"Darkness Be My Only Friend" by Kelsey M. Graham

Raven was examining his newest theft when he felt shadowy fingers tugging at his sleeve. “Not now, Id,” he said without looking up “’m busy.” the fingers didn’t relent, however, and with a sigh, he looked up to see what the matter was. ‘The matter’ was three hulking men standing in the mouth of the alleyway, with rather nasty expressions on their faces. Raven knew why. He had, after all, just picked their pockets not ten minutes ago. He leaped up to run, but one of the men darted forward and grabbed his ankle, sending him crashing face first into the ground. Wordlessly, the man picked him up and threw him over his shoulder, ignoring the flailing arms and epithets of the boy. Closely followed by his companions, he carried the boy out of the alley, dumping him like a sack of flour at the feet of the villagers.

Raven looked around desperately, but there was no way out of the ring of stone-faced villagers. The headman refused to look at him, addressing a point to the right of Raven’s shoulder. “Raven of the Neither has been charged with the murder of Detlef of Twilight. When he was an orphan child, we, in our supreme mercy, had taken him in, spared this ingrate whenever he was caught stealing- and yet he repays us with this- this- atrocity! Dark Elves kill not their own folk!” Spared? You couldn’t land a blade on me, was all. he thought defiantly, but inside he was terrified. He’d thought the body had been safely hidden. On the ground beside him, he felt Id shift slightly. Id had protected him last time, but Raven wasn’t sure if he could do it again. Not enough light. The headman cleared his throat importantly.

“Since he has proven incurable, even in this twilight town, we have decreed that the one known as Raven shall be exiled from Twilight and all of the Dark, for all his days. Let him steal from the surface folk, in the blinding harsh light of the Sun and Moon, let him crawl upon the very crust of the earth, clinging to the ground like a beetle, with nothing to keep him sheltered and safe. Let none come to his aid, let him wander, starving and thirsty, burnt and blind, all through the remainder of his days, till the savage monsters and cruel beasts put an end to his suffering. Be gone, creature once known as Raven, you have no people now.”

The circle opened at one end and he was pushed by the rising tide of people through the gates that had encircled the only home that he had ever known. Two guards were waiting at the entrance way, they each grabbed one of his arms and half dragged- half carried him to the end of a tunnel. A droning filled his ears, as he blindly stumbled forwards, his thoughts were a scrambled chaos- this couldn’t be happening, it couldn’t! Only a few minutes ago, everything was normal, the world wasn’t allowed to change that fast!

Ahead was an unmarked piece of flat stone, beyond which, Raven knew, was the tunnel leading to the Overland, a place remembered in frightening tales and nursery stories told to every village child. Behave or a monster will take you away to the overland! Go to bed or the bloodthirsty savages from the surface will come for you! If you don’t eat your dinner I’ll send you aboveground! Even Raven had told and been told his share of scare stories. The Overland was a half real, half made-up world of fantastical monsters and cruel elves. Until now, Raven hadn’t even been sure of its existence.

The headman pressed one hand on the stone, muttering under his breath. With a dreadful crack!, the stone split down the center, revealing a tunnel leading upwards. As he was pushed through, he heard a soft voice whisper “Do not tarry in the tunnel, boy.” Then the stone slammed together once again, and he was left alone in cold, lonely blackness.

All of Raven’s people saw clearly in the dark. They lived in a world without day, far under the Earth’s surface, and had adapted to their home. But this darkness was of a different sort, a darkness not even the keenest of eyes could pierce. Raven lay where he had been thrown, wondering what to do, as his panicking mind painted vivid pictures of what creatures, perhaps, lay all around him, creatures that had been without a meal in a long, long time. Very hungry creatures. His heart beat frantic patterns inside his chest.

“Id?” His voice sounded weak and frail amidst the sea of darkness. “Id?” he cried again, a hysterical edge to his voice. There was no reply. But in the silence around him, he thought he could hear muffled clicks and groans, chittering sounds and the rasp of

-something- breathing. Do not tarry in the tunnel, boy. His breath caught in his chest, and he scrambled to his feet. He started running, to where he didn’t know, but once he started, he couldn’t stop.

All around him were the voices, strange whispers in silence, calling him, hissing around his ears, speaking in a language he didn’t know. He ran on and on, heart thumping in time to his footsteps, breath grating in his throat, and a voice in his mind repeating over and over again- Do not tarry tarry in the tunnel, boy.. Until the sounds were meaningless, jumbled up noises. Still he ran, a sharp pain in his side and a bubbling in his lungs, his eyes squeezed tight, though there was nothing to see. He didn’t know how long he ran- it could have been an hour, a day, a year, but at last, his strength given out, something- he didn’t know what, tripped him, and he landed curled up in a ball, thinking I don’t care what they do to me, I won’t run anymore, I won’t, I won’t… and fell into exhausted sleep, eyes still stubbornly closed.