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The creature's voice rang out again, clear enough for all watching above to hear.
“In the night's embrace, I come to play...”
“I don't like how it's starting,” Odessa whispered.
I tried not to snicker. “Stop. You’re being highly inappropriate.”
“A phantom figure that won't betray,” the creature's voice boomed out. “What am I, hidden in the gloom, a presence that dances in twilight's room?”
“What the fuck is the answer?” I hissed at Odessa.
She shrugged. “Fuck if I know.”
“Oh gods. Oh, Zorya.” My stomach was queasy. “I would be terrible at this.”
“Good thing we’re not down there. He is. Just watch.”
“What if he gets it wrong?”
“Then he lops the thing’s head off and makes it easier for the next contestants.”
I nodded, pretending a confidence I didn’t feel. “Right. Easy.”
“A moonbeam,” Draven’s voice rang out clear as a bell.
There was silence.
I held my breath.
“That is correct.” The creature slowly moved aside.
I watched Draven move through a cramped tunnel and then into another large stone chamber where the other contestants waited. Some sort of staging area perhaps?
“When the last contestant is through, the next challenge will begin,” Odessa murmured. “I’ve heard of it being done that way with some of the trials.”
Vespera was next. We watched as she almost danced up to the riddle-giver, rubbing her taloned hands together eagerly.
“She’s nervous. Her palms are sweating,” Odessa observed. “She needs to be careful, not too hurried or she’ll make a mistake.”
The eyeless horror faced Vespera unmoving.
Gradually, Vespera’s hands stopped twitching and she relaxed into stillness. But from a distance, we could all see she was trembling.
I pitied her. I was terrible at riddles. How could she have known she would face this sort of a challenge? It wasn’t exactly the kind of thing any of the contestants had been training for.
Unless they’d been secretly spending time in the library.
Then I remembered how Vespera had burst into my own training the day before, resulting in the injury to Draven’s chest which he had downplayed and tried to hide. Admittedly, I couldn’t see it impacting him so far. But then, he hadn’t faced a physical challenge yet today.
Had she been sent in to distract me, as Draven had suggested?
Even so, facing the monstrous riddle-giver was something I didn’t think I’d wish on my worst enemy.
“Step forward, child,” the riddle-giver said with a hissing voice.
Vespera took a small step towards the creature.
The riddle-giver’s mouth curved up slightly into a cruel, jagged smile, then opened again.
