A Hero's Curse by P. S. Broaddus Read Free Book Online Page B

understand him, but the sound is enough. He is in the water ahead to the right. I hear a screech behind us, a bone-shattering, teeth-grinding noise that sounds nothing like any creature I have ever heard. I gasp and choke on water again.
    “Where?” I scream to Tig. I’m hysterical now. I can’t hear him anymore as the water is up to my chin. A large splash sounds behind me. My stick hits rock in front of me. I desperately whack to the right and to the left. Rock, rock, rock. A dead end.
    The rock basilisk hisses behind me. Then I hear Tig ahead and to my right again. “Right!” he yowls.
    I turn right and my hands find sharp rock. I pull myself along the rock, not caring that the lava is cutting my hands to shreds. I drop my stick and pull faster along the rock face. Something catches my pack, and my heart is in my throat. But it isn’t the rock basilisk; it is more rock on my left. I am wedged in a crack. I feel cold water rushing around my body from in front of me, so I know I’ve left the pool and am still following the river.
    I yell to Tig, “Where am I?” But there is no response. He’s gone. I wave my right arm forward. The crack continues, so I grip the two sides and pull. I wedge myself deeper and deeper in the crevice, but my pack gets snagged again. I try to wiggle it free, but my backpack has me too stuck to turn. Before I can even yell for Tig again, something grabs my pack from behind—something big.
    I choke as it shakes me up and down in the water. It must have my pack in its teeth. It turns out the rock basilisk isn’t big. It’s huge. Then it is dragging me back out, fast. Too fast. My left arm catches on a jagged edge of lava, and I stop short, searing pain running up through my body. My whole right side is yanked around and the pack is torn off my shoulder. The rock basilisk gives the pack a vicious tug, and I spin back into the pool.
    The water in front of me has turned into a thrashing whirlpool. I push along the wall again, half swimming, half kicking, scrambling back into the crack, and I feel the wall close in around me, but this time I claw my way forward for several steps, my pack dragging behind on my left arm.
    Whack! I grab my head with both hands and feel the stinging pain shoot through my body. I feel sick. I smell blood. I hear scrabbling above me and another screech from only a few steps away, but coming from above me, on top of the lava flow. I bite my tongue because the noise hurts my head so much. One hand to my head, I feel my way forward. Rock. My hand finds a tiny opening between the water and the lava. I push my foot forward and find that the opening extends to the floor.
    Not risking cracking my head open again, I submerge and swim against the current. The water is moving faster now, and it is natural movement, flowing past me as I grab the rock sides and pull myself forward. I go as far as I think I can go, holding my breath, my head throbbing angrily, my pack still dragging my arm backward and catching on snags. My lungs feel like they are going to explode. I gently move my hands upward to see if there is room. They break surface. I push my face out of the water and gulp in the air, stooping a little, both hands held protectively above my head.
    “Not bad for a blind girl,” says Tig.
    I jump and utter a little scream. He is right in front of me.
    “It can’t follow us in here. That tunnel is too narrow for a rock basilisk,” he explains.
    All my tension melts out of me, and I start to laugh and sob at the same time. Still chest deep in water, I reach out to find Tig. He is dripping wet, sitting on a shelf of rock that is as smooth as Mom’s red silk dress.
    I flounder forward and for a long time I stand in the water, slumped over the smooth rock and holding Tig. The pain in my arm is cooling, but my head still throbs angrily. I think of the red dress instead of the pain. I think of the way the deep red has its own inner fire. The dress seems to glow and the rest