She was, Amalthea thought, getting rather tired of the smell of crushed moss and damp dirt. Just a little. They had yet to find a pathway to one of the lower levels, each attempt turning up dead ends or complicated loops that brought them back up to the overgrown caverns. The hazards they had faced thus far were not simple, but there was no great reward awaiting them at the end. They were...routine, if you could call it that. As dangerous as it might sound, she rather wished for a challenge. 

Oberon was in the lead now, having shouldered his way past Fetch as soon as they'd entered the Mouth of the Dungeon. He still did not trust her, not after their last escapade, but they all knew the value in having her, and her Hand, along. Neither he nor Amalthea had yet mastered the magic of conjured hands, which could do what they could not. Maggie carried the soul torch as before, hovering near Fetch's ears, while Fei bobbed just ahead of Oberon, allowing him to see where they were going. Thiel brought up the rear, lighting his own way with a perfectly ordinary lantern, the flickering flame protected by the clear glass walls. 

Fetch hadn't said a word this whole time, through hours of walking, which was rather unlike her. Amalthea had expected the Dungeon-born Courser to provide her typical cryptic warnings, but the ether mare had been strangely silent, putting Amalthea on edge. Was Fetch simply respecting Oberon's annoyance with her presence? Or did she know something? Or worse yet, did she not know anything? Perhaps her silence was due entirely to her present ignorance, which...was not a reassuring thought. 

"Ew," Amalthea muttered, nostrils flaring in disgust. The stale, fetid air wafted towards them, despite their careful distance from the slimy mouth of the tunnel, wet gleaming in Fei's light. 

"It's impossible to tell if someone's been down this way recently," Thiel reported, examining the thick layer of sludge. Despite its viscosity, it was still liquid enough that whatever hoofprints another party might have made, they had been long erased by the slow-moving slime. "Fei?"

The wisp whisked down the tunnel, quickly disappearing into the haze of condensation and becoming indistinct. 

"Never mind," Amalthea huffed, disappointed. "Come back, Fei!"

Fei did not, in fact, return. Given it was typically very obedient, this was unusual, and Amalthea edged closer to the slime to try and peer deeper into the fog. 

"Fei?" she called. 

"Onward." Fetch spoke her first word of the day, her voice rough with disuse. Amalthea and Thiel looked at her sharply; Oberon glowered. 

"Onward," he rumbled, clearly doubtful. You want to go in there? went unsaid. 

"Onward," Fetch repeated firmly. 

Fei still had not returned. In the thick fog, Amalthea could barely make out the faintest glow, and she wasn't even sure if it was Fei, or the light from the soul torch or Thiel's lantern. 

"Well," she said, gathering herself. "Shall we?"

"Amalthea, no!" Oberon snarled, but the Moonwright had already taken her first step into the muck, lifting her knees high in response to the squelching, sucking slime. 

"It's fine," she called back. "I can't really see much th—woah!"

Even her silhouette in the fog disappeared, accompanied by the sound of something heavy impacting thick sludge with a wet smack. Oberon lunged at Fetch, his teeth bared. 

"You!"

"Not now, Oberon! We have to go find her!" Thiel interrupted firmly, just before he plunged into the slimy tunnel himself. "Come on!"