Patrick Rothfuss

It was not easy to make my way into the labyrinth of the Underthing. In fact, I did not make my way in at all. I was already there.

Her name was Auri, and she was small, and she was all alone.

There was a question in the world that Auri did not know, and she was ashamed to ask.

Auri knew that the world was strange, and she knew that strange things happened in the Underthing. She wished she could make sense of it all.

The moon was a bright, glass-topped pinprick high above, and the wind was a distant thing that made the trees rustle and the stones clatter.

Auri did not like the way the world was. She wanted to fix it, to put it back the way it was supposed to be.

It was a tiny, perfect thing. A thing that was all her own.

Auri liked to think of herself as a good girl. She tried very hard to be good.

Auri liked the quiet, and she liked the dark, and she liked the way the world was when it was small and still.

Auri knew her way around the Underthing. She knew the names of all the rooms, and she knew where everything was supposed to go.

Auri was a creature of habit. She liked things to be the same, day after day.

Auri liked to be alone. She liked the way it felt to be alone in the Underthing, with only the quiet and the darkness for company.