The Royal Knight Academy

Chapter 21: Lake Supiria

By this point in time, everyone at the Royal Knight Academy had started calling me "the Masked Knight''. I never ever took off my helmet when I was around them, and no one, except for Xavier, knew why I always had the helmet on. However, there was one knight that really made it his mission to get my helmet off, Owen.

He was always taking every opportunity to show off and be the best, especially when we had to do training tasks as partners. Because of this, a rivalry was forming between the two of us and everybody knew it. When we needed to work together, it would always end in disaster. So guess who it was I had to work with to get the next magical ingredient? Yep! It was Owen. I knew it was not going to be easy going on the next adventure with a difficult person like him.

To retrieve the Water of Purity, we needed to go to Lake Supiria along the east coast of our kingdom and then swim all the way down to the bottom to find a mysterious cave literally called the Unnamed Cave. This was definitely going to be a trying feat.

Two weeks after the flame quest, the two of us took a horse drawn carriage to travel across the land.

In the midst of one of our many arguments, the coachman steering the coach pulled on the reins and shouted, "Okay you two, we're here!"

The horses pulling the carriage quickly halted in their tracks. When they stopped, I looked out the window to see our destination.

We were at an area of Lake Supiria with a vast sandy beach with sand and stones of many shades of tan and gray. Just beyond, there was the bluest of water as far as the eye could see. It flowed gently with the lake's waves that slowly moved up and down. The tiny bit of light that showed through the thick clouds shined on the water, looking like twinkling stars on the surface.

The sight of the lake took me back to the memorable times I spent with my mom in this exact same spot. She and I used to come here to walk along the warm sand, collecting unique shells and enjoying the beautiful scenery. We would have picnics, eating delicious treats she had packed, while looking out at the water. My favorite thing of all was putting my feet in the lake and watching the waves roll in and out with her. Just thinking about it made me tear up.

I opened the door and stepped out of the carriage, onto the sand, and Owen followed.

After we got out, the coachman shouted, "YA!" at the horses.

They neighed quietly and started to move back up the path they had come from.

When the carriage was gone, I asked out loud to myself, "So, what should we do now that we're here? Do we wait for something magical to happen?"

"Uhh, no," Owen answered, annoyed, even though I wasn't actually being serious or asking him. "The world isn't full of magic. What we have to do is swim all the way to the bottom of the lake, find the Water of Purity, and get out of here. Super easy if you're someone like me."

He grinned at his own compliment. I would've loved to tell him about all the magic that I had come across but figured it wasn't worth my time.

However, as he said, "We have to swim to the bottom." I was immediately terrified. Even though I loved Lake Supiria and all, I absolutely had a strong fear of going underwater. I was always afraid of drowning if I couldn't get to the surface fast enough. Even though I was scared, I had to be brave and do it anyway.

"I probably could even do this mission by myself if Duke didn't force me to be paired up with you!"

He then paused for a second and then smirked again before asking me a question.

"Are you scared Leo?"

Either it was my shaking hands that gave it away or it was just a very lucky guess, but I wasn't going to admit to him that I was worried. So I would have to lie. The truth might reveal something that I didn't want him to know.

"Huh, no!" I lied as my voice cracked a bit. "I'm not afraid. Perhaps I could do it better than you!"

"Yeah right!"

Owen removed his armor, revealing black clothing underneath and started down to the water. Suddenly I realized I had something bigger to worry about than swimming in the water; getting into the water without Owen seeing I was a girl.

With his back turned to me, I took off my armor, also wearing a shirt and pants underneath. I quickly pulled down a black cloth mask over my face that Xavier had given to me before the mission, to avoid accidentally revealing my secret to Owen. I took a big gulp as I stared down at the water, the waves and ripples getting bigger as the cool wind picked up. "Okay," I said in my head as I took a breath. "I have to do this for my mom. For my mom." With one final deep breath, I slowly started to walk into the lake.

Each step I took, the freezing blue water was getting higher and higher. At first it was just up to my heels, then my knees, then my waist, and then all the way up to my shoulders. The water completely drenched my clothing I was wearing. As the water creeped up to my back, a cold chill went up my spine. When the water was all the way up to my neck, I quickly looked down, took a deep breath, held it, closed my eyes, and went completely under water. After my head was underwater, I moved deeper into the water until my feet were no longer touching the sand. I opened my eyes and looked around for the first time below the surface.

The landscape around me was quite a sight to behold, making me forget that I was nervous. Circular bubbles filled with air were floating to the top of the lake. Fish of all colors, shapes and sizes swam all around, seemingly making a rainbow of sea life. And to top it off, it was silent. No sound to be heard. Suddenly, something disrupted the calmness of the water by noisily splashing in the water, trying to get my attention.

It was Owen of course! He swam up close and gestured frustratingly at the new mask I was wearing. I rolled my eyes and pointed forward, gesturing at him to follow me as I swam ahead further into the water. He followed me begrudgingly. The two of us kept on swimming, looking at our surroundings, going to the surface to take breathing breaks in between.

I was exploring an area full of rocks with Owen when I suddenly felt a sharp poke in the back of my arm. My eyes quickly widened. Apparently what poked me, poked Owen as well because his brown eyes were wide with fear. I started to panic thinking about what it was. My thoughts were a blur, "What is going on right now? What...?" As I looked behind me to see what was there, everything started to become foggy. My eyelids began to grow heavy as if I were about to fall asleep. The final thing I saw before everything went black was a small glimpse of something shiny and purple gliding through the water.