She woke, wedged into the receding shelf of a cave or crevice. She had to surmise this: she was prone, confined on all sides by what felt like roughly hewn stone, in complete blackness. It was so pitch in that she was not entirely sure she was alive: aside from the stabbing confines of her encasement, she felt no way of knowing she was corporeal.

At the same time she became dimly aware of a growing glow, and a light before her face: minute, pulsating and vivid. The light spoke, soft and indecipherable. She could not understand it.

She was also no longer discomfited: as the light grew, she realized that it was the darkness itself that had immobilized him. It seemed as though she was in a large cave, so giant that there were no walls. She presumed it to be a cavern because there was no sky: it seemed the power of the ember of starlight floating before her could only penetrate a few feet into the gloom.

The tiny globe pulsated again, and she felt its voice now like a wind on her ears, brushing her mind: “Guardian, where is your ghost?”

She had no conception of these words. She rose slowly, painfully, and sat upright on the gritty pebbles of what felt like a dead riverbed. “What is this place?”

The orb seemed to stare at her, unsure; and as it pondered, she realized she had asked the wrong question. “Who am I?”

“Without your ghost, I cannot hope to restore your memories, Guardian.” It paused. “I cannot be sure which you are; you are so disfigured I am unsure whether or not you are of our party. Don’t touch your face!” She had begun to reach for her cheeks, but the urgency of the light arrested her hands; she sat in dread. The light continued: “I cannot be sure of your name or order, nor your rank. I cannot find my master, and fear that he has let his mania consume him. We must attempt to flee this place and repair to the tower.”

She searched for anything that might tell her where she was, or why she was there. “I have attempted to reconstruct you from the fossil of your conscious,” explained the light. “But there is no way for me to be sure you are who you were, or that your soul might be restored. You are a new being, without the tethers of memory to tie you to your past. Forfeit it to the darkness.” There was uncomfortable silence all around them, like a palpable entity: so insipid and total she was distracted by its enormity.

“Guardian!” hissed the light. “This is urgent, and you must do as I say as quickly and quietly as you can manage.” Dread and silence vibrated in the black at the edge of the light; their tiny pocket in the abyss was an inverse shadow. “We are not far from the ladder; but if I knew for certain that I could reach it alone, I would not have restored you! I require your aid; I am weak, and it required much of my strength to bring you back. You must carry me.”

The light drifted in close to her chest: she reached out her palms and it rested lightly upon them. It vibrated as its whispers touched her mind. “Take me to the ladder; seek the light and it will find you.” With a soft hum, the light sputtered, and suffocated; the darkness pressed upon her again.