Scorched Treachery (Imdalind, #3)(45)
“Tight fit,” Dramin said with a chuckle.
I looked at him curiously, only to see him smiling widely. Leave it to Dramin to find humor and joy in any situation.
“We aren’t going to crawl through there, Dramin,” Thom said. “The crack is a start. If we work from there outward, we should be able to shift the rock enough to escape.”
Light from outside flickered through the tiny crack, the fresh air swirling pleasantly out of it. I could smell the snow and feel a million different energies carried on the wind. My muscles tensed at the sensation, stretching tight over my chest. I could sense the crack through my connection with the mountain, but what I was sure Thom could not feel was the instability of the large boulder above it. As large as a house, the mass rested on the crack, but the majority of its weight covered the roof above us. One wrong move and the rock would shift, crushing us in an instant.
“I am beginning to doubt if this is a good idea.” I kept my voice low, suddenly aware of the danger this cave had now become to us. Chances were high that we would never make it out of here, not with the instability of the boulder directly over our heads.
Only Thom had returned yesterday after the collapse to assess the damage. If I had known the instability of this space was so bad, I would have never consented to bring us back here. I held Joclyn’s body against mine, terrified we would have to run at any time.
“It’s the only idea, Ilyan,” Thom said quietly. “What would you have us do, sit in a cave until we all waste away?”
I narrowed my eyes at him, watching him as he pleaded with me. I didn’t know what to say.
“What other option do we have? This is our chance; if we don’t take it, then you have doomed us to death already,” Dramin whispered. I knew what he was feeling. I felt it too. Thom was right, as much as I hated to admit it.
I said nothing as I laid Joclyn’s body down against the smooth rock next to me, her body settling into an unnatural position. I moved past them, their focus on me as I approached the opening, Dramin moving to stand next to Joclyn.
Neither of them questioned my motivation. Neither spoke or asked for clarification, they just watched as I placed my hands against the stone. I held my kouzlo there, ignoring my heartbeat that was racing in a desperate plea for me to stop.
The energies of the three bodies behind me thrummed through my blood stream. A keen awareness of Joclyn’s weak pulse reminded me of everything else she was facing. This decision, to move the final rock, was dangerous. The selfish part of me begged to just stay, to find another way, but the leader I had been raised to become could not deny the needs of those with me and all those who still lived on the other side of our stone prison, few though they may be.
I needed to do right by them as well.
My magic surged into the rock, the powerful energy flowing away from me as I surveyed the rock more carefully. I tried to formulate a plan for the highest chance of success. The rock shifted and moved at my touch, the living elements within the stone responding to my very thoughts.
The shifting mass felt like a part of me, an extension of my own mind, thanks to the powerful magic that flowed through my veins.
Minutes ticked by as the rock obeyed my commands, as it yielded to my power. And then I felt it, the tiny shift, the start of what I had feared, what I had known was going to happen.
The mountain was coming down on top of us.
The large rock just above our heads, the one I had been fearful of since the beginning, began to shift away from the larger mass of the mountain that it was attached to. I grunted as I released more of my energy into the rock, hoping that I could shift it enough to fuse it more securely to the mountain it nestled against.
A large groan echoed through the cave, the sound loud enough to drown out the loud profanity that had spewed unbidden from my mouth.
I felt Thom and Dramin run from where they had been standing to either side of the cave, their hands flying to the rock as they too moved to assess the damage. Now that the rock had shifted, it only took a moment for them to find the weakness and for their magic to move alongside mine as the three of us worked to heave the giant boulder back into position.
My voice echoed around the cave as I yelled out, my strained magic weakening my body enough to cause me physical pain. I could feel the muscles in my shoulders knit together as I pressed against the rock. I pushed as if I alone was holding up the rock, attempting to make it move, my heart thunking in my chest in fear and panic.
Without having asked me, my eyes fled from the rock to Joclyn’s still body that I had nestled into the rock.
She looked so peaceful. For one moment, her body didn’t twitch, and her shoulder didn’t bleed. Although I was sure the horrors she was trapped within were still a terrifying prison, right then she was peaceful, beautiful. Just looking at her set the beat of my heart into a steadier rhythm.
I needed to get her out of here.
I knew what needed to be done. I always did, from the moment I sensed the boulder above our heads, I knew. But as with all right decisions, there was a sacrifice to be made, wrong steps to take first. There always was. Making the right choice was never easy. But making it was required, and it was what I was raised to be.
A King, a leader to my people.
“I am going to blow the rest of the cave open,” I announced, my voice loud above the incessant growling of the cave. I could see Thom and Dramin’s heads turn to me in a panic, but I didn’t acknowledge them. “I will be able to hold the ceiling for enough time for us to get out of the jeskyně.”