The Firelands

74 - Murder in the Water

16th day of the forth Month, Worth's Moon

1:00 pm

The Forgotten Temple

They hit water.

Crashing down into dark depths, icy water rushing into their lungs, the four spun in the darkness, trying to find the right direction to swim.

Faint light directed them towards the surface and they all rushed upwards.

Kalen broke the surface first, breathing hard, franticly looking around.

They were in a huge cavern. Stone walkways on stone stilts crisscrossed around them, many broken, crumbling into the water, rocks and boulders protruding from the surface here and there.

"Theth!" Kalen shouted.

Incendio appeared next, coughing and also looking around. "THETH!" he screamed.

Zedkiel came up almost a second later, gasping for air.

And, finally, Theth appeared, scrambling up as if he could claw his way up into the air.

"Rune!" he cried, whirling around, searching the water – his paralyzing phobia of water warring for dominance over another, greater fear.

He had lost his grip of his bag. The backpack wasn't on his shoulder.

"RUNE!" he screamed, choking on water before he dove back down again.

"Theth!" Incendio cried and Kalen plunged under the water again, swimming after Theth.

Theth raced down through the water, nothing but a muscle memory of how to swim driving him forwards; though there was no conscious memory of ever learning.

He could see the bag. It was sinking down into the depths. He could see the dark shape jerking and he just knew that was Rune trying to escape.

Lights.

Small balls of turquoise lights were drifting up from the darkness.

Above, Kalen paused, staring; confused by the sight of the strange little balls that illuminated Theth's descending shape.

Theth didn't pay attention to them, all his focus was on the bag, it was almost in his reach. Throwing out a hand, he snagged the shoulder strap and a face loomed out of the darkness from below making him recoil upwards, kicking away in fright, pulling the bag close.

It was the face of a woman, her expression innocent, just curious, beautiful, the shimmering lights falling across her pale blue eyes and translucent skin, deep black hair flaring around her.

Theth stared at her; all he could do was stare. One part of him told him he was simply amazed by the sight of her. Another part told him he needed to get above the surface.

And then a kick to the stomach through the bag jolted him out of his trance, he turned and kicked upwards.

He could see Kalen above, swimming towards him, a much faster swimmer. He threw up a hand, reaching for him and a hand closed around his ankle.

Instinct kicked in.

Everything told him he needed the bag out of the water. Gripping the bag, he hurled it upwards, straight up at Kalen, with enough force to send it hurling upwards into Kalen's hands.

Kalen kicked upwards, without a second glance, getting the baby dragon back to the surface.

... And Theth realised that Kalen didn't know that something – someone – was down there with him. He stared up at Kalen's shrinking form, his eyes widening and the hand on his ankle tighten.