Chapter Five
Flying on a Nevermore's back wasn't a happy experience. It was terrifying. It was nothing compared to the sky turning a dark shade of red, or the land giving place to cracked and broken ground on which crystals grew and Grimm by the score trudged about.
When we landed, Ashelyn's-no, Cinder's hand found mine once more. We stood on a large circular platform, an airship docked nearby. "Make no mistake," Salem spoke curtly. "You will be of use to me, as I have been of use to you, or you will be discarded."
Which meant dying.
It was pretty clear that it meant dying.
"I am not an unfair taskmaster, however," she spoke as we walked into a long hallway. "I will not set upon you tasks which are unfair, or which are meant for failure."
I was listening, but I was also looking around. The ceiling of the hallway was so high I had to strain my neck to see just how high it went. There were candles lit across the walls, and they seemed to burn without melting the wax. My eyes took in everything they could. It could just as well be the last thing I'd ever see.
When we stepped into what looked like a meeting room, my eyes glanced to some people that were indeed familiar to my sight. There was the burly form of Hazel Reinhardt sitting on a nearby chair, the mustache-twirling Arthur Watts in front of him, and the cackling Tyrian Callows was instead perched on his own, his scorpion-tail out and swishing right and left.
Nobody spoke at first. Tyrian simply cackled. His eyes shone with unspoken promises of murder. "Fresh meat," he giggled under his breath, breaking the silence as Salem sat down at the head of the table. "My goddess, what is to be done?"
"I have returned from Mistral," she spoke. "The Spring Maiden remains hidden even from Leonardo, but he has graciously offered his own huntsmen and huntresses as collateral. Hazel, Tyrian," she clasped her fingers together. "Coordinate with the cowardly little lion, and make sure no friend of Ozpin remains in Mistral," her eyes narrowed. "Are we clear?"
"Crystalline," Hazel grunted.
"The will of the Goddess will be done," Tyrian cackled.
"Shall I be the one to ask of the elephant in the room?" Arthur asked, glancing in our direction.
"They will be a fundamental part of our future plans, Arthur," Salem acquiesced. "Have some of your machines prepped to teach them the basics. If they show promise, I will take a personal interest in them. If they do not, and prove disappointing..." her voice trailed off. "But I am sure they will not disappoint me."
Arthur said nothing.
They were all dismissed with a simple wave of the hand.
Arthur came to a halt by our side, looking down on us with a barely noticeable look of disdain. "Follow me," he spoke. "I will show you to your rooms and then I will show you where you will be expected to be every morning, and every afternoon, until told otherwise."
Cinder's hand squeezed mine as we walked behind the man. "In order to make this babysitting task the least annoying as possible for me, I would prefer it if you didn't speak unless talked to, and when you do, you may refer to me as Doctor Watts. Are we understood?"
"Yes, Doctor Watts," I said while swallowing back a grimace. Cinder dutifully repeated what I had just said, her eyes focusing firmly on the man's back, as if attempting to burn him alive with her gaze alone.
"Good," the man nodded. We walked across hallways that seemed all identical, until they suddenly weren't. We were a few floors below the ground level, and as he pointed at two equally distanced doors, we each opened one to reveal equally dusty rooms. These had to be old guest quarters, or the servants' rooms. Or at least, they had to be the rooms used in the past by whoever serviced the giant castle-like structure.
Now, they were empty.
"I will show you where you are to come tomorrow morning," Arthur continued. "The earlier, the better."
We climbed back up. Our silence apparently pleased the man, because while he didn't become talkative, he also wasn't excessively brusque. The room we stepped into was circular. Lights hung from the walls and a glass ceiling cast down a grisly crimson light.
"Tomorrow, you will begin training," he acquiesced. "If you have any questions, I would suggest bothering someone else."
I raised a hand all the same. He looked at me, annoyed, but gave a small nod. "What was your doctoral about, Doctor Watts?"
The man raised an eyebrow at the question. He then smiled, if briefly. "Finding the precise line which divided an android from a man replaced with prosthetic machinery," he placed a hand to twirl a corner of his mustache. "Those fools of Atlas didn't understand the benefits of a human fully transformed into a war cyborg," his face grew shadowed. "But it is not like you could understand such complicated things." He shook his head once. "Remember the way. Memorize it. You will not like getting lost around these parts."
With that, he turned and made to leave. "How will we know it's morning?" Cinder asked. The Doctor turned, a scowl on his face. "Doctor Watts," Cinder added. "How will we know it's morning?"
"Someone will fetch you for breakfast tomorrow morning," Arthur spoke. "The pantry is stocked with food and I am sure I will have to provide you with Scrolls. I do have an older model you can share," he looked at where Cinder was still holding on to my hand. "But let me give you a friendly advice, since you seem quick on the uptake."
He looked at us both. "Do not displease her, and nothing bad will happen to you. However, make no mistake. What she asks, you will deliver. And if you think you can run away, well...other people, better, stronger huntsmen-they have tried, and they have failed."
"Who...who is she?" Cinder asked.
Arthur chuckled at that question. "You do not know? Then, why should I be the one to tell you? You will either find out by yourself, or she will tell you."
He walked away, leaving us both in the empty training room.
"We should catch some sleep," Cinder muttered, tugging me along.
"Cinder," I muttered, "Are you all right?"
"I'm fine," Cinder answered. "Just-this is a lot to take in, and I could use some sleep."
Finding our way back wasn't easy, but neither was it difficult. She wasn't wrong that we needed to sleep, if tomorrow was anything like what had been implied. We could count on some kind of breakfast, however, and it was the small things that mattered, right?
The small things. The nice things. The good things.
I blinked as I realized Cinder wasn't letting go of my hand after we had reached our rooms. "Cinder?" I muttered. "You...Do you want to sleep together?"
"Yes, please," she murmured. She squeezed my hand tighter still.
Thus there we were, in a bed that I had managed to dust off by virtue of multiple sneezes and which Cinder had tried her best to make presentable.
Cinder didn't fall asleep quickly that night. She just cried. She just cried drowning her sobs and hiccups into my chest as I kept my arms around her, gingerly rubbing her hair as she let go of everything she had been holding in until then, every single moment, every single bit, every instant or shred of guilt, grief, sadness-she threw it all out.
Then she fell asleep, and I quietly stared at the ceiling until sleep caught me too.
What woke me up was loud knocking.
I scrambled on my feet with my sword in hand. There were no such thing as pajamas in this place. There weren't any toiletries either, I reckoned. Still, Cinder was quickly behind me as I reached for the door and opened it as fast as I could.
Then I took a step back. The one fetching us for breakfast wasn't a person. It was a Grimm. It was a horned Grimm with a terrifying skull-like face and short, stocky legs. It had unevenly long arms, and laughed maniacally as it hopped on its spot ever so briefly. Then, it began to move.
"I think we should follow it," Cinder said, shaking ever so slightly before taking the lead. I followed behind her, my thoughts still in disarray from the sudden shock of seeing a Grimm at an incredibly short distance.
Was it weak? Was it strong? Could it be killed?
Would Salem know my thoughts, or just the general impression behind them?
Breakfast would tell.
The pantry, true to form, was big. There were many cans of food, meant for long preservation and easy to cook provided one had some heating source available. There were stacks upon stacks of bottled water, as well as some bottles covered in dust filled that had once been wines, and were now probably poisonous vinegar.
My eyes fell to a bag containing some powdered black coffee. It was going to taste horrible, but I just knew I needed something to pick me up after everything that had happened. Cinder, however, had grabbed a box of powdered chocolate, and was looking at it with pure delight on her face.
I stopped my fingers from grabbing the coffee.
I grabbed some hard biscuits, and then quietly we followed the Imp-Grimm through the pantry and out into a small room that had some kind of Dust-powered stove. There was no milk to be had, but that was our first breakfast in the realm of Darkness, in the land where the sun didn't properly shine, under the watchful gaze of Salem.
We had hot chocolate and hard biscuits...
...and it was the only sweet thing of the whole day.
