Chapter Sixteen

Fish scales scraped against me, carrying me farther away from the guardian, back up the river, toward sharp rocks. Amidst the bubbles, I could only just make out the spots on the scales and their golden-orange underbellies. They were brook trout, the only native trout species in the Smokies.

Of course, I was quite sure normal brook trout didn’t grow to four feet long.

Rocks came up sharply on my right, jutting toward the surface. I had just enough space to avoid being taken up into the rapids, and for one brief moment, I thought, I can do this.

Then my elbow slammed into a rogue stone and the pain made me gasp.

Underwater.

Not a good thing to do.

But I couldn’t help it. Hitting your elbow standing still was painful enough—all those nerves arcing through your body and freezing you, but this pain was ten thousand times worse. I’d probably sliced open my skin and hit it so hard my shoulder jerked unnaturally. The rest of my body followed, and I lost whatever control I had.

Freezing water slipped down my throat and into my nostrils, too, filling my lungs. It stung and burned, but it wasn’t any worse than the constricted, desperate panic that had me kicking and thrashing. My vision started to tunnel and as it did, the water around me shifted unnaturally. Like the entire river just…tilted.

Instead of sloshing left and right, splashing against the banks, or forward, speeding ahead, it went…up.

From its center, the river parted like the Red Sea. Great towers of water surged up to the sky on either side, creating walls of churning liquid against the banks, the trees and brambles and grass doused by showers and icy water.

I rolled over onto the river bed and coughed, my body surrendering the small amount of water I’d swallowed. Then I looked up.

Alder stood in the middle of the river, water stretching toward the sky, his eyes glowing bright like two wisps and his hand outstretched and trembling.

A few trout had been caught in the walls of water, and their fins flapped and splashed. The force of the river strained behind the strong blue mana barrier that flowed out of Alder’s outstretched hands.

He took careful steps toward me and then crouched down. “Brye? Can you move?”

The towers of water shuddered and Alder’s eyes flared gold again, mana pouring out of his arm to strengthen the barrier that held off tons of raging, angry, icy water.

My body felt beaten and bruised, but no bone seemed to be truly broken. Trembling, I lifted myself on my good elbow and let out a groan. My elbow still screamed in agony and my left side was in an immense amount of pain. “My side,” I rasped. I didn’t know what a broken rib felt like, but if it felt worse than this then I definitely never wanted one.

“I’ve got you.” His other hand waved through the air right over the left side of my rib cage.

His mana, silver this time, rose up from his skin and spread onto mine. Like the steam off a teacup, it whirled and teased and disappeared under my skin.

I could feel the energy—his energy—rush through me like a blood transfusion.

It chased away the pain. Curled around my bones, the places where it hurt the most, my elbow and left rib. Pressure, warm and soothing, coated my muscles and nerves, taming my pain and making it bearable.

No, not just bearable. Nonexistent.

In no time, the pain was gone, his mana disappearing like the wisps of smoke from a strong breeze.

Quickly, we climbed the river bank. The moment we were clear, Alder dropped his arm, his whole body shuddering as the river splashed down in a miniature tidal wave. It rained down on us as the trout jumped and twisted in midair, then fell back into the river and swam away.

“That was…incredible.” My heart was still racing from being overrun by giant trout, almost drowning, and then witnessing Alder move an entire river.

Alder hunched over, panting with strain as he rested his palms on his knees. “That took a lot of energy.”

I rested a hand on his shoulder. “If you get into the river it’ll help restore your mana, right?”

He raised an eyebrow, his breathing slowing. “How did you know that?”

“I saw how you soaked up mana from the ground after the earth gate. That’s how it works, right? You draw mana from the ethereal plane. But you should rest for a few minutes.”

He nodded, wiping droplets from his chin with the back of his hand. “No, let’s keep going.”

The trip downstream was trout-free, while swimming with Alder was almost effortless the second time around. We swam closer together, riding with the current that he manipulated.

When we finally reached the water gate, Alder squeezed my hand, pulling me to the bank. Together, we broke the surface of the water, and I sucked in a breath to see the monster turtle a mere twenty-five yards away. Its head was lying on the smooth rock, warmed by the sun. Its eyes were closed, and I could swear I heard it snoring.

“Okay, get ready,” Alder said, pushing himself out of the river then kneeling on the shore, water dripping from his silver hair and his shirt clinging to every inch of his body.

“What are you going to do? Lure him out with pizza?” I whispered, pulling myself out of the water as well.

Alder chuckled. “He looks more like a Donatello to me.”

“Alder.”

“Brye, you have to get the key. I’ll distract him. That’s how this works.”

“I know, but…” I ran a hand through my wet hair. It tangled and snagged, and I mentally groaned knowing it would be a rat’s nest by the time it dried.

He shook his head and said simply, “You don’t get it.”

“I don’t get what?” I asked, scowling.

Yes, I had trust issues, and I had trouble being a team player. Relying on someone was difficult for me, but I knew that my hesitation for Alder to be the distraction again wasn’t just because I didn’t trust him.

I didn’t want to see him hurt.

Before I could argue any further, the turtle breathed deeply. The sound made Alder and I freeze, our gazes bouncing from the turtle back to each other.

Yep, this conversation could wait.

Alder took off across the wet boulders covered in water, algae, and slime. His strong legs jumped from rock to rock, landing smoothly on each. How he didn’t fall was beyond me. I certainly would have. He was quiet, too, his feet barely making a sound across the wet stone.

I scrambled up the bank, but not nearly as gracefully, and kept my gaze locked on the prize: a pearly pink shell fragment the size of a dinner plate nestled right next to the guardian’s leathery front toe. It was about the only one within decent reach that I could carry easily.

As I balanced on the rocks, carefully jumping from one to the next, I checked Alder’s progress. He was already nearing the turtle’s face.

I prayed that he wouldn’t have to do anything, that it would continue to sleep the day away, and I could merely tip-toe over, grab its broken piece of shell, and make like a tree and leaf.

Damnit, no one is ever around for my good ones.

Once I hit the part of the shore where the rocks flattened out, I moved faster, my sneakers slipping and sliding on the wet, slimy stones. Ducking under the lip of his shell, where a curtain of moss and vines dangled off the side, I felt something heavy hit my shoulder. My pulse jumped as I frantically tried to brush it off. The heavy thing hit the stone at my feet.

Hissing.

I shrieked, the sound echoing along the shore.

The turtle’s sapphire reptilian eye snapped open in my direction. The guardian lifted itself on its trunk-sized legs and delivered a loud roar. A Jurassic Park roar.

While the snake—an eastern black kingsnake—elongated, stretching in a way that indicated it was about to strike. A small voice in my head reminded me that this snake wasn’t poisonous. Only northern copperheads and timber rattlesnakes were the two species of snakes that were poisonous out of the twenty-three species found in the Smokies.

Still.

Poison ivy wasn’t supposed to have almost killed me, either.

The snake was already irritated after being tossed from its dry island down to a shore covered with water. It gave an angry hiss, revealing two long fangs.

Above, the guardian swiveled its soft, leathery neck toward me. The upper part of the mouth was shaped like a triangle. A snapping turtle.

And snap it did.

I fell backward, the mouth coming up short by just a few feet—thanks to a strand of vines around his neck acting like a lasso. Alder was on the other end of the vines, pulling back on the neck of the guardian with all his strength.

“Get the shell!” he yelled.

I bolted for it, but the snake hissed angrily, its body coiling around the shell as if it knew exactly what I was after.

Cursing, I tried to lunge for it anyway, but Raysh’s voice pierced the air. “Don’t let it touch you!”

I froze, my hand outstretched, and the snake’s unnatural green glowing eyes latched onto it. Just waiting to sink its fangs in deep.

My pulse pounded in my ears as Alder’s grunts from holding back the neck of the turtle reverberated in my muscles and nerve-endings.

Aggravated, the snapping turtle grabbed the vines in its mouth and whipped its head to the side. The momentum of the vines coming from the guardian’s great tug sent Alder flying into the lake with a large splash.

As Alder sank into its depths, the snake and the giant turtle turned their glowing eyes toward me.

“Use your mana, Briony.”

Raysh’s voice whispered in my ear, like the spirit was right beside me. Guiding me.

“Use it?” I muttered.

But I couldn’t use mana like Alder. I wasn’t a nature spirit.

Then I remembered Alder’s words.

“Some days it was hard to tell the difference between you and any other spirit.”

I raised my hand, my fingers flexing as I focused on this reservoir of mana inside me. Reaching deep into this pool of astral energy, I imagined the water from the surrounding rocks congealing, coagulating, converging into one giant wave. Blue mana trickled out of my fingertips, trembling and shaking. Weak, but there. I fed it more strength, pouring as much mana as I could from my reservoir into a river of my own making.

The blue energy pulled millions of droplets off the rocks, floating them in midair, and when I felt I had enough power behind it, I flicked my wrist forward.

And splashed the spirit guardian right in the face.

Oops. I had been aiming for the snake—the creature that hated water.

The water spirit didn’t even blink, but luckily the movement did surprise the snake enough to uncoil itself from the shell and dart into the shadows of the guardian’s underbelly.

I dove for the shell fragment, scooped it up, and raced back toward the lake.

The guardian roared again and jerked its neck forward. Icy cold air blew at my back like the arctic wind. Its mouth was right behind me. Mere seconds from closing in.

At the same moment, the water receded from the shore, like an ocean tide pulling in. It built and built, rearing back into a gigantic wave that rose high above the turtle.

Within the wave was Alder. He reached his hand out to me, his fingertips emerging from the stirring curtain of blue mana and restrained water. Without a second thought, I launched myself into the wave, diving off the rocky shore just as I would off a block at the rec center pool. My streamlined arms pierced through the wave’s wall and Alder’s hand wrapped around my middle, pulling me tight against him.

In one fluid movement, Alder let go of the mana and the force of the displaced water shot us away from the shore, into the center of the lake, buffeting our bodies against the strong magical currents.

We had to get to the mouth of a river. Still being within the water gate was too dangerous. The guardian could come after us and chomp us up for a midafternoon snack. But Alder had used up almost everything he had with that wave. I could feel it from his touch and the mana mixing with mine.

I still had some, though.

But was I strong enough to get us to a river?

I had to try. I tightened my grip on the shell fragment and on Alder’s waist as he had mine. Once again summoning the reservoir of mana inside, and pushing it down around my legs, I gave one powerful kick.

We shot through the water like a missile straight into the closest river mouth. I’d forgotten how powerful the current had been and, too late, I worried we’d hit rocks and rapids.

Just as I was trying to figure out how to slow down and get safely to the river bank, three dark shapes darted around us.