“Broghan!” I gasped, extinguishing the flame. I hadn’t realized that Nalan and Alara’s pet could change into inanimate objects. Would I ever cease to be surprised by Tua magic? And why was hehere?
“Can I have some food?”he asked me in mindspeak, and I stared. His voice was that of a young boy.“I haven’t eaten anything since we left the Tuarealm.”
“Sure,” I said warily, sitting back down. I offered him some of the meat and bread, which he wolfed down eagerly—pardon the pun. “You’ve been able to speak this wholetime?”
“Yes, but there was no need to,”he said.“Nalan and Alara were doing fine answering yourquestions.”
I snorted at that. “Do they know you’rehere?”
Broghan said nothing, curling up at my feet and rubbing his cold nose against my leg. I scratched the back of his ears, still feeling a bitdisconcerted.
“Broghan,” I said again, a little more firmly. “Doesanyoneknow you’rehere?”
“I wanted to see the human world for myself.”He sounded a little petulant now.“Without waiting forever for the others to make up their minds. Nalan and Alara would never have let me go if I’d told them, so I hitched a ride with you. And it’s a good thing I did, since you gotstuck.”
I gasped. “Was it you who pushed me the last bit of theway?”
“Duh.”
Well, that was one mystery solved. A talking Tua pet possessed more power than me, even with my original strength doubled. And had saved my hide. It was more than a littlehumbling.
“Thank you,” I said, a bit stiffly. “But the last thing I need is for the Tua to think I stole youaway.”
Broghan licked my hand.“You won’t get in trouble for this,”he assured me.“I’ll make sure ofit.”
I wasn’t so sure aboutthat, but it wasn’t as if I could just banish him. He would probably come right back, and it was a waste of magic, anyway. “I am glad you’re here with me,” I admittedas I stroked his furry back. “It’s nice to have company in this gloomyplace.”
We finished our picnic, and then Broghan morphed into an otter and plunged into the lake. I’d always been perfectly happy with my shifter form, but now that I’d met him, I was a little envious that he seemed to be able to change into whatever hewanted.
As Broghan splashed about in the water, I focused on my serapha charm, trying to sense Iannis. As before, there was no trace of him. I was certain that Ta’sradala had done something to disrupt the charm—there was no way he was dead. He’d been safe and sound at the palace when I’d left. Surely he was on his way over here by now, wasn’t he? Iannis was one of the most intelligent men I’d ever met—he would have figured out where I’d gone by this point. How much time had passed since I’d left? A week? By Magorah, the girls were probably worried sick. I felt bad for disappearing on them like that, but it wasn’t as if I’d had a choice. I hoped they were doingokay.
“Come on, Broghan,” I called as I headed toward the tunnel up ahead. “Let’s see where this thinggoes.”
The challenge, I surmised as Broghan caught up with me, morphing into a giant bat, was to figure out how to get out of this blasted place. The bats, which had been hanging peacefully before, had awakened at my presence, and were flitting overhead in weird patterns. I conjured a glow light to help with illumination as we walked, but as we moved from cave to cave, there was nothing but endless caverns. This underground world was beautiful in its own way, full of glowing plants and wonderful rock formations, but aside from the bats, there was little to eat down here. I needed to find a way out before I ran out offood.
Broghan, for his part, seemed to be having the time of his life. He chased some of the other bats around the caverns and did somersaults and a few other aerial tricks. I told him to stay close to me so he wouldn’t get lost, but he only laughed. He probably couldn’t get lost if he tried, and found it amusing that I was trying to look out for hiswelfare.
Wondering if I could make the bats work for me, I picked up some pebbles and tossed them at the bats, noting which direction they fled. Several of them darted for one tunnel in particular, and I followed, hoping it led to the surface instead of deeper into the cave. I repeated the process a few more times, but eventually it became harder, as the bats would disappear through holes in the cave ceiling too high for me to reach. I tried to follow them with the levitation spell, but the bats were too fast. Some of them vanished through a confusing field of sharp and spiny stalactites that hung so close together they formed a lattice. I had to find a wayaround.
Eventually, I dropped back down to the ground again. Even though I was much stronger now, constant use of the levitation spell would deplete my magic eventually. There was enough illumination here from the glowing mushrooms that I extinguished my glow light. Broghan shrank into a normal-sized bat, albeit one with bright red fur, and landed on myshoulder.
“Tired of flying?” I asked as he leaned his warm, tiny body against my neck. Rather than answer, he licked my earlobe, and I couldn’t help giggling. Regardless of the consequences, I was really glad he had come along. Having a companion kept me grounded, which was more important than ever since I couldn’t feel Iannis anymore. I had not realized how comforting the tiny speck of his essence in the necklace had been until it went silent. One more crime to hold against his cursedgrandmother.
Using the dim greenish light from the mushrooms, I tried to follow the bats’ trail from the ground. But the floor in this stretch of the cave system was brittle and uneven, and it was slow going as I picked a path between the various clusters of stalagmites. Some of them were taller than me, and I felt like I was walking through a forest of stone, while others were tiny, like thick blades of grass, and I had to skirt around them to avoid cutting myself on their sharpedges.
I’d just spied another tunnel up ahead when my foot slipped on some loose pebbles. “Whoa!” I cried as I slid down a steep slope. Conjuring a light, my heart leapt into my throat as I shot straight into a wide, bottomless fissure. I dropped a good thirty feet before I managed to activate the levitation spell, but I was falling too fast by then for it to fight gravity. A scream tore from my throat as I continued to plummet, and I frantically searched Fenris’s spell catalogue, trying to find something, anything that could help me before I crashed into the rocksbelow…
Strong claws clamped around my arms, and I looked up to see Broghan flapping his wings above me, a giant eagle now. He soared out of the fissure and deposited me safely on the other side. I collapsed, my body shaking from delayed reaction, and I laid my head on the cool ground, panting with fear andrelief.
“Thank you,” I choked out when I finally had enough breath to speak. “I thought I was agoner.”
Broghan nuzzled my face—he was back in wolf cub form again.“Watch where you’re stepping,”he said.“You gave me ascare.”
I laughed. “Gaveyoua scare?” I asked, rubbing the top of his head. He curled up against me, and we lay there for a long moment, until my legs had stopped shaking and I was ready to move onagain.
We spent the next couple of hours climbing up and down through the caves, until my stomach was gnawing at me with hunger and my limbs were beginning to ache with exhaustion. It had been a long time since I’d done this much physical activity, and I’d been growing out of shape to begin with. Too many parties and meetings, and not enough sparring with Rylan—I’d make sure to keep up my form, if I ever got out ofhere.
WhenI got out of here, I corrected myself. I couldn’t accept anythingless.
