Advent Letters: Year Seven, Letter Two

Jer took the glowing present out of the satchel. By the light of the stone torches, he could read the name on the label. It was for him. With shaking hands, he unwrapped the present, mind whirling with possibilities. Was this some mighty talisman that would rescue them from the pit and solve all their problems?

But when he looked inside the box, his eyebrow turned up. He would have been disappointed if he wasn’t so confused.

It was an oval pane of glass about the length of his hand. The glass was tinted red, and a faint light shone from it. Very faint. 

“It’s amazing,” Brian said. His pupils grew wide in the dim light.

“But what is it?” Matt asked.

“No idea,” Jer replies. He turned it around  in his hand.

“But what’s it for?” Matt pressed.

“I said I don’t know. I just opened it—you know as much as me.”

Jer handed the lens to Matt. Matt turned it over and over with a deepening scowl before handing it back. Jer thought about letting Brian hold it. But Brian was bouncing up and down so much that handing him something made out of glass seemed reckless.

“Maybe it’s some kind of light?” Brian suggested.

“I guess…” Jer said. But even as he held out the lens in front of him, he knew it wouldn’t work. There wasn’t even enough light for his next step.

“That’s it!” Brian declared. “It must be lighting our way!”

“No it isn’t,” Jer said. “If it wasn’t for those two torches  on the archway, I wouldn’t be able to see you.”

“Check the map—maybe we can see the arrow now?” Matt ventured.

Again, Jer dutifully held the lens toward the map. But it was no use: the arrow was still gone. And even if there was an arrow, the lens would hardly give enough light to see it.

“Let’s get going,” Brian said, tugging Jer’s sleeve toward the yawning abyss. “That has to be why Santa gave it to us.”

“We don’t know that,” Matt replied. “The only thing we have for sure are those.” He gestured to the two stone torches, built into the cave, which hung high above their heads. “Without the torches, we’ll be in total darkness. I’m not leaving them.”

But even as Matt said this, a huge crash landed against the door. The goblins were still outside. And they’d found some sort of battering ram. 

Matt and Bri both turned to Jer. The implication was clear. Bri voted go, and Matt voted stay. It was up to Jer to break the tie. As usual.

Jer glanced down at the glass lens—for all the world a useless trinket. Could it really help them navigate a maze in the dark? Just the thought made his chest race. 

Another crash brought his attention back to the door. It was only a matter of time before the goblins broke in. And who knew how many hundreds of them there could be by this point? Even with their magical weapons, they couldn’t fight them off forever. Besides, the map had led them here.

“Let’s follow the lens into the maze,” Jer announced, strapping on his battle helmet. “It’s our only chance.”

Bri put his own helmet on with a cheer. He started pulling Jer along by the shirtsleeve. Matt crossed his arms. But a roar from the other side of the door shook him out of it. He scampered after his brothers, fumbling with his helmet straps as he went.

Lens held like a dying penlight, Jer shuffled slowly into the darkness. A darkness so complete that it was a tangible thing—a cloak of ink and night consuming the senses. Jer kept his eyes on the lens. Its pitiful glow was his only proof he was still alive.

Matt clutched at Jer’s shoulder, trying to slow him down even further. Bri, meanwhile, strained on Jer’s arm, trying to pull him further forward.

Worse still, the runes from above the door echoed in his head. There was a minotaur in this labyrinth. Somewhere in the shadows. Maybe just beyond the reach of his lens: its muscular torso slathered in blood, its bull nostrils panting for its next victim.  

Bri tugged at Jer’s sleeve like a puppy on a leash. “What are we waiting for? We have the light—let’s get going!”

“Calling that lens a ‘light’ is a bit generous,” Matt grumbled. “We may as well be in complete darkness.”

“Matt’s right—sort of,” Jer said. “We need to be careful. No telling what could be ahead.”

Brian sighed. “We don’t have to be careful. And we don’t have to worry. That’s why Santa gave us the lens. All we have to do is believe!”

Brian let go of Jer’s hand. Without looking back, he leaped forward into the dark. Jer waited for the sound of Brian’s foot hitting the ground. 

It never came.

Instead, Jer heard a gasp of surprise followed by a tumble of body against stone!

“Brian!” Jer and Matt shouted.

Jer shuffled forward as quickly as he dared, his lens held out. Only Matt’s grasp on his shoulder stopped Jer from falling down the sharp embankment. Clearly, Brian had leapt into this embankment, and was still falling down the steep slope—his crashes and yells grew fainter and fainter. 

Jer raised his eyebrow at Matt. Matt sighed, and nodded. Both brothers started down the embankment, leaning back on their rears to keep their balance. But after a few scoots, they both lost their balance and started tumbling down themselves. For seconds that felt like hours, Jer crashed into the sloping rock again and again as his feet tumbled over his helmet and the world was a spinning darkness. For reasons he couldn’t explain, he clutched the lens to his chest to keep it safe.

The slope finally flattened, and the boys slid to a stop. Coughing and wiping dust off his tunic, Jer staggered to his feet.

“Where are we?” Matt groaned.

Carefully, Jer inched around the room. Because his lens only lit the area directly in front of his nose, it was a tedious process to realize the horror of their situation. 

Twelve different passageways snaked away from them like spokes from a wheel. Brian could have fallen down any of them. The minotaur could step out of any of them.

Jer weighed finding Brian against alerting the minotaur. Then he called out “Brian!” at the top of his lungs. The voice echoed down the hallways, shaking dust onto cobwebs.

After far too long, Brian responded. At least, Jer thought he responded. But the voice was garbled through layers of stone. It was impossible to discern any words. It was even more impossible to discern which of the twelve tunnels the sound came from.

After Brian’s voice faded, another sound emerged. This one deeper, more guttural. Something gigantic and filled with rage. Jer forced himself to tamp down the fear. 

“Okay,” he said at last. “I think Brian’s voice came from this tunnel. Or maybe that one. Either way, there’s nothing to do but keep going forward and hope—”

“No.”

Jer felt like he’d been punched in the gut. “What did you say?”

“I’m not going any further.”

“Are you insane?” Jer shouted, “You’re going to just sit there and let Brian get eaten by the minotaur?”

“I’ll do just as much good for Brian sitting here as you will stumbling into the dark,” Matt said icily. “You’re pitiful little light won’t help you find Brian. The only thing it might do is attract the minotaur. How can you help Brian if you’re chewed up inside the minotaur’s gut?”

“You don’t know that,” Jer shot back. 

Matt slapped the rock he was sitting on. “Here’s the one thing I do know—the ground beneath me. I’m not going to stumble any further in the dark until I’m sure of what I’m doing.”

“You’re just giving up,” Jer snarled. 

“No, I’m being logical. Maybe Brian will find me here. If you go forward, you’ll just make things worse.”

“I’m going after Brian,” Jer said. “You stay here with your logic.”

“Fine,” Matt shot back. “I’ll be waiting here when you realize your mistake.”

With a final snort, Jer held his lens out in front of him, and started down one of the tunnels. For the first few minutes, Jer’s righteous anger fueled him forward. But after some twists and turns, and a couple near misses on rocks hanging from the cave walls, he started wondering if Matt had a point. He also couldn’t make out anything that sounded like Brian. 

He was just wondering if he should turn back when his foot slipped on another embankment. Once again, Jer was tumbling wildly in the dark, so disoriented that he couldn’t even tell which way was up or where his feet were supposed to be. His back crashed against a cave wall, knocking the air out of his lungs.

Officially, Jer denies this next part. But I have it on good authority that, as his lungs fought for air, he started sputtering tears. And who could blame him? He was lost in the dark. Both his brothers were gone, and a literal monster was tracking him down. All he had was some useless gift that only made things worse. Why would Santa do this to him? Was this some kind of joke?

Jer glared daggers at the lens, which still lay undamaged in his hand. In a surge of rage, he tears back his arm to shatter it against the cave wall.

But just before throwing it, he looked at the lens properly. For the first time, he didn’t look at the small light emitting from the lens. Instead, he looked through the lens itself.

He stopped his hand. With a spark of something in his chest, he held the lens up to his eyes.