Go, she mouthed.
So they did.
“How much further?” Iryana asked quietly as she trudged alongside her sister.
She was still weak and sore, her injuries barely patched up, but she knew they didn’t have time to wait.
Iryana had assumed the water well would be near the treehouse settlement she had visited with the 18th, but that would have been further north, and they were headed southeast instead.
“We’re close,” Hadima whispered. “It took me a while to find it when I went to forge the poison dart, but I know exactly where it is now.”
They were both shaken, neither daring to bring up those they’d left behind. One step in front of the other. It was all they could do. Iryana glanced around them again, but so far the dakii had not found them. They had used strong smelling herbs to disguise their scent, and despite the constant tickle in Iryana’s nose, it was working well.
Eventually, Hadima brought her to a small waterfall pouring out of the cliffs above. Iryana doubted she had ever been there before, or if she had passed by, it had been too insignificant to remember. The thought was mildly unsettling. It had been right under her nose this whole time.
Hadima started climbing the rock toward a ledge about twenty feet up. Iryana hurried after, ignoring the aches as she pulled her body up. She worried she would fall, but she reached the top right after her sister.
The ledge was larger than it had looked and dominated by a pool of water that overflowed into the waterfall below. Another waterfall poured down from above, filling the pool.
“This is it,” Hadima announced.
Iryana looked around, but it was just a pool of water…
“Behind the waterfall?”
Hadima shook her head. “No, there’s a channel beneath the pool. We have to swim it.”
With little warning, Hadima started stripping off her outer layers and hiding them behind one of the bushes. Her hands were shaking.
“Hurry, Iryana.”
Iryana shook her shock off and joined her sister, unstrapping and removing her training armor, and then her outer layers to add them to Hadima’s. The autumn air was chilly against her sweat-soaked skin.
Hadima headed toward the edge of the pool, carefully placing her bare feet on the slick rocks.
“You’re just going to jump in?” Iryana eyed the water, feeling queasy.
Hadima bent her knees, about to jump in.
“Wait,” Iryana pleaded, stopping Hadima with a hand on her shoulder.
“Don’t worry,” Hadima smiled, though her eyes were tight with worry. “I’ve done this a few times now. Follow closely.”
And she jumped into the pool.
Iryana gaped, but she didn’t have time to question. With a leap, she crashed into icy cold water after her sister.
When she opened her eyes, Iryana was met with currents of frothy white obscuring the darker, murky water. But below her, she could see Hadima swimming. Iryana followed.
The water darkened, almost turning black, as they swam under what Iryana thought was a solid cliff wall. Her lungs burned, and her hand skimmed the rock above her. It was so cold her joints were locking up. She kicked her legs as hard as she could, struggling against the drag of her clothes. Then, thankfully, the water lightened again and she could see her sister’s dark figure rising above her.
Iryana gasped as she surfaced, sucking in musty air. She opened her eyes to an enormous cavern. A squat, kind-faced woman stood on the rocky bank of the cavern, two large towels in her arms.
“Keeper Magovya,” Hadima greeted, already out of the water and taking a towel the Keeper handed her.
Wiping the water from her eyes, Iryana hesitated in the freezing water. But her suspicions about the woman waiting for them melted away when she remembered what they were.Water-forged.
Surely there was a forged seer among them.
