Escape (Book 1 of the Gods' series)

Chapter 9

“You put up a pretty impressive imitation though, just your eyes, it’s hard to forget them.” I blushed at Dylan, Aaron- rudely- interrupted “Anyway, I’m glad you took my advice, how do you feel now?”

“Um, better now, thanks.”

“That’s good to hear, want to get that key then?”

“You bet!” I ran up to the wall, stopped inches away from it, then transformed into a kite (The bird, not the thing kids fly when it’s windy out) I spread my wings and gave a little bounce, I flew up and up to the ledge then I perched. I looked around for the key it was teetering at the edge. The key was emerald green and encrusted with sapphires and gold. (Nyx really didn’t care about costs did she?) I picked it up gently in my beak and fluttered down to the bottom where everyone else was. I landed gracefully and dropped the key in front of Aaron, who I suspected was holding the keys somewhere, he looked at me blankly, I changed back to myself and glared at him, “What are you looking at me like that for? Don’t you have the keys?” I snapped, he just shook his head and pointed to Dylan who was behind me, I spun on my heel to look at him, “Please tell me you have them.” He shot me an apologetic smile (it made me weak at the knees, but I didn’t show it, obviously) “Yes. Well, I did have them, but then with having all of them, they got heavy so when Jess did what she did to you, I put them down.”

“Uh oh, that isn’t good.” Aaron grabbed my shoulders and spun me around to where Jess had been, and she wasn’t there. I saw movement to the side of me I looked and saw Jess crawling towards the pools, the 6 keys were in her hand, looped on her finger, she shot me a sickly smile (She deserved to be with Nyx, she had the right smile and tone of voice for it) and dropped the keys into the pool, I gasped and started to run- dropping the emerald key as I did so- toward her, Dylan and Aaron flanking me.

“Dylan, why are you such an idiot?” I shouted as we ran.

“Sorry! I didn’t-“

“Think! That’s what you didn’t do! All of our hard work has gone!” I reached the edge of the pool and jumped, not caring if I transformed or not, diving into the clear water that had a slight red tint, only small but it was there, the blood from the monstrous beast I killed, I heard Dylan gasp, Aaron was just silent, he trusted me, he didn’t underestimate me like most people, he knew I could do it. The cool splash of water on my face refreshed me; I swam deep into the water, shooting threatening glances at the piranhas that tried to make a move. The first key I saw was one that was coloured like a ruby, it had gold and diamonds encrusted in the swirling pattern that was made from the blood red metal, I grabbed it and looped it through my finger, I swam deeper and the water got murkier, I would have missed the sapphire coloured key if the emeralds and rubies didn’t sparkle with some sort of light from above, I grabbed it as it slowly sank. I was running out of breath at a rapid speed, I was too far away from the surface to swim up without gasping for air, then probably dying, I needed to remodel myself into something other than human, I decided on a turtle, I was close to choosing a swordfish so it’s sharp nose could catch the keys easily, but a turtle was cuter. I soon realised that being a turtle and catching keys would be harder than I first anticipated, I then resorted to being an eel. The keys were on a loop my tail made and I continued swimming deeper and deeper. I found the third key; it was white like a diamond with amethyst and sapphires moulded into the intricate design of the bent metal, I looped it onto my tail with the other two keys, three down, two to go I thought to myself as I swam deeper still. The next key to catch my attention was an amethyst coloured key, like the rest of the keys; it had an intricate pattern on it and gems inside the pattern, the gems in question were diamonds and rubies, they glistened like expensive flowers, roses, lilies and bluebells, I looped that key onto my tail, if I was on the surface, and these keys were normal, they would have made a noise like pots and pans, they would’ve weighed a tonne! But these keys were not normal, yes, they still weighed a substantial amount, but although I was underwater, I could hear them clinking against each other, it was a beautiful sound, like wind chimes, it was catching my mind, mesmerising sound, my world was fading, then everything went black.