Doomraga's Revenge by T. A. Barron Read Free Book Online Page B

carried perhaps from the Flowering Isles, where colorful water lilies bloomed constantly.
    Turning to the side, he caught a glimpse of an emerald green shadow gliding just beneath the surface. A porpoise? A sea turtle? An azure-winged water butterfly?
    Looking closely, he turned his attention to the water itself. The same cool liquid that, even now, slid under his arms and tickled the small of his back held more colors than just blue. Many more. For this ocean held rivers of rainbows. Greens, violets, even scarlets and golds, coursed through every wave. Interwoven streams of color flowed all around him, trembling and shining in the light.
    The Rainbow Seas , he said to himself. How rightly named! A wave washed over his face, but he barely noticed. For he himself had chosen that name, on his very first voyage to this realm. Just as he’d chosen the name Wellspring of Mist for the enormous tower of spray that rose out of the ocean not far from here. Like a gargantuan fountain, the Wellspring lifted into the clouds above like upside-down rain.
    Feeling much calmer inside, if a bit chilly from the water, he turned over and swam back to shore. As he emerged, dripping wet, another breeze flowed past, drying his back and arms and legs. He shook his mane, sending scores of drops across the sand. Grabbing his tunic and belt, he donned them quickly, then sat down to pull on his boots.
    “I do love to swim,” he said to the dunes and the sky and the endless sea. “Almost,” he added as he tugged a boot onto his wet foot, “as much as I love to travel.”
    His sharp eyes caught a row of unusually tall waves that rose from the horizon as sharply as peaks. No—not waves. Sails! The sails of ships.
    Elven ships , he knew, recognizing them now. They must have sailed from their bay to the south. Bands of elves from El Urien’s forests had come there with their leader to establish a new colony, called Caer Serella. And a new breed of elves, I would guess, after enough time passes. Wood elves no longer—they’ll someday be water elves.
    He watched the ships skimming over the waves with the speed of the wind. Their giant sails taut, the boats leaned far on their sides, practically flying through the water. Already he could see the shapes of their hulls, lined with giant paua shells that sparkled with iridescent blue, lavender, and green. And there—that emblem of Serella’s, painted on all the sails made from woven elbrankelp: a great blue wave set within a circle of forest green.
    “Serella!” he cursed, raising his fist at the line of ships. “You may have gotten to this realm first. But there are many more places in this world—more than you’ve ever imagined. And I will beat you to the best of them.”
    Realizing that he was, once again, scowling, Krystallus pursed his lips. Why did that elf queen irk him so much? What was it about her that made his blood boil? The haughty look of superiority on her elegant face, perhaps. Or the way she trumpeted her discoveries, as if there were no other explorers in Avalon. Or maybe . . . the sheer delight she took in sneering at him whenever their paths happened to meet.
    “Well, well, if it isn’t Krystallus, the amateur explorer?” she had said at their last encounter, a chance meeting at a portal in northern Malóch near the dangerous cavern called Hidden Gate. “Aren’t you known far and wide as”—she had paused at that moment, savoring her next words—“as the son of somebody famous?”
    His scowl deepened, as if he’d never known the tranquillity of a swim. Then slowly it began to fade, as a new idea came to him, replacing anger with resolution, filling his mind as a rising tide fills a bay.
    “Serella. Father. Everyone else who mocks me. I’ll show you all! I’ll”—his dark eyes glowed with determination—“find places and pathways that no one, not even Dagda, knows about. Face any dangers. Solve any puzzles. And make myself indisputably the greatest explorer this