They greeted the innkeeper, who announced their companion hadn’t returned yet, so they went up to the room. It was only a few minutes past ten; Rosario would probably be back at any moment.

Franziska sat near the window and looked outside with a bored expression. “Maybe they invited her for a tour around the castle… she could have invited us too.”

In the end, they didn’t buy anything other than the book and the chocolate bar. He packed them and waited. It was now thirty minutes past ten.

“Stefan, I’m bored,” said his sister, still by the window.

“I’ll go get us something to drink in the meantime,” Stefan announced and left the room.

He walked down the hallway and to the stairs, at the same time he heard the door open in the lobby below, and masculine voices talking to the innkeeper. As he got closer, he managed to understand their exchange.

“Gentlemen, you know I’m always willing to collaborate with the guards’ job, but this is quite the unusual request.”

“I’m aware so, ma’am, but it’s for you and your guest’s safety. The visitors are crystal hunters who arrived in town yesterday, and it was confirmed that insufficient inspection was carried out before allowing them to enter the town. We need to check their belongings to make sure they aren’t accidentally carrying crystals with them. I have to ask you to keep this information private, as we don’t want to rise unnecessary alarm. Now please, we need you and the other staff members and guests to leave the house.”

In other circumstances, the situation would have been acceptable to Stefan even if he knew he wasn’t carrying crystals; he knew the fear people had of them, so it was best to cooperate. But after the discovery he and Franziska made today, he would let no one get close, especially after the attack from the day before and Rosario’s delay in coming back from the castle.

He started walking back to the room, and after hearing fast footsteps on the wooden stairs behind, he began to run, yelling Franziska’s name. But the men were faster and one held him firmly by the wrist.

“Come with us calmly. Make a scene and your teacher will pay for it,” whispered the guard in his ear.

At the end of the hallway, Franziska opened the door and froze at the scene.

“Franzi, go back! Run!” yelled Stefan, before the pain of his hand being twisted took the breath out of him.

Franziska disappeared back inside the room. It took the guard only a few seconds to reach the door and open it, but the girl was nowhere to be seen. He started looking in the obvious places: under the bed, inside the closet and the bathroom, and after not finding her, he began turning the room upside down in anger. Only then did he realize the closed window was unlocked.

He looked outside but didn’t see the girl either. He was sure she had run out that way, pushing the window back to its closed position before hiding somewhere on the roof, but he didn’t date stepping onto the clay tiles.

The other guard, who was still holding Stefan by the arm, stepped in. “Go get help. She can’t be that far.”

Hidden behind a chimney up in a nearby roof, Franziska saw Stefan and the guards walk towards the castle and past the gate, which was promptly closed behind them.

*****

Franziska scampered away along the rooftop as fast as she could, then climbed up to a higher roof and continued her escape. Some tiles broke under her feet, yet she continued, still hearing the voices of the guards running on the street below. Some steps ahead, a roof window opened and two guards emerged, but instead of stopping, Franziska turned to her right and leaped over the narrow alley to a lower roof. Her pursuers did not follow.

She quickly made her way over this new row of red rooftops, desperately thinking what to do. They had taken Stefan to the castle. Rosario and the two crystalsmiths who went with her to see the mayor that morning were probably prisoners, too. That meant there was only one option left: she would have to make it to the smithy on the other end of town, and get help there. She looked up towards the train station, visible at the top of the peninsula; it was so far away.

A guard climbed onto the roof before her, and she heard another one behind her. The streets on each side of the building were too wide for her to attempt jumping over them. Surrounded, she walked towards the nearest edge of the roof she stood on, and with relief saw a balcony down below. She flung down and to the balcony just as the guards were about to reach her, and without delay leaped to another balcony one floor below, holding onto the railing and sending some potted plants to crash on the cobblestones of the street below. Using the clasps on a rain pipe to get some footing, she made it to the street. The guards would be after her at any moment, but luckily, she noticed a crowded street right past a short alley, and she reached it just in time to blend in with the crowd.

With some relief, she walked and then ran, dodging the people who were mostly going downhill towards the docks, where most of the commerce of the town was located. The train station still seemed distant, and she hadn’t even reached the wall that marked the halfway point.

Now that she had moved further away from the docks, there were fewer people on the streets for her to blend in. Feeling nervous about being discovered, Franziska decided to go through the alleys, making sure to check her surroundings every few steps. Everything seemed to be clear, and she turned around a corner when a hand on her shoulder made her stop. Feeling cold, she looked up and saw Leonie, the guard who guided them into town the day before.

“Hey, Franziska! I’ve been looking for you and the others—”

But the girl didn’t listen, gave her a kick and ran away.

Leonie frowned as she watched her go.

*****

Rosario woke up to the feeling of something crawling on her skin.

She felt sore and her left knee hurt, yet nothing seemed to be broken. Thankfully, it hadn’t been a long fall, and what felt like a pile of hay saved her from any major injury. It was pitch black, and Rosario didn’t know for how long she had been unconscious. Worried about having hit her head during the fall, she slowly sat and then tried to stand up. Other than the disorientation that came from being in total darkness, she didn’t feel unwell, at least not physically.

The hay she had fallen on was damp, and the air felt heavy and humid. She touched her arms and felt some bumps over them. Only then did she realize the crawling wasn’t just a feeling: small things about the size of a phalanx were stuck and moving over her arms, neck, and face. She immediately started slapping them away. They felt like maggots or leeches, but in the darkness, she could not tell. Whatever they were, they didn’t seem to bite or hurt her in any way, but it was still an unpleasant sensation.

She was still trying to calm her breath when she heard the distant noise of echoing footsteps coming closer. The steps ceased nearby, and a key twisted in a lock. The door creaked open and light shone in, blinding her.

“Fascinating, so they won’t infest you either.”

Rosario was still shielding her eyes, yet instantly recognized the voice of the mayor. Just as she was about to speak, a movement caught her attention, making her realize she hadn’t been alone there.

The pile of straw was right below a trapdoor that connected with the cellar under the keep. Old wooden barrels and furniture lay rotting around, and near the wall opposite to the door where the mayor stood, was a large creature that Rosario immediately recognized as a more developed form of the monster artichoke she encountered at the power facility the day before.

This one was at least twice the size, fatter, and with a series of stems pointing up from the top, each carrying what looked like a seed pod. Back in the power plant, she remembered the monster having a dark green color with white specks, but in the semi-darkness, she had paid little attention to it. Now she realized the lighter marks were not coloring but small creeping creatures. They resembled maggots and were all over the plant and the cellar, and over her skin just a moment ago.

Rosario wished the horror ended there, but right below the plant lay two bodies. She recognized them as Emilia and Noah, the two crystalsmiths she was supposed to meet that morning but had entered the castle before her.

Panic washed over her. Was the mayor going to end her there and feed her to the plant? Maybe he was armed and would shoot at any moment. She turned towards him at the same time her head began throbbing. Black spots invaded her field of vision, but she wasn’t going to just stand there.

Expecting to be hit at any moment, she ran towards the mayor, noticing he only held an electric lamp in one hand and a crutch on the other. Good. An old and frail man would not stop her; she would push him aside and find her way out of the castle, but then, her foot stepped on water, and the darkness was replaced by a bright white light that came from… everywhere?

Rosario stopped in her tracks and looked up to a sky as white as a sheet of paper. Below the sky, and for as far as she could see, everything was covered in a layer of water that reached up to her ankles. It was so calm it reflected the whiteness of the sky like a mirror, so she could only see what was below the water in her immediate surrounding; it was an old stone floor, which curiously enough had no algae growing on it despite being fully submerged. This landscape extended for as far as she could see.

Her headache was gone.

Bill Cornwell was standing in front of her, without the crutch and the lamp.

Before she could say something, he moved his arms as if pointing at the place around them. “Welcome to the Convergence.”

 *****