I stared down at the ground, feeling my stomach grind apart my meal. What lurked beneath those wet, grey, worn paving tiles? The whole rest of the city, that was what. The great mushrooms that shot into the cavern air where only the hair of the beast we sat on. And I was about to go down there, unarmed, and with only my worst enemy for company.

The sound of chatter from the various cookfires died away.

“It’s time, you two!” shouted Tradfast, standing beside the biggest campfire, Captain Lorsson next to him. “Get up!”

My legs moved without me giving them any instruction. This was fate, and I had no choice but to obey it. I took a deep breath of cool, wet air to try and calm my shaking hands, and took one step after another towards Tradfast and Captain Lorsson. The other dwarves watched in silence, flicking glances between Urist and I, no doubt wondering who was going to come back. Or perhaps if either of us would return at all.

Urist smacked his shoulder into me from behind, knocking me a step sideways.

“It’s me who’s going to survive,” said Urist, scowling. “In case you were wondering.”

A flush of anger overwrote my terror for a second.

“You idiot,” I said, clenching my fists. “If it wasn’t for you neither of us would be going down here. We’d be safe, relatively speaking.”

“You should have thought about that before you killed Jost.”

For the briefest of moments, I considered whether or not I should punch him. And from the veins standing out on his forehead, black in the poor light, it seemed like he was considering the same.

But we just turned away from each other.

“Right,” said Captain Lorsson, flicking his gaze this way and that, before finally finding the guts to settle his eyes on us. “Remember, if you find anything interesting down the passage, any kind of information that could be useful, run back and tell us. It might be a good idea to go off in seperate directions, that way both of you can come back with different stuff.”

He made it sound like a routine occasion, like we were off to see which pub was best for a friend’s upcoming birthday. Fool. I wasn’t going to let Urist out of my sight for a single second.

Tradfast held out two lamps, glass globes, half filled with brightly burning oil, that let out thin vapours from holes in the top. A wire handle was attached to each. I took one, felt the weight in my hand.

“I hate to waste these,” warned Tradfast. “So don’t lose them.”

“Are you really not going to give us weapons?” I asked. “There could be anything down--”

“No weapons!” he barked. “We don’t have enough to go around.”

“It’s how we’ve always done it,” said Captain Lorsson. He gave a smile, so faint it barely changed his expression. “Now good luck. Remember, this isn’t a duel. If you both come back with useful information, it might help us find our friends.”

Urist and I both gave the briefest, shallowest of nods.

“Right,” said Lorsson. “Two of my dwarves and Tradfast will lead you down the passage. Then they’ll leave you on your own. If you give information we later find out is false, you’ll be judged as the less valiant, and I will judge the other’s claim as true. Tradfast.”

He gestured to the big dwarf.

“Yes sir,” replied Tradfast. “You two,” he said, pointing to Yor and another soldier, “Come with us.”

Urist, the two soldiers and I following in single file, Tradfast walked to the nearest stairway. It was a huge square, walled all around with high stones, and covered in strange scales of blue algae. Each step was smoothed in the middle so instead of a jagged row of stone blocks, it was half a slide.

We kept to the more walkable side. I pushed myself behind Urist, ignoring his hissed curse at me, and very carefully, eyes glued to where I was stepping, made my way down. Our soft footfalls made quiet slaps on the stone, and the air brushing my face grew ever so slightly warmer. With each breath in I could faintly taste something reminiscent of rotten wood, but tangier. Probably fungus spores.

“Reached the bottom,” said Tradfast, quietly. My hands began to shake again.

Another dozen steps, and I reached the bottom too, one foot nearly slipping on the floor. I put one hand out to steady myself, and bashed my lantern against the wall with a crack. Urist snapped his head round to look at me, eyes wide.

“Just my lantern,” I said. “No need to be afraid.”

He scowled, and I put on my best smile. The trial had started now, and the more angry I made him, the more likely he was to make a mistake.

“Right,” said Tradfast. “Time to begin.”

He gestured forwards. The passage stretched into the darkness, seeming to grow narrower until it stopped abruptly, or perhaps forked out -- it was too far away to tell. A regular intervals along were doorways, and through the nearest ones I could see stairs leading down. Brown and grey mushrooms no bigger than my fingers crowded the floor, and disc shaped ones jostled for space on the walls. There was no sound but the drip of water from somewhere, then the clank of armor and stamp of footsteps as Tradfast and the soldiers ascended. Leaving us alone.

“Well,” I said, gesturing down the corridor like Tradfast had done. “Let’s go.”

“Oh no,” said Urist, shaking his head. “I’m not leading the way, you bastard. You walk in front, and I’ll stay behind.”

“I don’t think so. We’ll walk side by side.”

“Fine.”

Still eyeing each other we took a step forward in unison. Then another. We began to walk, crushing the mushrooms under our feet, our march making a rhythmic squelch. The walls showed as brown and black as our lamps cast shadows from the disc-fungi on them.

Everytime we passed a doorway, I held my breath, waiting for something to jump out. But we made it to a bare sheet of stone marking the end of the passage without seeing so much as a slug.

“We need to go down one of the side passages,” I said.

“Obviously. We’ll turn together. So I can keep my eye on you.”

We counted to three, and wheeled around, eyes on Urist, watching for the slightest odd movement. Although Lorsson had said no weapons, I wouldn’t put it past the nasty little bugger to sneak a shank down here. I couldn’t blame him for it; I still had my own trump card -- King card -- in my pocket. But Urist did nothing untoward.

I cast my gaze down the adjacent stairway. They led on, covered in little fungi like always. Why wasn’t there anything bigger? Upstairs, the fungi reached massive proportions, but down here, not one was bigger than my hand, most not even bigger than my finger.

We discovered the answer at the bottom of the stairs. A three-toed footprint, as big as my head, was crushed into the mushrooms. Along the wall, great grey gaps had been exposed, like some giant beast had licked off the mushrooms covering it.

“At least it probably doesn’t eat meat,” said Urist. “Still, even herbivores can be provoked.”

“You better be careful then,” I said. “Wouldn’t want to provoke anything down here.”

“No. Not anything. Or anyone.”

He narrowed his eyes at me. I rolled mine.

“Oh, knock it off,” I said. “No point giving me veiled threats. I know you’re going to try and kill me down here. Let’s just try to be civil until we find a pit to wrestle each other into.”

He bared his teeth at me for a second, then relaxed.

“Fine,” he said. “I suppose there’s no point wasting my breath.”

“No, there isn’t.” I smiled. Always good to get the last word in.

Making sure he stayed in my periphery, I looked along the corridor to see where the footprints led. Getting Urist trampled by the beast would be a good way to win the contest, but the problem was not getting trampled myself. There was no space to leap away to if anything charged us.

“Let’s go the other direction,” I said. “Both of us could get killed if we run into whatever left those marks.”

Urist was silent for a second, probably wondering if getting the monster to attack me would be a good way to win the trial.

“Fine,” he said. He’d come to the same conclusion I had, no doubt.

In unison, we turned to the right. A sudden urge to smash his head into the wall came on me. It was right there, all I had to do was reach out and bam! He was a goner.

No, No! He wouldn’t go down easily. We’d punch and shout at each other, and bring who-knows-what after us.

The next corridor stretched for hundreds of metres, and much like the tunnel that had brought us to the underground city, it curved so after a while we couldn’t see where we’d come from. Glancing back, I saw our footprints were vivid, spaced between the monster’s. Easy for one of us to follow back when the trial ended. Easy for something else to follow us.

“What was that?” hissed Urist, and he stopped. I nearly stumbled in my hurry to halt. Couldn’t let him get behind.

‘I don’t hear anything,” I said, cupping one hand to my ear. “Are you trying to trick me? It won’t work.”

“Shhhh. No, I heard something. An echo in the distance. Like laughter.”

The warm air suddenly felt a lot chillier. Then my face grew hot.

“Don’t be stupid,” I said. “I’m not falling for this kind of bullshit. Let’s keep on moving.”

He resumed walking, but more slowly, more cautiously. From the paleness of his face, I understood he hadn’t been trying to trick me. He really thought he’d heard something.

Then I heard it too. A cackle, carrying through the passage so faintly I couldn’t quite be sure if it was my imagination or not.

“Did you hear it?” asked Urist.

“No,” I said, half because I didn't want to believe it, and half because I thought I’d have an easier time overpowering Urist if he was a nervous wreck. “You must be going crazy.”

“Fuck you. There is something out here, and we both know it.”

“Run back to camp then. I’m sure Lorsson and Tradfast will be delighted to hear about your hallucinations. In the meantime, I’m going to find something worth reporting back about.”

He huffed, and cricked his neck like a boxer.

“Fine. Let’s keep moving.”

An hour later, we were still walking. My legs were beginning to slow, and so were Urist’s, and my breath grew short. Then a bar of blue brilliance appeared in the distance, poking itself around the end of the corridor. My heart jumped into my throat.

“Stop,” I said. “Is that daylight?”

“Don’t be stupid. How could there be daylight out here? It’s just another glowing mushroom.”

I tilted my head sideways, and back. It was the same colour as the glowing mushrooms up at the surface, true. Nothing to remark on. As we advanced, the bar changed to a square. An exit? Drawing closer, I saw it was indeed a door shaped hole that the light blared through. It grew larger and larger, and I began to make out long shapes within. Fascination drove me forward, I wanted to see what was inside. But I always kept one eye on the enemy beside me.

“Wow,” said Urist, as we finally reached the doorway.

We stood at the top of a vast hall, about as big as the mining cavern, threaded through with trunks of blue so bright they overwhelmed our lamps. Steep, slippery stairs led down to the bottom where a carpet of more mushrooms lay, leg high and barely betraying their true brown and greys in the intensity of the glow.

“It’s beautiful,” said Urist. He stared, eyes glassed over, mouth open a touch. Inside, I laughed. I’d never taken him for a nature lover. He looked as if he’d forgotten I was even here.

His mistake.

I stepped behind and pressed both hands into his back, and felt the ribs against my palms. Then I leaned forward and sent every last ounce of my weight behind him. He toppled forward, yelling, and landed face first on the steep, smooth steps beneath, to slide and tumble down them, screaming and cursing all the way to the bottom, where he stopped with a wet rustle into the fungi beneath. His lantern flew from his hand and disappeared into the brush.

I sucked in a breath and held it. Would he move again? Had I killed him? I felt no remorse. This was what we had both come down here for.

With a groan, he tottered to his feet, and I let out the breath, heart sinking.

“You fucking bastard!” he screamed up at me. “I’m going to get you for that! I’m going to kill you right here and now!”

He began to run up the stairs, huffing and puffing. His face turned bright red with the effort before he was even halfway. I grinned; there was no need to worry. The moment Urist was in reach, I’d boot him in the face. He’d been lucky the first time, but another tumble and there was no question he’d break something. Hopefully his leg, or even better, his skull.

Another high cackle came, too loud to even think of dismissing as imagination, and I whipped my head around, adrenaline shooting through every inch of me. A lizard-dog, twice the size of any I’d seen before, loped down the corridor. Its teeth were bright white, and two pinkish depressions in place of eyes were fixed on me.

And behind it, another dozen followed in single file.

“Monsters!” I yelled. “Run!”

Urist blinked in confusion, and then he must have seen the terror on face because he turned and began to stumble down the steps.

“Faster!” I shouted.

But deep down, I knew that however fast we ran, the pack chasing after us would be faster. With no weapons, we were doomed. Unless... My trump card!

“Ghost King!” I shouted. “Do something!”

A blue flash from my pocket, bluer even than the glowing roots Urist was now weaving around, washed out the whole cavern. I shut my eyes, but the blue even penetrated my eyelids. When I opened them, the Ghost King stood at the bottom of the stairs, arms folded.

“Help me!” I cried. “Unless you want to end up in one of those things’ stomachs!”

“You are having a little difficulty, I see.”

“Yes!”

From behind the blue pillars, I saw Urist staring back at me as he ran, open mouthed. Shit, I couldn’t let him get away either. If he found out about the Ghost King--

There was no time to think on it.

“You deal with the lizards,” I said. “I’ll finish off Urist.”

The Ghost King curled his lip and gave me a look of pure disgust.

“I never take orders,” he said. “You will do as I say, if you want to survive. I will deal with your enemy. You will stay here, and not worry about the hyenas. Do you understand?”

“No!” I reached the bottom of the stairs, smashing a mushroom to pieces under my foot, and obliterated more as I ran on. “What do you mean not worry about them? They’re about to fucking eat me!”

He rolled his eyes, and spoke six words in a language I had never heard before, but yet could understand.

“It is time to come out.”

There was a blue flash, and a wave of cold shout through me. My strength halved, every cell in my legs drained of energy. Another flash came, and another wave of cold. This time I dropped to my knees. Fighting against the strain of head that felt four times it usually did, I looked up to see two dwarf ghosts standing beside the King. They wore ornate plate armour, and carried spears glistening with runes. Their faces were concealed in steel masks formed to look like war-screaming faces, with gold rings hanging down as beards.

“What’s going on?” I asked, but my voice felt like I was a hundred miles from it. Another flash of cold and blue, and I fell backwards, every part of me stiff. I tried to blink sudden sleepiness from my eyes, and found they were frozen open. A final flash came.

“Let us go,” said the Ghost King. “After that dwarf.”

Judging from the light, sick anxiety in me, my heart should have been pumping two hundred beats a minute. But instead it ticked along sluggishly, an age between each beat.

He was going to leave me to die then! The realisation dawned and I tried to struggle up, but my muscles simply wouldn’t move. There was nothing for my brain to signal.

This was the end then. I tried to accept it -- couldn’t. Was I really going to die here? Alone, poor, in somewhere I never wanted to be? Torn apart by savage beasts? I would have cried out in rage if my voice box wasn’t twenty degrees too cool.

The end stepped right over me, eyeless face straight forward. One taloned foot pressed into my chest, and then it was gone. The rest of the pack walked around me in quick succession. They hadn’t even noticed I was there!

Of course, they must hunt by detecting heat. The Ghost King had cooled my body down so much the monsters couldn’t sense me. Instead they’d gone for Urist, to tear him limb from limb. I felt a little sick.

Wait. If that was the case, why had the Ghost King gone after Urist in the first place? It didn't make--

A scream, Urist’s scream, pierced through the cavern, its echo ricocheting into my frozen ears a dozen times.

“Ghosts! Help me! Anyone! Help--”

It cut off as soon as it had begun. Then the cackling of the lizard monsters twisted into terrified yelps. The King and his guards must have finished off them off too. But why?

I tried to think of a reason, but as my heart slowed and my mind dimmed, the thoughts ebbed from my mind. Harmonic chants in that strange language reached my ears, but my brain didn't quite register them. The air around me grew colder, and then warm like a bath. I hadn’t had a warm bath in how many years? Five? Six? Eight..? I’d never know...

The sapphire blazed blue again, one, two, five times, and with colour came heat. My pocket was filled with sizzling, molten fire that flowed out into my veins. I screamed, but no sound came out, and then it did; a screech rushed from my open mouth to fill the cavern with its pain.

Strength ran back into my muscles, my eyelids unfroze. Warm tears flowed off the sides of my temples.

I stopped screaming and lay there, listening to my heartbeat and my breathing as they calmed. I was alive. Alive! And I’d won the trial!

The Ghost King’s voice sounded inside my head again like a gong, and my elation evaporated.

“I have returned. You will not have to worry about Urist anymore. I gave him a thorough rebuke, and he has agreed not to trouble you further.”

I paused, trying to make sense of his words.

“What?” I said.

“Pardon?”

“The screams. Didn't you kill him?”

“Of course not. I am the King of All That Has Worth. Killing him would have been a waste, and I waste nothing I might find a use for.”