"Someone tried to kill us," Kailin murmured. "Someone knew we were down here."
"They were after me," Saphir said. "No one outside the six of you, Nyxath, and General Lesten knows about the prophecy. Why would they want to kill you?"
"I'm the Hero of Elucia," Kailin said. "They tried to kill me during my leave."
"How did they even know we would be down here?" I asked. "Things like this take time to plan."
I kept my arm around Kailin as she pressed close to me, still trembling. Usually, she was more resilient than this, but she was still physically depleted and emotionally fragile from her incredible prophetic dream and the previous assassination attempt.
There was a limit to what a young woman like her could take without falling apart.
"We're going to be okay," I whispered in her ear. "Rescue is on the way."
She nodded against my shoulder but didn't speak.
The wait was agonizing.
We could hear sounds from above—muffled voices, the rumble of equipment, the occasional clatter of stone being moved. But down here, time seemed to stretch endlessly.
Morek had torn a strip from his shirt to bind his head wound. The bleeding had mostly stopped, but the makeshift bandage was already soaked through. Shovia kept testing her wrist, carefully flexing it, which probably meant that it was sprained rather than broken.
Codric sat on the floor, leaning against the wall with his eyes closed, but he wasn't asleep. Knowing my cousin, he was trying to solve the puzzle of how someone had known to plant an explosive device at the right place and the right time.
I was trying to solve that puzzle as well, but my brain was foggy either from the dust I'd inhaled or from the impact of what had just happened. Someone had attempted to kill the woman I loved.
Again.
Kailin was still trembling. I rubbed her arms, trying to warm her even though her chill was internal rather than external. Thanks to the geothermal effect, it wasn't cold down here.
It was the shock and fear and the aftermath of adrenaline.
"Talk to me," I said.
"Someone knew about the prophecy," she whispered. "That's why they tried to kill us."
"We don't know that."
She pulled back to look at me. "Someone knew exactly when we would be coming up those stairs. They knew we were down here."
I couldn't argue with her logic, although I couldn't reconcile the timing with what made sense as far as the chain of events. No one could have done that in the hour or so that we were in the chamber.
"Let's focus on getting out first," I said. "Then we'll worry about the who and why."
Who had known about this meeting?
Saphir had orchestrated it without telling anyone, separating us from the other cadets with minimal explanations given. As far as I knew, no one else had been told where we were going or why.
This couldn't have been planned in advance.
Someone had to plant the explosives while we were inside the secret room with the door closed. That someone had to have followed us, which meant that the traitor Ravel suspected in the Dragon Force must be close to us.
The excavation proceeded with agonizing slowness because rushing could bring more stone down on our heads, but understanding didn't make the wait any easier.
Eventually, a small hole appeared at the top of the pile of rubble.
"Shaman Saphir Fatewever and company, can you hear me?"
"We hear you!" Ravel shouted back.
