The Warslayer(93)

"Pity you couldn't've dropped a word in Cinnas' ear though, hey?" Glory said aloud. "How could he have done something like that to his own kid?"

But she thought of what she'd seen in Charane's great hall, the blood and the slaughter, and thought of seeing things like that every day, of horrors taking place everywhere in all the world you knew, to the people you knew, and thought that Cinnas had probably gotten, well . . . lost. The way Dylan had lost himself at the end.

That doesn't excuse it! she told herself angrily. But maybe it explained it, just a little.

And maybe, if the Allimir knew the whole story about Cinnas, and how his plan to save them had come out in the end, maybe they wouldn't make that same mistake again.

Always assuming they get the chance.

Not my department.

Her eyes had adjusted to the light from the one small candle now, and she found the cup in its niche on the wall. She took it down carefully and squatted beside the spring to dip it beneath the surface, remembering just too late that her hands were still bandaged.

"Oh, well," Glory said with cheerful resignation. A little wet wouldn't hurt them. Might even help.

She held the cup underwater until the cold made her hands ache, then brought it up again full to the brim, holding it carefully so as not to spill any. Still crouched there, she chugged it down in one go, then got up to put the cup back in its place.

As she turned, her foot slipped.

Off-balance, Glory took a step backward, and fell into the spring.

She plunged straight down, deep beneath the surface, the water filling her nose and mouth, choking her. The water was icily, numbingly cold, and she could feel herself sinking. Desperately, she struggled to keep from inhaling. Her lungs burned with the need for air, but there was nothing to breathe here—only water, freezing and lightless.

The spring seemed to have no bottom. Her eyes were open, but there was nothing to see—she was blind in the darkness, and as she flailed, she could not feel the sides of the spring. All sense of up and down had deserted her; the cold and the blackness was as disorienting as a blow, and she was no longer sure which way she was oriented. Her lungs burned for air, and her vision was fogged with false stars. In the room above, she could almost step across the spring, but down here, not matter how desperately she struggled, she could not reach the sides, as if the small opening above were only the entry to some vast and stygian underground lake . . . or worse.

Don't panic! she told herself. Just relax. You'll float up. But would she? Or was the Oracle spring more like an underground river than a well? Was she being swept along beneath the rock even now, carried away from the only air-hole for miles, to suffocate and die in the dark? Belegir wouldn't even grieve for her—when she didn't return in the morning he'd think she'd been magicked back home—

And Ivradan—

No!

That thought was too much to bear. She could feel her mind going fuzzy around the edges as she greyed out, and clasped one hand over her nose and mouth to keep herself from breathing in water for as long as she could. Kicking upward furiously—please, let it be up—she reached out with her other hand. If she could even touch rock above her head, she could pull herself back to the opening of the Wellspring and get back to the cave. . . .

At last, when will alone kept her hand clamped over her nose and mouth, she felt her questing hand break the surface of the water, felt it slap down on the edge of the spring in the free air, felt hard stone beneath her palm. Frantically, she thrust her way to the surface and hung halfway over the edge, gagging and sputtering, sucking in air in deep furious gulps between wracking coughs. Her nose ran, and she coughed hard enough and long enough so that most of the water she'd drunk—and her dinner with it—came up to decorate the rock. Glory felt a small vindictive surge of triumph.

"Oh, no, you don't, you old besom. You aren't getting rid of me that easily," Glory gasped at last, her voice hoarse with misuse.

Thoroughly cold and wet—and entirely out of temper with the Oracle—she dragged herself out of the spring again and sat weakly beside it for several minutes, panting hard. She struggled out of her foul wet T-shirt and jeans—losing her bandages entirely in the process—and towelled herself dry with one of the blankets.

What a mess.

She supposed she couldn't just leave the place looking—and smelling—like that. Using her T-shirt as a mop, she swabbed the stone clean, and then gave her shirt a thorough washing in the spring. The Oracle deserved it, after what she'd put Glory through, and the water should be clean again for drinking by the time Helevrin's lot came tomorrow. When she was done, she wrung out the T-shirt and her jeans as best she could, knowing they'd still be damp in the morning despite her best efforts, and spread them flat on the rock at the far side of the cave.