# Chapter 193: Into the Grey
The grey dust of the wastes coated Soren's tongue, a fine, abrasive powder that tasted of ancient death. The door to Haven ground shut behind them, the sound swallowed by the vast, oppressive silence. Before them lay a world of monochrome, a rolling plain of ash and skeletal rock under a sky the colour of a fresh bruise. Kestrel didn't hesitate, pulling a scarf over his mouth and nose and setting a brisk pace. "Stay on my tracks," his muffled voice warned. "The ground looks solid, but there are glass-pits and sinkholes that'll swallow you whole." Grak grunted in agreement, his eyes scanning the horizon with a blacksmith's critical gaze. Piper, however, had frozen, her head cocked, her wide eyes fixed on a distant ridge. "Kestrel," she whispered, her voice thin with terror. "What's that sound?" For a moment, Soren heard nothing but the wind. Then, a faint, rhythmic *thrumming* vibrated through the soles of his boots, a sound that felt less like a noise and more like a pressure building inside his skull. Kestrel's face, already grim, went pale. "That," he said, his voice devoid of its earlier confidence, "is the sound of us being hunted."
"Move!" Kestrel's command was a sharp bark, cutting through the rising dread. He broke into a loping, ground-eating run, his body low to the ground. Soren and the others followed, their boots sinking ankle-deep into the fine, powdery ash with every step. The air was cold and thin, searing their lungs despite the scarves wrapped around their faces. The thrumming grew louder, a resonant hum that seemed to emanate from the very ground beneath them, a predator's purr that promised a swift, violent end. Soren's hand went to the hilt of his sword, the familiar leather a small comfort in this alien landscape. He risked a glance back. The ridge where Piper had first spotted the disturbance was now crowned with a shimmering heat haze, and within it, shapes moved, vast and indistinct.
Kestrel veered sharply, leading them toward a jagged tear in the earth that looked like a wound. "The canyons!" he yelled over the rising wind. "It can't follow us there!" They plunged into the shadowed maw of the chasm. The temperature dropped instantly, the air growing heavy and still. The walls of the canyon were a twisted tapestry of layered rock and petrified wood, the remnants of a world drowned in fire. The thrumming faded to a low, menacing echo, then died away entirely, replaced by the sound of their own ragged breathing. They were in a labyrinth of stone and shadow, the sky a thin, grey ribbon far above.
"Don't relax," Kestrel gasped, leaning against a wall of obsidian-like rock. "That was a Glass-Wyrm. They hunt by vibration. The canyon walls will mask our scent and our steps, but this place has its own teeth." He pointed with a gloved finger. Soren followed his gaze to the canyon floor. It wasn't solid rock, but a mosaic of crystalline formations, some as clear as glass, others as dark as obsidian, all of them sharp and treacherous. "Glass-pits," Kestrel explained. "The Bloom's energy superheated the sand. One wrong step and you're impaled or falling into a nest of who-knows-what."
Grak knelt, tapping one of the dark formations with the haft of his axe. It rang with a dull, solid chime. "This is stable. The clear ones are brittle. And the green ones..." he paused, pointing to a patch of formations with a faint, sickly luminescence, "...they weep a corrosive acid. Stay clear." The dwarf's practical assessment grounded Soren, pushing back the nebulous fear. This was a problem that could be solved with caution and observation.
They moved on, a single-file line of extreme care. Kestrel led, his eyes constantly scanning the path ahead, his movements fluid and certain. Piper followed him, her small frame allowing her to navigate the treacherous footing with a nimble grace that defied her earlier terror. Grak came next, his heavy steps deliberate, his gaze fixed on the ground itself, a living geiger counter for unstable terrain. Soren took the rear, his senses stretched to their limit, watching their back and the sky above. The silence of the canyon was absolute, a pressure that made every crunch of boot on crystal sound like a thunderclap.
Hours bled into one another. The grey ribbon of sky above began to deepen, the bruised purple darkening towards black. The air grew colder still. They passed the skeletal remains of a creature so vast its ribcage formed a natural archway over the canyon, each bone as thick as a tree trunk and fused with the rock around it. Soren ran a hand over the surface. It was smooth, cold, and unnervingly like porcelain. A monument to a forgotten age of titans.
"We need to find shelter," Kestrel announced, his voice flat with fatigue. "Night in the open is a death sentence. The chill isn't the worst of it. It's what the chill wakes up." He scanned the canyon walls, his eyes tracing the lines of rock and shadow. "There. An old watchtower. Pre-Bloom, by the look of it. Might be intact."
He pointed to a point where the canyon walls converged, a narrow defile dominated by a stone structure that seemed to grow from the rock itself. It was a crumbling cylinder, perhaps thirty feet in diameter, its top sheared off as if by a giant's sword. It was a relic from another world, a defiant finger raised against the grey desolation. As they drew closer, Soren could see the carvings on its surface, worn smooth by centuries of abrasive wind. They depicted figures in armour, their faces turned to the sky, their hands raised not in prayer, but in what looked like defiance.
The entrance was a dark, gaping hole, partially blocked by a fallen slab of rock. Grak put his shoulder to it, his muscles bunching with effort. With a groan of protesting stone, he shifted it just enough for them to squeeze through, one by one. The air inside was stale and heavy with the scent of dust and dry rot. It was a single, circular room. A spiral staircase, its iron steps rusted through in places, coiled up into darkness. The floor was littered with debris—shards of pottery, the rusted remains of armour, and brittle, unidentifiable bones.
"Up top," Kestrel decided. "Better vantage point. Only one way in or out this way." He started up the stairs, testing each step before putting his full weight on it. Soren followed, his hand on the pommel of his sword, every nerve ending tingling with anticipation. The tower felt like a tomb, a place of profound silence and ancient sorrow. He could almost feel the echoes of the soldiers who had once manned this post, their lonely vigil against an enemy they couldn't have possibly imagined.
They emerged onto the flat, broken top of the tower. The wind was a constant, mournful presence here, whipping their cloaks and tearing at their hair. The view was a panorama of desolation. The canyons snaked away into the gloom like cracks in a broken plate. In the distance, the skeletal shapes of ruined cities clawed at the darkening sky. There was no sign of the Glass-Wyrm, but the feeling of being watched, of being a tiny speck of life in a world that hungered for it, was overwhelming.
Grak and Piper began to clear a space for a small, smokeless fire, using scavenged bits of dry timber from the tower's interior. Kestrel was already at the edge of the parapet, a small, brass spyglass to his eye, scanning the surrounding darkness. Soren stood in the centre of the space, his hand resting on the cold stone. He thought of Nyra, of Bren and Lyra, of the faces of the people he had left behind in the warm, living heart of Haven. He had made a choice. He had led them into this grey hell. The weight of that responsibility settled on him, heavier than any armour.
A sudden, sharp sound from below cut through his thoughts. It wasn't the wind. It was a distinct, scraping noise, like claws on stone. Soren drew his sword, the rasp of steel breaking the silence. Grak and Piper froze, their eyes wide. Kestrel lowered his spyglass, his expression grim.
"Company," he whispered, his voice barely audible over the wind.
The scraping sound was joined by another, then another. It was a chorus of skittering, coming from all sides of the tower's base. They were surrounded. Soren moved to the edge of the parapet and peered over. The darkness below was absolute, but he could sense movement, a shifting of shadows that had no right to move. He strained his ears, trying to isolate the sounds, to get a count, to understand what they were facing.
Then, a new sound joined the chorus. A high-pitched chittering, a sound of hungry anticipation that set his teeth on edge. It was close. Too close. He looked down at the rusted iron steps of the spiral staircase. They were coming up.