“This one might’ve been.”
“How do you know?”
“The only other thing that rakes that hard other than a really sharp rake is claws.”
“Oh okay, so it has to be a rake because it couldn’t have……. been………..”

The two suddenly grew silent and looked back at the lines. Claw marks. Their faces grew pale, realizing the size of creature that would have to be digging these tunnels to cut stone with its claws.

“Do… d-do you think it’s a Vraal?” The second one asked.
“No… Vraals don’t dig like this, unless there’s something to kill that they’re digging towards…”
“What’s going on over here?” Their mother asked, suddenly behind them. She had apparently decided to join them in looking at the wall.
“GAH!”
“Don’t be afraid, it’s just me. I’ll protect you from anything down here, now what’s this about claw marks?”

The two pointed at the wall, where their mother saw the carvings. She recognized crudely-carved unicorns and pegasi, all seemingly traveling in a herd. She observed the claw marks; they were deeper than the rest of the carvings, indicating that they had been done without care for detail and were more than likely a spur-of-the-moment addition. Anger, maybe?

There was a gasping noise down one of the hallways that caught the attention of everyone in the room. The woman and her children quickly gathered in front of the tunnel, the children beside their mother ready to fight rather than hiding behind her. The woman raised her finger towards the noise and sensed something in the darkness, beyond the glow of her light spell.

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Digging once more, ah it feels good!
I think I left a few gems down here, but I’m not sure if they’re of good enough quality for the queen…
Ah well, it should be a good snack at least. Nothing goes to waste down here, heheh.

“Do… d-do you think it’s a Vraal?”

What? Was that a voice!? Who could be down here, and what’s a Vraal?
I don’t recognize the voice…

“No… Vraals don’t dig like this, unless there’s something to kill that they’re digging towards…”

…I don’t think that’s any changeling. It’s coming from over in this direction….
……………………light… there’s light over here. What is—
WHAT IN THE NAME OF THE DEAR QUEEN ARE THOSE THINGS!?

Comments

[BronyKing]

best crossover ever

[TheJackalPony]

Deltora quest crossover?
Must read.

[ultra8]

Okay you get a thumbs up just for using Sorceress Thaegan.

[ShadowCelebi]

Deltora crossover? INSTA FAVORITE AND LIKE.

[Razzy]

Huh, never heard of the Deltora books before, might have to check them out.

[Fizzyberries302]

*Sees thumbnail* Instant fav for Deltora Quest!!!!