Thaumiel rests his head on the cobblestone floor, watching the fire flicker – growing and fading as the flames slowly consume the scavenged wood and kindling. 

There’s a faint sound of a mechanism moving, something long embedded into the wall of the room they’re currently resting in. Hunter has his eyes on it – raven peering over his head, he stands with squinted eyes as he attempts to figure out the reason or purpose. The rest of the party needed time to recuperate, Hunter had a desire to investigate the strange device – it was deemed acceptable to find a middle ground.

The silence that settles over the group is oppressive, only interjected by the brief ticking of the mechanism that causes Thaumiel’s ears to flick and his eyes to hold shut.

“You feeling alright?” Oriana, settled next to him, ventures to ask. 

“The effects of spectral attacks will last for a while, but his physical wounds look to be mild.” Arcturus, lounging some distance beyond the two knights, comments briefly before he lets his head drop once more.

Oriana nods, trying to process what that could possibly mean.

Thaumiel, himself, knows it. The strange courser that had confronted him in the previous room had proven his idea that the dungeons were never kind, and never to be fully expected. His blade cut through it like air only for it to reform once again. Yet, yet, its teeth sunk into his flank like they were made of metal. The utter chill that followed it was more haunting than anything else. His pelt shivers again just at the thought.

And it had been Arcturus that just ... watched. Waited. Oriana and Hunter had to help drag him to safety, but it had been Arcturus that stuck behind and watched his attempt at a defense, however pitiful. There's a mixed pit of emotion at the thought of it. He hadn't been able to see whether Arcturus watched on in pity, awe, or something far worse.

“Regardless. Hopefully we won’t need to move again, at least for the time being.”

“I don’t think you can consider this place safe,” Hunter says, punctuated by the cackling noise of a crow. “I’m inclined to say we should take our chances and seek out a different corridor first. I don’t trust this– this ancient thing.”

“The machinery?” Oriana lifts her head to look back. “It’s old-world, from the fallen kingdom. You should leave it be.”

“That’s not particularly what I’m worried about–” Hunter pauses when the ticking stops.

He steps back.

It’s quiet for all of a few moments before the gears in the walls slot against one another, churning and groaning as something moves and triggers in the room beyond. Arcturus is already on his feet, but Oriana follows as soon as she can hear the tumbling of something from the corridor – heavy, fast, stone. 

“Up, up you go,” she nudges Thaumiel urgently. “Exit, now.”

Thaumiel doesn’t have to be told twice.