The deeper levels of Veilhold, where the work-cycles stretched without the solace of a sky-view, remained silent. No clatter of tools, no gruff voices of laborers returning from the deeper veins. Kaelen had the sparse lodging to himself, a hollow box of carved stone that smelled faintly of damp earth and stale sweat. He had slept, or rather, simply allowed the quiet to settle around him, the pervasive mist inside him finding a temporary equilibrium. His ancient bones no longer ached. His mind, usually a restless repository of forgotten centuries, felt a rare clarity, a calm like still water within the boundless haze. He pushed himself from the cot, the coarse fabric rasping against his skin. A simple stretch unspooled the last knots of tension. Fatigue, a constant companion for lesser men, was a foreign concept to him now. His connection to the Perpetual Veil, the very essence of the world, hummed within his core, a subtle, invigorating current. It was a strange rebirth in a world long past its prime. Morning in Veilhold was a concept, not a visual. No sun, no sky, only the soft, ambient glow of luminescent moss and the faint, ever-present shimmer of the mist itself, clinging to every surface. It diffused the space, making distant objects hazy, near ones indistinct at their edges. He moved through the narrow tunnels, the cool vapor brushing his cheek like a phantom touch. He welcomed its embrace. He welcomed its obscurity. Veilhold, carved into the very roots of the world, was a testament to humanity’s stubborn will. It was small, a labyrinth of choked passages and damp chambers, yet it held the necessities. For those who delved into the earth for whisper-shards, or those who traversed the shadowed pathways connecting disparate enclaves, it was a vital hub. Caravans, laden with scavenged tech and filtered water, paused here before plunging into the deeper mist-zones. Explorers, their cloaks heavy with moisture, provisioned for perilous forays into forgotten ruins. Because of this ceaseless flow, a rudimentary market had congealed in one of the wider caverns. His primary task remained. He needed to absorb every nuance of this place. The whispers carried by the mist could be unreliable, fractured echoes of truth. Kaelen trusted only what his own senses gleaned, a survival instinct honed over long, solitary centuries. He strode towards the market’s humid heart. It was mostly empty, a hush broken only by the drip of moisture from the cavern ceiling. Most delving teams carried provisions for cycles, preferring to endure the deep rather than waste precious time journeying to the surface. Their lives were a slow grind, a descent into the earth’s maw that promised little but toil. Kaelen had no intention of joining them. A gnawing emptiness stirred in his gut. Since his unsettling arrival, he hadn’t taken proper sustenance. The hunger was a mundane discomfort, yet persistent. He needed to quiet it before he could focus. He drifted towards a faint, savory scent that cut through the general dampness. It led him to a small stall tucked against a craggy wall, where a lone figure hunched over a crackling brazier. A shabby old man tended to skewers, the flame casting dancing shadows on his deeply lined face. A beard, thin and grey as aged lichen, framed a pair of cracked spectacles. His age was a mystery, lost somewhere in the mists of time. Kaelen stopped before him, the mist within him settling into a cautious stillness. “What manner of beast is this?” A low chuckle rattled in the old man’s chest. “Best not to ask, wanderer. Heh.” Kaelen gave a slow nod. The world above, a ghost in his memory, had once offered bountiful pastures. Now, even the Sky-Cities like Aerthos relied on fabricated nutrient paste. In the desolation, any meat was a luxury, its origin often best left unspoken. He took a skewer, the warm grease a stark contrast to the omnipresent chill, and bit into it. The taste was rich, gamey, undeniably real. Through the fractured lens of his glasses, the old man regarded Kaelen. “A new face, then? You arrived with the last mist-shift, yes?” “Yesterday. This is surprisingly palatable.” Kaelen chewed slowly, his gaze sweeping the dim cavern. “Yesterday. Ah, the survivor from the Gloom-Leviathan’s reach. News travels even through the deep mist, young one.” The old man’s words were a dry rasp. Kaelen’s jaw tensed, a faint ripple of mist tightening around his ankles. “So quickly?” “Heh. Secrets here are as ephemeral as the mist itself, save for the color of your undergarments. By the next cycle, your arrival will be known to all.” The old man’s grin widened, revealing yellowed teeth. “A lone soul, untouched by the Veil’s hunger, carrying whispers of wealth… many eyes will turn your way, traveler. Many hungry eyes.” His words, though casually delivered, were a sharp prick. Kaelen met his gaze, his own eyes holding the weight of centuries. The old man, undaunted, continued. “Be wary. This place is not a refuge, no matter how desperately one seeks shelter.” “Refuge? I came seeking opportunity.” Kaelen’s voice was low, level. “Heh. Opportunity? And you arrive with empty hands? No delving tools? No mist-lights? That is not the bearing of one seeking to carve their fortune from the deep.” The old man’s words were like chisels on rock, each one finding purchase. Kaelen’s brow furrowed, a faint stir in the air around him betraying his frustration. The old man seemed to find this amusing. He changed tack. “You have been here long.” “Since the first whispers of Veilhold drew men into the earth. I am a fixture, a living piece of its foundation.” The old man gestured with a greasy hand towards the shadowed interior of his stall. Piles of miscellaneous items, dulled by moisture and disuse, were stacked haphazardly. “Look there. The detritus of desperation. Those who refused the deepest veins, who clung to their independence. When their glimmers ran out, they sold what they had. First the trinkets, then the keepsakes, then the tools that kept them alive. When nothing remained, only then did they join the delve-crews.” The old man’s voice dropped, edged with a chilling mirth. “The useful items are sent to Aerthos, claimed by the Sky-Cities. These are the husks, the forgotten remnants left behind by those broken by Veilhold. Heh.” The image settled on Kaelen’s mind, sharp and cold. His appetite, robust moments before, withered. He forced down the last bite, the richness now cloying, and set the skewer down. The mist around him felt heavier, cooler. “Ten glimmers for this?” Kaelen’s voice was an unexpected growl. “Are you mad? This meat is doused in gold dust?” The standard currency of the Sky-Cities was calibrated against the purity of a whisper-shard. One shimmer was a mere fragment, a thousandth of a full shard. Ten glimmers for a single skewer was a brazen robbery. Even in Aerthos, such blatant profiteering was rare. But the old man remained impassive, as if Kaelen’s outrage was a familiar song. “All things are precious here, young one. Sustenance, warmth, even the tools that pry secrets from the earth. That is the cost of existence in the deep.” “What if I refuse to pay?” Kaelen’s knuckles whitened, a subtle tremor running through the air around him. The mist swirled, a restless grey around his feet. A deeper chuckle. “Heh. There is a reason this old man has lasted so long in this rough place. A reason I still serve my skewers.” Across the cavern, other stallkeepers, shadowy figures in the dim light, turned their heads. Their gazes, sharp and predatory, felt like physical jabs. Kaelen understood. This old man was no mere vendor. He was a spider at the center of a web, his threads reaching across the market, binding it together. To defy him was to defy them all. “Damn it all.” A low exhale, a wisp of vapor on the cold air. “Still, your wits are sharp. Some wanderers mistake stubbornness for strength.” “I have no glimmers on me now,” Kaelen said, a forced calm in his tone. “Then you must have something else. Perhaps a whisper-shard? Hand it over. I’ll give you a fair price.” The old man’s eyes, magnified by his cracked lenses, held a calculating glint. Kaelen’s jaw tightened. He had carried his shard through untold dangers, a singular anchor in the void. To surrender it for a piece of meat felt like a profound defeat. “Kid,” the old man said, leaning closer, his voice a conspiratorial whisper, “the news that you carry a whisper-shard will echo through Veilhold within the next mist-cycle. Do you truly believe you can hold onto it then?” The implication hung in the damp air: the old man himself would be the source of the rumor. Kaelen glared, the mist within him coiling, a suppressed storm. He had navigated the forgotten corners of the world, confronted horrors of ancient origin. But this old man, with his placid confidence and veiled threats, felt like a deeper, more insidious danger. He was a predator of the mundane, thriving in the grim reality of the deep. With a slow, deliberate movement, Kaelen reached into his cloak, his fingers brushing against the cold, smooth surface of the shard. He presented a small piece, barely larger than his thumb, glowing with a faint, inner luminescence. The old man’s eyes narrowed, a sharp intake of breath. “Ah. A piece of that size… perhaps a hundred glimmers.” “A hundred? In Aerthos, it would fetch three hundred.” Kaelen’s voice was flat, devoid of emotion. “But this is not Aerthos, young one. This is Veilhold.” The old man’s smile held no warmth. “A treasure can be a curse if you lack the strength to keep it safe. Heh.” A raw, primal anger flickered within Kaelen, the mist around him swirling into a restless eddy. His hands clenched, the stone walls of the cavern seeming to press in. He wanted to shatter the old man’s complacent smile, to make him understand the true meaning of power. But the consequences. This man, an old-timer, would have forged alliances with the Keepers of the Veil, the powerful mist-guardians who maintained order in the deeper settlements. To strike him would be to invite swift, brutal retaliation. Kaelen, for all his power, was still a stranger in this new world, and vulnerable. He felt an unfamiliar shrinking in his chest, a sense of crushing defeat. He had journeyed so far, survived so much for this shard, only for its value to be stripped away by a conniving old man in a dim cavern. He sighed, a slow, heavy sound that seemed to draw the very moisture from the air. With grim resignation, he handed over the whisper-shard. “Heh. Do not despair. I am not so heartless. I will not fleece a new face to the bone.” The old man produced a small pouch. “Ninety glimmers. Keep them close. Pickpockets are as common as mist-flies in Veilhold.” He extended the pouch. “A cat pretending to care for a mouse…” Kaelen grumbled, his fingers closing around the glimmers. The coins felt cold, inadequate. The old man chuckled, then gestured towards the junk-filled interior of his stall. “For our first transaction, choose an item. A gift, from my humble collection.” “From that refuse?” Kaelen scoffed, but a sliver of stubborn pride remained. He wouldn’t walk away entirely empty-handed. He needed to reclaim some small measure of agency. “If you would prefer not to…” The old man’s voice trailed off, a knowing smirk on his face. Kaelen pushed past him, wading into the cluttered shadows. His hands sifted through broken tools, tarnished metal, fragments of unidentifiable tech. “Nothing but scraps. What am I meant to take from this heap?” The old man watched, a faint smile on his lips. Most who arrived in Veilhold, even those with an initial spark, were quickly dulled by its oppressive reality. Kaelen, despite his grumbling, still possessed a raw, tenacious energy. It was rare, almost defiant in this worn-out world. At that moment, Kaelen’s fingers closed around something smooth and cool. He pulled it from the pile. It was a small hourglass, its glass cloudy, its sand long since solidified into a single, unmoving mass. A relic of a past when time was measured, not simply endured. “An hourglass?” Kaelen turned it over in his hand. “What use is this here?” “No one else would have it. It remained.” The old man shrugged. He’d acquired it from a caravan cycles ago, a decorative trinket. Useless, forgotten, a piece of artifice in a world consumed by the real. “Take something else,” the old man suggested. “Something practical.” “Hmph. I doubt anything here is more whole than this.” Kaelen tucked the hourglass into his cloak. It was a fragment of a lost era, a silent testament to cycles that no longer turned. Perhaps that held some meaning. He started to leave. “I shall call you Old Man Rime. And I hope our paths do not cross again.” “Heh. We shall see, wanderer. We shall see.” The old man’s chuckle followed Kaelen as he vanished into the shifting mist of the cavern. Old Man Rime watched the empty space where Kaelen had been, his smile lingering. The young one had fire. But fire could be quenched, or it could burn bright, lighting the way. Only time, or the mist, would tell. ---

Echoes in the Gloam-Market