Tyke awoke to silence.
Real silence, the kind he hadn't known in days. No whispers blooming behind his ears, no scraping husks, no dripping shadows. Just silence, soft and ordinary, blanketing him like a thin sheet.
He lay staring at the ceiling. It was plain wood, uneven planks nailed together with rust-brown heads, the sort you'd find in any roadside inn. He counted the knots. Seven, then three more he'd missed, then a crack running down the middle. Boring, safe.
His chest rose and fell in rhythm. Slowly. Calmly.
Alive.
He dared a laugh—short, bitter. "Hells," he muttered, covering his face with one hand. "Still here. Still me. You didn't get me, you bastards."
For a while he lay there, letting his pulse slow. The air smelled of old dust and candle wax. A draft pressed against his toes from under the blanket. His body hurt in a dozen places, but the hurts were ordinary: the throb of bruises, the sting of cuts, the ache of muscles not meant for sprinting down endless halls. Flesh-hurts. Real hurts.
Normal.
Safe.
He turned his head. The room was exactly as he remembered it. The crooked window. The table with one leg shorter than the rest. A stub of candle melted onto its surface. The iron rod he had ripped from the curtains leaned against the wall, right where he'd dropped it.
It was all there. Familiar.
Too familiar.
Tyke blinked.
The chair. Yes. Crooked back, one splintered rung. Exactly the same angle as when he'd fallen against it yesterday.
The crack on the wall. Same as before. He could trace its path with his eyes, a thin line running jaggedly toward the ceiling.
The candle. Half melted, the wax spill frozen in the exact curl he remembered.
Not a detail changed. Not a speck of dust disturbed.
Tyke sat up slowly, the blanket sliding from his chest. He frowned. "Wait."
He swung his legs over the side of the bed, bare feet meeting cold boards. He pressed down. No creak. The boards always creaked. He knew that sound. Last night they'd whined under every step. Now—silence.
Tyke's breath hitched.
He stood, walked to the table. Stared at the stub of candle. Reached for it, pinched the wick between his fingers. It bent. Cold. The stub didn't move, didn't crumble, didn't smear wax. Solid.
Wrong.
He snatched his hand back.
The window, then. He strode across, boots forgotten, toes numb on wood. He tugged the shutter open.
A wall of black met him. Not night sky. Not storm. Just black. A flat, endless pane of it, pressing against the glass. No stars. No moon. No reflection.
"Right," Tyke muttered, gripping the frame till his knuckles whitened. "So not a room. Not safety. Just another trick."
Behind him, the bed groaned.
He whirled, iron rod snatched up in both hands. The bed sat there, plain as ever, blanket twisted where he'd left it. But the groan hadn't been his imagination. The wood still shivered faintly, as if something beneath it had exhaled.
His skin prickled. The boards under his feet were warmer now, faintly throbbing, like a pulse.
"Don't," Tyke whispered. He backed away from the bed. "Don't you do this to me. I've had enough."
The crack in the wall stretched wider. Slowly. Smoothly. Not like plaster breaking, but like lips parting. From within came a faint breath.
Tyke's stomach clenched. He pressed his back against the window, iron rod raised, heart hammering so loud it drowned the silence.
The chair tipped. Its crooked leg stretched longer, bending like softened wax. It reached for him.
Tyke gagged, bile rising in his throat. He squeezed his eyes shut. "Not real. Not real. Not—"
Real enough, the voice bloomed.
He froze. His eyes snapped open.
The entire room stared back.
The knots in the ceiling planks—eyes, wide and round, blinking wetly. The candle's melted wax curled upward, lip-shaped, whispering words he could almost hear. The bed swelled and sighed, blanket rising like a chest full of breath.
Tyke staggered toward the door, clutching the rod like a talisman. He shoved the handle. Pulled. Pounded. Nothing. The door didn't so much as tremble.
Behind him, the crack spread further, yawning like a mouth. Hot air wafted out, carrying the smell of rot and iron.
Tyke spun, slamming his back against the door. "No," he hissed. "You're not fooling me. You're not a room. You're it. You're the Pit, aren't you?"
The floorboards swelled, pressing upward in waves, ripples of flesh beneath wood. The knots in the ceiling blinked faster. The crack widened into a grin.
We never left, the voice sighed, from everywhere at once. You never left. You thought you ran. You thought you escaped. But we are the walls. We are the floor. We are the bed that carried your sleep. We are in you, and around you. Always.
Tyke dropped to his knees, palms clamped over his ears. "Shut up! Shut up!"
But it didn't stop. The whisper spread through his bones, through his teeth, rattling his skull. The rod slipped from his hands and clattered uselessly.
The candle flared. A tongue of wax stretched upward, shaping into a hand. It reached for him, fingers dripping, grasping.
Tyke crawled backward, nails splitting against the boards. The window pressed into his spine. No escape.
The bed lurched forward, blanket spilling like a tide of cloth, rolling toward him. Beneath it, something heavy dragged itself across the floor.
Tyke's vision blurred with tears. His breath came in ragged gulps.
"This isn't—this isn't fair," he choked. "I got out. I got away!"
There is no away.
The crack yawned wider. From it spilled darkness, thick and crawling, spilling over the boards like tar. The smell of the pit—the endless hollow, the rotting husks—flooded the room.
And Tyke finally understood.
He had never left. Not the pit. Not the husks. Not the call.
The room was a mask. A skin the Pit wore to lull him. To give him the illusion of walls, of safety, of air that didn't stink of the abyss. He had been in its belly all along, pacing, praying, sleeping inside its flesh.
There was no inn.
There never had been.
Only the Pit.
The floor buckled beneath him. Boards split, peeling upward like brittle skin, exposing the black ooze pulsing beneath. The room groaned as though the whole structure inhaled.
Tyke scrambled toward the far wall, fingers clutching for anything solid. His nails dug into the plaster, tearing flakes away. Behind the plaster wasn't stone, wasn't timber—just slick darkness, like wet clay that writhed when he touched it. He yanked his hand back with a cry.
The rod clattered across the floor as the boards tilted. It rolled toward the widening crack. Tyke lurched after it, sliding, palms slapping against the trembling wood. He caught the iron rod just before it disappeared into the black fissure, clutching it to his chest like a child clings to a toy.
The whisper didn't laugh. That would have been easier. Instead it hummed, like a lullaby sung by something with no lungs.
Hold it. Swing it. Pretend you have teeth. It changes nothing.
Tyke's breath came in gasps, fast and shallow. He shook his head hard, sweat flying. "If you wanted me dead, I'd be dead already! You're playing—why? What do you want?"
The candle's wax hand stretched further, dripping to the floor, each drop sizzling as though falling into acid. Its fingers curled, crooked, reaching for his hair.
We want nothing. We only are. You are the one who wants. To live. To flee. To understand. That is why you bleed. That is why you break.
Tyke stumbled backward, rod raised. "Shut up! Shut—"
The wall split open behind him.
Not a crack. A mouth. Wide, gaping, filled with black mist that smelled of rot and metal. He teetered on the edge, the iron rod scraping against the boards.
And from the mist, voices rose.
Not the whisper. Different. Many.
"Tyke…"
His name. Spoken in tones he recognized. The merchant from the stairwell. The boy who had carried the rope. The woman with hair down her back. The husks.
They were speaking with mouths that no longer had lips, voices rattling like dry leaves in a storm.
"Tyke. Why did you leave us?"
He staggered, knees buckling. His gut twisted with bile.
"You—You were gone," he rasped. "You were gone!"
The black mist throbbed, and through it he saw them. Shapes—human once, now hollowed. They stood shoulder to shoulder in the void, eyes pits of white, skin flaking like ash. Their bodies slumped, but their heads jerked toward him, all in unison.
"Not gone," they hissed. "Never gone. The Pit keeps what it takes."
The wave of voices broke him. Tyke fell to his knees, iron rod rattling to the boards. His ears rang. His heart slammed so hard he thought it might tear free.
The figures in the mist shuffled closer. Their outlines warped, bending like reflections in oil. Some reached out hands—bone-thin, trembling, fingers ending in splinters of wood or wax or stone.
Tyke gagged, scrambling back. The boards beneath his palms pulsed wetly, soaking his hands in black slime.
"Stay away!" he shrieked. "I'm not— I'm not one of you!"
A laugh broke from the mist, dry and wheezing. It wasn't the husks. It wasn't the whisper. It was something deeper. Something older.
Not yet.
The wall-mouth snapped shut. The mist vanished, leaving only cracked plaster and silence.
Tyke collapsed forward, forehead against the boards. His chest heaved, dragging air into lungs that didn't seem to want it. He gagged, spat bile, and forced himself upright.
"Not… yet," he repeated hoarsely. He looked down at his slime-soaked hands. They trembled uncontrollably.
Not yet.
The room groaned again. The window burst inward, glass shattering without a sound. Beyond it wasn't black anymore—it was endless descent. The Pit stretched away, an infinite shaft of flesh and stone, walls pulsing with lightless veins. The air blew upward, hot and wet, carrying the stink of decay.
Tyke staggered toward the bed. It had become a ribcage now, pale arcs curving upward, blanket stretched between them like thin skin. The sight nearly broke him.
He clutched the iron rod tight. His knuckles bled.
"Fine," he rasped. His voice cracked, but he forced it louder. "Fine! You want me here, then here I am! But I'm not laying down like the rest. You hear me? I'm not feeding your belly. I'll rot standing before I crawl."
The floor pulsed. The knots in the ceiling blinked. The wax hand reached again.
And then—another voice.
Not the whisper. Not the husks.
Clear. Small. Human.
"Tyke?"
His breath froze. His head snapped toward the bed-ribcage.
A girl stood there. Seventeen, maybe eighteen. Dark hair clung to her shoulders, eyes wide with fright. Her skin shimmered faintly, as though she wasn't quite solid.
"Tyke," she said again. "You hear it too, don't you?"
He staggered back, rod raised. "What—what the hell are you?"
Her lip trembled. "Like you. Caught. I thought I had a room. A bed. Walls. But it was the Pit. It's always the Pit."
Tyke's chest hitched. His arms trembled under the weight of the rod.
The girl reached toward him, hand thin and desperate. "Please. Don't leave me here."
The room shivered around them, boards flexing, plaster peeling back into wet darkness. The Pit was closing its skin again, sealing them both inside.
Tyke's mind raced. He didn't know if she was real. Another trick, another husk, another lure. But her eyes—terrified, pleading—looked too much like his own reflection.
And in the Pit, even a trick was better than being alone.
He lowered the rod.
"Stay close," he whispered. "If it wants us, it'll choke on us both."
The girl nodded, stepping nearer. Her form flickered, just for a heartbeat, showing the void through her ribs. Then she was solid again, clutching his arm.
The whisper sighed through the boards, disappointed.
Two lights. Two little candles. Easier to snuff together.
Tyke gritted his teeth, dragging the girl toward the window, where the Pit yawned in endless descent.
"Then let's give it something worth choking on."
They leapt.
And the room peeled away into nothing.