The next day was one of hard downhill trekking, and the first sun was starting its inevitable fall towards the horizon when Rial realised he was coming up to the place where he had buried Gryrne. The thick rows of trees thinned suddenly, and the downward slope levelled out into a flat area of cleared land. He could see the dark patch of turned soil ahead of him, a stain amidst the grasses.

It was only as he approached the grave that he realised the hole was too dark, with scattered patches of dirt surrounding it. It looked as if something had been digging at it. He hesitated as he approached, reaching behind him to pull his pack around and take Mead out.

The grave had been opened, a deep crumbling hole leading down into blackness. Some burrowing creature, perhaps, or a hungry predator that caught the scent of the body below the ground, thought Rial. It must have been large; the true width of the hole was hard to tell as the sides had collapsed in, but it was larger than an ordinary nekota.

A vicious, hate-filled growl caused Rial to start and look around for its source before he realised it was coming from himself. The realisation drained him and he fell to his knees, head bowed towards the ground as he held back the tears.

He couldn’t even dig a proper grave for his friend. He had left Gryrne’s body to be gnawed at and devoured by scuttling rodents and crawling insects, clawed and torn by the fauna of the mountains. He didn’t notice his nails cutting into his palms as he clenched them at the images flashing across his mind.

Rial could not tell how long he remained there, eyes held shut against the accusing scar in the ground in front of him, but after some length of time he was able to calm himself and stand. Saying nothing he gathered the scattered soil and poured it back down into the hole, sealing in the darkness and whatever was left beneath.

“Mead,” he said, once the ground was again level.

“How may I help?” came the reply from besides him.

“Can you… melt this? Make it fuse solid?”

Rial had seen the bloomery in the blacksmith heat metal to glowing, burning liquid, and he had heard of the giant mounds of slag that lay around the now-abandoned mines from which most of the region’s sparse iron had once been taken. It was said they were harder than stone.

“To what degree?” Mead asked.

“Enough that nothing can claw its way through.”

With no further comment a beam of soft orange wrapped itself around the weapon then curled off towards the ground, laying a translucent cover of energy over the grave. It moved and swirled like nectar, a hissing sound emerging from the sides, yet though the earth below was bubbling and steaming no heat was projected outwards. Rial, stood just a few steps away, felt nothing except the cool breeze of the mountains.

After only a few seconds the field snapped back. Rial thought he saw, in the fraction of a moment before it disappeared completely, the orange turn dark before disappearing completely.

The ground above the grave had become a smooth, burnished black, a glossy sheen reflecting in the early evening suns. It was featureless, and when Rial stood over it he could see himself fuzzily reflected in the surface. He reached down and touched it; it wasn’t even warm.

No scavenger was going to get through that.

“The exit is now blocked,” reported the weapon.

“Thank you, Mead,” he said softly.

It wasn’t until it was far too late that Rial realised he should have questioned Mead’s use of the word ‘exit.’