The Dark made no sound as it came, but pulled and ate what sounds there were, so its coming was hailed by a growing silence, strangely muting Fen’s hurried footsteps and the brush of her hands along the walls.

  “Come on, come on! Where’s a door when you need one?” chanted Fen, her voice muffled and quickly swallowed by the Dark.

  I turned my senses backwards. Though I was pressed beneath Fen’s arm, I felt in that coming darkness not an absence, nor a void, but something with a shape and presence of its own. It was, as Fen had said, a Dark, a moving body of thickest shade. But I felt from it no malice, only an intent, a command, and it was Sweep.

  The thought of speaking to it had begun to form in my mind when Fen’s hand plunged into the wall. She fell to the floor, only half her body through the doorway.

  “Fen, get up!” I urged, for she seemed to be nearly senseless, slowly rising to her elbows and knees. “The Dark is coming! The Dark is -”

  But it was too late; the Dark was already upon us. It had no substance, only pressure, shoving us through the door before rushing past to flood the tunnel behind us in a torrent of heavy black. Yet it had no interest in us, and stayed confined to the tunnel. None of it spilled into the lesser darkness of this new place we had been forced into, where the stale silence felt more natural than the Dark’s hush.

  Fen groaned and flopped onto her back, and only then did I realize her exhaustion. I should have recognized the signs in her restless breath, her unsteady steps, the strain in her arm simply to keep me pressed to her side. That she had kept me safely tucked against her, though so tired, only deepened my fondness for her.

  By her breath, she seemed already nearly asleep. Reluctant to wake her, I couldn’t let her slip fully into sleep, not yet. “Fen,” I whispered, “we’re out of the tunnel! I don’t know where we are.”

  Fen lolled her head, then drew me up onto her chest. “Have a look around,” she lilted, “tell me what you see.”

  I nearly protested, for this place was entirely dark. But Fen’s hand moved, and from between a drowsy dance of her fingers, above the center of her palm, appeared a shimmering, golden feather. Even as her hand dropped, it remained aloft. And all along its central stem, each individual barb, glowing of itself, began to drift outwards, very slowly, carrying a gentle light in all directions.

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  Dumbstruck, I could only look. Not only was this the first time I’d witnessed the use of magic, it was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. I had little doubt Fen had learned it in her book, The Magic Initiate. And though I had no memory of what I had read within its covers, this magic was somehow familiar to me. I felt that, with time and effort, I might find it in myself, look it up, turn to the right page, and then…

  Fen snored faintly, pulling me from my reverie. Perched on her chest, I saw by the glow of the golden feather that her mind had seeped out of her features. An intuition came to me then, a sense of her dreams. I realized that ever since she had opened me, many dreams had lain in wait just beneath the surface of her mind, thickening her exhaustion. It was their doing to pull her into sleep so steeply, to submerge her in a tide of dreams. And now that they had claimed her, I knew she would not soon be released.

  I had failed to notice just how tired she was, and resolved to thereafter be more attentive to Fen’s well-being. With that in mind, I reflected upon her needs. Soon, she would need nourishment, and hydration, but even more critical at present was her safety, which now depended exclusively on me. And though I had little confidence in my own abilities, a strength welled in me from my sense of duty. I was now her guardian, and would do all in my power to keep her safe.

  I felt, for the first time, that I was on the cusp of adventure. It seemed to me that I was standing on a hill, for Fen’s robes were of dark green wool embroidered here-and-there with wildflower patterns. From atop this hill, I looked out into a new place, all for me to discover on my own. Though the feather’s barbs had not yet drifted far, I could see around us stacked boxes and sacks, bare wooden beams and rough stone walls, cobwebs and the distinct, musty smell of unbothered dust. And by Fen’s feet, within a dilapidated cabinet, was the hazy outline of the small doorway through which we had popped.

  This was a storage room, and yet I immediately found a thing of particular interest: beside a heap of jute sacks, stamped across the lowest box of a stack, was a writing, upside down with an arrow pointed to the floor. It was a simple thing to read, and yet it was my first encounter with writing in the wild world, not bound to a book, and I read it with relish: THIS SIDE UP.

  At once I was overtaken with indignity. The writing was there, bold and clear for all to see, and yet these simple instructions had been disregarded. The box had been placed the wrong side up! I was acutely aware of my limitations then, for I could do nothing to right this wrong. Compelled to lament this injustice, I found myself muttering the beginnings of a vow, as much to myself as to the world, “I’m sorry… One day, I will be able.”

  But it was as though my words had been a challenge to the world, for just then came from behind me a small, raspy voice.

  “Grab ‘er,” it said.

  And, “Take ‘er,” said another.

  I spun to see two pairs of greenish, leathery hands, half the size of Fen’s, reaching out from the cabinet to take hold of her feet.