The Perilous Sea (The Elemental Trilogy #2)

It would be ridiculous to describe rock as soft, yet the next section of bedrock she tunneled through most certainly felt softer to her, easier to manipulate.

They advanced more rapidly, which should have pleased her, yet the closer they drew to the one-mile boundary, the more uneasy she grew.

“We must be almost there,” said Titus. “Ten, fifteen yards left at most.”

She stopped.

“You all right?” he asked.

“Our progress has been too easy, don’t you think?”

“What do you suspect?”

She shook her head. “I can’t be sure. But the armored chariots knew exactly where to find us, so it stands to reason that the soldiers looking for us know that I am an elemental mage. They should realize that I can make my way through rock, and yet they have been content to just comb the sand.”

“I can vault to the surface and check.”

“No, that would be too dangerous.”

“Do you want to stay here for some time, and see if anything develops?”

She stared at the end of the tunnel, twelve inches from her face. It looked as if it had been gouged by a beast with steel claws.

“Never mind. Let’s just keep going.”

“You should not ignore your instinct.”

“Well, there is no other way out, and it can’t be a good idea to stay here waiting for something to happen.”

Chunks of rocks broke off. The end of the tunnel receded by a few inches, and then a few more inches—her elemental powers at work.

“Move us forward,” she told him.

After a second or so, he did as she requested.

“The memory spells that have been used on us—quite sophisticated, wouldn’t you say?” she asked, after they had advanced several more feet.

They had been largely silent during the excavation, so she could concentrate on the task at hand. But now she needed something to distract her.

“And quite illegal,” he answered.

“I don’t understand the point of it all. The memory spells were tailored specifically so that we do our best to stay out of Atlantis’s grasp, but wouldn’t that be easier if we knew why?”

“You are assuming the one who applied the spells wanted to help.” He pushed her forward again. “But if—”

Pain struck deep inside her head, pain like a burning stake being driven through her skull.

She barely recognized the deafening scream as her own.





CHAPTER 8


England

WINTERVALE’S ENTIRE PERSON SHOOK. HIS lips moved—whether with curses or prayers, Titus could not tell. And he kept looking back, at the enemy ship closing in on him.

Titus swore. Five minutes ago, if anyone had asked him, he would have said that Fairfax was the only one for whom he would risk anything. But he could not simply let Wintervale fall into Atlantis’s grasp, not when the whole thing was unfolding before his eyes.

He took a deep breath. Before he could vault, however, Wintervale spun around and pointed his wand at the skimmer.

The surface of the sea seemed to shudder. Then it turned eerily calm, like a sheet that been stretched perfectly flat across a mattress. The next moment, Titus had the strangest sensation that the sea was caving. It was: a whirlpool formed, enormous currents of water churning around a central eye.

The skimmer, caught by the edge of this maelstrom, attempted to navigate its way out. But the maelstrom expanded with terrifying speed, its eye ever deepening and widening, exposing the actual seafloor hundreds of feet below.

The skimmer fell into this colossal crater. Immediately, the maelstrom ceased its rotation. All the water that had been spun outward rushed back in, crushing the skimmer under its volume and weight.

Titus clutched the railing, agape.

“Fairfax, what are you looking at?” came Cooper’s voice. “It’s your turn.”

Fairfax, had she caused the maelstrom? But she was gazing up at him, her expression as stunned as he felt.

“Play your turn, Fairfax,” he said, a reminder to her that she must keep playing her part.

He retreated into his room and reapplied the far-seeing spell. The displacement of that much water had caused violent waves, tossing Wintervale’s dinghy about. Wintervale seemed not to notice at all. His arms were wrapped about the small mast, his face wet with seawater—or was it tears? And his expression was one not of confusion, but of wonder and incredulity, as if he knew exactly how the whirlpool that swallowed his pursuers had come about, but simply could not believe it had in truth happened.

A particularly large wave buffeted the dinghy. The next one capsized it entirely. Titus gritted his teeth and vaulted. As expected, he landed in the frigid waters of the North Sea, the cold like shards of glass.

Blind vaulting—paradoxically named, as one blind vaulted with one’s eyes wide open, using only visual clues as a guide, rather than personal memory—was notoriously inaccurate. He could have rematerialized a mile away. But fortunately, in this instance, he was only a hundred feet or so from the upside-down dinghy.

Wintervale surfaced, gasping and flailing.