Entering the cave, Ray felt icy chill embrace him and damp air filling up his nostrils. Darkness surrounded him like a shroud over a dead body, swallowing even the faint light emitted from the beam of his flashlight. He knew this was only the start of what could be his last journey but was too late to turn back now. His hand holding the journal started quivering and shaking as he followed the path made by the long-abandoned footprint on the map. The fight became for each step, but it felt heavier than the last. Like the mountain would try and pull him to its very depths.
The further he walked, the more oppressive and heavy was the air-one could almost feel being suffocated by pressure. The walls seemed to have breathing like his heartbeat in synchrony. He had heard the stories—how the caves were full of strange noises, whispers, and things moving in the shadows. But the greater terror was not what he could see; it was the unseen, the way the mountain seemed to reach out toward him.
The path narrowed with every turn. The rock surrounding him was slick with moisture, with the sharp scent of earth and decay filling his nostrils. The tunnel twisted and turned deep within the earth; the walls were slick with ancient grime. Ray's breath grew heavier, his chest tightening with each step forward. It felt thick, charged with some ancient, dark energy. He couldn't shake the feeling that he was watched. It was as though the Watcher itself hid behind the rock awaiting him to blunder.
His flashlight flickered, and Ray cursed under his breath, smacking the side of it to get it working again. The light steadied, casting eerie shadows across jagged walls. He pressed onward, the echo of his boots off the stone, disorienting him so that every sound seemed an awful reverberation within that cavernous space, the feeling of walking through an endless tunnel of uncertainty.
Round another acrid bend, and it suddenly burst open into a gigantic saloon. He lost the ceiling in darkness; the floor was thick with dust. It was vast, unnervingly so, this place, and there wasn't a sound. Ray hesitated for a second or two, sweeping the area around him with his light. His gaze fell on odd symbols scratched into the walls—icons that had nothing to resemble something he'd ever seen; the pointed lines were akin to a dead language.
His hand gripping the map began to shake uncontrollably as his heart thudded in his chest. This was it. This was the heart of the mountain. Ray could feel it in his bones. The Watcher was near.
He walked toward the center of the chamber where, on the stone altar, moss and dirt covered the flat surface. The air was thick, almost oppressive, with the feeling that the altar itself was causing mountain malevolence. Ray felt the weight of history being laid on him; he could have sworn that he heard the whispers of those who had come before him. His mind was a blur-this was it-the source of everything, the place from which the Watcher's power began.
He placed the journal on the altar and began to study the marks which were written on the stone, seeming to match those he had seen inscribed on the caves, yet meaning still lived in the grave of time. He turned through the pages of the journal as he desperately sought a clue to show how to sever a bond with the Watcher.
There, toward the back of the journal, was a single line that made his blood run cold:
To destroy the Watcher, you must offer a sacrifice. A life for a life.
Ray's stomach twisted. He reread the sentence, the words sinking in like ice. A sacrifice. The price of freedom.
He hadn't been prepared for this. A trap, that is-sick game. Watcher, mountain-and now Ray thought the only way to stop the future from unfolding was to give up something precious and far dearer than his life. To have one more chance he had to make a choice. Someone to take his place.
But if she was such an anchor, did she not anchor him to destruction?
His thoughts came immediately to Eleanor. She had been with him through everything, had supported him when he had not the slightest notion where he was going. She had been his anchor, and now, he realized, she might be his undoing.
But could he live with that? Could he live with sacrificing her, with condemning her to the same fate Thomas Dempsey had faced?
Then came the question that gnawed at him, growing more insistent with every second that passed. He had been so very sure before—he had been so determined. Now, though, standing before the demand of this cruel Watcher, everything seemed different. The weight of his decision crushed him, suffocating him. It was all around him: the desire to save his town married in his mind to the overwhelming feeling of guilt that he would have to pay.
Ray stepped back from the altar, trembling and holding the journal in his hands. How could he accept what he had seen? There has to be another way. There has to be something, anything, that doesn't involve this.
But in the pit of his stomach, he knew there wasn't.
The mountain's power had always required a sacrifice. A life for a life.
Ray stood in the cavern, frozen, as realization sank in. The eyes of the Watcher rested on him, and there was no way out. Only one choice remained.
Could he make that sacrifice? Could he live with the consequences?
The altar before him seemed to purr with some unnatural energy, the symbols on the walls glowing faintly in the dark. Ray could feel it now, the pull of the Watcher, drawing him in.
He turned his eyes to the exit of the cave, where the shadows seemed to move of their own accord in the flickering torchlight, as if the Watcher itself was waiting, just beyond the veil of darkness.
Ray swallowed hard, his throat as dry as the desert outside.
Would he sacrifice Eleanor to save the town? Or would he find another way-one that didn't mean her death?
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Will Ray sacrifice someone he loves, or will he find another way to destroy the Watcher? And in the end, will anyone really escape the mountain's grasp?