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I have been here before.
A sea of fog spreads out around me as far as I can see, the coping above milky with how many layers of spells I have put up to keep this place hidden. My mind strains from maintaining the illusion. How much easier it is to call upon the Deep, with runes and chants to buoy you, the Tablets like stepping stones under your feet; here, in this white silence, I float unmoored without direction.
Only my worm knows my secret—but it will not tell anyone, for it knows I am, still, its only viable hope for survival. There are none other at the top of this chain who could bear to fill its gaping maw, and once it devours me and emerges, Oryx will slay it with one swing of his sword because he was stronger than Akka and is stronger than me. (Even now as I think this, I feel its hungry teeth sink into my flesh.) And so it will remain with me in this secret covenant, as I continue to struggle to hide my schemes from it, and in this struggle feed it by testing my cunning.
I have been here before. I feel the cold scales of a dragon’s hide wrapped around my shoulders, and know such artefacts are meaningless here—but still it is a grounding, a compass point to reference the directions, and anchored by this sensation I lean into the silence. It feels like a gasp of air, cool and fresh, with no scent at all. It terrifies me.
But I push this terror aside, because all new things are both frightening and thrilling, and many a border have I crossed pursuing the mystery that is the unknown. There is a tang of delight in the anxiety, fuel for the curious mind, and I chase it and let it propel me. I must understand it, in order to outwit it. My worm must feed.
I close my eyes, fearing the pressure of my thoughts will push out the silence. The sea of fog laps around me, and, slowly, I let myself sink.
I have been here before.
I do not know how to call upon it, untethered and aimless with no language to grasp on—but there are furious questions on my mind, and so I ask them, I speak them into being only to force them out like a persistent splinter. In no particular direction, I say,
“Who are you?”
Oryx said once the Deep is majestic. This—I do not know what it is like, but suddenly I can see it, I see it above me clear and unobscured by the fog. My worm trembles. It too can feel it, like a blade pressed against its taut skin, and for a moment all is silent around and within me. Carried by the tide, looking up at the shape above me, I feel calm.
As I break surface and emerge from the fog, I hear my own question repeated, brushing against the furthest edges of my mind.
Who are you?