The Prison Healer (The Prison Healer #1)(98)

It had to be someone else, some motive other than to spread fear and animosity, which Cresta didn’t need a poison to do. But, who—

Kiva’s concentration unraveled when a voice called out for the Warden, prompting their small group to pause. She was so relieved to turn and find Naari striding toward them that her knees nearly gave out.

“Arell,” Rooke grunted. “I wondered where you were. Did you know the infirmary was left unguarded?”

“A wagon came in this morning,” Naari said. “I was told it was covered.”

The Warden’s lips tightened, but her answer must have satisfied him, since he continued walking.

Kiva didn’t follow until Naari nudged her forward, and even then, she trailed as far back from the Warden and his entourage as possible.

“I need to talk to you,” Kiva whispered from the corner of her mouth.

“You need to focus,” Naari whispered back.

Kiva’s eyes flicked sidelong toward the guard, noting her pallid expression, her tense features, the anxious way she was holding herself.

“It’s urgent,” Kiva whispered. “It’s about—”

But Kiva cut herself off when she realized that something was wrong.

They weren’t walking toward the tunnel entrance, toward the aquifer.

They were walking toward Zalindov’s gates.

Suddenly, all thoughts of the poison fled her mind, fear overtaking her as she remembered she was about to face her third Ordeal, and it could very well end in her death. She’d been nervously confident while thinking she would have to swim across the aquifer, especially with Mot’s energy potion flooding her veins, but now . . .

Now she had no idea what was happening.

“Where are we going?” Kiva whispered.

Naari’s tone was as grim as her face when she replied, “I don’t know, but I don’t like this.”

Kiva didn’t like it either. But as they walked through the gates behind Rooke, followed the rail tracks past the farms, and continued on, she began to get an inkling of where they might be headed.

Saliva pooled in her mouth, and more than ever, she felt a frantic need to share what she’d learned, so she reached for Naari’s leather sleeve and leaned in to whisper, “It’s poison.”

“What?” the guard asked, before giving a swift hand gesture indicating silence, just as Rooke turned around to look at them.

“Keep up,” the Warden said. “Everyone’s waiting for us.”

Kiva knew he was referring to the rest of Zalindov’s inhabitants. She wondered if Tipp had been ushered away with the crowd on his way back from the entrance block, hoping he was with Mot or Jaren and not lost among a sea of burly lumbersmiths or quarry workers. But she also knew the young boy could fend for himself, so she chose not to worry about him and instead sought to make sure Naari had comprehended her message.

Rooke, however, had now noticed they were lagging behind and slowed his steps, forcing them to catch up. When Kiva looked over at Naari, she didn’t seem alarmed, revealing that she hadn’t understood what Kiva had said, or the importance of it. She needed to find a way to explain, and fast.

But then Rooke turned off the main rail track line, heading further east, somewhere Kiva had never traveled before, and she realized she was right about where they were taking her, her heart leaping into her throat with the dreaded confirmation.

The abandoned quarry.

A flooded deathtrap.

The perfect place for her Trial by Water.





Chapter Twenty-Seven


Like before the first two Trials, Kiva’s pulse was pounding in her ears as she approached her third. Unlike the immense quarry she and Naari had visited over a fortnight ago, the abandoned one was significantly smaller in width, but was said to possess a considerable depth, with workers having mined deep into the earth before the luminium was eventually depleted. It was impossible to judge how far down it went, since years of rainstorms and underground springs had fed into the open mine, filling it with water.

Kiva hadn’t considered the quarry for her third Ordeal, having forgotten it even existed. She was kicking herself now, scrambling to guess what her task might involve and whether Mot’s potion would still help.

As the Warden led Kiva to the top of the cliff overlooking the pit, some distant part of her couldn’t help thinking it was beautiful. The water was a brilliant turquoise color, the limestone and other minerals having bled into it, with a hint of glitter on the surface from traces of leftover luminium. On a summer’s day, it would have called to her, begging her to take a dip. But right now it was still winter—and unlike the aquifer, which was kept temperate from the tunnel heat, there was ice crusting the edges where water met stone.

Kiva wasn’t sure which was worse: how cold that water must be or that there was no telling what was hidden beneath it. Submerged rocks, deserted mining equipment, mineral toxins . . . the list of dangers was endless.

“Move,” Rooke said, gesturing for Kiva to keep following as he headed off along the rocky path. “We’ve a little further to go.”

Kiva tried not to look at the prisoners surrounding the edges of the quarry, the three thousand–odd people who were staring down into the water and waiting to see what would happen next. The anticipation in the air was palpable, even more so than before her Trial by Fire. Excitement . . . Anger . . . Resentment . . . Jealousy . . . Hope . . . It was a heady melange of emotion, something the guards must have felt as well, since the ones Kiva could see interspersed among the prisoners had tight grips on their weapons.