Dragon Slayer 4 Page 9

  I wanted to protest, but I knew she was right. I could feel the fatigue not just in my muscles, but a bone-deep weariness that only settled in when I over-used the magic. A few hours of rest would recharge my batteries enough that we could continue at full strength, and though I hated the delay, I guessed we could afford it.

  “You’re right,” I said.

  “Of course I am,” Arieste replied, and shot me a wink. “But it’s always nice to hear you say it.” She turned to Letharia. “Come on, let’s get some food. The tablets can wait until you’ve rested.”

  I followed the two women toward the center of the room, where Irenya had actually spread one of our heavy cloaks like a picnic blanket. Our meal of soft white cheese, biscuits, olives, and dried fruits was simple, but I found myself enjoying it more than King Obragar’s feast. Arieste was right, and it had been too long since my last break. I’d been so focused on protecting Whitespire, defeating Zaddrith, and now hunting Curym that I’d forgotten about the basic necessities of life. Everything we did wasn’t just about surviving, but living. That started with a pleasant meal in the company of the important people in my life.

  All too quickly the food was gone and we were licking the last crumbs from our fingers.

  “Hmmmm,” Irenya sighed as she stretched her arms up into the air. The movement caused her already ample chest to swell, and she gave me a coy smirk when she saw me appreciating her body. “Mind if I come over here?” She scootched herself so that she was sitting right next to me, and then she leaned her head on my left shoulder.

  “Of course not,” I whispered as I leaned my cheek down to touch the top of her head. I breathed in the spicy scent of her hair and the tension in my shoulder and back completely faded from my body.

  I felt touch on my right hip, and I turned a bit to see that Arieste had moved to my other side. The slender blonde woman didn’t speak or look at my face, she just mirrored Irenya’s movements and rested her head on my shoulder.

  I reached around with my arms and hugged both beautiful women to me. Arieste finally let out a light sigh, and she wiggled her body a bit so that she could snuggle closer.

  And for a few minutes, life was perfect.

  “This warms my heart, handsome,” Nyvea whispered in my mind. “These women have turned from hated enemies into your lovers. Look across at Rizzala and Letharia, they both wish to join in the snuggling.”

  I glanced across to picnic blanket at Rizzala. The warrior woman was laying sideways on the soft cloth, and her green eyes met mine. We stared at each other for a few moments, and a slight smile came to her lips. She glanced at Irenya and Arieste relaxing in my arms, and then she looked away.

  “She wishes for your touch as well,” Nyvea whispered. “When will you give it to her?”

  I didn’t answer the seductive voice from my ruby amulet. Instead, I glanced over at Letharia. The skinny brunette was running her long fingers through her hair, and I saw her glancing at Irenya, Arieste, and me out of the corner of her eye. She realized that I was looking at her, and the beautiful woman’s cheeks turned bright red.

  “See?” Nyvea whispered. “She wants you too. Her hips are quite slender. I bet that massive penis of yours will really spread her--”

  “It isn’t all about the sex, Nyvea,” I thought back at her.

  “Well, no. Of course not, but the sex should be a main consideration.”

  “What about friendship and love?” I asked.

  “That’s just wrapped up in the sex,” Nyvea huffed. “Before or after, it doesn’t matter. If you have the friendship and the love it leads to sex, and the sex leads to love.”

  “But you are my best friend,” I thought to the voice in my amulet, “and we don’t have sex.”

  “What?” Nyvea gasped.

  “Yeah, I can’t think of anyone, besides my parents, who have shown me as much love and support as you have. You are constantly cheering me on. You support me in everything I do. You are my friend, and I love you, but we don’t have sex.”

  “I… I… Ethan?” Nyvea asked.

  “I’m just proving a point,” I said. “Granted, Rizzala and Letharia are both beautiful, but I have no problem being their friend. There doesn’t have to be any sex. Yeah, it would be fun, but look at the two wonderful women in my arms. Look at you. I am surrounded my love. I really appreciate your friendship. There doesn’t need to be any sex involved.”

  “I see,” she said after a few moments. “Thank you, Ethan. Your words warmed my heart. But then again, they always do. You continue to impress me everyday, and I am grateful that we are together.”

  “Me too, Nyvea,” I whispered to her.

  “Oh, but one thing,” she said.

  “Yeah?”

  “I am very happy with our friendship, but if I was out of this amulet, I would fuck your brains out for days, hero.” Nyvea’s voice chuckled in my mind, and I snorted with my own laughter.

  “Hmmm?” Arieste asked in my ear as I felt Irenya snuggle her head against my neck more.

  “Sorry,” I whispered to both of them. “I’m just happy here.”

  “Me too,” Arieste whispered.

  “Me three,” Irenya whispered.

  Rizzala took up a position by the door to guard, and Letharia bundled up near the door, still reading the tablets.

  I closed my eyes and allowed myself to bask in the warmth and comfort of the women’s presence beside me. Even if we only got a few hours to rest, it would be worth it. Having Arieste and Irenya with me was as important as food and sleep.

  That realization struck me like a physical blow. I knew I had come to rely on them for not just their magical abilities, but for their friendship, company, and insights. I couldn’t imagine a life without Arieste’s calm confidence and Irenya’s quick humor. Rizzala’s fierce warrior spirit had made an impression on me, and I felt as close to her as I did Adath, Sir Galfred, or General Daxos.

  But what would happen when my quest to defeat the dragons of Agreon was done? Barodan had promised to send me back to Earth, but I found myself uncertain if I wanted to return. I felt I was needed here to protect people, and I loved the fact that I could wield magic in the defense of the defenseless. Yet it was more than that. I liked it here, liked the life I had with the people around me. My attraction to Arieste and Irenya had deepened to attachment, maybe even more. The thought of leaving them and everyone else here for my life on Earth left me feeling hollow.

  Beside me, Arieste and Irenya’s chests rose and fell in the steady rhythm of sleep, and Letharia snored gently. I ached to join them in much-needed sleep, but my mind refused to be still. The question repeated itself in my mind: what came after? Could I bring myself to leave Agreon, or would I say goodbye to Earth forever?

  A strange sound penetrated the chaos of my thoughts. It barely registered at first, and so faint that I couldn’t be sure I’d heard it. My ears pricked up as I listened, but I heard only silence. I had just shrugged it off as a trick of my mind when it came again. A quiet sound that I immediately recognized as the dripping of water on stone.

  My eyes popped open as it came again. A third time, then a fourth and fifth. The sound grew louder and faster, joined by more and more.

  That was when I felt the cold water trickling along the floor.

  Chapter Seven

  There was no mistaking the salty tang and icy chill of ocean water, which seeped through the blanket I was lying on and into my clothes.

  Water dripped from the ceiling in four different places, and before I could draw in a breath, a fifth leak had sprung. My gut tightened as I realized the danger we were in.

  “Get up!” I shouted as I removed my arms from beneath Irenya and Arieste’s heads and leapt to my feet. “Quickly!”

  Rizzala was awake, alert, and on her feet in an instant. “What is it?” Her eyes snapped toward the nearest leak, and she swore. Behind her, there was a loud whooshing sound, followed by a thunk as a stone door slid out of the wall and dropped into place
to block what had been an open entrance.

  “Shit!” the dark-skinned woman swore.

  Arieste and Irenya were both slower to react, but the moment the felt the icy water through their clothing, they sprang upright.

  “Arieste, help me block the leaks!” I said and reached for her hand. The moment our fingers touched, I tapped into the ice magic and pushed it through my body into hers. Together, we coated the ceiling around the leaks with a thick layer of ice. Just as we finished with the fifth leak, a sixth and seventh began on the far side of the roof.

  “Just ice up the whole roof!” I shouted. Eight heartbeats seemed to pass in an eternity before I could tap into the magic again. By the time we had coated the entire ceiling with ice, the water had risen to the tops of our boots.

  “What happened?” Irenya asked. “Did someone set off a trap?”

  “Not that I know of,” I said, and I glanced between the other three women. “I didn’t hear anyone moving around.”

  “The high tide,” Letharia said. Her face had gone white, and her eyes were white. “It’s early afternoon, which is when the tide comes in over Emerald Deep.”

  “So this isn’t a trap?” I asked.

  “I don’t know.” She shook her head. “It might be. Or the ceiling could have been damaged during the sinking of Emerald Deep.”

  My eyes went to the now-closed door as I tried to figure out what the fuck was going on. To my surprise, I found the water wasn’t seeping through the stone, almost as if the door was fully watertight.

  I whirled to Letharia, who was nearest the two doors on the opposite side of the room. “Letharia, is there water leaking through those doors?”

  The dark-haired woman frowned down at the floor, then shook her head. “No.”

  “Shit!” I swore again. “It is another trap.”

  An eerie cracking sound echoed from the ice coating the ceiling, and an entire section to my left crumbled beneath the weight of the water. As I summoned another ice shield to block off the leaks, another chunk of ice shattered and collapsed, and water splashed from the roof to soak Irenya. Arieste quickly repaired the ceiling, and for a moment, the ice barrier held.

  “Think about it,” I said quickly, my eyes never leaving the ceiling. “This room is designed to be airtight, so when the high tide comes in, it will fill with water.”

  “Killing any thieves foolish enough to be caught here,” Rizzala added.

  “Exactly!” I said. “This is just one more security measure meant to stop grave robbers from getting into the crypts or leaving with stolen loot.”

  “So what do we do?” Letharia asked.

  My answer was delayed by a crumbling section of the ice shield, which I had to repair before more water filled the room. By now, I could feel it splashing around my ankles, so the leaks had to be growing faster as the tide rolled in.

  “The identical doors are just the sort of puzzle that would make grave robbers pause, making it more likely they’re caught in the room,” I said as the pieces clicked into place. “It’s a riddle we’ve got to solve.”

  “How?” Panic edged Irenya’s voice. I glanced at her and found her eyes wider than Letharia’s, her face bone white. “How do we get out of here?” The claustrophobia-induced panic was taking hold, and she’d have a full on anxiety attack if we didn’t come up with a solution quickly.

  Behind Irenya, Rizzala gripped her spear tightly, and she shifted from foot to foot, chafing with her inability to do anything but watch helplessly as the room flooded. Arieste was too occupied renewing the ice shields on the ceiling to have time for fear. Letharia’s brow furrowed in concentration as she studied the stone tablet for any answers to the riddle.

  “That’s it!” My eyes flew wide as I remembered what the dark-haired woman had found in the tablet. “Letharia, what was that riddle you read to us back when we first entered? Something about dragon hearts and honor?”

  Letharia sucked in a sharp breath, and her head bobbed wildly as she nodded. “Honor guides your steps from danger,” she recited from the tablet, “The heart of dragons signals the path to the altar.”

  “The heart of dragons!” I wanted to kick myself for not seeing it sooner. “Dragons have a beating heart like all living thing, but what is the thing that actually makes dragons come alive in the first place?”

  Arieste’s eyebrows shot up. “Magic!”

  “Exactly!” Triumph echoed in my voice. “Magic signals the path to the altar. Letharia, where is the altar and Curym’s lair?”

  “In what was once the palace,” Letharia said, excited.

  “So magic will guide us to the palace, where we’ll find Curym’s lair,” I said. “More importantly, it will get us the fuck out of here!” I turned to Irenya and Rizzala. “Use your magic on the doors and see what happens.”

  My attention was diverted by another section of crumbling ice, this one half the width of the room. Had Rizzala not been leaping toward the doors, she would have been struck by the falling ice. Twenty or more leaks dripped thick streams of water into the room at a terrifying rate.

  I tapped into the magic within me, but I felt the pain of every nerve fiber being rubbed raw. It was the sensation that made it clear I was reaching the end of my magical stamina. If I kept using the power, I would burn out. But right now, I had to push through the pain. The water had reached my shins and was rising fast as more and more leaks sprang in the ceiling.

  I took Arieste’s hand in mine and, together, we summoned a shield of ice to cover the entire length of roof. Were it not for Arieste’s strong grip on my hand, I would have staggered as I released the ice magic. I saw the combination of understanding, fear, and determination in her eyes. We would keep doing this for as long as it took. If we stopped now, we’d end up drowning or freezing to death in the icy ocean water before we got the doors open.

  “Yes!” Letharia cried.

  I whirled in time to see two glowing runes flaring to life on the door. One was red to match Irenya’s fire, the other as black as the darkness magic that brought Rizzala to life.

  “That’s it!” Letharia pointed to Irenya’s door. “That’s the one.”

  “Are you sure about this?” I asked.

  “Absolutely!” Letharia’s head bobbed. “It’s the other half of the riddle. ‘Honor guides your steps from danger.’ That symbol there is the Elmentian character for honor!”

  I hesitated a single heartbeat. We had nothing else to guide us, no other hints to tell us whether the door was correct or not. The stone tablet’s riddle was the only thing we had to go on.

  “Do it!” I told Irenya.

  With a nod, Irenya gripped the handle of the door, twisted it, and shoved hard.

  The door swung outward, and immediately the leaks from the ceiling stopped. The only sound in the chamber was our ragged breathing and the whisper of water slipping through the open door.

  Rizzala broke the silence first. “That was too damned close!”

  “Once again,” I said as I turned to Letharia, “it looks like we owe you our lives.”

  “She’s making a bit of a habit of it isn’t she?” Irenya said with a little grin.

  “I…” Letharia faltered, and her cheeks colored a delicate pink. “It was the tablet.”

  “Don’t sell yourself short.” Arieste walked over and placed a hand on Letharia’s shoulder. “You’ve more than proven your worth, so never let anyone tell you that you have nothing of value to offer.” A regal smile graced her lips. “You are a welcome addition to our team.”

  “Indeed,” Rizzala said, and though she didn’t smile, she gave Letharia the same nod she’d used when speaking to Sir Galfred or Adath. A warrior’s sign of respect.

  “Let’s see what sort of damage the water did to our gear,” I said as I turned back to my pack. All of our packs were made from cowhide, which was water-resistant but not fully waterproof. As I’d feared, moisture had seeped through the pores of the hide, and Letharia’s pack had been fully overtu
rned and waterlogged in our escape attempts. All of the food within her pack was sodden and soggy, along with her spare clothing.

  I was relieved to find the rest of our equipment had escaped a similar watery fate. That meant we had enough food for a few more days, and dry clothing for everyone in the group. Unfortunately for Letharia, she was too tall to fit in Irenya’s red dresses, so she had to choose between Arieste’s and Rizzala’s spare clothing. The choice was obvious, for Rizzala was far too broad in the shoulder, back, and legs for her shirts or trousers to fit the dark-haired woman.

  On Arieste’s insistence, I turned my back for Letharia to pull on the borrowed white gown. The dress hung loose on Letharia’s shoulders, and the moderate neckline ended up plunging low enough to reveal the slight swell of her modest cleavage.

  “Interesting,” Nyvea purred in my mind. “She can be quite the looker, in her own sexy slender way. Looks like you might have four mistresses to have fun with.”

  “That didn’t seem to work out too well for King Dentas,” I said with a chuckle to myself.

  “Ah, but I’m willing to bet he didn’t have your magic dick,” Nyvea responded. “Or that hunk of a body. Not much call for muscle on a man who spends all day sitting in a chair, not compared to a warrior and hero like you, handsome.”

  I pushed Nyvea’s voice to the back of my mind and turned to the four women. “If you’re up for it, I think we should get out of here. I’d rather not have to deal with that again, so I’m willing to put some distance between us before we stop and rest.”

  “Are you certain?” Arieste asked, a note of concern in her voice. “I know we are all feeling the strain of not only the day’s exertions, but also the use of magic. If we were to run into any more dangers, we could find ourselves in serious trouble.”

  “I like Ethan’s suggestion,” Irenya said. “Coming close to a watery death once is more than enough for me.”

  “I agree,” Rizzala said. “Between us, we should have more than enough magic to handle whatever the crypt can throw at us.”

  All eyes turned to Letharia. The dark-haired woman shrank back for a moment, then seemed to regain her courage and stood straighter. “I’m for leaving,” she said. Her voice had lost its hesitant, fearful note. “Ethan’s right in thinking that the trap could just reset and catch us in here again at the next tide. Better find another section of tunnel that isn’t trapped to take a break.”