Estimating I had a couple seconds of air left, I squinted harder. Fortunately, the stream dragging me toward the cliff was narrow, and the water sweet and clear—salt would probably have stung in this world.
Come on, come on,I urged my racket.Come back to me. I need you.
Unless it had gotten stuck in the sandy riverbed, it would go over the drop with me, but I couldn’t even spot the drop yet, which meant I would be out of oxygen long before I went over. The edges of my vision began to fray, which couldn’t possibly be a good sign.
Maybe I could break the surface for a quick breath. I stared up. The beetles were no longer hovering over the water. They were sitting atop it, bobbing like bloodied ducks.
Time for Plan B.
If only I had a Plan B.
Something bumped into my foot. I craned my neck, and although I felt like I was floating in a puddle of opaque glue, I made out the faintest, shimmering curve. Like a faulty pendulum, my arm arced toward my thigh, and then my cramping fingers curled around what had hit me. Hoping I wasn’t hallucinating, I dragged the thing toward my face and almost wept at the sight of it.
Instead of returning thewitainside of me, I fashioned a snorkel so long and thin it poked through the net of vamp beetles. And then I sucked on it. Water surged inside my mouth. I was so stunned I choked and almost dropped my device. In a dusky recess of my mind, it struck me I should blow into it to clear it, but I didn’t think I had a blow left in me. I tried, though. Not even a trickle of air drifted up the flooded tube.
Was night finally falling? The watery world around me had turned incredibly dark.
Although my grip was weakening, I gave my oversized snorkel a soft squeeze, making it solid, and then another to make it hollow. And then I pulled in a swallow, praying for air, praying I wouldn’t return to the field of mud, because I needed to reach the others and help whatever fight had begun down in the valley.
Air—delicious, pure, and crisp—luffed my cheeks and snuck into my stiff lungs. I breathed in and out, in and out. Slowly, my vision cleared, the gray dots replaced by dabs of bright color—iridescent blue and gladeberry-red. I didn’t even mind the sight of the beetles anymore. They couldn’t hurt me anymore.
I dragged one hand through the velvety sand, the grains puffing and dancing around me, tangling around my unraveling braid.
Boredom, or perhaps an innate sense that their mission had become futile, made the vamp beetles rise in droves and drift away, back to their bark ports. Breathing calmly, I took advantage of the respite to relax before what awaited me in the valley. After a couple more minutes of idle drifting, I reeled my dust back into my palm, kicked my legs, and broke the surface.
The water foamed, wavelets rocking into my cheeks and nose, spraying into my eyes. I was getting close to the drop-off. I poked my head out a little higher to gauge the distance. Half a mile. Perhaps less. I fluttered my legs, carving across the expanse toward the shore, fearing that flopping over the ledge would result in undesired spinal realignment. My muscles hardened and stretched, the tendons and sinews coiling deliciously. How I’d missed swimming. Too soon, I reached the embankment and clawed my way to dry land on hands and knees, droplets of blood plopping into the sand beneath my face.Damn bloodthirsty fiend.
Waterlogged, I rose to my feet. My clothing stuck to my body, but there was no point wringing them out, not when I was about to dive head first off a cliff and into more water.
I shuddered as the memory of my last fall lit up my brain. Not even the knowledge that I’d resuscitate tempered the horror of dying. My aim, when I pushed off the cliff, needed to be true. Unless I created another parachute . . .No.I didn’t want the other prisoners to see I had access to magic.
I hurried along the shore, kicking up clumps of sand, my feet squishing inside my boots. Ten heartbeats later, I stood on the edge of the cliff. Although the dense blue foliage obscured most of the valley, the crescent encasing the pool was perfectly visible—white dappled with so much red I imagined someone else had gotten injured or killed, because all that blood couldn’t possibly have come from my waist wound.
As though the cell had heard my contemplations, a striped beast with paws the size of dinner plates and lavender fur matted with blood inched toward the water. It tottered. Once. Twice. And then it collapsed, half into the water, half out. A hoarse mewl turned the fine hairs on the back of my neck erect.
Oh, Great Gejaiwe. I pressed my knuckles against my gaping mouth.
“You just gonna stand there, princess, or actually get your feet wet?” someone yelled.
I jumped as the voice of the older man who’d been on the beach earlier drifted toward me. He was paddling with the current, bald head slick and shiny as a pearl.
“We already killed half of them off,” he continued, his voice carrying over the rushing water.
“Half?”
“Three,” he shouted. “They’re always as many as we are.”
I gulped. Were they all as big as the one on the beach? I looked back down at it. The animal was motionless, deep crimson blooming around its thick body, golden stripes shimmering as though made of foil instead of fur.
“Where do we jump from?” I asked loudly.
“You need to get back in the river, swim to the middle, then let it carry you down! You dive from anywhere else and you’ll break your neck. Take it from someone who’s tested a variety of dive spots.”
My saliva thickened anew. “How many prisoners . . . have thetigrikilled?” I asked, retreating back the way I’d come. Strong swimmer that I was, in this current, I’d never reach the heart of the river before toppling off if I didn’t add a few more yards.
“Just me. Damn tiger carved up my chest with its metal claws!”
Metal claws. . . Like on Kiera’s necklace. She must’ve plucked them off one of the beasts and strung them up on a cord. A battle trophy.
