I fidgeted with the edge of my sleeve. For some reason, revealing that Morlet had shown me his face felt like acknowledging I’d done something wrong. “He’s always wearing a black cape.” Which was true.
“Well,” he said, coming to stand before me. “His magic is probably depleted after reaching all the way out here to visit you in your dream. It takes much less effort on his part to bring you to him.” He rubbed his face. “I’d like to try and catch a few hours of sleep. Would you mind staying in here tonight?”
I didn’t want to sleep in his room; however, I understood why he wanted me to. Considering all he’d done for me, it was the least I could do.
***
The sound of people talking roused me. Opening my eyes, I found myself in Vidar’s bed, wrapped in his arms, my head on his chest. Thunder boomed in the distance.
“We’ll discuss it later,” he whispered. “Go before you wake her.”
Realizing Vidar wasn’t talking to me, I flew to a sitting position and twisted around. Anders stood in the doorway, dripping wet from the light rain.
“How’s my father?” I asked. Anders turned and trudged away without acknowledging me. Wanting to speak to him, I went to climb out of bed.
Vidar’s arm tightened around me, and he tapped the end of my nose with his finger, capturing my attention. “You’re adorable in the morning.” His lips curled into a slow smile. “I slept like a baby. How about you?”
Both of us were fully dressed and lying on top of the blankets. Obviously, nothing had happened, but I didn’t want Anders to get the wrong idea. I shoved away from Vidar and scrambled out of bed. “I slept just fine, thank you.”
“Morlet will try to communicate with you again as soon as he’s strong enough. I’d recommend not napping.” He sat up and stretched.
“I’ll make sure I’m near Anders and the medallion.”
“That won’t work.” Vidar ran his hands through his rumpled hair. “The medallion is mine, and I’m supposed to wear it at all times.” He pointed to the door handle where the necklace hung. “See, Anders already gave it back to me.” Vidar got up and took the medallion, placing it around his neck so it rested against his chest. He glanced at me and chuckled. “Guess you’ll just have to sleep with me from now on.”
I rolled my eyes. “You should be so lucky.” I hurried from the room, eager to talk to Anders about my father.
Chapter Seven
The light rain picked up, turning into a heavy downpour. I ran to my room and changed into a clean pair of trousers and a thick shirt. When I entered the main room, Vidar was kneeling at the hearth, nursing the flames back to life. Banging came from the kitchen, so I headed in there. Anders had his back to me while he stirred something in a pot hanging over a small fire.
“I’m glad you made it back safely,” I said. “Were you able to find my father? Is he well?” Hopefully, Papa had not gotten worse. I held my breath, waiting for Anders to answer.
“I just returned,” he mumbled, not bothering to look at me while he spoke. “Can I at least eat before you bombard me with a thousand questions?” He shook his head. “I forgot how much you love to talk.”
Sitting down at the table, I drummed my fingers on the wooden surface. This was my father we were talking about. He was the only family I had. So no, I couldn’t wait for Anders to do something so trivial as eat. I started tapping my foot.
After using a wooden ladle to scoop some white mush into a bowl, he sat across from me and ate, not once looking in my direction.
“Are you mad at me?” I asked. Another thought occurred—maybe my father had died and Anders was afraid to tell me the news. “Is my father … ” I trailed off, unable to finish the sentence.
He glanced up with fierce brown eyes and said, “Your father is fine.” Then he went back to eating, studiously ignoring me.
“Now that we’re all here,” Vidar said as he came into the kitchen, “we need to talk.” He went over to the pot and scooped some white mush into two bowls. After handing one to me, he sat down. “Anders isn’t the best cook,” he loudly whispered, “but at least it’s warm.” Taking a spoonful, he elegantly ate the food.
I stirred mine, not really hungry.
“While you were gone,” Vidar continued, “Morlet visited Kaia in her dreams. He has to know someone is helping her. It’s only a matter of time until he discovers we’re still alive.”
Anders put down his spoon and observed his friend. “How is this possible?”
“I spoke with Grei Heks. She said he’s feeding off Kaia’s power.”
Anders rubbed his face. “So now what?”
“We need to train Kaia. Then we’ll rescue the Krigers.”
“I’m not sure she’s ready,” Anders said. “She’s only sixteen.”
Vidar smiled. “True, but she’s not like other girls. She’s special.”
Both of them spoke as if I weren’t in the room. I pushed away from the table, not caring to hear any more of their conversation, and walked out of the kitchen. The walls felt confining, suffocating. I needed some time alone to sort through my thoughts. I left the house, crossed the bridge, and climbed down the tree. I stepped out of the trunk, the rain pounding on the ground. I closed my eyes and tilted my head back, letting the cold water wash over me. Papa was okay. Morlet hadn’t captured him nor had my father’s illness taken him.
My clothes were drenched, but being alone in the forest in the pouring rain was liberating. I could almost forget Anders’s degrading words: I’m not sure she’s ready. She’s only sixteen. Neither Anders nor Vidar looked much older than I was. Granted, I wasn’t an assassin skilled in the art of killing. However, I was more than capable of taking on a larger opponent and winning. After all, I’d been training my entire life for this—I just hadn’t known it.
The sound of raindrops hitting the leaves and branches soothed me. On a whim, I decided to try to find the lake with the large waterfall. Heading east, I had difficulty seeing more than a few feet in front of me. Thunder boomed and lightning sliced across the sky. After five minutes of walking, my hands pulsed with acute pain, almost knocking me over. It was stupid to have come out here all alone during a storm when I was so unfamiliar with the area.
Closing my eyes, I thought back to what Anders said at the pond. I raised my hands out before me and slowly turned around, searching for some sort of pull. The only thing I felt was the rain pounding on my body and the throbbing in my hands. Squinting, I searched for an animal or someone lurking nearby. Nothing.
The ache intensified, and I fell to my knees, crying out. My arms shook, and I glanced at my palms, expecting to see them on fire. They appeared normal, but the cool rain did nothing to soothe them. The ground beneath me suddenly gave out, and I dropped into the earth, screaming as I fell through darkness.
I slammed against a hard surface; a sharp shooting pain pierced my right leg. Luckily, my head didn’t hit anything. The only light came from the opening through which I had fallen, a good ten feet above me. My clothes were soaking wet, and cold seeped into my bones. Taking a deep breath, I moved my foot in slow circles. My ankle was sore, but not broken. Relieved, I bent my knee and discovered it too was just bruised.
My father told me there were hundreds of underground caverns throughout Nelebek. Some of them opened up to the middle of the world, causing people to disappear forever. I would have to use the upmost caution searching for a way out.
Standing, I yelled in case someone above could hear me. No one came. The rocky floor sloped to my right, so I headed in the opposite direction, hoping there was an exit. Sliding one foot forward to ensure the ground didn’t suddenly open up, I shifted my weight, and then slid my other foot forward. It was slow going, especially since my leg was sore. The farther I moved from the small opening in the cavern’s ceiling, the darker it became until complete and utter darkness took over.
It smelled of damp sulfur like the pool Anders and I had bathed in. I
shook my head, not wanting to think about the assassin right now. It was eerily quiet—the only sound coming from my feet. The darkness started playing tricks on me. I kept imagining someone grabbing me from behind. Balling my hands into fists, I continued on.
If I reached a dead end, retracing my steps would be difficult, if not downright impossible. This reminded me of being stuck in the closet when I was younger. Since my mother died in childbirth, there was no one to care for me when my father went to work. At first, he left me with a neighbor who had six children of her own. Papa never talked about it, but I got the impression she didn’t take very good care of me. He started leaving me home alone to fend for myself when I was only four years old. When soldats came to search the apartment building, I would hide in the secret closet my father built, staying in the dark, cramped space until he returned in the evening. Often times, I’d go all day without food and water.
A noise came from up ahead. I started shuffling my feet faster, hoping there was an opening and that sound was rain. Gradually, the floor and rocky walls became defined, a soft gray light filtering in from somewhere. I went around a bend and entered a large circular area in the cavern approximately fifty feet wide and thirty feet tall. An opening directly above illuminated the pool before me. A waterfall cascaded down from a cave twenty feet above the pool. Sun sparkled on the beautiful greenish-blue water. Kneeling, I stuck my hand in. The water was hot. Shivering from my wet clothes, I stripped and climbed in, basking in the water’s warmth.
After rinsing the dirt and grime from my body, I floated on my back with my eyes closed, trying to relax. Anders’s angry face appeared before me, shaking his head as if I’d done something wrong. His face melted away and was replaced with Vidar’s handsome one, smiling sardonically as if he knew a secret I didn’t. His face dissolved and Morlet appeared in his bedchamber, standing in front of a tall mirror, lacing up his shirt.
“Kaia?” Morlet asked, his voice hesitant.
Shock rolled through me—were we somehow linked together? How was that possible since I wasn’t asleep?
“You’re cape isn’t on,” I lamely said, noticing it draped over a nearby chair. The mirror reflected his beautiful face, tousled black hair, and penetrating blue eyes. There was something dark and sinister yet alluring about this man.
“I can hear you,” he softly replied. “But I can’t see you. Where are you, my Kaia?” He turned away from the mirror, searching for me.
Remembering that I was swimming naked, my concentration faltered and our connection severed. Did I just invade Morlet’s thoughts? Swimming to the edge, I swiftly climbed out of the water and put my heavy, wet clothes back on, trying to mask my feeling of vulnerability.
Before I could think about my power, how to control it, and what just happened, I needed to find a way out of the cavern. Looking at the opening far above me, I searched for a way to climb up there. It didn’t appear possible. Maybe if Vidar threw a rope down, but even that seemed sketchy.
My father taught me to be resourceful and to use the environment to help me. I focused on the details of the cavern. The waterfall came from somewhere, filtered into this pool, and then what? Was this where it ended? If so, why wasn’t the water filling up more? There had to be an outlet. I observed the pool’s movements. The waterfall came down, swirled around, and then headed toward the right. I went over to that area, looking for additional clues. The water flowed below the surface where I stood. There had to be a way out through there.
Keeping my clothes on, I took a huge breath, jumped into the water, and let the current carry me below. It was stronger than I anticipated, and my clothes weighed me down. Panic filled me, but Papa always said that panicking only made things worse. There was nothing I could do except allow the water to take me where it wanted. It carried me into a narrow tunnel. If my lungs didn’t get air soon, I’d drown.
As I was jostled forward, I kept my legs together and my hands on my head, protecting myself from the rocky wall. Suddenly, I fell in a gush of water, gasping for air. My arms flailed about in the darkness. My body hit water again. This pool was much colder than the previous one. The current carried me along. When I felt it pulling me down, I took a big breath and went under. The water pressure was so strong, it shoved me right along.
The tunnel spit me out, and my body fell a short distance to a small pool bathed in sunlight. Gasping for air, squinting, I stared at the open sky with a huge sense of relief. I was out of the cavern and the rain had stopped. The water kept shoving me forward, too deep to gain my footing, as the edge of the pool neared. The sound of roaring water was the only indication of what lay ahead. There was nothing I could do to stop myself from going over the edge of a steep cliff.
My stomach gave out as I fell with an enormous surge of water.
Chapter Eight
After falling a good thirty feet, I slammed into another pool of water. My body twisted every which way as water continued to crash on top of me. I tried swimming to the surface, but the force from the water was too strong. I sank lower and lower.
Desperately needing air, I let instinct take over and swam sideways, away from the waterfall. Kicking furiously, I finally broke the surface, gasping for air. My chest felt like it was being crushed. Heaving deep breaths, my arms and legs spent, I could barely keep my head above water. Angling straight toward the closest bank, I forced myself to swim until my feet touched bottom. I trudged out of the water, crawled onto one of the boulders that surrounded the lake, and collapsed.
“Kaia,” Morlet frantically whispered. “Are you all right?”
I was lying on Morlet’s bed, soaking wet. He sat next to me, his hand pulling wet strands of hair off my face. I must have fallen asleep on the boulder. “I’m fine,” I croaked, my throat sore. I nuzzled the silk blankets, the roaring fire warming me.
“Earlier, you found me.” He drew his eyebrows together.
“I have no idea how that happened,” I mumbled. His hand reached out, cradling my face. The intimate gesture shocked me. We stayed that way for several minutes, neither of us moving.
Morlet’s face was rarely uncovered, so I used the opportunity to study him. His dark hair and thick eyebrows accentuated his bright blue eyes. “How old are you?” I asked. He looked nineteen years old, but he’d been ruling over Nelebek for at least a century.
Instead of answering, he asked, “What do you know about being a Kriger?” His hand dropped from my face.
I pushed myself into a sitting position. “Very little.” Would Morlet be willing to share his knowledge about magic with me? Would he teach me how to use my power? However, this was the man the Krigers were supposed to defeat. He couldn’t be trusted. “I don’t understand my role as a Kriger. Frankly, it makes me feel very lonely.”
“You don’t have to be alone,” he gently replied. “I’m here. You can come to me.” He took my hand, tracing small circles on my palm.
“So you can kill me?” I asked. Or was there more to it than that?
Morlet abruptly stood and went to the fireplace, his back to me. “Yes,” he finally admitted.
“Then you know I can’t come to you.”
“It’s the only way to end the curse,” he said. “I have to eliminate all the Krigers.”
“Why?” Vidar’s warning not to trust Morlet came back to me. However, right now, it seemed like he was being honest with me.
Morlet turned around, and his face hardened, making him look malicious. “I won’t live another hundred years like this,” he sneered, the gentleness and concern from earlier gone. “I hear you’re close to your father. If you don’t come to me, I’ll hunt him down and kill him.”
My heart pounded, and terror filled me. I couldn’t allow Papa to suffer because of me.
Morlet’s head tilted to the side. “Who’s with you?” he demanded. “I can feel something severing our connection.” He grabbed my upper arms, squeezing hard. “I can’t lose you!” he yelled, his face turning
an angry shade of red.
A surge of magic coursed through me, hot like fire. I screamed in pain.
“Kaia,” Vidar cried. My eyes flew open. Vidar hovered over me on the rock, the medallion hanging around his neck. “What happened?”
My body ached from everything I’d been through, and I was shaking from the frigid air, my clothing and hair still dripping wet. Vidar patiently waited for me to answer, but I didn’t even know where to begin. Tears filled my eyes. Morlet had threatened my father.
Vidar scooped me up. I didn’t have the energy to argue with him to put me down. As he carried me in his arms, I drifted off to a peaceful sleep, my hand clutching the medallion.
***
Rubbing my eyes, I sat up, still wearing the same clothes from earlier. Although now dry, they were stiff from the water. My boots and socks had been removed and were on the ground next to the bed.
A blazing fire roared in the small hearth, making my bedchamber hot and stuffy. Something moved in the corner of the room, and I twisted around to see Anders sitting on a wooden chair, staring at me, the medallion dangling from his hands.
“What are you doing here?” I asked.
He watched me with hooded eyes. “I want to make sure you’re okay,” he said, his voice barely audible.
He only cared about me because I was a Kriger. My life was precious and valuable. He didn’t actually care about me.
“And I want you near the medallion,” he added, glancing away.
“I’m all right. You don’t need to watch over me.” Morlet’s haunting words replayed in my mind. Was he honestly going to search for my father? If so, I had to find a way to protect Papa.
“I was hoping we could … talk.” Anders fiddled with the medallion’s chain, not looking at me.
I laughed. “Sorry, it sounded like you said you wanted to talk.”
Rise Page 9
