The dungeon was very wet.
This was the first thing that Cassie noticed, even before she opened her eyes. Water dripped on her head. It pooled around her ankles and soaked through her pants. It tumbled down and crashed against stone somewhere only a few yards away from her, filling what sounded like a very large space with it’s roaring echoes. When her eyes adjusted to the dark, she saw that she was in a large space that had obviously been built by someone—at least it seemed to be so, judging by the regularity in the way the otherwise irregular stones were fitted together and mortared—and what looked like an underground river ran through it. She stood up on shaking limbs and assessed herself for a moment to make sure that she was not injured. After that, she felt along the walls (particularly the one that had light shining through the cracks) and found no way out.
“That’s probably not good.” She murmured out loud, turning towards the river. Her feet made sloshing noises as she walked forward, unknowingly stepping off the edge and almost falling in. Cassie squeaked, pulling herself away.
“Here I was hoping you would fall.” It was a deep, male sounding voice with an amused tone added on, radiating from the other side of the river. “It’s probably for the best though. The fish would eat you.”
“Do the fish often eat people?”
“Yes. They’re blind and don’t get to leave here, so they like big meals.” He replied airily.
“That sounds…unpleasant.”
“Frankly there’s not much we can do about that. Swimming across is not an option and I’m also assuming there’s no way out on your side either so there wouldn’t be much sense in me trying to go over there.”
“Would there be an exit in the river?”
What?”
“We had to get in here somehow. Assuming you’re not just some trick and you’re in the same circumstance as me, you are just as clueless as how you got here as me—“
“Wow you talk a lot.”
“I’m not done.” Cassie snapped, “Anyway, there’s a possibility that we were lowered in here from above, though I don’t see any signs of that on my side. Another possibility is that up or down this river is an exit. The most complex explanation would involve underground pulley, dam, and level systems that could only be accessed through being in the river, but based on the structure of this place, I’m ruling out that level of sophistication—“
“I’ve been here three years, you think I wouldn’t have figured that out?”
“Shut up, I’m thinking!”
“Out loud may I remind you. Why aren’t you screaming? Everyone else does?”
“If everyone else decided to wear yellow to school, would you?”
“I’m not sure how that applies—“
Cassie rolled her eyes, though she knew he couldn’t see it, “You’ve been here three years? I’m not going to sit around and wait to die like that, wait how do you eat?”
She was aware that when she spoke, everything came out as a rush, like all the words were actually syllables of one long word that would be a sentence when normal people spoke. It was something that she could stop when she was thinking about it, but when she was trying to speak as quickly as she thought, she found herself asking rapid fire questions.
“They give you meals.”
“How?”
“They appear.”
“Like magic?”
“Not ‘like magic’ it is magic.”
“Well excuse me for not being updated on that.” Cassie frowned. As far as she knew, magic didn’t exist, but she figured that it would fit in nicely with the strangeness of her circumstances. The last thing she remembered was going to bed. It was possible that she was dreaming, but usually dreams were just disjointed wrecks of memories and familiar images all mixed together, but she had never dreamed of anything like a dungeon with a river running through the middle.
“If you’re not going to scream or throw yourself into the river and get eaten, can I suggest that you be quiet?”
Cassie pondered this proposal for a moment, “No. I don’t like being wet.”
“What? Why are you wet?” The voice sounded far more concerned than before.
“The water’s running up on this—“
At that moment, she felt something brush up against her leg in the shallow water. She froze, as if that would have made it any better, watching a white spot the size of a catfish circle around her leg, it’s tail running against her jeans. Through it’s transparent skin, Cassie could make out a row of teeth that could likely take off a finger in one bite. That’s when she noticed that there were at least five more.
“Try to find a spot out of the water.”
Cassie obeyed, trying to dash past the fish, and slinging herself against the wall she remembered being dry. It was at the top of an incline, and while slick, it wasn’t filled with water deep enough to house the strange fish.
“I don’t like these fish.” She called out to the other side.
“Then you really wouldn’t like the ones in the deep part of the river.”
“Are they bigger?”
“The length of oak trees and the width of round doorways.”
“So big?”
“And they have seven rows of teeth.”
“Uhm okay—that’s making this all very difficult—is there any way to, uhm, make them not want to eat you?”
“Not sure. We could toss you in while I try to make a getaway.”
Cassie didn’t particularly like that plan. She approached the water again, this time walking until she reached both the edge of her cell type thing, and the water. She stepped forward slightly, and found that there was a ledge almost a foot beneath the surface of the water, “Is there a ledge on your side?”
“No—“
“There’s one on mine. It’s barely beneath the water.” Cassie edged her way along it for a moment, clinging to the drier rocks, “I’m going to try to see how long it goes for.”
“That’s probably not a good idea.”
“I know, but I’m not good at sitting still.” Cassie retorted. She nearly slipped, gasping, feeling fish run around her ankles but continued forward until unexpectedly, the wall stopped and she flopped forward, in another cell. “Hello?” She called out, but only heard the distant familiar voice.
“Are you still alive?”
“Yeah!” She saw that there was a bridge of stone across the river this time, and didn’t hesitate in crossing it, “There’s a bridge down here, I’m on your side now!”
“Seriously?”
“Why didn’t you try this ages ago?” Cassie asked.
“I’m chained to a wall.”
“Well that sours things from the get go.” She murmured, then made her voice louder, “Would you like me to come try and get you out?”
“Why not? I haven’t been this entertained in ages.”
Cassie found that the same process worked for slowly making her way to his cell. She didn’t fall this time, but her joy about that was cut short when she realized that she had no idea how she was going to get her new companion out of shackles. Instead, she cheerfully approached him, “Hi, I’m Cassie, nice to meet you. Can I look at your locks?”
“Yeah.”
“….”
“What?” He asked, irritated.
“What’s your name?” Cassie knelt over and began examining the lock as much as she could in the poor might-as-well-not-be-there light.
“Ugh.” He shifted, acting like giving his name was such a chore, “It’s Thorn.”
“Like a rose thorn?”
“Yes, like a fucking rose thorn. Thanks for the comparison. You can dump me in rosewater and—“
He stopped mid sentence when a resounding click broke through the air, “I did it!” Cassie pulled the shackle off, and then went about to working on the next one, “What was that about rosewater, Thorn?”
“Who the hell are you?”
“I told you, my name’s Cassie.”
“How are you doing this?”
“It’ll sound really cliché, but I’m using a bobby pin.” The pin snapped, jamming itself in the lock, but it was enough to break it open. Her thumb brushed against his abnormally rough skin as she stood up, “Shall we go? I think our best bet is down river—“
He moved quickly, pinning Cassie against the wall. Despite the duration of his stay at the waterside dungeon, he was strong. Mentally, Cassie corrected herself. Thorn wasn’t just strong, he was a wall of muscle that she couldn’t quite make out in the dark, but there seemed to be something wrong with his skin. His head lowered and she was aware of how very close he was and how trapped she was in return.
“Are you a trick?”
“Not that I’m aware of.”
“Speak plainly.”
“Seriously. Not. That. I’m. Aware. Of. In some books I read, there are people that are programmed to lead others into a trap and they aren’t aware of it. I don’t think I’m one but I can’t be sure. I dunno. I just don’t want to stay in here.” Cassie shrugged out of his suddenly limp grip, “It’s not very nice to grab people.”
“You’re rambling.”
“I do that.” Cassie admitted.
He skirted around her to the edge, dipping a cautious foot in the water, “All right, let’s go.”
“Okay!” Cassie cheerfully followed, clutching the wall tightly as they both inched their way down.
She felt a mouth wrap around her ankle and shrieked, almost losing her balance in kicking it off. Thorn threw an arm across, which was enough to prevent her from falling in. Then he continued forward as if nothing had happened. When he got a fish biting at him, he simply moved quickly and stomped on it, but Cassie couldn’t move fast enough, nor was strong enough to pull that off. They finally made it to the third cell before they found a boat.
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