Page 107 of Realm of Thieves

“What the fuck,” Kirney says, his voice going high.

“Get out your swords,” I tell them, reaching down through the water and grabbing my ash-glass swords from my belt. “I think it’s a freshwater dredger.”

“Are they…dangerous?” Andor asks, brandishing his sword, the tip only visible above the surface.

“If they weren’t I wouldn’t be about to tell you to kill the thing before it uses its—”

A strong tentacle wraps itself around my ankle and yanks me under the water before I even have a chance to finish my sentence. I scream, water filling my mouth, thrashing as I try to pull away, doing all I can not to let go of my swords. The snake tries to take me even deeper and I have no idea how far the water reaches here, but unless I free myself I’ll drown.

I try in vain to slash and slice at the snake, but it keeps contorting itself out of my reach.

Oh damnation.

This is how I’m going to die.

Dragged to my death beneath the Daughters of Silence before I even had a chance to get my revenge.

The egg of immortality doesn’t sound so frivolous now.I’d almost laugh but I don’t even have the strength to fight back anymore. The only thing I can do is hold on to my swords as I’m dragged to the deep, and even then my fingers are starting to let go.

I’m going to let go.

Of everything.

It’s already black so it’s hard to tell if my vision is going fuzzy, but then I see a faint glow.

The light cube around Andor’s neck.

Hope.

Suddenly the water fills with bubbles and blood and the serpent lets go of my leg.

Arms wrap around me, hauling me to the surface, where I burst through, spitting out water and gasping for air.

“We’ve got you,” Andor says from one side, Kirney on the other.

“Snake thing is dead,” Kirney says. “Andor sliced its head off. What were you going to say about them?”

I spit out more water and give him a steady look. “Just that it can kill you.” Then I give them both a sheepish look. “Thanks for saving my life.”

“Are there any other monsters you’d like to fill us in on?” Andor asks.

“No,” I say, my breath coming back to me as we tread water. “Though we better pick up the pace in case there’s another lurking.” I pause, a flicker of a memory in the back of my head. “Except, perhaps, the one about the dungeon.”

We start swimming faster now, helped by the current. We can’t be too far from the cistern now, and yet I’m starting to lose faith that we’ll get there.

“I’m sorry,” Andor scoffs, “there’s a dungeon here?”

“It’s an old convent,” I tell him. “What do you think happens in convents to those who stray from the path? Especially in the old days, when the Saints of Fire first settled in Esland. Punishment was a way of life.”

“And so what was the rumor?” Kirney asks as we start swimming faster downstream.

“Just that they kept something, some creature, in the dungeon that no one was allowed to look at.”

“You sure it wasn’t a dredger that got loose?”

“I have no idea. I never saw anything.”

“Tell me, how did rumors spread when you all had taken a vow of silence?” Andor asks.

---