Finley nodded, its face resolute. “You are right, but I cannot tell you any more than you already know. Not here, at least. Come. Follow me.”
Chloe looked at the others, shrugging once more before following Finley through the crowd of sherikans climbing back to their feet. As they passed through rooms and went down stairs, they heard the noise in the dining hall slowly resume its previous level.
Finley led them all to the lowest levels of the palace. They passed a room with a large shrine lit by candles, which Chloe paused at, noting the fast-travel location point. She was pleasantly surprised to find a notification pop-up informing them all that this fast-travel point also acted as a respawn point.
“Useful to know they do exist,” Tag commented.
Finley waited patiently, then led them to a place farther along the floor, where the lights were dim and the noise level was low. Finley navigated expertly through a series of corridors, open arches instead of doorways lining its length.
Chloe poked her head inside several of the rooms, hearing the snores of sherikans in the gloom. These were clearly bedrooms, although they were not as she expected bedrooms to be.
Instead of the soft plushness of duvets and pillows she’d come to expect, there were broad baths filled to overflowing with water—presumably taken from the palace’s lakes—with sherikans tucked awkwardly into the structures. The waters rocked and roiled as they slept, their breathing causing the water to rise and fall with their chests.
Chloe couldn’t understand it. For a creature that hated the idea of swimming and was terrified of drowning, why would they sleep in baths?
And, more importantly, why could these sharks not swim?
You’re thinking like a human not of this world, KieraFreya said to her as they walked in relative silence, only their footsteps making noise. Don’t think of Obsidian as you’d think of your home. Remember, Obsidian is not your home. If you keep thinking like that, you’ll get in trouble. If anything, it’s weird for me that these “sharks” you keep speaking of can swim. Wouldn’t the water pass right through their fingers?
They don’t have fingers. They have large paddle-like appendages called fins that protrude from the sides of their body, Chloe replied, thinking as she said it how crazy that sounded.
KieraFreya scoffed. Who’s the fucking weirdo now?
Finley stopped before a room toward the end of the corridor, looking both ways before heading inside.
The room was empty of occupants. There was a bath filled with water by the far wall. A wall lined with books made up one side of the room, and there was a desk against the other with a series of quills and ink pots molded out of clay and mud.
Finley bade them come inside, crossing the room and scouring the bookshelf. It patted its knees as it mouthed the titles of the books.
“Hey! It’s not just a weird human searching thing,” Tag said. “I do that whenever I’m looking for a DVD.”
“You still have DVDs?” Ben asked in surprise.
Tag back-pedaled. “Well, they’re my mum’s, really. She can’t work digital downloads like we can. Likes to have the physical copies. DVD player’s on the blink anyway.”
“Of course, it is.” Ben winked, causing Tag to glow a bright shade of pink.
“What are we doing here?” Chloe asked, watching Finley with interest. “Why isn’t this something you could have told us back up there?”
Finley didn’t turn away from the books as it spoke. “Because there are no words for what I’m about to show you. Once you see it, you’ll understand. Even my descriptive knowledge is limited, and it’s best to give you some kind of indicator of what danger truly is out there in the sand.”
“Ah! Here we are.”
It pulled out a thin leather-bound volume and placed it on the desk. Scraping some rocks together, the sherikan made a spark, which lit the torch above the desk. A stray ember rolled toward the book and it smashed a fist on it, making them all jump.
“Sorry. Precious texts. I forget how flammable these are.”
It rifled through the pages, each leaf of paper crunching and crinkling with age. Eventually, it found a sketch on a double-page spread and sat back, letting them all have a good look at the monstrosity depicted there.
The sandworm was hideous, a monstrous snake-like creature with what could only be described as a cavern for a mouth. Its lips were rimmed with teeth, and the picture showed sand pouring into its mouth as it sped through the surrounding sea of sand.
“Pretty thing, ain’t it?” Ben joked.
Chloe ran her finger over the pages, over each ringed subsection of the worm’s body. She wondered how something like this could exist. What its diet was, and how it could remain hidden beneath the sand. Was this really the creature that was causing the walls of the palace to tremble?
“How big?” she asked.
“No one knows,” Finley replied. It flicked to the next page, pointing at lines of text that had been underlined and noted. “It’s only ever been seen once, and even then it wasn’t in view for long. The sherikan that spotted the worm and drew this picture barely escaped with his life.
“It happened years ago. The monster chased Gillian through the sands—”
“Gillian?” Ben arched an eyebrow. “As in, ‘Gillian—'”
“Don’t ask,” Chloe said, rubbing her hand down her face. At least now she knew Gillian was a male.
“As I was saying,” Finley continued, “the monster chased Gillian through the sand, racing him. Gillian was a warrior. A champion. One of the fastest sand-swimmers we sherikans have ever seen.
“He was making haste, twisting and turning, outrunning the beast. As his head cut through the sand, the sandworm swallowed it behind him. Gillian skirted the palace, hunting for the entry points, but soon found himself lost in the sand.”
Gideon, enraptured by the story, leaned closer. “So what happened? How did he escape?”
“Gillian hunted blindly through the sand, listening over the haunting roar of the sandworm, desperate to find his home. His heart pounded, the sandworm getting ever closer to chomping his legs off as he swam.
“And then came the drums. You see, our people have long held an interest in the musical arts, and in the days of our elders, when we lived up on the shores, enormous drums were constructed to accompany the musicians and fill the world with music.
“Gillian’s lover, Lady Sharkita—”
“You have got to be kidding me!”
“Desperately sought her partner. She urged that the drums be played. The sherikans divided, with some wanting Gillian’s return, while others feared for their lives in attracting the sandworm toward the palace.”
Finley paused, staring into the flickering flame of the torch as if re-living Gillian’s tale. Chloe couldn’t remember sitting down, but they were all on their asses as if listening to Grandpa around the campfire.
“The drums were struck, the rhythm loud enough in the sand to draw Gillian back home. The sandworm gave chase, chomping at our hero and taking off a section of the lake floor, creating an opening where the lake began to drain into the sand.”
“A lake? Down here?” Tag said incredulously.
Chloe took over, describing the lake she had seen, the water so clear she could see to the bottom. It was hard to imagine that there had ever been a hole at the bottom. It was already so large, how big could it have been before the drainage?
“The water angered the sandworm. It weighed it down, creating more drag. Gillian took advantage of this and flew into the hole, swimming desperately against the water. Our men and women all dropped our ropes and anchors into the water to help him. It was a close call, but Gillian was eventually pulled to the surface.
“Thus, we now have the tale recounted in this book of heroes. The survivor of the sandworm. A great tale of heroism and victory.”
Finley closed the book delicately, its eyes glassy as it relived the tale inside its head.
“What happened to the lake
?” Gideon asked, adjusting his seated position. “You said the lake began to drain. How did your people stop it?”
Finley turned and faced Gideon. Chloe couldn’t help but see Gideon’s discomfort return, and did her best to hide her smile. Gideon always seemed to take longer to adjust to the things that were different, despite his many years of gaming.
“Our people threw rocks and stones into the pool—hundreds of them, working as fast as we could to block the hole and keep the sandworm at bay. The drain was plugged, but we lost a lot that day.” Its eyes went glassy once more as a distant memory took it. “Our precious jewels of the water were lost forever, buried beneath the rock and stone.”
Chloe’s head went up suddenly. “Jewels? What jewels?”
Finley shrugged. “Legend tells of a great glowing mass of jewels in the center of the bottom of the lake. Our people could never dive down there and retrieve them, but they shone and sparkled with their own vibrancy and light. A remnant from the old world, I’m guessing. Despite our best efforts, our hooks could never retrieve the jewels, so we allowed them to remain in the water, a shining light to illuminate the wonders of the lake.”
Chloe looked eagerly at Gideon, who matched her gaze.
“You don’t think…” she said.
“Maybe?” Gideon said, smiling at her sudden burst of enthusiasm.
“Finley, could you take us back to the lake, please?” Chloe asked. “I think we need to do some swimming.”
Chapter Sixty-Five
“You’re really going to do this?” Gideon asked.
Chloe nodded. “Yep.”
“You’re going down there?”
“Ya-huh.”
Gideon peered over the walkway, looking down to the bottom. “Any idea how far down that is?”
“Nope.”
Tag turned his head, scouting along the walkway. He picked up a pebble the size of his palm. “Here.”
He dropped the stone into the water, and it hit the surface with a small splosh. They all craned their necks, watching as the rock floated down, down, down, down, and down. After a few moments, it was so small that they had to squint to see the tiny speck, its shape warped by the water between it and them. Eventually, it hit the bottom and settled amid large boulders.
“Some distance,” Ben remarked.
Chloe waved a hand. “It’ll be fine, I’m sure. I’ve got a skill in swimming.”
“You do?”
“Yep.”
“Nice!” Tag replied. “Off you go, then.”
Chloe felt the toe of Tag’s boot connect with her back as he kicked her into the water. She had enough time to utter a quick “No—" before the water surrounded her.
When Chloe was in Oakston, she had earned her first skill point in swimming by helping the washerwomen go to the pools in the surrounding forest to clean clothes and dive and hunt for fish. Back then the pool had been rather murky, her technique clumsy. A layer of foam had clouded the surface from a small waterfall that provided the pool with its contents.
Down here, Chloe could hardly believe she was underwater. Despite the fact that she couldn’t breathe, the water was as clear as glass. Around her fish swam, some of the larger ones approaching her with curiosity, pecking and pulling at the fabric of her shirt.
She smiled and reached out to stroke them, but they moved out of her way.
She let her weight drag her down, seeing, now that she was underwater, just how deep the lake went. She found it hard to imagine how much water must have been inside the lake before the sandworm had created the drain. Surely, somewhere deep down, there were many more treasures than the one Finley had described.
Keep on sinking, KieraFreya thought. Bring it home, girl. Bring me my prize.
Chloe’s hands began to paddle of their own accord, guided by KieraFreya’s eagerness to find her missing piece. She focused her eyes on the rocks below, wondering if the armor was lying beneath them, buried for thousands of years. Waiting for a hero to come get it.
A notification blinked in the corner of Chloe’s vision. She ignored it, choosing instead to watch a school of fish dive toward the bottom, weaving between large fronds of seaweed and disappearing in a second. Their scales had turned the perfect green to camouflage them from predators.
It’s so beautiful, Chloe thought. Can you believe this exists under the desert?
All the water has to go somewhere, KieraFreya replied. Keep your focus, girl. Remember, you only have so long beneath the water.
Chloe panicked suddenly. KieraFreya was right. When she had dived in the Oakston pools, she had only had a short while before her oxygen ran out and she needed to resurface for air.
Now, though, her lungs didn’t protest. Her head didn’t pound. If anything, she felt as if she could swim in these waters all day.
You don’t suppose it’s...pool magic?
KieraFreya laughed in her head. Pool magic?
What? Chloe paused to watch as a fish with a flattened back and a long, barbed tail swam gracefully below her. The Nauriel Tree has magic. This realm has magic. Why can’t the pool have magic? Why can’t it let you stay underwater for ages without consequences? With the sharks—
Sherikans.
—so scared of drowning, they might never have even tried it. How would they know you could swim without needing to take a breath down here?
Hmm. KieraFreya considered. You make a good point.
Thanks.
Not really a compliment.
Chloe swam deeper, shocked now at her ability to get so far. She looked up at the surface, where she could make out a few sticks that could have been the legs and feet of her companions. She wondered what they were talking about. Whether they were freaking out that she’d been under the water for so long.
The notification continued to blink. She shook it away, choosing to ignore its flashing.
When Chloe neared the bottom, she noticed that her vision had become blurry. Her hands touched one of the large rocks and she shook her head, trying to clear her vision.
Must be something in my eye. That’s all that it is, surely?
She walked over the rocks like a woman on the moon, taking great strides and using her arms to propel her forward. However, the more she tried to focus, the more her vision began to blur. Before long, she was struggling to see at all.
Throwing up her menu, Chloe checked her stats, panicking as she saw that her health was showing just 7HP remaining and it was going down by the second.
Her eyes grew wide (not that it helped her see better), and she did the only thing that came instinctively to her in that moment. She opened her mouth, let out a stream of bubbles, and began frantically kicking her legs, aiming for the surface.
Chloe only made it halfway before her vision went dark and Obsidian disappeared from view.
Demetri had been frying some eggs when he was called over to the armchair to come and talk to Chloe. He panicked, struggling with the decision of whether to leave them to continue cooking or to take them off the burner now and continue after his conversation.
Burned eggs, or underdone eggs?
“Come on!” Mia called enthusiastically.
Demetri turned off the stove and placed the pan to the side, next to the other failed attempts, trying not to let his annoyance at the disturbance get to him too badly. He guessed this must be what it was like to have kids—constant interruptions and half-finished jobs.
God, imagine having six kids, like the Lagardes.
He bounded across the room, jumping onto the chair and placing his arm around Mia. They were both excited to share their news and couldn’t wait to tell Chloe.
“How did she die?” Demetri asked, having been distracted by his cooking at the time. He had recently found out that Mia was a sucker for eggs over-easy, and after some Googling and watching videos on the internet, he believed he had the technique down.
Turned out it was a lot easier said than done.
“Drowning,” Mia said. “She just c
ontinued swimming until she hit the bottom and drowned.”
“That’s weird.” Demetri raised an eyebrow. “Shouldn’t she have recognized she was running out of air?”
“Hey, Chloe!” Mia said over the phone, a jolliness in her voice that contrasted with the grumpy Chloe she could see on her screen. “How was the swim?”
Chloe scratched her head, her face a mixture of pissed off and confused. Mia was beginning to get used to Chloe’s surges of annoyance whenever her character died. She wondered why she hadn’t realized it sooner. Most gamers she had seen who found themselves fully invested in their journeys threw tantrums when their characters kicked the bucket. Why should Chloe be any different?
Chloe went on a rant about how the swim had been great but she couldn’t understand what had happened. She hadn’t felt any danger. There had been no sign that she was running out of oxygen.
“Not even the notifications in your menu?” Mia offered.
“I’ve muted them from popping up. Do you know how annoying it is to be in the middle of something and have a message appear in front of your face?”
Demetri took the phone. “Hey, forget about that, Chloe. We’ve got good news!”
Chloe’s expression changed from annoyance to radical excitement. It was staged expression she had practiced many times before when pretending to be interested in her siblings’ successes.
“No. Way. You guys are having a baby! That’s fantastic.” She clapped and squealed like a schoolgirl.
Demetri’s face dropped, the phone nearly slipping from his hands. “No. No, no. No,” he exclaimed, turning to Mia for confirmation.
She shook her head, her eyes as wide as his.
“Definitely no,” Demetri finished.
Chloe waved a hand at them on the screen. Demetri wasn’t sure whether Chloe knew the position of the game’s camera, or if it was just a lucky guess. “Relax, I’m just screwing with you both. Nice to know you’re dating now, though. Managed to keep that one pretty quiet.”
Collecting The Goddess (Chronicles Of KieraFreya Book 1) Page 46