Summer Break

Chapter 21

"ART!" Tess screamed as she saw Arthur fall out of her sight.

Everyone else saw this as well but were frozen in shock to see their seemingly invincible friend disappear from sight. Tess scrambled to her feet, dropping Sylvie to the ground with the only thought in her head being to get to Arthur.

"TESS NO!" Lilia screamed as she saw her friend running.

Elijah was closest, and scrambled to his feet to stop her. Tess saw Elijah coming out of the corner of her eye, and without thinking moved her hand up to block him, but ended up smacking him in the face instead. Elijah lost his footing and tumbled to the ground. Kathyln used her ice magic to create an ice wall to block her, but Tess used her wind magic to jump over and clear the wall. As she soared above he looked down to look for Arthur, only to see ice moving to a large opening in the middle of the ground that was once underneath the ice. It was only for a second, but as she looked at the opening she could have sworn she saw a faint glow coming from within.

"That's where Art went," Tess thought to herself.

With another burst of wind she shot herself downward towards the opening. The yells from the rest of the party became more faint as she landed on a sheet of ice moving towards the opening. However she was impatient, and as soon as she landed she ran towards the edge and then jumped to another sheet, then another, all moving herself closer to the dark void that was swallowing up all the ice sliding into it, and hopefully Arthur as well. With one final jump Tess plunged into the darkness, praying to find Arthur alive and well.

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"No! Let go, we need to go after them!" Lilia pleaded as she fought against Curtis, who was holding her back.

"And what's your plan?" Elijah asked as he dug through his bag.

"Save them. Arthur's your best friend, why aren't you running to find him too?" Lilia replied.

"Because he's thinking rationally," Orson chimed in. "We have no idea how stable the ice is. If we just rush out there we risk having more people that need saving."

Orson's words calmed Lilia down. He was right, if something went wrong they could all be in danger.

"Ok. What do we do then?" Lilia asked.

"I'll go check it out and see if I can spot them," Orson volunteered.

"No, I will," Elijah said as he tightened a rope around his waist. "Arthur put me in charge if anything happened to him. And being an earth conjurer I can make some structures pretty quick if I need to save them, or myself if something goes wrong."

Elijah handed the remaining rope to Orson as Kathyln removed her ice wall. Carefully Elijah walked out onto the crack riddled ice. Kathyln tried to re enforce the ice, but some areas the cracks were so bad that her spell didn't do much. Elijah made it to the edge and looked out into what once was a sea of ice. He could see there was a wide stone ledge that led back to the other side, which would be helpful for later. As he looked down he could see everything had calmed down, with only a few large sheets of ice remaining just sitting down in the dirt. He could see the massive opening that was most likely where the rest of the ice went, but he couldn't see any signs of Arthur or Tess. Just then he felt something jump on his back.

"Hey Sylvie. I don't suppose you can see them?" Elijah asked. Sylvie shook her head and pointed down to the opening. "Yeah I think they went down there too. If only there was a way to..." Elijah froze as he mentally slapped himself. "Your and Arthur's bond! You can sense if he's still alive right?"

"Kyuu," Sylvie replied with a smile.

"Arthur said once that you two can communicate with your bond. Is he ok?"