Warrior Mage (Book 1) (36 page)

“Any chips left in your pocket? I wouldn’t be too proud to lick out crumbs.” Lakeo glanced at his bat-guano-smeared robe. “Well, maybe I would.”

“The chips were in my other clothes, but Kei got them all, anyway.”

“And hasn’t been back to visit since. I knew that parrot was rude as soon as we met him. You really shouldn’t make friends with birds that are clearly racist.” Odd, she actually sounded perky, like she was enjoying herself. Did she think they had won the night because they had trapped the mage hunter?

Yanko could not bring himself to be that optimistic.

You think you’re clever, boy?
an irritated voice resonated in his head.

Yanko had been prepared for the warrior mage’s intrusion. In fact, he had expected it earlier, but maybe Sun Dragon had been helping unbury the hunter. Yanko did not respond to the question. He had already decided that he wouldn’t; on the chance that the man
didn’t
know where he was, Yanko did not want to risk giving away their location or thoughts of where they would come out. Not that he could do more than guess where they would come out. Only the gods knew if they had stumbled into the tunnel Akstyr had meant.

You should have studied more than rocks growing up. You can’t solve every problem by dropping caves on people’s heads.

Such venom came through the words that gooseflesh rose on Yanko’s arms. He doubted Sun Dragon could hurt him from this distance, but he kept that brick wall up around his thoughts, regardless, remembering the attack Senshoth had hurled at him in the prison.

As you shall soon see, boy. As you shall soon see.

“We’ve been threatened,” Yanko said.

“By your mage friend?”

“Friend isn’t quite the word I’d use.”

“I wonder why he doesn’t talk to me. Just because my talents are more meager than yours...” Lakeo waved to the orange globe floating ahead of them, the one that had gone out a couple of times during their trek because she had stubbed a toe or bumped a knee.

Yanko understood the struggle to master the ability to maintain enough concentration for basic tasks while other things were going on around a person. “Talent doesn’t have much to do with it. Just practice. You’ll get there, especially if you find someone to teach you. I could try sometime, but as you know, it’s frowned upon for people to become instructors unless they’ve graduated from an official mage school. And I...” He did not finish. She knew all about it. “Maybe if I give you the letter to hold, he’ll talk to you instead of me. If you’re truly eager to experience his wit.”

“I don’t think I want the responsibility of your quest. But I was thinking... you said pirate’s stash? That’s where your artifact is?”

“Yes.” Yanko did not see any point in holding back the truth anymore, not when half of Kyatt knew about his quest—and his dubious past—so he relayed the information he had learned from Mela and her newspaper.

They came to their first cross passage as he did so, a spot where another tunnel fed into theirs, and the direction changed slightly. Yanko did not know whether that was promising or not, but they kept following the downhill passage. Heading upward should only take them to the caldera. Even if the volcano was dormant, he didn’t want to end up there.

“So if we found this cache,” Lakeo said, “you could get your gold rock and complete your mission, and maybe there would be other valuable loot there, too, loot that could be sold to finance a person’s tuition to a certain expensive institution.”

“The loot came from the Kyattese Museum. I think we would be obligated to return it.”

“Please, we’re Nurian. What’s a museum in another nation to us? Besides, you’re not planning to return the lodestone.”

“I might after we’ve discovered the lost continent and claimed it for Nuria,” Yanko said.

“Oh, very generous.”

Up ahead, another tunnel emptied into theirs. Yanko increased his pace, hoping this meant they would reach an exit soon. He sniffed the air, hoping for a whiff of fishy ocean air, but he smelled an unfamiliar gas instead, something that made his nostrils pucker.

“It’s gotten hotter,” Lakeo said. “You’re sure we’re going
away
from the center of the volcano, right?”

Yanko wiped sweat from his brow. She was right. It
was
hotter. He had been thinking they had simply been working hard climbing over rocks, but since the first tunnel had joined theirs, the floor had grown relatively smooth. They were simply walking now, their pace brisk but not strenuous.

Their tunnel curved slightly, and a hint of orange stretched along the ground ahead. Yanko thought the glow of Lakeo’s orange light might be reflecting off something, but her weak globe had not reached far enough to illuminate anything up there yet. Whatever was on the floor seemed to glow of its own accord. As they drew closer, he realized what he was looking at and felt stupid for not grasping the situation sooner.

“But I thought this was a
dormant
volcano...” True, nobody had
told
him that. Yanko had assumed that an entire city would not have built up around a volcano that could erupt at any time. Wasn’t that
dangerous
? He had visions of buildings and entire civilizations being swallowed, such as had happened in the Legend of the Dragon God’s Punishment.

“Lava?” Lakeo pointed at the small stream oozing out of the tube joining theirs.

The sluggish flow was not going anywhere quickly, and that was the only thing that kept Yanko from feeling too uneasy as they continued forward, walking near the wall so they would not chance stepping in the lava. “I hope this means we’re getting close to... wherever the lava goes.”

“I was thinking that we would come out above town somewhere, but it’s hard to imagine a lava flow dumping out onto the president’s house.”

“I wouldn’t mind some dumping onto the ambassador’s compound.” Yanko lowered his voice and added, “Or on his head.” How could that man have automatically sided with an assassin? He could understand how seeing someone in the crimson robe of a warrior mage might sway a person—hadn’t he used his mother’s robe to sway the commissioner of that prison?—but mage hunters weren’t loved by the general populace. If anything, most people feared them. They had assassinated at least a half dozen great chiefs throughout history and been hunted nearly to extinction more than once. Maybe this assassin had never made an appearance.

“Does this lava seem like it’s getting thicker?” Lakeo pointed at the orange ribbon they were following.

“We passed that other tunnel that was dripping some into the channel.”

Lakeo continued walking, but she kept glancing down at the molten stream. It
had
grown wider. Yanko thought his explanation made sense, but the orange stuff made him uneasy too. Heat radiated from it, turning the entire tunnel into a steam yurt, and sweat ran down the sides of his face.

“I’m sure it’s perfectly normal,” Yanko said, “but we may want to increase our pace, in case the authorities are waiting at the opposite end of our tunnel.”

“You’re the boss.” Lakeo broke into a jog, her bow and pack bouncing on her back.

“I am? Since when? And of what?” He matched her pace, telling himself it had nothing to do with the lava or the feeling of claustrophobia creeping over him.

“Well, you’ve effectively ordered that parrot around.”

“I’ve bribed him to do things by withholding chips. I don’t think that makes me his boss.”

“Yeah, you’re right. I was trying to make you feel better about yourself.”

“Really? I don’t recall you ever doing that.”

“You seem glum,” Lakeo said. “It’s no fun pushing you around when you don’t get that sulky expression on your face.”

“Thanks. I think.”

The air ahead of her had grown brighter. Yanko hoped that meant they were almost to the exit, but he couldn’t imagine what light outside they might be witnessing, not unless they had been down here longer than he thought, and dawn had come.

The tunnel curved, and Lakeo stopped abruptly, flailing her arms.

“Stoat’s teats,” she growled and caught herself on the wall.

Yanko couldn’t come up beside her, not without jumping over what had become a two-foot-wide river of lava, but he leaned out to look, and his mouth sagged open.

“Now what?” she asked, pressing her back against the wall, so he could see better.

He had already seen enough. Their stream of lava had met with the outflow of several other streams, and a huge steaming pool of molten rock stretched across the confluence zone ahead of them. Heat blasted his face, and the gas they had been breathing had grown stronger, a mix of unpleasant chemicals that stung his nostrils and made his eyes tear. The pool stretched from wall to wall, leaving no way around, not unless one had a boat that could withstand however many hundreds of degrees in temperature lava was. Maybe thousands. Yanko wiped his face. He had no idea, and he wasn’t about to stick his finger in to check.

“About twenty meters.” Lakeo stood on her tiptoes and pointed to the far side of the cavern where a wide tunnel continued onward. “Want me to boost you up so you can take a look?”

“I’m perfectly capable of seeing our predicament from down here at my lowly height.”

It’s about to get worse
, came the smug and angry voice of the warrior mage
. My specialty is fire, you know.

“Maybe we could go back to one of those side tunnels,” Lakeo said. “Find another way around.”

Before Yanko could share the message, an ominous rumble reverberated from the depths of the mountain. Of the
volcano
, he reminded himself. The warrior mage wouldn’t cause it to erupt, surely. That couldn’t be within his power. Even if it was, the Nurian ambassador would not allow it. If the volcano blew, everyone on the island would be in danger, Nurians as well as Kyattese. But if Sun Dragon was feeling angry and vengeful, maybe he had not asked for permission.

“That does not sound good.” Lakeo thrust an arm back the way they had come. “Look, the lava flow is getting denser. Faster.
Bigger
.” She gripped Yanko’s arm. “We’re about to have our flesh burned off our bones if you don’t do something.”

He kept himself from squeaking out an unmanly and uninspiring, “Me?” Instead, he examined the ceiling above the pool—the magma glowed intensely orange, throwing out enough illumination to highlight every crack and crevice up there. How far into the mountain were they? Had they traveled far enough down to be back below the tree line?

“Can you levitate us across?” Lakeo pressed her back against the wall and pulled Yanko over, as well. The two-foot-wide stream had grown to four feet, leaving them only a foot of solid rock to stand upon.

“I never mastered levitation. Telekinesis is covered in the mind sciences book I’m reading, but, uh, I haven’t practiced.”

“Maybe you should prioritize that.” Lakeo had not let go of his arm, and her nails dug in like the parrot’s claws.

“I’ll do so in the future. I can try to push us across with some wind, but the precision needed to land in that tunnel over there...” He could not imagine it being anything other than an act of last resort. He doubted there was enough air in the tunnels behind them to gather the force to hurl them twenty meters, aim notwithstanding.

“Push?”

“Maybe...” Yanko closed his eyes, reaching up through the rock above them with his mind, hoping to find plant life. “Ah, they’re up there.”

“What is?”

“Trees?”

“Trees. That sounds even less helpful than pushing..” She growled, her eyes huge as she stared at the rising flow of lava melting the ground as it passed inches from their toes.

Yanko tried to ignore the scorching air, the nauseating gases, the sizzle of molten ore melting the rock beneath it. He focused above the ceiling, beyond the rock and to the soil over it, soil that provided a bed for trees, shrubs, and grass. A vast network of roots ran above their tunnel—and above that lake of lava. Some had already broken through the volcanic rock, creating cracks and fissures, poking through over the years as they extended downward. He identified the trees, since they would have the strongest roots, and sought those closest to their position. A forest of koa had claimed the earth up there. He nodded to himself, took a deep breath, and funneled his energy into the root systems.

“Yanko, whatever you’re doing, it needs to be done soon,” Lakeo said. “Or we’re going to have to try to run across. Maybe it’s not that deep.” A thunk sounded as she threw a rock.

Eyes closed, Yanko barely noticed. He willed the roots to grow deeper, to stretch their toes for some fresh oxygen. Granted, this air wasn’t all that appealing, but it was all he could offer.

A crack sounded, and shards of rock tumbled into the molten lake. The first root appeared, dangling down several inches from the otherwise smooth ceiling. More cracks came from farther out.

“You’re going to bring down the ceiling so we can climb out?” Lakeo asked. “Good, hurry, Yanko. Damn, I don’t know if I’ll be able to reach...”

Yanko shook his head, but didn’t respond. There wasn’t much time, and he could not risk a lapse in concentration. He
could
bring down the ceiling, but the lava would splatter everywhere, and with a stream of magma running across the path they had come down, there wasn’t room to run back up their tunnel. Besides, he didn’t have Dak there to run volume equations and make sure the earth and rock above wouldn’t completely fill in the lake and trap them. Instead, he kept pushing through the ceiling with clumps of roots.

It took tremendous energy, to make trees grow as much in a minute as they would in a year, and he had to lean against the wall for support. His thigh muscles trembled, threatening to give out. They weren’t getting enough oxygen. The air was scorching, and his lungs protested the gaseous miasma entering them.

Pain burst from the side of his foot, shattering his concentration. He gasped, yanking his leg away from the flow that had brushed his boot, eating through the leather in an instant.

“Yanko,” Lakeo said, already plastered against the wall and standing on her tiptoes to avoid the ever-widening lava stream, “are you going to—”