Chapter 7 Something Like Normal

The tunnel was colder than before, the air pressing against them like a weight as they descended.

Edric held the measuring equipment Garrick had found somewhere, a worn device that probably hadn't been used in years, its needle already flickering before they reached the chamber.

Lyra walked ahead of him, her hand occasionally brushing the wall, reading something Edric couldn't see.

"The pulse is stronger tonight," she said.

Edric checked the device and watched the needle jump. "Irregular intervals. About forty-five seconds between peaks."

"That matches what I felt before."

They reached the chamber and Edric set to work immediately, measuring the arrangement of fragments while Lyra stood watch and Garrick held the lantern steady.

She placed her hand on one of the larger pieces and closed her eyes, and the silence stretched between them as she concentrated.

"The stress patterns are consistent," she said. "The fragments are doing something together. Like they're connected to each other."

"Like a circuit?"

"Maybe. I don't know." She opened her eyes. "But it's not random. Someone arranged this deliberately."

Edric sketched the layout on his paper, noting the distances between each fragment with careful precision. "This isn't natural. Someone put these here."

"Who?"

"That's the question."

They came back up cold and tired, the night air biting at their exposed skin and the wind carrying snow that stung their faces.

The walk back to the residence was quiet, each of them lost in their own thoughts. The only sound was the crunch of their boots against the frozen ground.

Garrick produced food without being asked, setting bowls on the table with a grunt.

The stew was simple, thin broth with vegetables and some kind of meat that Edric couldn't identify. But it was hot, and that counted for something.

Edric picked up his spoon and took a careful bite. "This is actually good."

Garrick looked surprised. "Really?"

"Really. What did you put in it?"

"I found it at the inn. The innkeeper's wife makes it."

Edric took another bite. "Tell her she's a genius."

Lyra tried her own spoonful and nodded. "He's right. This is good."

Garrick sat down heavily and took a bite of his own. "Well, I didn't make it. So I can't take credit."

"Then you get credit for finding it," Edric said. "That's a skill in itself."

Lyra looked at him. "You've been different lately, you know that?"

Edric paused. "Different how?"

"You actually seem like you care. Like you're paying attention." She set her spoon down. "The old Edric would have just signed whatever the council put in front of him and gone back to sleep."

Garrick grunted in agreement. "She's right. You've been... present. It's strange."

Edric kept his face neutral while his mind raced. The old Edric. Right. There was someone here before me. Someone everyone remembers.

"I just got tired of watching things fall apart," he said carefully. "Someone has to do something."

Lyra studied him for a moment. "What changed?"

Edric shrugged. "Maybe I finally realized that waiting for someone else to fix things is a waste of time."

She seemed to accept that. Garrick nodded like it made sense. Edric let out a quiet breath he didn't realize he'd been holding.

"So what did you actually want to do?" Edric asked. "Before all this. Before the cell, before the explosions. What did you actually want to build?"

Lyra was quiet for a moment. "I wanted to redesign the furnaces.

They're old and inefficient. They waste fuel, they break down constantly, and nobody ever bothered to improve them.

If I had the resources, I could rebuild them from the ground up. Make them better. Something that would actually work properly."

"That's a good goal," Edric said.

"It's a useless goal," she said. "The council doesn't care about improving things. They just want things to keep running the way they always have."

"Then maybe we need to stop listening to the council."

She looked at him. "You really mean that."

"I always mean what I say."

"Most people in your position don't."

"I'm not most people."

Lyra laughed. It was quiet and surprised, like she'd forgotten how to do it. "No. You definitely aren't."

Garrick refilled his cup. "He's been like this since he woke up from that furnace explosion. Different. More focused." He looked at Edric. "It's a good change."

Edric didn't respond. He just took another bite of his stew.

"Do you remember anything from before?" Lyra asked. "The explosion, I mean."

Edric paused. "Fragments. Noise. Heat." He looked at her. "Why?"

"Just wondering." She set her spoon down. "The old Edric wouldn't have gone near that furnace. He was terrified of the mines. Wouldn't even set foot in the upper tunnels."

Edric kept his face neutral. So Edric Hale was afraid of the mines. Good to know. File that away.

"Maybe I finally decided it was time to face my fears," he said.

Lyra looked at him for a long moment. Then she nodded. "Maybe you did."

The conversation drifted after that, away from the investigation and toward something easier. The fire crackled in the corner, casting warm light across the room.

Garrick told a story about a miner who got stuck in a collapsed shaft for three days and came out talking about ghosts. Lyra laughed and said the miner was just delirious.

Edric listened and filed away details about the town, the people, the way they talked about the mountain.

Garrick didn't respond eventually. He'd fallen asleep in his chair, his head tilted back and his mouth slightly open.

Edric looked at him and then at Lyra.

"We should wake him," Edric said.

Lyra shook her head. "Let him sleep. He's been running around all day."

Edric looked at Garrick's sleeping form. "He's been with me through all of this. Since the moment I woke up."

"He's a good man," Lyra said. "He shows up when you need him. He doesn't ask too many questions."

"Those are rare qualities."

"They're rare in Hollow Crest."

They sat in the quiet of the room, the fire crackling low in the corner.

Edric looked at the wall map, the red marks scattered across the mountain, and thought about what they'd found. The fragments. The pulse. The pattern.

"Tomorrow," Lyra said, "we should go deeper."

Edric nodded. "I was thinking the same thing."

"The pulse seems to originate from further down. If we can get to the source—"

"We'll need better equipment. More light."

"Can Garrick find that?"

"Probably. He seems to find everything."

The fire popped and settled. Garrick snored quietly in his chair.

Outside, the wind picked up, carrying snow against the window. Edric looked at Lyra, her face illuminated by the firelight.

"We're going to figure this out," he said.

She looked at him. "You sound certain."

"I'm not certain. But I'm not going to stop trying."

She smiled. Small and fragile, but real. "That's good enough for now."

Edric looked back at the fire. "What do you think is down there?"

"I don't know. But I think it's been waiting for a long time." She paused. "And I think it's starting to wake up."

Edric looked at her. "Then we need to find out what it wants."

"And if we don't like the answer?"

Edric held her gaze. "Then we deal with it."

She looked at him for a long moment. "You really have changed."

"Like I said. Someone has to do something."