Apprentice (The Black Mage, #2)(40)

I made a face. "You are lucky we are friends."

"You will help me then?"

"I will. But you had better be right. Darren will have our heads if we are wrong."





****





This is nothing. You've climbed cliffs five times the scale of this drop… I swallowed. That didn't mean I wasn't scared. Climbing I could control; falling was luck.

Ella leaped into the dark waters below, and I heard the telltale splash as she landed inside the sea cave. "Ry," she called from the water, "come on, it's fun!"

I struggled to see her, peering down into over a hundred feet of shadow. Fun was the last thing it looked. I made a silent prayer to the gods: Please, don't let this be a mistake. Then I took the plunge, jumping into the dark hollow with my tunic flapping along the black cavern sky.

I hit the waters with a loud splash and then I was submerged into the icy pool. I emerged for air with a loud gasp, sputtering out water that had somehow founds its way into my nose. "It's so cold." Teeth chattering, I swam after Ella, following the smooth, sloping ceiling with our hands as we searched for an exit in its tunnel-like passage.

The walls of the cave were stained blue and green algae dotted its ceiling. It was beautiful in a lonely, cold sort of way. My entire body was quivering by the time we had swam five minutes.

We continued our quiet trek to what we hoped was the sea's entrance.

Finally, after almost fifteen more minutes of searching in numb semi-darkness, we reached the end of the tunnel only to find it covered in the same dark limestone wall as the rest of the cavern.

There was no exit.

"It must be underwater." Ella bit her lip. The current tide meant we were fifteen feet from the bottom of the cave. "I think I can see some light below – that has to be the way the water is getting in. I'm going to dive down and check."

"Be careful," I warned.

My friend smiled, shivering as she did, and then she was gone. I waited nervously for her to return, hoping that our efforts wouldn't leave us trapped in a dark ocean cave.

Five minutes later Ella emerged, wheezing water as she did.

"The entrance is right below us. You'll need to be careful, though. Coral lines the rim and it's definitely sharp."

"Did you see the mentees? Did you spot their boat?"

She grinned broadly. "They are just west of us. I saw Ian and your mentee Merrick on the nearby rocks arguing over the best way to climb the bluffs. It's too dangerous, apparently. They are stuck and the rest of their group doesn't seem too happy. There's two second-years keeping guard of their boat right next to the cave's entrance but they couldn't see me. The cavern is hidden in a high outcropping of rock – they'd have to know exactly where to look to find it."

"Do you think it will be easy to pick them off?"

She hesitated. "I'm not sure… Do you think Ian would…?"

I laughed sharply. "He would never fall for that trick twice."

"Well, then we both cast loud distractions in opposite directions to scatter their group. When a couple of them go to investigate we take on whoever is left. Hopefully the element of surprise will even the odds."

It was a good a plan as any. Taking a deep breath I followed Ella into the dark waters, squinting with salt-burned eyes until I spotted a small crevice of light coming from below. Avoiding the beautiful but deadly reef I propelled my body through the entrance and into a bright, shallow pool on its other side.

I surfaced. A second later Ella popped up beside me. Slowly, we raised ourselves onto the slick rocky shore surrounding the cave.

The two of us crouched low and tiptoe-climbed along the rocks until we were ten feet away from where Ian and my mentee stood arguing. The rest of their group – except for the two mentees guarding the boat - were standing close by, waiting impatiently for the others to make a decision.

"I know it's somewhere around here. Priscilla and I used to play in it when we were kids!" Merrick was saying.

"We've combed this shore for an hour," Ian challenged. "We need to stop wasting time and find a new way up. The mentors are going to realize that barge is empty any minute and then they will be looking for us! We will lose any advantage we had in surprising them if we continue to look for your precious cave!"

"Fine! Go ahead and be leader – even though I am the one that grew up here!" Merrick tore off his black armband and tossed it at Ian.

The fourth-year bent low to pick it up, brushing the sand off his new prize with a self-satisfied smirk.

That's the boy that I'm courting. I couldn't help grinning. Ian looked good with the armband. Even on enemy lines. Forbidden and dangerous – especially after he stood up to Priscilla's bratty cousin.

Ella elbowed me. "Enough drooling, we've got to cause a distraction!"

A series of hushed whispers took over as my friend and I sent two castings at opposite ends of the beach. There was a loud boom and then sand went flying where I had cast mine. Ella's magic split a boulder in two.

"What was that?"

"They've found us!"

"We've got to get to the boat-"

"No." Ian's voice rang out clearly. "We aren't going back to the boat. Not yet. I want two five-man parties scouting the beach. We don't know that it's them. There is no way the mentors could have already made it back this quickly. You saw them in the looking glass on the eastern bluffs, did you not? That's three miles from where we are now."