I wanted to ask him how, but I couldn’t bring myself to speak. Silence was safest.
The floor began to slant downward at a steeper angle. The terrain was broken into rough steps, but they seemed secure enough. Jeb led me down them confidently. As we dropped lower and lower into the ground, the heat and humidity increased.
I stiffened when I heard a babble of voices again, this time from ahead. Jeb patted my hand kindly.
“You’ll like this part—it’s always everyone’s favorite,” he promised.
A wide, open arch shimmered with moving light. It was the same color as the light in the big room, pure and white, but it flickered at a strange dancing pace. Like everything else that I couldn’t understand in this cavern, the light frightened me.
“Here we are,” Jeb said enthusiastically, pulling me through the archway. “What do you think?”
CHAPTER 17
Visited
The heat hit me first—like a wall of steam, the moist, thick air rolled over me and dewed on my skin. My mouth opened automatically as I tried to pull a breath from the abruptly denser air. The smell was stronger than before—that same metallic tang that clung in my throat and flavored the water here.
The murmuring babble of bass and soprano voices seemed to issue from every side, echoing off the walls. I squinted anxiously through the swirling cloud of moisture, trying to make out where the voices came from. It was bright here—the ceiling was dazzling, like in the big room but much closer. The light danced off the vapor, creating a shimmering curtain that almost blinded me. My eyes struggled to adjust, and I clutched at Jeb’s hand in panic.
I was surprised that the strangely fluid babble did not respond in any way to our entrance. Perhaps they couldn’t see us yet, either.
“It’s a bit close in here,” Jeb said apologetically, fanning at the steam in front of his face. His voice was relaxed, conversational in tone, and loud enough to make me jump. He spoke as if we were not surrounded. And the babble continued, oblivious to his voice.
“Not that I’m complaining,” he continued. “I’d be dead several times over if this place didn’t exist. The very first time I got stuck in the caves, of course. And now, we’d never be able to hide out here without it. With no hiding place, we’re all dead, right?”
He nudged me with his elbow, a conspiratorial gesture.
“Mighty convenient, how it’s laid out. Couldn’t have planned it much better if I’d sculpted it myself out of play dough.”
His laugh cleared a section of mist, and I saw the room for the first time.
Two rivers flowed through the dank, high-domed space. This was the chatter that filled my ears—the water gushing over and under the purple volcanic rock. Jeb spoke as if we were alone because we were.
It was really only one river and one small stream. The stream was closest; a shallow braided ribbon of silver in the light from above, coursing between low stone banks that it seemed constantly in danger of overrunning. A feminine, high-pitched murmur purred from its gentle ripples.
The male, bass gurgle came from the river, as did the thick clouds of vapor that rose from the gaping holes in the ground by the far wall. The river was black, submerged under the floor of the cavern, exposed by wide, round erosions along the length of the room. The holes looked dark and dangerous, the river barely visible as it rushed powerfully toward an invisible and unfathomable destination. The water seemed to simmer, such was the heat and steam it produced. The sound of it, too, was like that of boiling water.
From the ceiling hung a few long, narrow stalactites, dripping toward the stalagmites beneath each one. Three of them had met, forming thin black pillars between the two bodies of flowing water.
“Got to be careful in here,” Jeb said. “Quite a current in the hot spring. If you fall in, you’re gone. Happened once before.” He bowed his head at the memory, his face sober.
The swift black eddies of the subterranean river were suddenly horrible to me. I imagined being caught in their scalding current and shuddered.