Brave Story - Miyuki Miyabe [149]
It seemed to him that there was a burnt smell on the night air. Odd, I didn’t notice anything during the day. Placing his right hand upon the hilt of his sword, Wataru tried to drive all such thoughts out of his mind. Look for the light. That’s what I’m here for.
When he heard a sound like a strangled squawk come from the rocks above the ruins, he nearly jumped three feet. Probably some wildfowl having a bad dream, he thought to himself. I hope it didn’t startle my udai. On second thought, he’s probably braver than I am by far…
It was pitch black. Wataru saw nothing even resembling a light. He started to look around the well, but the only thing shining were the stars in the sky above. Wataru chuckled, half out of relief, half in disappointment. He lowered the lantern, lighting the ground by his feet, and turned around.
Just then, something white moved on the border between the lantern’s light and the darkness of the night.
Wataru whirled to see something bobbing in the air, just brushing the edge of his lantern. Wataru looked at it in shock. He felt like he had been punched in the gut.
It was a white arm floating in midair.
The scene was almost too surreal to be frightening. The arm didn’t appear to be severed, rather it looked as if it was somehow growing out of the darkness itself. A long slender arm, beginning just below the shoulder. A woman’s right arm.
Now it waved from side to side, the index finger pointing straight at Wataru. Then it motioned to him. It wants me to follow.
The arm looked like a narrow white fish swimming through the water of night. It slid gracefully through the darkness until it stopped. The arm tilted, pointing down, and quite suddenly, it was sucked into the ground. No sooner had it disappeared than the ground began to glow. The light grew until it lit Wataru’s face. Then it was almost too bright to look at.
Wataru ran to the spot. Suddenly, the ground shuddered and he started to wobble. One of his feet sunk into the ground.
There must be a room under here.
During the day, the hole would have been hidden by rubble. Wataru crouched and began to examine the ground. Soon he found a handle that seemed to be attached to a half-open lid. He lifted it, and the light blazed pure white, and then quickly faded. It was as though whatever lit the ground had scampered away.
Wataru looked to see a ladder descending down into the earth. Fixing the lantern to his waist, he began to descend.
As he climbed down, he counted the rungs until he reached forty—and then he gave up. It was a long way down. Wherever this was going, it was deep. He didn’t want to think about it too much, lest he start to get frightened. Right now, he needed to focus only on the simple act of climbing.
Wataru began to sweat. He was breathing heavily when at last the hard tip of his leather boot touched something that wasn’t a rung. Holding tight to the ladder with both hands, he craned his neck and looked down to see a damp, rocky floor.
It was a cave. From where he stood, he could see a rough winding passage leading off into the darkness. The white light appeared to be coming from far down the tunnel. It had grown much fainter than it had been when he first saw it on the surface.
Moving the lantern to his left hand and holding his sword in his right, Wataru began to walk forward. The color and the feel of the walls around him resembled tombstones. Water seeped through unseen cracks, dripping in the tunnel, and making the walls and floor slick. He reached out a hand to touch it and found it incredibly cold. He lifted a finger to his nose and sniffed, but there was no trace of medicine. Since he had been in a hurry to leave, he had forgotten his gloves. He resolved not to touch things any more than he had to. It wasn’t hard to imagine something living in the crevices in the wall, something with poisonous fangs or stingers.
A little further down, the stone tunnel took an