GRAVEHOOK

Chapter 6: Beneath Blackwater

The monastery gates stood open when they reached them. That disturbed Draeven more than the dead soldiers outside.

Bodies covered the stone bridge leading into Blackwater Monastery. Some wore church armor. Others wore dark robes stitched with ritual markings. None of them had visible wounds.

They looked emptied.

Like something had hollowed them out from the inside. Snow drifted through the open gates into the courtyard while iron bells swayed overhead without wind.

Oric stopped beside one of the corpses.

“This man was alive when we passed the lower trail yesterday.”

Malgraves crouched carefully beside the body. The priest touched two fingers against the dead man’s throat, then quickly pulled away.

Cold black residue coated his glove.

“Corruption spread through the bloodstream,” he muttered. “Fast.”

Draeven studied the monastery windows above them.

No movement. No guards. Nothing. That made him uneasy.

Severin had vanished after the mountain shook, disappearing with half the surviving soldiers into the monastery depths while panic tore through the clearing outside.

And the children…

Draeven still could not forget their voices. Not children anymore. Something speaking through them.

Mournhook pulsed faintly beneath the wrappings.

The seal is weakening.

He ignored it and stepped into the courtyard first.

Blackwater Monastery had once been beautiful. Even ruined by age and winter, the old structure still carried traces of wealth beneath the decay. Tall gothic towers overlooked the mountains while massive stained-glass windows lined the upper halls.

Most were shattered now.

Something enormous had broken outward from inside. Stone debris covered the courtyard fountain. Long claw marks carved through the frozen walls.

Malgraves stared upward uneasily.

“What could do this?”

Draeven’s eyes tracked the damage patterns carefully. Whatever escaped had not climbed. It had crawled.

The monastery doors groaned open under their weight. Inside smelled of blood and burned incense.

Candles still flickered across the entrance hall despite the destruction surrounding them. Long dining tables had been overturned into barricades while dried blood painted the floor in thick black streaks leading deeper inside.

Oric swallowed hard.

“This place feels wrong.”

“That’s because it is,” Malgraves answered quietly.

Draeven moved ahead slowly.

The deeper halls carried signs of fighting everywhere. Church soldiers torn apart near stairwells. Burned ritual circles. Walls marked with desperate scripture written in blood.

One message appeared repeatedly.

DO NOT LET IT SPEAK.

Another hallway carried a different warning carved directly into the stone.

HE IS NOT ASLEEP.

Draeven paused there. The black veins beneath his skin pulsed sharply again.

Almost reacting.

“You feel it too,” Malgraves said behind him.

“Yes.”

The priest lowered his lantern.

“There’s power beneath this monastery. Ancient power.”

Oric looked pale.

“You mean demons?”

“No,” Draeven answered.

“Something older.”

The silence after that felt heavier. Then came the sound. A bell ringing underground.

Slow. Deep enough to vibrate through the floor itself. Once. Twice. Then screaming followed. Human. Close.

Draeven moved immediately toward the lower stairwell.

The underground chambers beneath Blackwater stretched far deeper than monastery foundations should allow. Ancient tunnels carved directly into black mountain stone descended beneath the church architecture, older than the monastery itself.

The screams led them into a massive circular chamber lined with iron cages.

Most stood empty. Not all.

Children huddled inside several cages against the far wall. Weak. Silent. Their eyes blackened the same way as the ones outside.

One cage held church soldiers instead. Or what remained of them.

Their bodies twitched unnaturally against broken bones while black veins spread beneath translucent skin.

Transformation. Midway. Oric looked sick.

“They’re turning into those things.”

“No,” Malgraves whispered.

The priest stared toward the center of the chamber.

“Something is using them.”

A massive pit opened there. Bottomless darkness.

Ancient chains thicker than tree trunks disappeared downward into the abyss while enormous ritual symbols covered the surrounding floor in silver and dried blood.

Draeven approached carefully. Then he saw Severin.

The executioner stood near the pit speaking calmly with another figure wrapped in black robes.

Sylveth.

Even from this distance the Veilmother carried unnatural stillness around her. Her dark glass veil reflected the lantern light strangely, hiding everything beneath it.

Neither seemed surprised to see him. Severin looked almost relieved.

“You took longer than expected.”

Draeven’s hand tightened around Mournhook.

“The children.”

Sylveth answered this time.

“They survive because of you.”

Her voice remained soft. Calm. That made it worse somehow.

“What does that mean?”

The Witch tilted her head slightly.

“Your bloodline stabilizes the corruption process. Without it, the body breaks too quickly.”

Oric stared at Draeven. Malgraves looked horrified.

“No…”

Draeven kept his expression still despite the pressure building beneath his skin.

“You created M-17.”

Sylveth nodded once.

“A prototype.”

The mountain groaned deeply beneath them. Chains rattled from somewhere inside the abyss.

Then something moved below. Not climbing. Breathing.

The sound rolled upward through the pit like distant thunder soaked in blood. Oric staggered backward immediately.

Malgraves gripped his prayer chain tightly enough for his knuckles to whiten.

Even Severin’s expression sharpened slightly. Only Sylveth remained calm. Draeven stared into the darkness below.

“You bound something down there.”

The Veilmother stepped closer to the pit.

“No,” she corrected softly. “The church did.”

That landed harder than expected. Draeven’s eyes narrowed.

Sylveth continued.

“They found it centuries ago beneath these mountains. Buried beneath old kingdoms and older gods.” Her voice lowered slightly. “They could not kill it. So they fed it.”

The cages suddenly made sense. The children. The experiments. The bloodline trials.

Not resurrection. Containment. Malgraves looked physically ill now.

“Dear God…”

“There is no god here,” Sylveth said quietly.

The chains below the pit jerked violently. A roar followed. Not animal. Not human. Ancient.

The lantern flames throughout the chamber dimmed instantly.

Then Draeven heard it. A voice. Deep beneath the mountain. Not through his ears. Inside his skull. Blood of the gatekeeper.

His vision blurred.

Pain exploded through the black veins across his chest while Mournhook pulsed violently against his hand.

The scythe recognized the voice.

Worse

It feared it.

Draeven dropped to one knee breathing hard. Oric shouted something nearby, but the sound felt distant now.

The voice beneath the abyss spoke again. You carry his scent. Images flashed across Draeven’s mind suddenly.

War. Fire. A man holding the same scythe centuries earlier. Mountains drowning in black storms. A massive shape chained beneath the earth.

Then another image.

A child standing before the abyss. Himself. Young. Covered in blood.

Draeven’s eyes widened. Memory. Not vision. Memory. The pain vanished as suddenly as it came.

He looked up sharply toward Sylveth.

“You know what they did to me.”

The Witch stood silent for a moment.

Then, slowly, she reached beneath her robe and removed a worn piece of parchment.

Old. Burned at the edges. Marked with church seals.

She tossed it toward him. Draeven caught it carefully. The page contained church records.

Experiment authorization.

Subject Designation: D.M. – Approved for Gate Communion at age seven.

His blood ran cold. Malgraves stared at the document in disbelief. Draeven’s hands tightened hard enough to nearly tear the page apart.

Then Sylveth finally spoke.

“They didn’t create your curse, Gravehook,” she said quietly. “They fed you to it.”