Ascension

The darkness came two days later.

The last lamp sputtered and died. The darkness was absolute. It was a physical weight, pressing against Mercy’s eyes, heavy as the mountain itself.

"Elias?" she called out into the black.

Silence. Then, a rustle of silk.

"It is time," Elias’s voice whispered right next to her ear.

Mercy screamed, scrambling back.

"Don't be afraid," Elias said. He sounded lucid for the first time in weeks. "The darkness is the final test. We must shed the heavy clay of our bodies."

Mercy heard the *shing* of metal. A knife? No, something else. A chain.

She felt something cold and heavy wrap around her throat. A gold chain.

"Elias, stop!" Mercy gasped, clawing at her neck.

"It hurts to be born," Elias soothed. He began to tighten the chain. "Just let go, Mercy. We will be statues. Perfect. Eternal. No more hunger. No more cold."

"I don't want to die!" Mercy shrieked.

The survival instinct, dormant for weeks, roared back to life. She wasn't a queen. She was a rat in a corner.

She kicked out into the darkness. Her foot connected with something hard—Elias’s shin.

He grunted but didn't let go. He was strong, fueled by the adrenaline of his delusion. The chain bit into Mercy’s windpipe. Stars exploded in her vision, brighter than the gold.

*I am not dying here,* she thought. *I am not dying poor.*

Her hand flailed in the dark. It struck the side table. Her fingers closed around a heavy object. A jagged, raw nugget of gold the size of a fist.

"I love you," Elias wept in the dark, tightening the noose. "I love you so much."

Mercy swung the gold nugget with every ounce of strength she had left.

*CRACK.*

It connected with his skull.

Elias let out a wet sound. The tension on the chain released.

Mercy didn't stop. She swung again. And again. She beat the God of the Mountain with his own riches. She beat him until he stopped moving, until the only sound in the cavern was her own ragged, sobbing breath.

"Elias?" she whispered.

Silence.

She scrambled away, crawling on her hands and knees until her back hit the cold stone wall.

She was alone.

\---