If I Had a Heart

The old man recoiled as Nikolai touched the heart, and he snapped something angrily. He wiped the image of the heart away quickly, then burst into a violent coughing fit.
"Drutni stra nuk kla wa," he croaked when he'd finished. "Nuk kla wa!"

Nikolai was distracted. Raptor wanted to make sure that he was alright, but the old man interrupted before he could. No matter how hard he tried to wrap his head around it, Raptor was struggling to explain just what the old man was implying. He was still convinced that they needed the heart to leave this place, but the effect of returning the heart was up in the air.

Raptor groaned.

This was as bad as trying to get Bartimaeus to do something. He grabbed the chalk from the old man's hand with a swift, sudden reach of his own hand. Then he drew his own version of a heart - a much more simplistic, cartoon version - and drew a line with an arrow pointing to the statue. To emphasis his point, he drew a big, bold question mark above it.

He dropped the chalk down and gave the old man a look from underneath his helmet.

He wiped it away immediately, lips curling in a snarl as he growled something out about "Migh'nur" and "Drutni."

The pinpricks of light in Raptor's helmet grew smaller.

Picking up the chalk again, he redrew the heart, arrow and question mark. Each was drawn with more gusto than before. It wasn't until he was emboldening his question mark that he heard a snap as the chalk broke up in his fingers.

He stared down at the broken chalk littering his drawing.

The old man sat back slightly, frowning down at the chalk. Then he sighed heavily and picked up one half, drawing an X through the heart and drawing another arrow pointing to the statue head.
"Migh'nur," he said slowly, then tapped the sun and drew an arrow to himself. "Chakna."

Ainsley turned to the right and crossed the threshold of the tunnel. They were inside a smaller cave, which branched into three smaller paths, not unlike a tree branch separating from it's trunk.

He sighed at the thought of having to bicker about which path to take with the others. They all seemed to have different ideas of which steps to take next, even if they did ultimately stick together.

Aumrauth scuttled up next to Ainsley, looking at the map again to see where the three paths led.

"I vote we go right. Through that third passageway."

"Okay, so he doesn't like that," Nikolai said slowly, stating the obvious. His long coat didn't have any pockets, or else he would have put his hands in them to hide that they were shaking. Had the man understood them and just didn't like what he was hearing, or was there some miscommunication?

Raptor was getting irritated, he noticed. It wasn't the old man's fault they couldn't all understand each other, but he decided that unless anything escalated further, he wouldn't have to step in--

Snap.

Uh oh. Raptor had just broken his chalk.

Nikolai winced, giving his companion a meaningful look-- but not a scolding one. Hopefully Raptor wouldn't lose it right now.

"Okay, so Migh'nur is this statue, or the thing the statue's of," he mumbled to himself, thinking out loud. "Maybe it's of their god or something? Someone honored, like a hero? I don't see why else they would build it so large... Monsters don't get glorious shrines and altars."

Unless that monster is a god. The old man always spoke of the statue grimly. Maybe it was an evil force.

Then the man pointed to himself when he said 'chakna', which they'd associated with leaving the caves. It could also be his name, which would be nice since they didn't have anything to call him yet, but he didn't think it was that.

"...Are you saying you're our way out?" Nikolai said slowly, pointing between the man and the sun as he spoke.

The man seemed slightly subdued. He wiped away both Migh'nur and the heart and circled the sun. "Out," he said, then set about drawing a rune. It matched the one on the end of the rope Raptor picked up. Under this rune he drew a squiggly line, a bottle, a fat upright rectangle, another upright rectangle with a straight vertical line through the top, a four pronged hook, a lantern, and a shorter squiggly line.

Raptor hadn't expected the chalk to break. He was irritated, but he hadn't gripped it as hard as he could have. It had been harder to break things like chalk before - his body's strength was so different now. But the look from Nikolai reminded him that he needed to be calmer, so he took a deep breath and grabbed a larger piece of chalk from his bag. He wouldn't be able to write with half a stick.

Nikolai's theory held weight. May had always talked about the gods as powerful beings who only sometimes chose to be helpful or kind. A god could be terrifying and still be worshipped. If anything, that made it more likely.

But before he could offer his insight, the old man drew something again. The drawing was different from before. It was familiar, too.

Raptor stared at the drawing.

His gaze slowly traveled to his bag.

"I know that rune," he muttered. He reached into his bag again and pulled out the rope he had taken from the very first room they were in. The rune at the end of it was identical to the one that the old man had drawn.

The old man smiled when he saw the rope tapped the longer squiggle. "Ka. Yes. Drutnat." He turned away as he began to cough again, thin body heaving with the effort.

Mel glanced at the different paths ahead of her then stepped forward to peer at the map Ainsley was holding, holding her wrist in front of her to see the map better.

"Why not take the center path?" she asked. "Seems less narrow and more to explore."

"Huh," Nikolai muttered. "Is this, a, um... what do you call it in English... scavenger hunt? Where you go around looking for things to find them?"

If so, they had one of the items already. He knew that Raptor had the rope— in fact, he'd just pulled it out. A few of the objects that had been drawn were also easy enough to guess. There was a grappling hook, probably for climbing. And then there was a bottle. Was it one of the wine bottles he'd chosen not to drink from? If so, he wished they'd taken one with them. They didn't have the lantern. He wasn't sure what the rectangle or the line were, either, but this was a start, at least.

Then the old man was coughing. Again.

At least he'd turned away from him and Raptor while it happened, but Nikolai visibly flinched. He scrambled a few feet away on all fours. The instinct to stay healthy was a perfectly reasonable one, yes, but he shouldn't be this affected by it. His cheeks were flushed with mild embarrassment. What was going on with him?

"Sorry," he mumbled, looking away from both of them. His voice was shaky, and he couldn't hide it well. "Didn't mean to react like that."

Aumrauth threw his arms up into the air and marched ahead to the center entrance. He didn't feel like discussing their options.

"Center it is," he said, trudging forward.

Without a view of the map, Elias was left to trust the others, which wasn't something he was particularly keen on. Sighing, he shook his head slightly.
"What's the worst that could happen?" he muttered, leaning on his cane. "I can't imagine much beyond a bloody lake serpent."