Chapter 17 | Part 2

Drusniel found the deeper passage while the others slept.

He hadn’t meant to explore—not really. But the restlessness that lived in his bones wouldn’t let him stay still, and the cave system branched in ways that suggested routes to somewhere else. Somewhere with answers. Somewhere with food.

The phosphorescent glow guided him through obsidian corridors that twisted like frozen thought. He counted his steps automatically—two hundred, three hundred, four hundred—tracking distance against his limited ability to retrace the path.

At five hundred steps, the voice came.

No greeting. No arrival. Just presence, as if it had always been there and had simply chosen this moment to make itself known.

You waited longer than expected.

Drusniel stopped walking. The words didn’t echo—they never did. They existed in the space between thought and sound, bypassing his ears entirely.

“I didn’t call you.”

You are starving. Your companions are starving. You explored deeper alone, away from their hearing. A pause that felt deliberate. What did you expect to find?

He had no answer. Or rather, he had an answer he didn’t want to acknowledge.

“Information,” he said finally. “Routes. Resources.”

And if there are none?

The silence stretched. In the darkness, the voice felt closer than before—familiar in a way that disturbed him more than hostility would have.

“You know something.” It wasn’t a question. “You knew I’d come here. You know what’s in these caves.”

I know many things.

“And you’ll share them. For a price.”

For a debt.

Same terms. Same careful distinction. A debt wasn’t currency—it was obligation, open-ended and undefined. The first debt still hung over him, its eventual cost unknown. Adding a second felt like the beginning of a pattern he couldn’t escape.

“I can’t afford more debt.”

You can’t afford starvation either. Your companions certainly can’t. The voice carried no emotion, no pressure. Just facts, stated simply. The shapeshifter is depleted. The goblin knows survival but not this terrain. You are resourceful but ignorant. In three days—perhaps four—the first of you will weaken past recovery.

Drusniel’s jaw tightened. The voice was telling him things he already knew, forcing him to confront calculations he’d been avoiding.

“What are you offering?”

Information. Location of a goblin settlement—independent, willing to trade. Direction, distance, terrain hazards between here and there. Enough knowledge to reach them before your bodies begin to fail.

“In exchange for another debt. Another favor you can call in whenever you want, for whatever purpose.”

Those are the terms.

No negotiation. No flexibility. The voice didn’t bargain—it offered precisely what was needed and waited for acceptance or refusal.

Two favors owed, two chains around my neck, and I don’t even know what’s holding the other end.

“Why do you want me alive?”

That wasn’t the question. The question is whether you want your companions alive.

The distinction landed like a knife. The voice wasn’t asking about Drusniel’s survival—not this time. It was asking about Elion and Srietz, about the people he’d somehow become responsible for.

The first debt had been selfish. Survival, pure and simple. He could have justified refusing it, accepting his own death.

This was different.

“The goblin settlement,” he said. “You’re certain they’ll trade?”

I’m certain of the location. Trading will depend on what you offer.

“What do we have to offer?”

That’s your problem. Not mine.

Of course. The voice gave just enough to keep him moving, never enough to guarantee success. Information without solution. Survival without security.

It’s not helping me. It’s keeping me useful.

The realization should have made him refuse. Should have made him accept death over manipulation.

Instead, he said: “I accept.”

The information arrived like a migraine—sudden, invasive, impossible to ignore. Location, distance, terrain, dangers. Not learned but implanted, as if the knowledge had been carved directly into his memory.

When it faded, he was on his knees, gasping.

Two debts now.

The voice was already gone by the time he could respond.

Drusniel stayed there in the darkness for a long time, breathing slowly, feeling the weight of what he’d just agreed to. Two favors owed to something that wouldn’t explain itself. Two chains made of words and desperation.

Two favors now. I can’t afford to wonder what they’ll cost.

But he would wonder. He would count them, track them, wait for the moment when the bill came due.

That was how he’d survive. The only way he knew.

He stood, oriented himself toward the return path, and began the five-hundred-step walk back to tell the others what he’d learned—and only some of how he’d learned it.

End of Chapter 17.2 —> 17.3: The Second Choice: The Transformation