Fingers Of The Mountain Oblivion Novels & Stories

The cave carved into the heart of the Mountain of Darkness glowed faintly, lit by a fire that was no fire at all. Its flames burned pale blue, casting long, eerie shadows that writhed against the cavern walls like living things. The stone dripped with moisture, its veins glimmering faintly as though the mountain remembered the blood and battles buried in its bones. Freya sat close to the unnatural fire, its glow brushing warmth against her chilled skin, but no flame could quiet the storm inside her chest. The shadows seemed to lean closer, listening, watching as though the mountain itself hungered for her response to what had been revealed.

Elara screamed from the ridge. I couldn't look at her. My jaw was locked. The earth didn't retreat. It adjusted. It felt the weight of the mountain I was holding, and it simply increased the pressure. The tectonic hammer-blow struck again, heavier this time, trying to fracture the granite frequency I had stolen. A sharp, wet snap echoed in my chest. Another rib gave way. A line of dark blood leaked from the corner of my mouth. I was losing. Flesh cannot hold the density of a mountain forever. The purple glow was beginning to creep back into the edges of the rails, crawling toward my blistered fingers.

The air that came up through the ceiling was not hot like the air from the vents. It was cold. It felt like the air one breathes when they are high up on a mountain. The fingers that were holding Elara's wrist were made of porcelain. They were very strong. They were also very shiny and white like they had been polished a lot. As Elara was pulled out of the part of the mountain, she could hear the sound of the fifth tier collapsing into the oil lake. The sound was getting fainter and fainter like the sound of a stove cooling down in an empty house.

It was almost… sweet. At the base of the mountain, a river of blood flowed. The surface bubbled and popped, and I could see things floating in it. Organs. Pieces of flesh. A child’s hand, fingers curled like it had tried to grab something one last time. “Beautiful, isn’t it?” The voice. “No.” I turned and stumbled away. Down the mountain path, between the bodies. Charred, bloodied hands reached for me. I swatted them away, and their nails scraped my palms.

A vision began to form, not in my mind’s eye, but in the air above the grimoire, woven from silver light and shadow. I saw a mountain, not of rock, but of black, obsidian glass, under a perpetual, starless twilight. A citadel was carved into its heart, a place of terrifying, angular beauty. At its center, in a vault sealed with bonds of moonlight and thorn, a form of swirling shadow and silver raged in silence. The prison of Morvana. But the vision didn’t stop there. It pulled back, showing the land around the obsidian mountain. A dead forest of petrified trees. A skyline I recognized—the jagged, distant peaks of our own world’s northern mountain range. The prison wasn’t in some other dimens

It’s bizarre, the moment my fingers interlock with hers, I’m filled with dread at the thought of having to let go. My heart is beating so fast that I’m surprised she can’t see it threatening to burst from my chest. The only thought I can manage is how I never want to let go of these delicate fingers of hers, ever. There’s no path here, only the short grass and an unseen path, leading the way to the mountain that we will climb. The starry sky and the moon are the only witnesses of this perfect moment. As we walk it seems nothing else exists, we are alone. Of course, we are alone, this night is just for us.

He already knows what is wrong but he still needs to confirm. He studied the young woman's wounds. There are scratches around her arms and legs. Probably from the dragging by her predators. Jones is a vampire but after years of practicing self-control, he managed to make his senses devoid of any scent. If his guess was true, then this woman's blood wouldn't affect him no matter how addictive her blood is.

"The mountain. Look at the Great Peak." ​The highest mountain in the Northern range, a jagged spire known as the Titan’s Finger, was shifting. It did not merely crumble. It unfolded. Huge slabs of granite, some the size of the Citadel itself, tumbled down the cliffs. A massive, clawed hand made of living stone and pulsing purple veins punched through the crust of the Earth. It gripped the side of the ridge, shattering a forest of ancient pines into splinters with a single flex of its fingers.

The sentence that made the Guardian go pale. "We found the mountain." Silence. Absolute silence. The Guardian closed his eyes. For several seconds nobody moved. Then he whispered: "It's opening." The words sent a chill through every person in the room. Althea stared. "What is opening?" The Guardian slowly looked at her. Ancient fear visible in his eyes. "The First Path." And hundreds of miles away, hidden within clouds and stone, the impossible mountain continued rising toward the sky. As though the world itself was remembering something it had spent centuries trying to forget.

His fingers clenched, scraping against the stone. Then Caelum’s eyes opened.