May Death Do Us Part | RB ✔︎

NINE ☆ BLACK

I stand at the mouth of the cave, my heart pounding in my chest.

This place terrifies me. I know what it's like to drown. It fucking hurts. Your lungs are on fire, but no matter how much water you breathe in, it won't douse it.

Everything I fear stands just beyond these rocks. The cave. The inferi. The water.

But my fear if losing the one thing I just got back dulls the rest.

Mona fucking Monhagen.

I shake my head, my trembling hands at my side. "Why couldn't you just be the stuck-up girl I thought you were?"

If she was, we wouldn't be in this situation.

I wouldn't have to reface the cave, the inferi, the Dark Lord. I had the chance to be free, no strings attached. But, here I am, risking it all over again because of a girl I just re-learned about.

Then again, her recklessness is the reason I'm not doing this alone.

Please, Mona. Please just be okay.

I crouch down, ripping up a section of the grass and scooping dirt out of the way. A small crater is formed in the mud and I drop the notebook inside, shoving dirt over top. The brown leather is coated with dirt when I shove the patch of grass back on top.

I get to my feet, wiping the dirt on my pants before unsheathing my wand from my back pocket. I take cautious steps towards the mouth of the cave, the dark interior causing my stomach to flip.

I move inside, grimacing at the feeling of dark magic. Everything about this place is unsettling. The tooth-like rocks that hang from the top of the cave. The water just a few inches beneath the rocky ledge along the cave wall. Even the eerie silence that somehow echoes through the cave, rattling my ribs.

It's too quiet.

Mona's not here.

My gut says she is.

"Lumos." I whisper, twisting my wand slightly to the right.

The soft blue glow surrounds the tip of my wand, illuminating a few feet in front of me. I take cautious steps on the slippery edge of the rock. Droplets of water form calm ridges in the otherwise still water. My heart audibly thunders in my chest and I realize that the lack of life is slowly starting to eat away at my hope of finding Mona unscathed.

I push myself to go further, using the jagged edges of the rocks beside me as a handrail. When I reach the center and find it empty, my heart pummels. The locket is in the center of a crevice in a rock, the drinking shell dropped on the slippery rocks.

The necklace is familiar, as though I'd seen it recently.

I realize, with a start, that the locket mirrors the one Novaline was wearing earlier.

I look around, watching the lining of the cave for any movement. The sides of the rocks for any sign of Mona.

I come up empty handed.

Until I hear bubbling in the water just in front of me.

"Lumos maxima." I whisper to myself, holding my wand out further.