Something caused Jak to stop in her tracks. A small hum seemed to buzz inside her brain, like the sound of a passing fly, except...warmer, more inviting. And it was more of a feeling than an actual sound. What’s more, she recognized it, having felt something similar only a few months prior in the caves of the Hollow Peaks. Back then, the source of the humming had been a Relic, the original copy of the Annals of Adam. It had called to her then.
Something called to her now.
Jak knew what it must be, the Relic that had changed Cerai and the other students into Water Fae, that had given them those large tails and fins. It had to be.
Jak felt it call out, inviting her to draw closer, to take it away from these evil men who were exploiting its power, to give it the purpose it was built for.
Instinctively, she knew where it was, not far from where she now stood. In fact, it may just be in or near the bathhouses where she was going anyway.
Putting one ear to the door, she listened for anyone who stood nearby. Hearing no one, she opened the door a crack and peered in both directions, then slipped out and continued towards the bathhouses. From the conversation she overheard earlier, she could probably expect to find the Royal Priest there, though hopefully, he would be alone.
Tip-toeing around the corner, she felt the warmth and humidity in the air rise. She must be getting close. Finally, she found a doorway flung wide open and the wall beside it partially demolished. That must have been where Amelia set her explosion. Jak could feel the strange hum in her head growing louder. It must be nearby. But right now, Amelia took priority.
Inside she could see steam filling a large room. The walls held intricate mosaics of tile, and marble pillars filled the room. Several large circular pools filled the space.
Standing just ahead, his back to her, was the Royal Priest. He had on his typical black robe, and his stance spoke of authority and triumph. Jak peaked around him to follow his gaze. He was looking at the nearest pool, where Amelia lay clutching at the side, her hair and clothes wet. What had she decided to go for a swim?
“Well, well. Isn’t this interesting,” the Priest said to Amelia.
Jak wasn’t going to let him say anymore. There were no guards, for now at least, making this her best chance to get Amelia out, though she found herself distracted. The buzzing in her head had grown so loud.
She still didn’t know what the Priest’s brand was, so she decided not to take any chance. She snuck up behind the Priest, raised her spear, and delivered a blow to the man’s head that left her spear vibrating. He instantly crumpled to the floor.
“Amelia, what are you doing? We need to get out of here!” She paused as she caught the expression on her friend’s face.
Instead of the usual cheery look, Amelia’s face was awash with panic. Her hands gripped the edge of the pool so tightly that Jak could see the whites of her knuckles.
“Amelia? What’s wrong.” Jak stood still for a moment, and the room was silent, leaving only the strange hum in her head.
“I... can’t.” Amelia’s face was pale. What could be the matter?
Jak drew closer, not daring to believe her suspicion. Tears began to stream down Amelia’s face. “You need to get out of here.”
“I’m not leaving without you,” Jak said, closing the distance.
“You need to get out of here!” Amelia shouted the words, and there was a great splash in the pool. Bits of water splashed onto the floor and Jak’s face. That was when she saw it.
Amelia’s legs were gone. Instead, she had a long, silver tale that was the source of the splash. Without the use of her legs, Amelia relied on her arms to keep her fixed to the edge of the pool. Jak’s heart plummeted. Amelia had become a Water Fae.
“How?” was the only word she could summon.
Amelia pointed upward. Hanging above the pool was a gold object. Jak recognized it immediately from the descriptions she had heard. It was the Relic, with two gold rings and a circle in the center, looking like ripples in a lake, the pieces somehow magically held together.
“I came in here to make the explosion, and I did it, but then lost all strength in my legs,” Amelia explained. Tears were continuing to stream down her face, and her breath came in short, panicked bursts. “And I knew I needed water, so I came here. Then I saw them…”
Amelia swept her hand around the room. Jak had been so focused on Amelia’s she hadn’t bothered to look anywhere else. She did so now, and her hand rose to her mouth.
The other baths were full of people, some of them looking at her, some appearing to be asleep or dead. There were several of them, perhaps two dozen. And from what she could tell, every one of them was a Water Fae.
Amelia went on. “They’ve been making more Fae, Jak. They’re trying to see how it works! I... I don’t know why.”
At that moment, Jak heard the clank of armor again. Someone was approaching. Without a second thought, she raised her spear high enough to sever the string that held the Relic above her. It fell to the ground, and Jak hastened to pick it up and shove it into her pouch.
“Come on,” she extended a hand to Amelia as she heard the footsteps grow louder. Whoever was coming, there were a lot of them.
“I told you, I can’t go with you!” Amelia yelled. “You’ll never get away if you’re carrying me.”
“We came all this way to get the others out, and we carried them. I can get you out too.”
“Oh, I would say your friend has it about right,” a woman’s voice said from behind Jak.
She spun to see the queen standing at the entrance, surrounded by guards. These men and women had a different kind of armor and looked far more dangerous than the others. These were likely the queen’s personal guard.
“Well, well,” said the queen, glancing down at her Royal Priest who still lay unconscious on the floor. “I admit, I didn’t expect anyone to actually try and break into the palace. I see you’ve already taken possession of the Relic. How did you get in? Actually, never mind that. We’ll have all the answers from you eventually. Guards!”
The soldiers on either side of the queen stepped in, surrounding Jak. She began to panic. How was she going to get out of this one? She was surrounded, her friend couldn’t help, and there was no way she could fight her way out. To add to the trouble, she felt her arms snap involuntarily to her sides, and her spear fell out of her hands. There was a telekinetic in the group. Jak closed her eyes. She was caught.
“Hello Telma,” said a quiet voice.
Jak’s eyes snapped open. Armor groaned as nearly every guard in the room turned to follow Jak’s gaze. The queen turned more slowly, but her face was white.
In the doorway stood Seph, his mask uncovered, his hands hanging loosely at his sides. “Seph, my boy,” said the queen, her face recovered from its momentary shock. “I should have known you would have been behind this. You always did carry a fascination for Relics.”
“Let them go, Telma.”
“Silly boy, I’m afraid I can’t. One of them has fallen ill, along with the rest of those you see here. She must stay.”
“The other then. Let her go without uncovering her face.”
“Now why would I ever do that?” The queen’s voice had taken on a motherly tone, but it was clear that anger boiled just beneath the service.
Jak had an idea of what was coming. She didn’t know Seph’s past with the queen, but she knew it wasn’t good. Don’t do it, Seph!
“Because you’ll get me, willingly.”
Jak let out a breath. The queen surely wouldn’t stand for it, but the woman did appear to be considering Seph’s proposal. Seph’s eyes met Jak’s for a moment, and... did he just wink at her?
“You realize, of course, that giving yourself in does nothing,” the queen continued. “Nothing is stopping me from taking the girl and the Relic.”
Seph drew a few steps closer. The guards tightened their grips on their weapons, but Seph made no sudden moves. “Yes, that thought had occurred to me.
”
With a sudden jerk, Seph smashed something into the ground. Before Jak could process what he was doing, whatever he threw exploded on the ground. Dust and smoke filled the entire cavern, and gasps sounded from the remaining Water Fae in the room.
“Go, Jak.” She heard Amelia’s soft voice behind her. “That’s your cue.”
Jak hesitated only a moment. Turning to look at her friend, but barely seeing her through the smoke, she said, “I’ll come back for you!”
Then she ran.
Shouts echoed through the room as guards scrambled to find their bearings and the queen barked orders through the smoke. Jak ran at the noise, slipping by a pair of guards as she did so. She caught only a glimpse of Seph, who was throwing himself at the guards to keep them from moving, saved from the soldiers’ weapons by cries from the queen. “Don’t kill him, don’t kill him!”
In the chaos, Jak found herself outside the bathhouses and running back towards the kitchens. Images of Amelia and Seph’s faces haunted her as she went. The more distance she put between her and her friends, the worse it got.
It wasn’t long before she heard shouts behind her, and she redoubled her efforts and forced her legs to keep running. The hallways seemed to elongate, and Jak felt like she was in a dream, unable to run fast enough. But the kitchens were just ahead.
She flew into the large space and scrambled down the trap door inside, pulling the door closed behind her. She could still hear shouts, but none of them were in the kitchens yet. Perhaps they hadn’t seen her go in?
Not about to take chances, she flew towards the edge of the hidden room that led to the stairs. There was a light ahead!
Naem emerged from the top stairs, just as Jak arrived. He held a torch, and Jak could see Cerai and the Water Fae Seph had been carrying.
“He raced after you once I was partway down,” Naem said, his voice strained as though worried Jak would blame him. “Is he with you? Where’s Amelia?”
The void in her stomach grew stronger, but Jak pushed it aside. “We don’t have time.”
Without another word, she bent to pick up Cerai. Naem followed suit by lifting the third Water Fae, Haffi, she thought his name was.
“I already took the other to the ocean. He’s safe.”
Jak nodded but said nothing as she began to make her way down the steep stairs. Realizing straight away that she couldn’t hold Cerai, her spear, and cling to the rope to keep her from falling, she cast her spear down the long cavern. It took several seconds before she heard the faint sound of it hitting the ground below. She counted on the spear’s branding to keep it from breaking.
Now she focused all her might on not falling as she stumbled down the stairs with Cerai over one shoulder. Naem led in front of her and made better time than she did.
Thankfully, they heard no sounds of pursuit, though that didn’t stop both of them from moving as fast as they could. Eventually, Naem made it to the bottom, set down Haffi and began climbing to give Jak a hand. When Naem reached for Cerai, Jak almost hesitated, but let him have the Fae.
Jak felt no lighter as her burden was lifted. The void in her stomach turned into a weight, which only grew stronger as they reached the ocean and let the Fae go. She only barely felt her lips move to tell the Fae to wait where the Trade river emptied into the ocean, just south of Skyecliff. They had rescued the Fae, and Jak had the Relic, but that meant nothing to her right now. She had lost two dear friends, and worse, Amelia was one of the Fae now. Perhaps the Relic really was dangerous.
She resisted the urge to throw it into the ocean after the Fae that swam away, looking far healthier now that they were in the water. Something grabbed her arm, and she looked down to see Naem’s hand there. He spoke something to her. They needed to leave. People were coming.
Jak let him lead her away. Away from her friends, away from her failure.
17
There would be no sleep that night, no matter how hard she tried. Naem had taken her home but then left, and she hadn't dared to ask him to stay. Now she was alone, lying in bed with her clothes still on and feeling nothing but the crushing weight of her failure pressing down until she thought she might suffocate.
Why had she ever thought it would work out to break into the palace? What could possibly have possessed her? There had been too many unknowns, too many things that could have gone wrong, and they did. She should have remembered that the Relic might change more than just the students that had discovered it. But she had no reason to think they would take it out of the Void box. Perhaps the queen and her priest were responsible for some of the missing people Jak had heard rumored through the streets. They were using them to experiment. And now they had her friend too.
Broken brands! Jak shot up from lying on her bed. She had carried the Relic with her this whole time and into the college no less! People were in danger!
Everyone was asleep, but she knew this couldn’t wait. She grabbed her pouch and ran out the door. She didn’t slow to keep her footsteps from echoing through the hallways. She simply ran for all she was worth to Gabriel’s quarters.
Arriving, she pounded at the door. When no answer came, she pounded again. Her fist felt a mild tingling from the impact.
“Relics,” she heard from the other side. “What in the name of…”
Jak heard several latches click into place and then a creak as the door swung open. Gabriel stood there, still in his night clothes, and wearing a fully irritated expression on his face. That expression changed the moment he saw Jak.
“What’s wrong girl?” he said.
Apparently, her face echoed how she felt inside. Where to begin? Tell him the whole story or... she settled for handing him her pouch without saying a word. Gabriel looked inside, and his eyes widened.
“Where did you get this?”
“It’s a long story, but you need to contain its magic like you did before. It could change people here. It... it changed…” She couldn’t say it. Her throat closed, and nothing came out.
Gabriel looked like he needed to know more but retreated into his room with the Relic. Jak followed and found him placing the Relic in a chest he kept in the corner. Then he shut the lid, secured the latch, and his hand glowed as he branded the chest with a Void brand.
Jak felt herself give a sigh of relief. At least now it couldn’t hurt anyone else.
“Now, girl.” Gabriel turned, and Jak took a step backward. There was a fire in Gabriel’s eyes that she had never seen before. “I assume you went against my advice and did something stupid. Start from the beginning.”
Jak hung her head. He was right, she had done something stupid. She began by telling him about Seph, and how he knew of a secret passage leading into the palace. She told him how they snuck in, retrieved the three remaining students, and were about to leave before everything went wrong. It took her a long time before she was ready to go further. Gabriel expressed outward patience, but his eyes bored into her the longer she waited. Eventually, it all came out in flood, about Amelia, about Seph, about the other Water Fae hid in the palace.
“Amelia. That is terrible news.” Gabriel’s jaw tightened. “I’ve heard rumors that the Royal Priest likes to experiment with branding. He keeps several Gifters inhouse. Most of the work he does is likely illegal, but when you’re the one who makes the rules… Well, I imagine this Relic must have been a treat for him. He’ll want it back, surely.”
Jak nodded, and they sat in silence for a while. Instead of calming Jak, the silence only magnified the weight of her failure. Finally, Jak couldn’t take it anymore. “I’m sorry!” she cried. “I should have known, I’m not a hero. You and Seph, you were both wrong.”
Gabriel’s eyes flashed. “I know you’re dealing with a lot right now, and what I’m about to seem harsh, but you need to listen to me. That kind of talk is the worst thing you can do to yourself right now. Get on your feet and be proactive.”
“But I’m not the one…”
“Who cares if heroism is
in your destiny or not. Does destiny determine your actions, or do you? You have control over exactly one thing, what you do with yourself. So, make something of that. Yes, you acted rashly over a misguided belief that being a hero made you invincible. Now you have to take responsibility for those actions.”
Jak couldn’t say anything. She was shocked at Gabriel’s harsh tone. He had never spoken to her like this before. “I... I don’t know what to do.”
Gabriel sniffed. “All I’m saying is that wallowing in self-pity will get you nowhere. Don’t react, let your grief and your feelings of failure fuel you. Perhaps you aren’t the hero Seph thinks you to be. But even if you aren’t, that doesn’t mean you can’t be a force for good.”
“You want me to go back and get Amelia and Seph?”
“Heavens no, child. In fact, until further notice I want you confined to the college. For your safety as well as for everyone else’s.”
Jak took another step backward, towards the door. She didn’t need this, not again. “But you said…”
“I said to be proactive, there are many ways to be so. I’d say start by learning to channel these feelings you have into your own development. Stick to your classes, learn to stop blaming your shortcomings. If you want to help others, start with yourself.”
Sounds echoing down the corridors interrupted them. People were shouting. What could be bothering someone at this hour? Jak felt her body go stiff. No, oh please no.
Forgetting about Gabriel, she flew out the door towards the sounds of the commotion. Professor Gona was dragging someone down the hall, towards Gabriel’s quarters. She spared a confused look at Jak before addressing Gabriel as he followed Jak out the door.
“Gabriel,” She said as she neared. “We have a situation.”
The student she was dragging had tears in his eyes and was shaking uncontrollably. Jak took one good look and wanted to turn away. The student’s legs were now a gigantic fin, just like the other Water Fae. It seemed they hadn’t shut away from the Relic in time after all.
Growing Ripples: An Epic YA Fantasy Adventure (Roots of Creation Book 2) Page 15