Young Immortals

Five: The Cave

The queen narrows her eyes at the ruby necklace in my hand. "You, copper. Where did you get that?"

"The princess gave it to me, Your Highness." I clear my throat, trying to keep my voice from trembling. "She had no use for it, so I'm disposing it for her."

She scoffs. "She had no use for a ruby necklace?"

"It was for an old dress that she no longer wants to wear... you may ask her yourself, Your Highness. I'm sure she can explain it better than I."

"Explain what? That you are a thief?" Her eyes are cold, unfeeling to the horror on my face. "You coppers are all the same. Wait until a week before your bargain is up and then pocket whatever valuables you can get your hands on. Such poor characters do not deserve hands."

The queen jerks her head at one of the knights. With a teeth-grinding screech, he unsheathes his sword. All the blood in my body rushes to my face, and a choked noise escapes the back of my throat.

"Quiet now," the queen hisses, "or I'll have him cut your tongue, too." Then she turns to the knight. "Well, what are you waiting for?"

My eyes widen. I stagger back, and the knight lunges but before he can grab me, a strong hand shoots out and catches his wrist. The knight freezes, dropping his sword at once and straightening into a salute. "Your Highness!"

Releasing the knight's wrist, Silas offers the queen a sardonic smile. "While I appreciate your passion for justice, Mother, the princess truly is partial to this copper."

"Is she? Perhaps we ought to have a discussion on suitable pets." Not bothered in the slightest at having nearly dismembered an innocent, the queen thrusts her palm in front of me. I'm wondering if I should kiss it when Silas takes the ruby necklace and hands it to the queen. I don't breath as she turns around and strides out the way she came, not until every one of her knights has disappeared down the hallway.

Then I turn to Silas. "You saved me." My hands move on their own, wringing together as if to check and double-check they're still attached to my wrists.

"Of course," he says with that easy grin of his. "I couldn't lose your hands just before your most important assignment yet."

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With the sun rising at our backs, painting the hills red, I grip Silas' waist as we cut across the woods on the back of his stallion. My eyes sweep across the trees. No one who has ever laid eyes on the beast has ever lived to tell the tale. But the good thing is there's been no reported attacks before dark, so we should be safe for now.

When the trees give way to a mountain, Silas slows his horse to a trot, then takes us along the mountainside. There, the rocks take a sharp curve, forming the mouth of a cave, so dark nothing could be seen but blackness. Unbothered, Silas dismounts and offers me a hand down.

I hesitate, my eyes flickering between his hand and the darkness of the cave. "Have you kept any of my drawings, your highness?"

"I have not."

"Then what's this all for? Is there a lesson I'm supposed to learn?"

He raises his brows as if to say, what do I look like, a professor? "I was testing you. The whores to see if you could keep a secret. The scroll to see how accurately you draw. It's all been leading to this."

I stare into the cave. "This?"

"With every turn of the moon, a different section of the cave opens, each containing a set of symbols you will copy. There are three sections in total, so we'll return three times until I have the text in full. You may ask what message I hope to decipher, but I will not answer."

I narrow my eyes, studying his expression. When I agreed to his deal, he made it seem like a favor given out of sympathy, but I should have known better to think a fae had sympathy – excluding Aerwyna, of course. At least, most of the time. I accept Silas' hand, and he pulls me off the horse.

The moment we step into the cave, the temperature drops twenty degrees. The deeper we go into the tunnel, the colder, quieter, and darker it becomes. It's pitch black and freezing when we reach the crossroads of three different passage way – two blocked up and one glowing with a faint blue light.

"Each tunnel is a different test." Silas points ahead, at the foreign symbols carved above each tunnel's entryway. "Present." He shifts his finger to point at the symbols above the second tunnel. "Future." Finally, he points at the blue tunnel. "Past."

"Test? What do I have to do?"

"Nothing. Dark spirits may try to provoke you, ignore them. Just stare at the wall and only the wall. I'll take care of the rest."

I whip toward him, my face pale. "Dark spirits?"

"I'll be fine; I've dealt with their kind before."

"I'm not worried about you," I sputter.

We take a sharp turn, and I forget everything I am about to say because suddenly, the cave wall is visible in full. It towers over two stories high, with strange symbols carved into the stone, glowing blue, so bright it burns my eyes just to look at it.

"Whatever you do, keep your eyes on the symbols," Silas says, his voice echoing off the walls. "Don't give anything else your attention. Don't look at it. Don't talk to it. Don't speak at all, except to call me when you're done."

"Why?" I say, my voice high with tension. Out of instinct, I start to look his way, only for Silas to grab my jaw, turning my head back to the cave wall. "What's it? What's going to happen to me?"

Silas leans down until he's even to my height, his breath grazing my ear. "Draw well."