The dawn’s early light faded behind them gradually as Weltun and his sister, Folia, descended the mine. The light from their lantern illuminated the tunnel. The walls were marked with many tiny holes and rough spots, the signs of years of mining.
Weltun kept his eyes moving, looking for even the smallest glow. It was very unlikely anyone would leave magical ore behind, but the siblings needed all the money they could get.
The backpack left for them at the mine entrance had two pick axes and the lantern attached to the side, but otherwise, it felt empty to him. He guessed their mysterious employer didn’t want to pay to feed them. Weltun wasn’t surprised. The mages that sent orphans like them to do their dirty work always wanted to provide the bare minimum.
Weltun groaned.
“Weltun, would you stop complaining,” said Folia This job should pay well.”
“When have these jobs ever paid well?”
“They’ve given us enough to eat. And we’re still alive. Can’t that be enough for now?”
“The only problem with ‘for now’ is that no one cares to say when things will get better. They always say stuff like ‘soon’ or ‘one day’.
“Just be patient.”
“Patience without a payoff is just you getting played,” Weltun grumbled under his breath.
The two of them had certainly been played. First, their dad turned out to be a swindler and took off with all the family’s money. Then their mom got sick, and without any money, there was nothing to do to save her. Ever since then, he and Folia had been on their own living off whatever job they could get.
Now, they were hired by a mage to collect his precious magical ore. It was a common job among homeless orphans, and they had done it plenty of times. The last time they did this job, the mage paid a fraction of what was promised. Weltun guessed part of getting to live in a mansion like all the mages was paying as little as possible for labor.
Weltun looked back and saw all signs of daylight had vanished. Weltun was getting a bit worried by the growing distance to the surface. This bag wasn’t that big, meaning they’d have to keep going back and forth to unload the ore they collected. That would eat up a lot of time, and time was definitely money.
After a few more minutes, they were just able to make out a light-blue glow coming from up ahead. They finally arrived. The end of the tunnel was covered with large crystals. Each one gave off light and was colored like a clear day sky.
“Wow!” Folia exclaimed. “I just love how beautiful magical ore is.”
Weltun chuckled. “Maybe one day we’ll have enough to buy you a necklace covered in the stuff.”
“That would be amazing!”
“Yeah, it would. But for now, all this goes to our greedy employer of a mage.”
“Come on, Weltun. They all can’t be bad.”
As she said that, Weltun reached into the bag to see if there was anything else the mage had given them. He was shocked to find his arm sunk in all the way up to his shoulder. He quickly pulled it out and studied the bag. He reached in once again and sure enough his arm went in way too far for a bag this size.
“This bag has a pocket dimension!”
He dug around the open air inside the bag for a second and then found two boxed lunches with the sibling’s names on each.
“You see! Not all mages are bad.” She grabbed one of the pick axes. “Come on, we have work to do.” She went over and started hacking at the wall.
Weltun paused still staring at the bag. These things were worth a small fortune. He had never heard of a mage letting hirelings use one. This one had never even spoken to them. They woke up this morning in one of the safer alleys the city had to offer and found a note saying to come to this cave and mine ore.
This wasn’t unusual in terms of how mages hired commoners. Most didn’t want to be seen with such rabble, so they would magic away a message to them with a time and place. There was never a written promise on what you’d be paid.
Part of him was tempted to just take the bag. It had to be worth a lot more than whatever this mage was going to scrape out for them. He looked at his sister and knew she would never go along with it. Her heart was too pure for this life. Even though they had so little, she always helped out anyone who appeared to need it.
He quietly sighed to himself. He grabbed his pick axe, left the bag on the ground, and started working.
Hours went by and the siblings kept shoving more and more of the ore into the bag. It never showed any sign of getting full. Weltun guessed there was no reason to worry about having to make round trips to empty the bag at the entrance.
Eventually, they started to get hungry. Without any sun, or money for a timepiece, they could only guess it was around lunchtime. They took a break and ate their lunch. The food was far better than what they expected. It wasn’t quality fit for a king, but it was certainly better than the stale bread and questionable water they were used to.
“Mmm. This chicken is delicious!” Folia cheered.
“Don’t get too attached. After this, it’s right back to eating garbage.”
“You don’t know that. This guy has been quite generous with us. Maybe he’ll pay us enough to get our own place.”
Weltun rolled his eyes. “Come on, Fol. There are plenty of mages who use hirelings not just for labor but also for amusement. He’s probably trying to get our hopes up so he can watch our disappointment when he shows his true colors.”
“I don’t believe that.”
“I’ve heard it happen before.”
“Oh yeah, from who?”
“Ya know, around.”
“’ Around’, huh? Is that their first name or their surname?”
“Shut up.”
Folia giggled.
They finished their lunch and returned to work. Another couple of hours went by, and the sibling steadily filled the pack. At one point Weltun shouted, “Ow!” as a piece of ore dropped from the ceiling and smacked him on the head.
Folia stopped her picking. “Are you alright?”
“Yeah, it just really smarts.”
As Weltun finished speaking they both felt the ground and walls begin to quake. Soon the siblings found they were unable to stand as the ground was too unstable. More loose ore and rock fell from above. One of the falling rocks landed on their lantern, and the light went out.
The siblings were left in darkness, say for the faint glow of the ore sticking out of the wall. The shaking grew more and more violent. The falling rocks became bigger and bigger. Weltun leaned against the wall and shuffled his way over to Folia. He found her crouched and covering her head. He wrapped his body over hers and felt more and more rocks pelting his back.
Either a few seconds or an eternity went by, Weltun couldn’t tell, and the shaking would not stop. He looked around for anything, any hope of surviving. His eyes eventually found a brighter glow of magical ore on the ground just a few feet away from them.
“Come on!” Weltun shouted as he guided his sister over while still covering her.
They made it to their pack. “Get in!” He opened the pack as wide as he could. Folia managed to squeeze her tiny frame through the hole.
Weltun followed after her, trying to crawl his way in. Folia grabbed his arm and pulled him in.
They could no longer feel the quaking from inside. The once loud rumbling was very muted. After a few long seconds, the opening they just crawled through closed with the seem still present, and shortly after the quaking stopped.
When everything seemed to finally settle, the kids took the chance to breathe.
“Are you okay?” Weltun asked.
“Yeah, but you’re bleeding.”
Weltun put a hand to where the first rock hit him and winced. He looked at his finger and saw there was a little blood. Looking down he saw his whole body was covered in bruises. Folia was similarly injured.
“Nothing serious. Should stop on its own in a minute.”
They sat there, finally taking the chance to look at their surroundings. It was just a large rectangular room with perfectly black walls. The wall with the entrance was warped to form the pack’s opening. On the far side of the space was the giant pile of ore they had collected. From what they could tell they hadn’t even filled the bag halfway.
“Think it’s safe to go out?” Folia asked.
“Let’s find out.” Weltun grabbed the edges of the opening, but they wouldn’t budge. He pulled harder. No movement. He put all his strength into it. Nothing. He found one part of the opening he could squeeze a finger through. He was immediately met with a cold, stone surface.
He stepped away. All the color drained from his face.
“What is it?” Folia asked with much trepidation.
Weltun paused a moment, not wanting to say it out loud. “I think the tunnel has completely caved in.”
The color now drained from Folia’s face. “No. No, that can’t be right. It’s probably just a big boulder fell on the bag. Maybe if we work together we c— ow!” Folia tried to get up but immediately fell again.
Weltun went over and looked at her feet. Her left ankle was badly bruised. One of the rocks must have landed on it. He ripped off one of his sleeves and wrapped it around her ankle gently but firmly.
“Thank you,” she said with a soft smile.
“Not sure if there’s really a point to it, though.”
“Don’t say that. We’ll get out of here.”
“I would love to hear how you think we’re going to get out of this.”
“You just have to have hope.”
Weltun let out a deep sigh. Hope was not something he thought of often. All these years had shown him no reason to believe hope did you any good. It only ever set you up to knock you down hard. What’s more, all the other bad stuff that had happened weren’t nearly as bad as their current situation. Where in this magical pack were they going to find hope?
Weltun sat down beside his sister. She leaned her head on his shoulder. “Try not to talk. Don’t want to waste air.”
“You’re the one talking, doofus.”
Hour after hour went by with no sign the rocks outside would move or help would ever arrive. Weltun started to feel his thoughts get a bit hazy. It would seem the air was starting to run low.
“Folia.”
“Shh. No talking, remember?”
“I don’t think it matters anymore.”
“Yes, it does. We just need to wait a little longer. Someone will come and get us.”
At this moment, Weltun was faced with a choice; give his sister a happy lie or say what was on his heart before he died.
“That’s it.” Weltun stood up. “No one is coming for us!” He shouted. “We’re orphans! Our only value was our cheap manual labor. Replacing us is the easiest thing in the world. You think because you helped a kitten out of a tree, or you picked up and returned a necklace an old guy dropped, or gave what little money we have to feed other orphans means people care about you? It doesn’t!”
Weltun paused and Folia didn’t say anything.
“We are going to die down here. No one is going to remember us or even notice we’re gone. I did want to say a sweet goodbye to my only sister before I went, but at least I get to die having finally spoken the truth!”
He struggled with panting for air but managed to catch his breath after a moment.
“So, you think I wasted my life being kind to others?”
Weltun didn’t respond. He never heard Folia talk in a such serious tone.
“You think people either believe everything is terrible and they’re realistic or they believe in better things and they’re delusional?!” Folia stood up and hobbled closer to Weltun, getting right in his face. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe there is nothing good in this world. Maybe I have just been fooling myself this entire time. But the way you see things sounds like the most miserable way to live, so I’m going to stick with my happy delusions until my dying breath!”
Now she was the one trying to catch her breath. Weltun stood there in stunned silence. Folia then made her way back to the wall and sat down.
Weltun had nothing to say. He went and sat against the wall opposite his sister. He sat there and thought about what just happened, what he just did. It didn’t matter which one of them was right and which was wrong. All that mattered was that he chose to use his last minutes of life to yell at the one person who was always there for him.
A few more minutes went by in even greater silence than before. Weltun and Folia were struggling to keep their eyes open. Folia then used what little strength she had to crawl over to Weltun. She sat beside her and rested her head on his shoulder once more.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“I’m sorry.”
Weltun felt a great relief. At least he could go to sleep with no regrets. He closed his eyes and the glow of the ore grew dimmer and dimmer until there was only darkness.
A new, bright light broke through the darkness. Weltun could feel a cool breeze brush against his body. He opened his eyes and found he was still in the pack’s pocket dimension with Folia. He looked over to where the bright light was coming from. The pack’s mouth was opening and an old man with a long white beard was sticking his head inside. A small ball of light was hovering over him.
“My, my. Aren’t you two rather clever?”
Weltun didn’t know how to respond to this weird old man or this situation. He shook Folia awake. She came to and found herself seeing the same thing as her brother.
“Who are you?”
“Me? Why, I am the great wizard, Mergace!” The old man dropped the bag’s opening in the middle of his sentence. Judging by the muffled echo, it sounded like he made a grand declaration to a supposed large audience.
“Whoops.” He opened the bag again. “Sorry. I got a little carried away.”
The siblings stared at him, not knowing what to make of him.
“Well, please come out. I’m sure you’ve been stuck here for far too long.”
The two children crawled out to discover the tunnel was free of any rubble. In fact, the sides were now perfectly cylindrical, without any rough spots to be found.
The two looked at the old man. He must have used magic to carve his way down.
Weltun finally spoke up. “Not to look a gift horse in the mouth, but why are you down here?”
“Why, to rescue my hirelings, of course!”
Weltun gave him an incredulous look. “Rescue us? Your hirelings?”
“Yes. Although truth be told, I wasn’t sure there was anything I could do at this point. However, you came up with a rather brilliant idea, hiding inside the bag. I’m very impressed.”
“But why would a mage bother saving hirelings?”
Mergace considered the boy for a second. “You’ve had some rather unfortunate dealings with others in my field. Well, I have two reasons. The first is that I do not agree with how those in your circumstance are treated. I wish to do my part in changing that.”
Weltun couldn’t believe what he was hearing. A mage that actually cared about someone other than himself?
“The second reason is that you showed me great kindness the other day.”
Folia and Weltun looked at each other confused. Then, Folia’s eyes shot open, and she pointed at Mergace.
“You’re the old man who dropped the necklace!”
Mergace nodded. “That is correct.” He pulled out the necklace out of his robe. “This is a gift from my late sister, whom I miss very dearly. I don’t know what I would’ve done if I lost it. So, I wished to repay you by eventually hiring you to live and work at my mansion.”
The siblings couldn’t believe what they were hearing. They wouldn’t have to sleep another night in a cold alley? They wouldn’t wonder where their next meal would come from or if it would make them sick? Before Weltun went too far down that thought, he realized something.
“Wait. If you were going have us work at your mansion, why send us down here to mine ore?”
“Ah, good question. Unfortunately, when I made this offer before with other orphans, they were skeptical. They thought I would use them in some magical experiment or what have you. I don’t know where they got that idea. So, I thought I would try to earn your trust gradually with steady work until it seemed you were ready to hear me out.”
Folia turned to Weltun. “So, you could say if some people didn’t always assume the worst in others, the two of us would never have been in danger in the first place.”
Weltun face drained of color once more.
“Hmm.” Mergace stroked his beard. “What an odd way of looking at it. But, I suppose that isn’t inaccurate.”
“You know what?” Weltun cut in with extra energy. “How about we get out of this place, and talk over job details in your mansion, Great Wizard, Mergace?”
“Splendid idea!” With that, the wizard marched forward.
Folia gave Weltun the stink eye as she passed him. Weltun followed behind sheepishly.
A few minutes went by with only the wizard’s magical light guiding them. But, sooner than Weltun expected, the orange light of the setting sun became visible, guiding them to their new home.
