This was what he had to save, this place, this wonder and the power that surged through the stone carvings. He could save Ys. Just like Fabien had.
His mind tripped over the thought. There was something wrong there. How was there still a curse, a curse on all his family, if Fabien had already saved Ys?
‘Dahut,’ he whispered and the cavern around him took up the echo, her name repeating and repeating, murmuring around him until he could hear only its music. Calling her to him. Strength left his legs and he fell to his knees on the cold stone, right at the edge of the plinth, as darkness swept over him, swallowed him whole.
Cold lips pressed to his, icy hands framed his face. He tilted his head back, succumbing completely to the spell, toher. Dahut, the water witch.
There was nothing else to do. She had won. She would always win. She was too powerful for any man to stand against. She was ancient and terrible, a sorceress, an enchantress, the water witch, with a heart of stone, and she had destroyed his line, leaving only him and his own innocent little boy remaining. Soon Rafael himself would be gone too. Followed by his son. How had he dreamed he would be able to break such a curse? He’d been a fool and the air humming with the magic of this place told him that over and over again.
‘Rafael? Rafael, please! Talk to me.’
The voice was just an echo, not even real, a dream. He’d had a dream and now it was over. He’d wait here until she came to claim him. He’d wait here in the darkness until she pressed her cold lips to his and made him her own. That was what she wanted.
Just kneel and wait. Just give in. Like a man without air, beneath the waves, lost. All he had to do was accept it, embrace it.
Surrender to her.
He had done it in the sea, giving himself up to the current, letting it take him where it had taken Ari. It was instinctive, bred into his line, a hereditary memory. He understood that now.
Maybe, just maybe, if he begged enough, she would spare Georges.
‘Damn it, Rafael! Wake up! Please…’
Warm hands touched his face, warm with life, trembling from the cold. And then another pair of lips pressed to his. Not the icy kiss he expected, the kiss of the deepest ocean, the lightless depths of the sea. These lips tasted of salt, but also sweetness. They were warm and alive. They were lips he had already kissed and longed to kiss again, to feel again her lithe body against his.
He opened his heavy eyes to see her desperate face, to feel the warmth she generated, the passion he remembered, the only source of heat in this lifeless place.
‘Ari?’ It came out as a groan, a sound of need and hunger, and that same heat rushed back through him.
‘Yes, yes, it’s me. What happened to you? Are you OK?’
‘You kissed me.’
For a moment, she looked positively guilty. ‘I…I know, I’m sorry. I just didn’t know… It was that or hit you. Rafael, you spaced out completely. You were saying things, I don’t know what. I didn’t understand. Another language. I had to snap you out of it.’
So she had kissed him. Woke him with her kiss like one of her fairy-tale heroes.
Instead of arguing, he kissed Ari back, bringing his heavy arms up to hold her against him. For a long moment, he could think of nothing else. She was the air he needed, the warmth he craved, she was everything. He was lost, but not in the darkness. She was a flame, lighting him from within.
‘We have to get out of here,’ she told him breathlessly, when she could tear her mouth from his. ‘There isn’t time. There’s something weird about it and it’s affecting you. Like the mask. Something to do with the curse on your family. And this place. I think… Do you understand?’ She said it slowly and clearly, as if talking to an idiot. Which, he reflected, he was. He was a complete idiot.
He nodded. Yes, he could feel it too and she was right. The delirious need to make love to her here and now in the darkness, on the cold stone, was just another symptom of whatever this place was doing to him. It had to be. Because he did not lose control like this. Never.
Later, he promised himself, later, he would beg her to let him explore this further. Somewhere safe and warm. But not here and now.
‘I do. We must find another way out of here. Quickly.’ He took her hands, and let her help him back to his feet.
‘One torch at a time,’ she said. ‘Conserve batteries.’
‘We need something to mark our way, so we don’t double back on ourselves.’
She lifted her wrist where she wore a slender white sheath around her wrist. ‘The pen from the dive pad. That should do it.’
He was never so grateful for her. Was there even a way he could tell her that? Not now. There wasn’t enough time. ‘Let’s go then.’
They retreated from the chapel-like area, the eyes of the carving of Dahut following them.
Hours passed, hours in the darkness, feeling their way along the walls and squeezing through gaps, trying to head upwards. They were forced back several times, too many times to keep count of, but Ari’s marks on the walls kept them on track. Each time they retreated, she would put a slash through the symbol, curse softly to herself and set off again.
