The cave opening was dark and empty when David woke. Gone was the glowing blue eyes, the aura of cold that pierced to the very core, and the relentless rage. The sun had risen and bathed the boys in a soft and comforting warmth, in the light of the sun the night’s events seemed as distant as a bad dream.
That illusion was shattered once David looked over to where his brother lie.
Robert was still in the place he had fallen, face-down and unmoving. His breathing was slow and steady but he still hadn’t moved in the time David has spent resting. The mark on Robert’s back shone like the purest of silver under the light of the morning sun.
David looked at the clawed handprint that had been fused into his brother’s back. The shirt had burnt away and left a hand-shaped hole that exposed Robert’s skin. Behind the burnt hole in the shirt was the silver claw, twice the size of David’s own hand. Despite the burnt shirt the silver scar radiated a slight aura of cold.
The mark was smooth, unlike a scar the mark was flush with the surrounding skin and smooth as David’s finger ran across it. The claw-shaped mark could have been there from birth, there was no sign that it had been burnt into Robert’s back just hours before.
Even over a decade later, David knew, the wraith’s mark was still on Robert’s back, as shiny and cold as the day it was made. It was never mentioned by Robert, not since that day. They had stumbled back to the village, David supported his weakened brother until they arrived back into town. Their return was treated with surprise and then they were quickly shuffled into a chamber beneath the townhall where the town’s secrets were shared.
Robert was not the first youth to be branded by the wraith’s clawed hand. Throughout the years others had been “touched by the wraith” to various degrees: a scratch here, a poke there. Robert was the only one known to have a complete handprint fused onto his body. The mark was seen as a sign of greatness, as if the individual had been chosen by a god. The marking guaranteed the former child a life of luxury, wealth, and power.
Robert and David left town the next day. They had never even discussed returning. They barely discussed the events of that night despite the effects it had on their lives. David would spend the next decade of his life pursuing the study of necromancy, obsessed by the monster he had encountered that night: the wraith. Robert followed his brother across the land selling his sword to any who wanted his services and amassing his own band of mercenaries along the way.
The brand was hidden from sight after that night and rarely mentioned by the brothers.
David moved his fingers absentmindedly through the water at his side. He watched the ripples trail behind his hand as he moved it slowly back and forth across the surface of the pool. Was it warm or cold? There was no sign of steam so it couldn’t be that hot. There was no ice around so it couldn’t be that cold. It had been so long since he had been capable of noticing differences in temperature by touch. It was only the extremes he could recognize and only through external signs.
David’s obsession drove their travels. Robert’s contracts might take him away from time to time but he always returned and always moved to wherever David’s studies took him. No complaints were ever uttered by Robert.
That was why they journeyed into the desert with only a vague destination and the shaky promise of unknown riches. It was why they were in a forgotten bathhouse beneath the desert sands.
“We’re alone here,” Robert informed David. “Water closets are clear. Nothing in the pools but water. Room temperature water: not hot, not cold. Are you sensing anything?”
“No,” David shook his head, The shake was as much to punctuate his statement as it was to bring his mind back to the present. “We’re alone, no undead I can sense.”
“We’re not alone,” Robert answered. “Where to next?”
“The floor beneath us holds the dining hall and the private eating rooms,” David replied after a moment of thought. “The kitchen is under that followed by the storage chambers and the tower servants’ quarters. After that should be the archives, six levels, I believe.”
“And the treasure?” the question came from one of the mercenaries.
“The vaults and armouries are just underneath the archives,” David answered.
“We still have a way to go,” Robert said. “Let’s get moving. We’ll call it a day once we make it to the servants’ quarters. Keep your eyes open, we don’t want to get trapped underground.”
David watched Robert’s back as he headed toward the stairs down to the next floor. The red plate of metal covered the black leather tunic and provided an additional layer of protection to the warrior’s spine. Beneath it all, in the centre of that back, was a claw print of the purest silver: the brand of a monster; the symbol of change.