What Stalks the Deep

What Stalks the Deep is the third novella in T. Kingfisher's Sworn Soldier series, narrated once again by the retired soldier Alex Easton. Alex receives an urgent summons from Dr. James Denton, the American physician who helped ka during the events of What Moves the Dead: Denton's cousin Oscar has vanished while exploring an abandoned coal mine, after writing letters about a mysterious red light he intended to investigate. Alex and their companions descend into the mine and encounter a strange, unsettling being that calls itself Fragment, once part of a larger hive mind — loosely inspired by Lovecraft's shoggoths — that wants only to be left alone. Kingfisher balances cosmic horror and claustrophobic dread with her usual dry humor and sharp character work.