It's cold. That is all Nia can feel.
She is no longer able to feel anything else: her hands, her feet, her body. She is numb all over.
The water is near freezing. Even through her numbness, she can feel the temperature drop, yet it is not the cold that frightens her.
The burning from the Act of Remembrance is great; yet the burning of the Pulse of Life inside her veins, when it heals everyone inside the cave, is even greater. With this amount of pain in her body, she wonders why she is even alive right now.
But it might not be for long, because her body is being dragged by the lake's siphon, moving through darkness toward an unknown destination.
Sol… The walls begin to hum; the lunoxene in the water throws a thin rind of light.
Wanwan… Then the lake inhales her.
The pups… Farther and farther down.
She can only hope that they are all safe, and that what she did has actually made a difference.
Head priestess… perhaps sending me was a mistake after all…
—
The csezul impacts the cavern floor with a wet, squelching sound. Sol and the Garm pups are still there, waiting for it to twitch or show any sign of life. There is none.
Sol drops to one knee and exhales.
"Nia, we won!" He turns his head toward the spot where Nia floated with light before. She is no longer there.
What remains are bubbles rising from the lake.
His eyes widen. He sheathes what's left of his dagger (the blade) with bloody hands and runs to the water's edge.
He stops. Nia can no longer be seen.
He looks to the Garm pups. He has no time to enlist their assistance. He is not even sure they can swim. He is the only one who can do this.
He looks to the lake once more, draws a breath, fills his lungs as much as possible, and dives.
All sound muffles instantly. The cold is a bit worse than before, now that the hole above the lake is opened wider, but he can take it.
He moves his hands and legs, trying to get deeper…
…deeper…
…deeper…
He cannot see her anywhere, and he is the one with eyes that are very good in the dark, better than everyone else in Rahzar's party or even the younglings. The light starts to grow very dim in the depths. His breath is almost gone.
Do I go up to breathe? I don't have time! Nia must still be down here! He shakes his head underwater and keeps pushing downward.
He remembers Kaiyo telling him this lake can act as a shortcut to the Dalmas River, somewhere below this height, but he does not know where. He is not a swimmer like Kaiyo. He is not fascinated by fish, which is why he never spends much time underwater. Besides, the water is freezing. The fisherman's son is built differently.
He keeps pushing down, and he sees a speck of light. A silvery, shimmering line near the wall. He also feels the temperature drop by a couple of degrees. Lunoxenes shine along the walls of the siphon.
A tunnel!
The tunnel is big, an oval mouth about two meters wide and a little over a meter high, necking to a one-meter throat before widening again. It looks big enough for him to swim through.
The cold pricks him like needles, and then a tug. He notices the siphon is drawing water from the lake to spew it somewhere else, most likely farther downslope.
The shortcut that Kaiyo mentioned!
He still has the option to swim back up. He does not have time to think. The oxygen left in his lungs, and in Nia's, compels him to choose fast.
Shit, I guess we're doing this…! He shakes his head, chooses to move forward toward the mouth, and lets the stronger current drag him inside.
The current is vastly powerful. He knows he will not escape even if he tries, so he leans in and tries to gain even more speed by swimming with it, not against it. The tunnel goes straight, almost diagonally.
Until it doesn't.
The tunnel suddenly goes vertical, dragging Sol downward with its extremely powerful current.
He instinctively protects his head with both hands. It would be dangerous if his skull hit the cavern walls at this speed. He looks up. The opening to the alcove grows farther and farther away. He can tell by the dwindling orange hue of the lunoxene light at the mouth.
There is no coming back from this.
He focuses on the flow that carries him, tries to ignore his lungs screaming for air, and starts moving his hands to go faster with the current.
Nia! Hang on just a moment!
He disappears into the darkness of the underwater siphon.
—
Wanwan and his siblings look toward the lake, then at each other.
"Arf!" Wanwan knows something has to be done, but Garms are not exactly the best divers. Sure, they can swim, but diving under a lake?
"Wan! Wan!" One of his siblings, the one with the wounded ear, tells him to go for it. There is no point in waiting. The girl and the boy will die soon if they do not intervene.
"Awooawooo, arf arf, grrrr!" Another sibling, the one with the short tail, tells him they can go up through the opening in the ceiling of the alcove and run from there toward wherever the lake leads.
"Wan!" Wanwan asks how they even know the lake leads anywhere.
"Woof, rrrrrrrruffff!" Another sibling, the one with heterochromia, tells him everyone knows the lake leads somewhere. Their mother told them so. In fact, the hole above the lake came from their mother's accidental entrance to the cave. Did Wanwan forget?
"*whines*" Wanwan lolls his tongue. He guesses he kind of forgot that part because he was busy dragging the deer carcass up from the Lowlands.
"Ruff! Ruff! Arrrrrf!" The last sibling, another male with sharp eyes, walks to the edge and tells him Sol can no longer be seen; he was sucked in by the siphon. They have to move soon if they want to save him.
Wanwan's tongue slips back into his mouth. The neurons in his brain fire hard, but he knows thinking is not his strong suit. He is the big one of the litter for a reason.
He barks once again.
"WAN!"
A bark that feels strong. It is no longer a discussion. Now, it is a command. And his command rings true in the heads of the other pups: save their saviors.
All the other pups howl. Wanwan never thought that his siblings would agree so readily.
He jumps in, headfirst, without thinking about anything else.
—
Nia's body is dragged by the current like a white ribbon in the middle of the oppressive darkness. Slack, weightless.
In her vision, the world has already thinned to black. At the edge of consciousness, she feels the cold hands of the water take her by the neck and pull, steady and patient.
Her body goes where the water wills. Her platinum hair fans, her limbs loosen, the glow of lunoxene smears past her like embers.
There is a glassy weight against skin she can barely feel because of the numbness from the Act of Remembrance. The current drags her, gathers her, and keeps her, turning her once, twice, thrice, then drawing her into a narrow throat of stone.
Somewhere along the cavern walls, a hum follows.
She surrenders the last bit of her consciousness as she exhales the last bit of air inside her lungs, obedient to the dark embrace of the freezing waters.
—
Sol knifes forward. He knows he can let the river inside the tunnel take him where he needs to be, but he knows that if he does, when he gets to Nia, it will be far too late.
He has seen Kaiyo swim before. The fisherman's son's grace underwater is unmatched, and perhaps now, inside the flow, he can learn a thing or two from his youngling friend.
He tucks his chin, his arms tight to his sides. He rides the pull exactly like a fish rides pressure. Not against, but with, steering only a little if he feels too close to the cavern walls.
…!!! He notices his speed increases dramatically when he does it, just like Kaiyo said:
"Look, if you were to be dragged by a waterfall like the ones near the village, you don't swim away. You go with the current. Tuck your chin, get your arms to the sides, and just ride the current like a champ. Besides, at that point, you're dead anyway, might as well make the most of your last journey by going as fast as you can, if the drop is like Dalmas' Fall."
He feels the water thickens around him; his ear pressure pops.
Kaiyo, you brilliant bastard! Remind me to thank you if I make it out of this alive!
He reads the pull the way hunters of Elm read the wind, calm, collected, focused. The air burns in his lungs, rebelling, trying to get out. He refuses to let go of the air, exhaling only a very tiny amount at a time, determined not to pass out inside this tunnel.
He strains his eyes; he needs his darkvision now, more than ever.
And then his prayer is answered. A white shape beneath the darkness.
It is Nia. He has caught up.
He just needs to go a bit faster to save her.
—
A sharp, jutting rock grazes Nia's left arm, fresh blood drawn by the current. She feels it, just a bit. In fact, that one particular sting keeps her consciousness from delving into the depths of the abyss.
However, the pain was not enough to bring her back.
Inside the darkness of her vision, everything suddenly goes white.
—
Sol kicks the water furiously, not just with mere strength, but with precision as well.
He is close to her.
He is very, very close.
He only needs to get his arm forward and take Nia into his arms, but the flow inside the current refuses to give him the leeway to move the way he likes.
He thinks fast and decides to kick the water again as strongly as possible.
His lungs almost give up.
—
Inside the absolute whiteness, there is peace.
It is no longer cold. It is no longer painful. No longer did she feel the burns from the Act of Remembrance. No longer did she feel any burn from the Pulse of Life.
She looks around. She cannot see anything.
Everything is flat, pure, white.
She frowns.
Wait, I was supposed to do something in the Netherward. What was it again…?
—
Sol's lungs are screaming. His eyes are bloodshot, but he does not know this; he only knows that everything hurts.
The good news is that he is right next to Nia. He notices the bleeding left arm and moves toward it, using his legs to maneuver himself towards that side.
Nia is right in front of him now.
Using all of his strength, he manages to resist the unthinkable pressure, grabs the open wound with his right hand, and applies pressure, preventing the bleeding from killing her.
He notices that the tunnel walls are getting closer, fast.
He embraces Nia with both arms as the tunnel closes in on both of them.
The tunnel is getting smaller! He uses his body as a shield to prevent Nia from being hurt by abrasion, making sure that Nia stays in the middle of the flow.
The tunnel walls rake him. Heat sears his back, like a thousand csezul's teeth scraping him at the same time, and then repeating, again and again. For the entire length of the tunnel
The pain ebbs his consciousness, then pulls him back, only to ebb again.
Throughout the extremely agonizing process, he holds on to Nia as if both of their lives depend on it.
The tunnel opens up. A bit of relief, however, his consciousness was hit pretty hard in the small tunnel.
He looks forward, towards the direction of the flow, using everything he still has.
He sees light.
A small mote of brilliance, and it gets bigger every second.
However, no matter how many seconds, it might already be too late for him. The damage to his back was too severe; he is bleeding profusely. By what power did he hang on to Nia all this time, he does not know; what he knows is that it's nothing short of a miracle.
He can feel his lungs crying for help. There is only a small amount of air left. He could exhale and let the bubbles float free, and perhaps feel a bit of relief.
But then, he stopped looking up to the exit. He moves his head to see Nia's face.
She looks so peaceful.
Sol will not let her die; better him than her; she can heal a Geherrim. With her powers, she must have an unfulfilled purpose, a purpose greater than one thousand of his mac'ga combined into one.
Sol knew that wherever she went, change would follow. But him? Nobody will miss him, not the chief, not the other younglings, not Rahzar and his party, no one.
Sol was sure that even Wanwan was already resting in their alcove, together with his littermates.
For someone so unwanted, he felt that he did pretty well.
So, in the middle of his excruciating pain, he tries the last thing his brain can come up with.
His lips meet hers.
He exhales the last of his air inside, surrendering the last of his consciousness to her.
Hoping that it will make a difference, no matter how small.
—
Inside the white world, Nia feels something touch her lips, and color starts to come back, little by little.
Little steps come from behind her. From the returning colors, five small things, all white, are running toward her.
"Are those…"
Her eyes widen. She knows what they are.
Garm puppies. So small, so fluffy, so cute. And they are running toward her with the utmost urgency, as if running toward her is the only thing left for them in this world.
"Why are you guys rushing?"
With each step, they get bigger.
"Whoa."
And bigger.
"Whoa, whoa."
And bigger, until all of them are the size of Wanwan.
"WAN!"
One of them passes her, then another, then another, then another. Only Wanwan stops right in front of her, licking her face.
"Ow! Sol's right, you've got a rough tongue! Hehe!"
She looks back to see where the other four are going.
And what she sees is Sol, floating, arms locked around her.
The light blinded her once more, and then darkness, and then blue.
She can see the sky.