by Sever Bronny
The hellhound lunged only to get cleanly cut down in mid air. Even as the body flopped to the ground, Augum’s long sword disappeared and he ran back through the pair of Darkness clouds behind him, aware that Bridget stood frozen inside the second one, but near the wall. He thus ran along the edge, balancing precariously over the rushing water, soon emerging on the other side of the black clouds.
Only to find nothing. The water flowed rapidly by. There was no sign of Leera, the other hellhound, or the woman.
“Leera!” Augum shouted. Hearing no reply, he relit his palm and ran along the water, searching and repeatedly calling for his beloved.
Finally, he heard a gurgling sound ahead and sprinted, spotting somebody crawling out of the water in the distance. “Leera—!” but instead it was the hellhound. The creature shook itself off like a wet dog before charging at him.
Augum slammed his wrists together. “ANNIHILO!” yet the creature seemed to anticipate and jumped over his strike.
“Paralizo carcusa cemente!” Augum spat so quickly that the thing barely landed on its canine feet before it froze in a landing posture. “Summano arma—” and Augum, ever the practiced arcane warrior, sliced off its head as he ran by, once again allowing his long sword to disappear, exchanging it for a shining palm.
He soon reached an intersection of two canals. Which way, which way! And then he heard a distant moan straight ahead. He raced, heart in his throat. A figure soon emerged from the darkness.
“LEERA!” he screamed, sprinting. She was barely hanging onto the edge, gasping for breath, only to slip back into the stormwaters. He lashed out telekinetically and snatched her wrist, holding her just long enough to skid to a halt, grab her hand, and heave her over the edge.
“I got you, my love, I got you!” he said, holding on to her while frantically looking about with his palm in case the woman showed up. “Where is she—?”
“Headlock …” Leera gasped between coughs. “Drowned … her …” Her eyes were closed and she was limp. It had to have been an epic underwater struggle. But that’s where Leera excelled. The enemy woman had been a fire warlock, but Leera’s domain was water. He recalled how she had easily bested him in underwater wrestling back at a Library of Antioc Trainer. That woman had stood no chance.
Bridget soon emerged behind them with a glowing green palm.
“Where is she?” she asked, panting for breath.
“Drowned,” Augum replied, gently pushing Leera’s wet hair away from her face, inspecting her for signs of aging. Thankfully, she looked the same.
“My love …” Leera went on in a weak voice. “You died … underwater … in my arms … it was … horrible … horrible …”
He kissed her cheek and squeezed her close. “Shh, it’s all right, my love, I’m fine.”
“How many heartbeats?” Bridget asked, placing a gentle hand on Leera’s arm. “Lee? How many heartbeats?”
“Thirty … or so …”
Bridget swallowed and nodded. “Two months of aging. Suppose it could have been worse. And the side effects?”
“Seeing … shadows …” Leera whispered, refusing to open her eyes. “One is … Vion Rames …”
“Of course,” Augum said, locking gazes with Bridget. “The man—”
“—she vanquished back at Castle Arinthian,” Bridget finished.
“The shadows are not real, my love,” he said to Leera.
“Pain … real …”
“You have to fight it.” Easier said than done when one is feeling weak.
Bridget glanced back into the darkness. “Should we abort?”
Augum seriously considered it. But then what? No, they had to retrieve his mother’s body, they had to. Everything told him it was the key to unhinging his father. But what if it was a suicide quest? What if they really were in over their heads on this one? Well, being in over their heads was a given, but were they in so far now they were going to drown completely? Maybe they should have tried to persuade Jez to come with them, or waited for Mrs. Stone.
Bridget could seemingly read his thoughts just by the expression on his face. “Maybe Mrs. Stone can advise us.” She retrieved the Exot orb from a pocket in her robe. “Contact Anna Atticus Stone. Mrs. Stone, are you there?” She paused. “Mrs. Stone, this is Bridget. Are you there?” She shook her head. “Cease contact,” and sighed. “She was in a deep sleep when we left. Might be some kind of healing slumber, I don’t know.”
She next checked in with Haylee, who said the castle received its first wave of academy refugees, and things were chaotic. Jengo was healing the injured and the castle was mobilizing for more people. Chaska and some others were keeping a watch over the grounds. Unfortunately, Bridget was unable to reach Elizabeth or Caireen, judging that both were likely busy.
“It’s interesting that I don’t see the shadows like you two do,” Bridget said. “They were fleeting. Happened only a couple of times.”
“Yeah, but, you spent how much time in the spell?” Augum asked.
“Fifteen heartbeats.”
“Leera spent thirty, and I’m up to seventy-five.” He glimpsed a shadow moving beyond Bridget, as if bringing up the subject made a difference. “But they’ve been bothering me a little less of late.”
“Mrs. Stone warned us the side-effects get worse the more time we spend in the spell.”
Augum sat reflecting a moment. “I wonder what Nana sees. She has cast the spell the most, yet it doesn’t seem to affect her the way it does us. Why do you think that is?”
“She’s the only living master warlock, Aug. I suspect that has a lot to do with it. We both know her concentration and willpower is extremely strong. It’s mostly her health that’s failing.”
They rested to allow Leera to recover from her ordeal, during which Augum sat against the wall, holding her gently in his arms. Bridget sat beside him, watchful, listening. Above ground, the storm steadily worsened. The intervals between lightning strikes shortened, the wind increased to a shriek, and the rain turned torrential.
“Look at the water,” Augum said.
Bridget, who had been scanning the corridor with furrowed brows, glanced down at the raging torrent of a river that was now lapping over the edge of the pathway, and gasped.
“We’ve got to move if we don’t want to drown,” she said quickly, standing and helping them up.
“I feel a little better now, thanks,” Leera muttered, though her eyes flitted about suspiciously.
They resumed a hurried journey to the sewer hub, finding it not too far beyond where they had fought the warlock and her hellhounds. By then the rushing waters had risen to their ankles.
“Least it doesn’t stink anymore,” Augum added. But the joke elicited no reaction from Leera, whose gaze was locked on the deep darkness ahead. He gave her a gentle nudge and she snapped out of it.
Meanwhile, Bridget consulted the map. “Mrs. Stone’s group left a hidden mark to the right tunnel. Should be one of the ones ahead.”
The four-foot jumps across each river became precarious as the water rose, for the ledge could no longer be seen in the brackish waters. But try as they might, they found no marks written on the walls.
Bridget consulted the map again. “There’s a word here I missed—unc.”
“Unconceal,” Augum blurted.
“Of course!” She allowed her palm to extinguish and focused a moment. “Un vun deo.” Evidently the spell picked up on something because she immediately led them to a nearby wall, finding a small loose masonry block. She dislodged it, discovering behind it the scratched-in initials A.W.J. along with an arrow pointing down the tunnel.
“Anna, William, Jordan,” Leera said.
Bridget replaced the block.
Augum felt the water start to drag on the bottom of his necrophyte robe. “Water’s rising, we better hurry—”
Leera suddenly summoned her shield in front of Augum. “Told you to stay away!” she yelled.
“There’s no one there, Lee—�
�� Bridget began, only for Leera to suddenly shriek as she grabbed her arm. “Gods, I’m bleeding!” Her eyes were wild and glassy.
Augum brought her near. “No, you’re fine! Look at me, you’re fine. You’re not bleeding—”
She glanced at him with that wild look, face pale, pupils dilated.
“Look, see?” He made her look at her arm. “Nothing there, no injury—”
Suddenly there was a loud roar from one of the tunnels, a roar that steadily increased in volume.
“STORM SURGE!” Augum shouted. “RUN—!”
The trio ran as fast as they could, Augum in front with lit palm, a tight grip on Leera’s hand; Bridget in the rear. Behind, they heard the roar of water slamming into the walls of the hub and channeling out to the various tunnels.
Augum stopped at an intersection, panting. “Which way?”
Bridget was already hurriedly consulting the soaked map. “Shoot, the ink’s running.” She pointed at the left tunnel. “That way!” but they soon discovered that particular passage was some kind of extra run-off tunnel, sloping at a precarious angle and slick as ice. Deep below roared falling water.
“You sure this is it?” Augum asked. “Once we slide, there might not be a way to get back up.”
Bridget double-checked the map. “Yes. Looks like there’s another hub ahead. Margin notes say we have to jump and swim.” She secured the map inside the rucksack and gripped it firmly.
Leera suddenly yanked Augum aside before slamming her hands together. “ANNIHILO!” A jet of sharp water blew a shallow hole in a stone block just behind where Augum had been standing.
“Where’d you go, you slimy fiend?” Leera asked the darkness.
Augum saw nobody there, but there was no time for that. The water from the surge was catching up to them fast, now up to their waists. The spillway they were supposed to go down began to collect even more of that surge. If they didn’t jump, they would get sucked away to who knew where in moments.
“Hold hands!” Augum said, snatching Leera’s right and Bridget’s left. “One, two, three—!” They jumped together into the spillway, sliding faster and faster down a dark and narrow tunnel, finally shooting out into thin air. Augum felt his stomach jam into his throat, briefly glimpsing a massive churning whirlpool below. A moment later the trio splashed into it. The violence of the maelstrom surprised Augum, snuffing his palm, ripping him from the girls, and sending him tumbling into deep darkness.
Maelstrom
Augum desperately struggled underwater to find the surface, but instead felt himself being pushed deeper and deeper into that watery abyss. The whirlpool pushed him around and around, faster and faster and faster. When he scraped the dark bottom, he realized the horror of the situation—there was no exit hole; the whirlpool had been created by the sheer force of runoff!
Panic suffused his being. He frantically strained against the current, swimming in what he judged was up, but as his breath had long run out, he was unable to stop suddenly inhaling a lungful of water. This caused his panic to worsen immeasurably, and he became a convulsing mess. As the walls of consciousness rapidly closed in, he felt himself being pulled by a force toward the edge. Soon as his head burst above water, the girls grabbed him and held on tight, finally dragging him onto a thin ledge, where he lay gasping for breath.
“Good job, Lee,” he heard Bridget say above the roar of waterfalls.
“It’s rising, we have to find the right passage,” Leera added, holding onto Augum, who still writhed in pain, coughing. She had evidently used Telekinesis to fish him out of the water, though how she saw him in that brackish maelstrom was a total mystery. That element of hers certainly showed its strength here.
“Which tunnel?” Leera asked.
While Bridget fished for the map in the soaked rucksack, Augum looked around. They were in a tall spill-off silo, the crown of which gushed water from a circle of spillways.
Bridget consulted the soggy map, shaking her head. “Should be right here.” She pointed behind them. “Almost exactly here, actually, but behind us.”
Leera raised her shining palm upward at the slick walls. “No tunnel above this spot.”
The girls glanced at each other before peering down into the churning water.
“Oh no, no way—” Augum gasped.
“Don’t have a choice unless you want to give up,” Leera said, nodding at a single rotten iron ladder across from them, leading to one of the tunnels above. “Place is filling fast. The sooner we dive to the tunnel, the less we have to swim.”
Augum peered at Bridget. “Tell me we brought rope—”
Bridget instantly fished a coil out of the rucksack. “Father always used to say to come prepared.”
They hurriedly tied up their waists to each other, with Leera as the head and Augum in the middle, seeing as he was still recovering from that underwater disaster.
“But let’s be quiet coming out of the water,” Bridget said. “Map margins say to expect a booby-trap.”
“Swim toward the light,” Leera said, raising her lit palm. “On three. One … two … deep breath … THREE—!”
They jumped into the massive whirlpool. The rope went taut immediately, squeezing against Augum’s waist. He swam in the direction of Leera’s palm light, trying not to panic again. After so many harrowing near-drowning events, he was seriously starting to develop a phobia of dark water.
Her light dipped around a corner, dimming significantly. Augum felt himself losing the battle against the water, only to feel the rope heave him onward and around the corner, where he found Leera bracing the wall with her feet, hand-pulling the rope. He quickly helped, dragging Bridget around the bend, then the three set off at a fast swimming pace, no longer burdened by a current. Leera soon angled them up until they broke the surface of an air pocket.
“This sucks,” Augum said, gasping for breath in a shallow space just high enough for them to stick their noses above the water. Again the feeling of trapped panic was setting in. He was sick of these confined spaces and sick of holding his breath until he almost passed out. The only thing he was happy about was that this was all rainwater runoff. If it had been sewage …
“Next leg,” Leera said.
“And remember to be quiet,” Bridget added.
They took a series of deep breaths, holding the last, before diving once more. The passage narrowed uncomfortably until they had to slither sideways between oddly angled walls. Then, just as Augum felt himself about to burst with panic, the passageway opened up to a gentle pool from which rose about a hundred ancient moss-covered steps.
They quietly caught their breath, then Bridget held out an open palm, whispering the Reveal incantation, only to place a finger over her lips while indicting the first step, before proceeding to disenchant the spell.
Augum and Leera exchanged looks while she worked.
“Disarmed,” Bridget said. “It had been sound trapped.”
Augum gave her a nod. “Good anticipation.”
“All thanks to the map.”
They untied the rope, stuffing it back into the rucksack.
Leera shone her palm upward. “Looks like a large old door up there.”
They warily made their way up, palms lit, until Leera abruptly recoiled, hissing, “Get away from me!”
“No one there,” Augum said.
“It’s in your mind,” Bridget added. “You can fight it.”
“And shut up! Oh, not you two, him—” She nodded at the darkness.
“Madness is your destiny now, kiddo,” Erika Scarson said.
Augum glanced up to see her floating near the door. “Shut up,” he said.
The girls glanced at him.
Leera gave him a lopsided grin. “Easier said than done, eh?”
Just as they were about to continue ascending the steps, Bridget stopped them with an extended arm. “Wait, the map—” She unhooked the rucksack from her shoulders and withdrew the soggy parchment. But her face fell after care
fully unfolding it. “Ink’s almost completely washed out. And there were careful instructions on how to get through.”
“But we have the invisible key,” Leera said.
“I know, but there are traps and stuff.”
“Then try Repair.”
Bridget placed the soggy parchment on the ground. “Apreyo,” but after a long moment, it was evident it wasn’t working. “The ink must be out of range,” she said. “Or perhaps this kind of repair is beyond the scope of the spell. I’m guessing the latter.”
Leera glanced up at the door. It sat dimly lit at the edge of their light, covered in a thick layer of cave moss and lichen. “Mrs. Stone doesn’t like to give us reasons for things unless she thinks it’s crucial, but there was a reason she made us learn 10th and 11th degree spells.”
Augum nodded. Disenchant and Reveal were complicated spells, and she certainly hadn’t made them learn them just to defuse a bunch of traps in Castle Arinthian. No, that had been a training exercise. This place had to have been the reason. But if that was indeed the case, then Mrs. Stone had always known she might not be able to come.
Augum studied the door, which looked like it had not been opened in a hundred years. As benign as it appeared, there was something about it that gave him clammy hands.
“Try Nana again.”
Bridget spoke into the Exot orb. “Contact Mrs. Stone. Mrs. Stone, we’re at the secret sewer door to the Black Castle. Are you there? Mrs. Stone—?” but only ended up shaking her head and putting the Exot orb away. “Nothing.”
Augum stood and shook out his hands. “Then we know what we have to do.” He splayed his palm over the steps, allowing the Shine spell to die, dimming the passage by a third. He focused his mind. “Un vun asperio aurum enchantus.” Suddenly every single step ahead of them lit up red. “Gods—” He yanked the girls back. “Booby-trapped. All remaining steps leading up to the door are trap-enchanted.”
“Then we’re lucky we didn’t set any off,” Bridget said.
“How do you know we didn’t?” Leera whispered.
“Because—” but Bridget froze. “You’re right, could have set off a silent trap, or a missed sound trap …” She glanced back at the dark pool. “For all we know, there could have been traps all through that underwater corridor.”
