NOVEL NEXT Volume 3 Chapter 16
Yvette didn’t want to let his hand go, but she knew she had to. She could feel the soft, gentle song. The catacombs managed to hinder the magic in it from fully taking effect, but it still sounded so wonderful that she longed to go towards it. She could tell by the way that Gervas had tensed up that he could feel the effects as well, even though his reaction was far different from hers.
The sirens were still searching for them. She had hoped that they would have given up, but there didn’t seem to be any sign of that. Leaving the cavern and heading back onto the beach seemed suicidal. If the song hit her fully, there was no way she could resist it for long. She doubted even Gervas could resist it once they all awoke and wove their song together.
“Yvette, how’s your geomancy?” Gervas asked.
“My geomancy? Ummm… I can throw a rock,” Yvette said sheepishly.
“That’s it?”
“It could be a big rock. But I can’t tunnel us out of here or anything. I could, maybe, given a few days. But it’d likely collapse on us long before I was done.”
Gervas sighed and leaned back against the wall, shaking his head. “Then we don’t have any choice. We’ll have to try to rush it.”
“Rush it? How?” she asked.
“I’ll run. There aren’t too many of them. I can drag you and--”
“It’ll draw me back,” Yvette said softly. “What do you plan to do, try to swim to the next island? While I’m under their spell I’ll be fighting you the whole way. Even worse, it’s so dark out there you’d have no way of knowing if you were even going the right way.”
“It’s better than waiting here. It’s not like we have any other options,” he said, his voice gaining a sharp edge.
Yvette stared at him before giving a soft sigh and then leaned her back against the wall, closing her eyes. Once again she wished she had studied another type of magic more thoroughly. Geomancy would be incredibly useful here. Or even something that could tunnel. Heck, she would settle for something that could throw massive boulders and block off the cave entr--
Her eyes popped open and slowly a smile formed on her face. “Gervas. Sirens are a type of fay, aren’t they?”
“I believe so. Why?” he asked, turning his gaze on her.
“I have an idea. I don’t know how long I can hold it, but I think I can get them to stop singing. At least long enough for us to get out of here. How long do you think you can hold your breath?” she asked, her heart pounding with excitement.
“Long enough.”
“Okay. Then here’s my plan.”
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Yvette held her breath, staring down the tunnel, the sounds of the singing echoing around her. A large part of her felt foolish for even trying this. But the alternative was dying. It was their only real option.
Once more she tapped her bracer and new reagents came forward. This time, the bracer turned a dark shade of red as well. She took one more soft breath before her form began to shift and change. She grew taller, wider, her bones thickened and her weight increased dramatically. While it only took a few moments to adopt this new form, she could feel the massive size of it pressing in on her with each moment of the shift.
However, this time, the burning in her core, while there, did not feel nearly as strong. Even more important, the way she saw the world had shifted. She could ‘see’ the song now. Reverberating off the walls of the tunnel. While she could hear it, she couldn’t feel any pull now.
Then again, she supposed that was to be expected. Trolls hunted fay, they devoured magic. To them, the song called them to dinner. So she lumbered forward, towards the source of the song.
Yvette gave a soft pleading to the stars above that her plan would work. That she could just maintain this form long enough. She stepped out from the tunnels and into the rest of the world. It was dark, however she could see the song, waves of magic radiating off from above. It took only a few moments for her to finally see the three glowing creatures that radiated so, singing their song on the beach, slowly walking back and forth. She raced towards the nearest one.
Unfortunately, while her new form could see the magic, it couldn’t see in the moonlight very well. The ground seemed to give out beneath her and she was sent rolling down towards the beach. She tucked in her arms and legs, bouncing along the ground for a few moments before she thumped into something and just stopped. Slowly, she uncurled herself and rose to her feet.
She’d crashed into the beach, creating a small crater in the sand from the force. She marveled at the fact she had barely even felt it. It took her a moment to realize the song had stopped. She looked up and saw the three creatures on the beach. While she couldn’t make out their features through the glow, she could only imagine they were now starring at her. Watching her.
She ran forward, lifting her huge hands towards the nearest one. The song started again, but even this close she couldn’t feel its effects. All it seemed to do was make the creature look more delicious, the magic rising off it in waves.
She was almost upon it before it seemed to realize how much danger it was in. The song stopped and it tried to flee. The other two had turned as well, one fleeing towards the nest above, the other racing towards the sea, both abandoning their songs. The one closest, unfortunately for it, hesitated when choosing a direction. Yvette’s stone-like hand lifted up and came crashing down, striking the creature to the ground, pinning it beneath. Her massive fingers wrapped around the creature, hefting it up into the air.
Slowly she raised it up, looking at it. It glowed with a delicious beauty that made her want to lung forward and take a bite out of it or start to dissolve away its physical form to--
She shook her head before staring back down at the shaking creature. Though she could only barely feel it in her grasp, she could still see it thrashing around wildly, trying to escape her hold.
Off in the distance she could see another, far weaker glow. Gervas. He’d made it down to the beach and was running towards the waterline. He was going to make it.
She then looked back down at the creature in her grasp. With a mighty swing, she hurled the creature up, back towards the caves and its home. It crashed down onto the side of the mountain, bouncing twice before quickly scrambling away to its den.
That burning in her core was slowly growing. Duller than it had been the last time she had adopted this form, but her time was nearing an end. She still had to adopt one final form if she wanted to be able to escape this island, so she had to move quickly.
She saw Gervas across the beach, racing into the water. She lumbered forward towards the depths after him. The song didn’t fill the air, at least not yet. She closed her eyes and dove into the sea, the water crashing against her body. To her surprise, she could barely feel it. The water was calm and she found herself able to go deeper into the water with ease. It was nearly up to her shoulders when, finally, she let her form revert.
Within a few moments she was herself and she could feel just how deep and dangerous the water could be. It felt ice cold against her body, disorienting her. She had all too familiar memories of her near drowning.
She shook her head and tried to focus. That was then, this was now. Gervas was out here as well, she had to take the form of the dragon turtle again. Otherwise they’d both drown.
She touched her bracer with her left hand once more, trying desperately to resist the instinct to swim to the surface. If they were singing again, there would be no way for her to--
Her thoughts were shattered by pain. Something crashed into her and she felt sharp agony in her right arm. She screamed, though the only effect it had was releasing the little air she had left and caused water to flow into her mouth and nose. She thrashed about, trying to grab whatever had latched onto her.
She felt a person’s head. It let her go a moment before she could get a grip of it, though. Then it crashed into her from behind and she felt another sharp stabbing pain in her shoulder. She tried to grab and shove it off, flailing wildly and struggling to get to the surface for air. It pulled away and then slammed into her again, this time shoving her hard and making her crash into the sand below.
The siren that had fled into the sea. She couldn’t see it, but she could feel it now, holding her beneath the water. A few moments later she felt its sharp fangs dig into her body, biting into her left arm. She screamed, though no sound came out through the water.
She had only a few moments to react, but she drew on the training that Gervas had given her over their short time together. This time her left hand managed to get a hold of the creature and it didn’t pull away, instead holding her pinned and biting into her arm. While she couldn’t see it, though, she now knew where it was.
Her right hand drew her dagger. She stabbed into the creature, the first cut barely finding purchase, the second missing entirely, the third partially cutting and the fourth embedding deep. Again and against she stabbed until she felt the teeth in her arm loosen their grip and the creature yanked itself free from her grasp. She could hear a cry of some sort echoing through the water and then felt one last blow, sending her down to the ground, before the monster was off her.
She was still for a moment, gripping the dagger tightly in slowly numbing hands, waiting for another attack. One didn’t come, though. However, between the loss of blood, lack of air and freezing water, she didn’t have much time.
She focused, willing her body to shift, to change one more time. Growing once again, her body forming a protective shell around itself. The wounds, mercifully, felt so much smaller in this far larger form, partially closing. When she returned to herself she’d need to fix them.
But the burning in her lungs quickly faded, as did the numbness caused by the cold. More importantly, she could see even through the murky depths. The siren left a trail of blood behind, leading towards the shore.
Most importantly, she could see Gervas struggling to swim through the water, away from the island. His head was down beneath the waves and his arms moved rapidly.
She moved quickly towards him, soon lowering herself to be underneath him, then raising herself up and out of the water. Once her head rose above the water, she could hear him coughing and gasping for air.
They’d done it. They’d gotten the tear and escaped. It had nearly cost them their lives. But they were one step closer. She felt a thump on her back when her guardian finally just collapsed, panting.
“Let’s just get to the next island and never think about these sirens again.”
She agreed wholeheartedly. If she never heard their deadly song again it would be a dream come true.
