Aethylweiz glared up at the elusive Misty Goat, its four curly horns pointing in every direction, but his. Below. He’d spent the better part of a month laying delicate traps and baiting the creature at every gnarled branch and boulder for its fur. Trouble was, he, himself, had become the goat and sucker. Stuck in a dark hole at the side of the accursed mountain he’d been scrambling around, endlessly.

“I don’t suppose you’d wish to offer a hand or hoof, would you,” he asked. An actual response wouldn’t be too surprising, given the heavy magic around the creature.

Instead, the Misty Goat danced around the opening, stirred up some rocks, then merrily skipped away.

Aethylweiz sighed. “I guess I can’t blame it, given the reason I’m out here. We’re practically playing a game of hide and seek at this point.”

He summoned a bronze metal cube with a swirling crimson and gold portal, contained within one of the faces. It was no larger than his palm, but expanded enough for him to slip the sheep shears he’d been holding into it. Usually, it was something done, storing an item in his dimension pocket, without a second thought. But the brightness and stark contrast against the unexplored darkness ahead made his eyes squint. Then an eyebrow curled as the darkness snapped back over the cavern. Snapped, not faded. A distinct difference and one he made note of.

“Come to think of it, I may need something to light my way.”

He flicked a silver-leaf paper, meticulously folded into an intricate kite. It hung over his head like a lantern, lighting three spans ahead.

Next, a handful of marbles. An adventurer’s essential, spilled from his robe sleeve, then rolled around the unseen cavern like jeweled fire-chasers, hunting for sparks of life. Their droning, thunks, and clicks continued farther and farther until the wizard’s patience wore thin.

The cavern was large. Far larger than he’d anticipated. With a sigh, he put the kite back into the dimension cube and switched it with a paper-crafted bird. This one from a rust-based paper, heavier on the red.

“Hm, yes. That’ll do the trick.” He cupped the small papercraft in his hands, then breathed embers of light into the bird until its wings flapped and caught flame. He swirled the bird around, then whipped it high into the expansive cavern. Its body grew as did its fire with each flap of its wings until their breadth was double Aethylweiz’s own height. He marveled the beauty of this magic, admiring the defiant light in what felt like an oppressing darkness.

“Unexplored dangers and many unknowns. Nothing better than a Fauxnyx to light the way.” He glanced back at the hole he fell through above. “Oh, Misty Goat. . . I suppose your beloved belly fur will have to wait, along with those nobles. Those egg heads can wait another hour or two for their mop tops.”

He continued into the cave.

A fleck of darkness fell onto his hand and powdered it like ash. That, and the poignant smell of overcast spells saturating the air, turned the casual stroll into something more sinister. There was only one way such a smell could be so prevalent and it was not something done on a whim, but tragedy. Something horrible happened here.

The first clue appeared as he rounded a stalagmite. A white stone wall. Imprinted shadows of people spackled its surface. More evidence of magic gone wrong. It was magic summoned beyond what one’s magic frame could handle. Strained and desperate spellwork. Something done as a last resort and paid with the ultimate cost.

“SoulFire,” Aethylweiz said under his breath.

More and more shadows decorated the accumulating walls of a building as he pushed forward. Some looked to have been casting toward the sky. Hands overhead. Others faltering, but the timing was already too late. Their forms longing and legs bent, trying to run. All forever plastered against the light stone in human-like form with lashes of fire and gobs of charcoal.

“Far too many to be an accident. A shared sacrifice? Mind control? Could be—”

He paused.

The walls inside the long crumbled building held mosaic art of a history. A story of wherever he was, what it was, and the tragedy that came to be. He quickly checked on the Fauxnyx before enthralling his probing mind in the mysterious culture. The magic paper bird’s light was still burning, but the darkness was dense and overbearing. He’d need another, soon enough. But not yet. First, the art.

A radiant golden sun claimed the top third of the mosaic. Its topaz tiles with a glint of shiny specks, beamed over what Aethylweiz assumed to be the worshipping populace. Their small stick-like shapes all outstretched toward the cosmic being above. White, beautiful buildings stood with pride around the shapes. Evidence of rich commerce and bountiful harvests made evident by the symbols of grain, cattle, and stick people. All working with one another as a supportive and flourishing community.

“Another set of sun-gazers. I really ought to look into that swirling mess of stars above. Eventually. Figure out what all the hub bub’s about, hand it over to a bunch of. . . Star-Studiers? Sky-Lookers?”

He shook his head, deciding to pin the thought as he rounded the corner for the next mosaic.

Nothing. The adjacent wall was covered with a similar massacre of soot, burned into the obscure.

Footsteps shuffled in the distance, circling, and closing around the wizard.

“Ah, right. Dark doom-village. Best continue.” He moved out of the building and into what he guessed was a park. Long-dead, filled with petrified trees and grass. All long and void of moisture, or anything resembling life. A statue, cleaved in half. The top glared at him without a nose and half a chin. The arms obviously in worship, like the mosaics, but hands missing, forearms covered in the same soot, like everything else.

Aethylweiz scraped a layer of the soot for closer examination. The material was warm to the touch and curiously clingy. Even his magic struggled to remove their stain.

“It’s like this darkness sticks to itself. A—”

The footsteps caught up with him. They had moved as a group, clustered, then dispersed around him. Five to six by his count. More than enough to overwhelm a common traveler.

He summoned the Fauxnyx closer, its rust-colored light revealing a shadow incarnate. Human-shaped, but sharing nothing else with the species. Whatever darkness had claimed it made its origins difficult to decipher.

Still, some markers remained. A pair of daggered ears. A willowy frame stretched too long for reason. That was enough to make a decent guess.

“Fae,” was all Aethylweiz could say.

A highly dense, magical being. Long, pointed ears, posture and pride thick enough to salt an ocean. They were often confused with elves, but it was always the height that gave them away. Nearly once and half his own.

But these. . .victims are twisted. Perhaps a remnant. A deviation from their evolution or perversion from the darkness. There was no telling.

He could feel their adept magic, no more than a grain of sand under the bank of a roaring river. A more primal nature had taken over and buried it. Long limbs dangling like an afterthought. Backs buckled and poised to strike like some vicious shadow cat.

The shadow stepped closer, watching Aethylweiz with caution. Seconds passed as more revealed themselves. A handful, then dozens more.

“Stealthy and far more than I thought,” he mumbled. It wasn’t often he found himself fooled.

Aethylweiz watched them more with curiosity than fear as he wracked his brain on what to say or do. He wanted to break the ice. Discover if they were a people he could still save despite what he already felt in his bones.

The first shadow’s mouth opened. Dark-gray fangs, mottled with viscera, dripped with archaic hunger. There was no intelligence behind its movements. At least, not its own. Whatever drove it wore the shape of thought, but the creature itself was nothing more than animal.

Aethylweiz’s face dropped with disappointment.

“Fae of old, fallen to tragedy,” he whispered into the darkness. A touch of fear crept along his spine at the thought of anything that could best a Fae as much as this. Whatever it was, he would not take it lightly.

Aethylweiz slung his arm around the great expanse. The sound of crunching crystals filled the air as a tessellated fabric, made of time itself, wrapped over the park and creatures within. He waited for the shadows to slow to a crawl, then walked past the pack, anger pricking at his back.

“Whatever took these people, they are beyond saving. But I can feel it lingers.”

The park ended and a long road trailed toward the deeper part of the city. More shadows appeared, succumbing to Aethylweiz’s slowing spell as it followed him.

Another set of mosaics appeared along a decorative wall. This one revealing more than the last.

The sun-worshippers had apparently suffered a growing calamity. A darkness was etched into the bottom. Black flames danced at the worshippers’ feet while a few stepped to the top of a grand staircase. Offerings. Sacrifices. Most likely in attempts to stave the darkness.

Aethylweiz continued down the wall.

Floating castles, gleaming as bright as the sun, floated above the taller flames now. Some worshippers, still on the ground fighting the darkness, but the buildings in the air appeared to be a solution to their burden.

“Floating castles. . . No good can ever come from those.” He continued, but the next held something curious. A response to his remark.

The top of the mosaic had melted into a hole, pummeled through by something fiery and large as a fist.

He peeked through, curiosity always getting the better of him.

Entire castles of melted stone had meteorically fallen and buried themselves amongst the ruins. No doubt a manifestation from the mosaic’s story on the wall.

“Unfortunate, that,” Aethylweiz nodded. Without needing more affirmation, he continued farther into the city until the precipice appeared.

An armchair, stone amalgam, holds a very real and very black, flame. The distance was still great, so the details weren’t refined, but nonetheless, the flame there burned.

More pieces of mosaics were uncovered as he walked closer. The group of sun-worshippers all turned black as pitch. The ominous flame from ahead burning one person and another. All turned until they were on their feet, bowing to the omnipotent flame.

“Something beyond the darkness, greater reach than shadow,” Aethylweiz whispered as he took the first step toward the great flame.

The air rippled with a dense pressure of magic. Enough of a change for the wizard to pause.

It was unsettling. All magic and everything Aethylweiz naturally knew and felt of it shook at the flicker of the night flame before him. Its height and depth, more than enough to swallow a city whole. Blotched and permanent shadows lay engrained into the stairwell at his feet.

“So they turned to you, for salvation, did they? Can’t say I’d do the same, but the most vile of magics are never found so obvious.”

The flame flickered once more and once more magic trembled.

“Not all wants bear sweet fruit, wizard.”

A grin crept over Aethylweiz. “You’re not a source of power, but something more then. What do you wish of this world, flame? Why are you here?”

Two Fauxnyxes slipped from under Aethylweiz’s sleeves. One green. The other blue. They swirled around the flame to give it shape against the surrounding darkness as the first Fauxnyx joined their flight.

“Much more.”

The flame’s tongues whipped and snapped at Aethylweiz’s spells. At first, it was a playful thing. Testing how the Fauxnyxes moved. Then, with more fervor, they coiled and struck like starving serpents. There was a desperation behind them. A wanting, longing for the magic evading their grasp and the devouring flames.

“Answer me, flame,” Aethylweiz commanded.

“All will be mine in time. Today, tomorrow, centuries. Someone will seek for power and I will be there, wizard. I will devour all and all will be mine.”

A gravity, a force, pulled at the threads of magic that made the Fauxnyxes like a spindle of twine. A stream of light trickled from each and into the void of the flame.

Aethylweiz’s face slacked grim. Normal magic would not suffice. He’d have to use his greatest gambit, but even that was not a full solution.

“Perhaps, but I will be plotting. There’s no enemy worse than a pondering wizard and time is more than just on my side. Until then, Devourer’s Flame.”

The time spell that had followed him throughout the city burst, then grew to contain the cave and ancient city within. All was petrified and rendered still as the fabric crystallized. For as long as the wizard lived, the city would be unbreachable. The Devourer starved and contained.

Aethylweiz teleported back outside, by the fallen ground and cave mouth he’d entered from. He stared at the unflinching abyss for a long while, then watched as the toll of his spell, age, grayed a streak of his beard.

“Right—” he said, stroking the new mark, ”—best not forget that one. Can’t have another surprise like that abominable Whisper Well.”

He covered the cave mouth with a simple casting of clay and dirt, then continued his hunt for the ever-elusive Misty Goat.