Chapter — The Call
The room was breathing.
At least, that was how it felt to Tyke as he sat on the edge of the rough bed, staring at the crack in the plaster wall. It inhaled with the faint draft that seeped through the slit in the window, and it exhaled with the hollow thrum in his skull. The walls seemed to press closer with every pulse of silence, like lungs tightening around him.
He had been pacing earlier. Pacing, muttering, gnawing at the inside of his cheek until he tasted iron. But the pacing hadn't calmed him, so he had sat. And now, sitting, he felt it—
a shiver not of the body but of the mind.
A tug, like an invisible hand had plucked a string deep in his chest, vibrating through his ribs and teeth and bones. It wasn't a sound, not exactly, and yet it carried the gravity of a bell tolling across an empty city.
Come.
The call was naked, without words, and yet his marrow understood it.
Tyke rose so suddenly that the chair toppled behind him, clattering on the wooden floor. His breath came short and fast, his palms damp. He pressed them against his temples as if he could keep the summons from echoing, but the vibration only spread deeper, through every chamber of him.
He had heard rumors. Whispers, traded by half-drunk men near dying fires, about something buried beneath the surface of ability. A center, a root, a mouth that eats and feeds. They said when it stirred, those marked with power were unable to resist. Some called it the Gathering. Others called it the Pit. Few ever explained in more than half-sentences before their eyes drifted elsewhere, unwilling to name the thing aloud.
Now, Tyke understood why.
The call wasn't a voice. It was a pull, raw and magnetic, dragging at every hidden thread inside him. His stomach twisted; his shadow lengthened unnaturally, stretching along the floorboards, as though eager to obey.
"No," he muttered, staggering back. "No, no, not me. I didn't ask— I didn't—"
The window rattled. The air thickened, pressing at his ears. For a moment he thought someone else was in the room with him, standing at his back. He spun, fists raised—nothing. Only the bed. Only the peeling walls. Only his own panting breath.
Then came the sound.
A creak like an ancient hinge turning where no door existed. It didn't come from outside—it came from inside his skull. Something opening, groaning, ancient. And from beyond that creak: whispers.
Not human whispers. Too many, too layered, too sharp at the edges. They hissed like teeth scraping stone, thousands of them at once, all murmuring beneath the threshold of meaning.
Tyke's knees weakened. He pressed his forehead to the cold wood of the door, willing himself to stay put, to resist. But his legs betrayed him. His body moved before his mind consented, his hand clutching the knob and twisting.
The corridor outside was empty, washed in a dim, sickly glow that had no source. He stepped into it.
And the door closed itself behind him with a soft, final click.
The hallway stretched longer than it should have, bending into a narrow throat. The lamps that usually burned with steady flame flickered green, coughing shadows across the walls. Tyke tried to slow his pace, to dig his heels into the stone, but the call gnawed at his chest, pulling him forward.
The air tasted of iron and mildew.
He wasn't alone.
Others were emerging. From the doors that lined the passage, figures drifted out, their eyes glassy, their movements jerky like marionettes tugged by the same hidden string. Some he recognized—faces of the inn's guests, travelers with odd eyes or crooked scars that marked them as ability-bearers. Some he didn't. A woman with hair trailing to the floor, matted with dark fluid. A boy no older than twelve, dragging a broken hand that swung loose at the wrist.
None spoke. None even blinked.
They shuffled forward together, a grotesque procession. The silence was worse than a scream.
Tyke's breath rattled. He wanted to break from the line, to run, but his feet refused. His veins burned with compulsion. His chest felt as if invisible fingers were twisting his heart, puppeteering each step.
The corridor narrowed further, swallowing them one by one into its maw. The air grew colder, until every exhale poured fog.
At last, the hall spat them into a stairwell descending into blackness. The steps were steep, slick with something he dared not name. No lanterns lit the way, yet every one of them stepped in unison, their eyes reflecting a faint phosphorescence like drowned fish.
Down they went. Deeper and deeper, the call hammering louder inside their skulls.
With every step, Tyke felt pieces of himself shedding. His sarcasm, his doubt, his humor—falling away like flaking paint, leaving only a hollow vessel.
And beneath it, fear.
Raw, rattling fear that this wasn't a summons but a harvest.
By the time the stair ended, Tyke's lips were trembling with prayers he didn't know he remembered. The chamber they entered was enormous, a cavern cut into the earth. Its ceiling vanished into shadow. Its walls pulsed faintly, veined like living flesh, as though the stone itself breathed.
In the center of the chamber was the source.
A pit.
Perfectly circular, rimmed with carvings that writhed when he tried to focus on them. The blackness inside was absolute, yet it shimmered as if it contained movement—like a sea too deep to fathom, shifting with unseen tides.
The call thundered from that pit, louder now, vibrating through marrow and soul.
The procession circled it. One by one, the ability-bearers dropped to their knees, eyes rolling back, mouths opening to release thin threads of light that streamed into the pit. Their bodies convulsed, drained, shriveling like fruit left too long in the sun.
Tyke staggered, bile burning his throat. He wanted to scream, but his jaw locked. The call was in him, begging release, clawing its way upward, demanding to tear out of his chest and feed the thing below.
Resist.
For a split second, he thought the word was his own. But no—too sharp, too alien. A voice not from the pit, but from somewhere within him.
"El Como?" Tyke whispered. His own voice cracked. "Is it—?"
Silence.
No answer. Only the pit's hunger.
Tyke's knees buckled as if some invisible hand had pressed him downward. The stone floor was wet beneath him, slick with a cold film that soaked through his trousers. Around him, the others swayed in rapture, their faces twisted in ecstasy and agony both. Their mouths poured streams of light into the pit—thin, shimmering threads, like their very souls were being unwound.
The cavern echoed with the whispers again, but louder now, as if the pit itself was speaking through a thousand mouths. The language was wrong. It scraped. It folded. It bled meaning without ever forming words. And yet, Tyke knew what it wanted.
It wanted him.
His chest ached with pressure, as though something inside was swelling, ready to burst free. His jaw clenched, fighting to keep it in. His veins burned with white fire. The call urged him to open, to surrender, to give.
"No," Tyke croaked, teeth grinding. "You can't— You can't have me."
He pushed against the compulsion, body shaking, eyes wide and streaming. His vision swam; the cavern blurred, colors bending. The pit pulsed, sending waves through the floor. The ground quivered like muscle beneath skin.
One of the kneeling figures collapsed beside him. The woman with floor-length hair gave a dry gasp, then crumpled like paper. Her husk folded in on itself, brittle, empty. The thread of light that had been her essence snapped, sucked hungrily into the abyss.
Tyke flinched. The stench of decay spread, thick and sweet, burning the back of his throat.
The pit laughed. Not with sound, but with sensation. A rolling, gurgling delight that echoed through his marrow. It savored. It celebrated.
Tyke's hands clawed at his own chest, nails raking through fabric, through skin. He felt as though something inside him—something deeper than blood—was trying to escape. His fingers curled tight, leaving half-moon gouges.
Let go, the pit urged.
Give.
"No!" Tyke screamed. His voice cracked, raw with terror and defiance. "I am not your food!"
The others didn't hear. They kept offering, kept unraveling themselves into the pit. Their lights thinned, dimmed, flickered out. Their corpses slumped forward like dolls.
Tyke's heart thundered. Every pulse was a hammer striking his ribs. He swayed, teeth chattering, jaw aching with the effort to resist. His eyes darted around the cavern, desperate for some anchor, some reason not to collapse into the abyss's demand.
And then he saw it.
Across the pit, standing apart from the others, was a figure.
A tall shape, wrapped in a cloak too dark to be natural, its folds absorbing even the faint phosphorescent glow of the chamber. The hood shadowed its face entirely, yet Tyke felt its eyes drilling into him. Unlike the rest of the summoned, this one did not kneel. It stood, arms crossed, head cocked slightly, watching.
Tyke's breath hitched. He wanted to call out, but no sound left his throat. His mind, however, screamed a question: Who are you?
The figure tilted its head further, as though it had heard.
Then, slowly, it raised one hand and pointed. Directly at Tyke.
The compulsion surged. His mouth flew open against his will, light spilling up his throat like bile. Panic shot through him—he clamped down, gagging, choking, thrashing on the stone floor.
The pit trembled in irritation. Its hunger clawed harder, slamming against his chest, demanding release.
And then—
Resist.
The word returned, sharper this time. Louder. Not the pit. Not the hooded figure. From inside his head, buried under layers of fear. A voice like oil on water.
"El Como?" Tyke rasped aloud, clutching his throat. "If it's you— say something!"
No response. Just the echo of his own voice. Just the grinding whispers of the pit. Just the call, relentless.
But the word had given him a sliver of leverage.
He latched onto it like a drowning man clings to driftwood.
"Resist," he whispered to himself, over and over, mantra-like, grinding the syllables through clenched teeth. "Resist. Resist. Resist."
His body convulsed with the effort. His stomach lurched; his muscles spasmed. Every nerve screamed to surrender, to let the light pour free, to end the agony. But he kept his jaws locked, kept his chest tight, sweat flooding his skin.
The pit roared inside him now. A void, furious, starving. The cavern shook with its temper. Cracks spiderwebbed across the stone, dripping black ichor.
All around, the last of the summoned gave up their essence, crumbling into husks. The air grew colder, thicker, choked with the stink of rot.
Tyke remained.
One flickering light still sealed inside him. One refusal in a sea of surrender.
The hooded figure across the pit lowered its hand. For a moment, Tyke thought it was disappointed. But then—it nodded. Slowly. Almost approvingly.
The pit hissed.
Its hunger collapsed inward, pulling harder, turning desperate. The pull became so violent Tyke thought his spine might snap, that he'd be ripped from himself entirely. His vision went black at the edges. His ears rang.
And then—
Something answered the pit.
Not Tyke. Something else.
From the far corners of the cavern, shapes stirred in the darkness. Not human shapes. Things like silhouettes carved from ash and smoke, limbs too long, heads faceless. They slithered down the walls, their forms shifting as though deciding what to be. Their bodies writhed with whispers.
They gathered at the rim of the pit. Dozens of them. Hundreds. Leaning, bending, watching. Their eyeless faces tilted toward Tyke.
The pit's hunger became laughter again.
The shadows began to chant.
The sound was unbearable—metal scraping bone, glass shattering in water. Tyke clapped his hands to his ears, but it was inside him, rattling his teeth, burrowing through his veins. His body trembled, on the edge of breaking.
And through it all—
Resist.
A hiss in his skull. A grin without a mouth. The whisper of El Como—or the memory of him—coiling in his brain like smoke.
Tyke's lips bled from how hard he pressed them shut. His fists cracked against the stone. He howled without opening his mouth, rage and terror twisting inside him.
And still—he resisted.