The Darksteel Eye by Jess Lebow Read Free Book Online

lifted herself up off the dark ground.
    “Goblins not made for rolling, huh?” said the goblin. “Slobad sick.”
    His words were followed by a gurgling sound, and the splash of liquid on the chamber floor. Glissa felt the wave of fluid flood over her feet.
    “Nice, Slobad.”
    The door opened and light poured in.
    In the dark, Glissa hadn’t noticed how dizzy she had become. When she saw the wall of the lacuna, her head spun one way, and her eyes the other. She vomited.
    Bosh’s stubby digits reached in and pulled the two nauseous riders out into the light.
    “You must stop that,” said the golem. “It tickles.”
    Glissa looked up at Bosh then leaned over his hand and threw up once again.
    “Thanks for the warning,” she said. “What did you do?”
    “We can cover that ground later,” interjected Bruenna. The wizard hitched her thumb over her shoulder. “Right now we’ve got a bunch of angry vedalken to outrun.”
    Bosh lifted Glissa and Slobad onto his shoulders and took off along the tunnel.
    Glissa clung tightly to the seam in Bosh’s neck. The fresher air and the light were helping her to regain some equilibrium, but she was still a little queasy. Slobad looked even worse off. Every few steps, his limp little goblin body threatened to fall from the golem’s shoulder. He hung on with all his might, his knuckles turning pale against his rumpled flesh. Every time one of Bosh’s feet landed on the ground, Slobad let out a little moan.
    Bruenna hovered behind them. “You two going to make it?”
    Glissa looked up, shrugged, then nodded.
    “Good, because once we get up the Pool of Knowledge, we’ve still got to get out of Lumengrid.”
    Glissa grabbed her head. “I’d forgotten about that. I’m not sure if I
can
make it.”
    Slobad gagged. “Me neither.”
    The company continued up the lacuna. The mossy stuff on the ground began to give way to simple metal, and the tunnel grew darker. The vedalken warriors were nowhere in sight, though Glissa knew they couldn’t be too far behind.
    “We’re nearing the top,” exclaimed Bosh.
    The giant metal golem came to a halt. On the floor, the edge of the tunnel rippled. An opalescent oval broke the regular metallic sheen before them—the bottom of the Pool of Knowledge.
    Glissa looked at it. “I didn’t like this on the way out.”
    “It’s easier on the way in,” said Bosh.
    The golem lifted his two passengers off his shoulders then knelt down. He poked his finger at the floor, and the silvery substance gave way, letting the golem’s whole hand pass through. Waves rippled off in every direction, as if a drop of water had hit a puddle.
    “That all serum, huh?” said Slobad.
    Bruenna nodded.
    “But how does it stay there? Why doesn’t it just drain into the lacuna?” asked the elf.
    The human wizard shrugged. “If I had to guess, I’d say magic.”
    The sound of booted feet coming up the lacuna echoed up the tunnel.
    Slobad dashed for the silvery wall. “Good enough for Slobad,” he said. The goblin dived upward into the serum.
    The wall wavered but none of it came into the tunnel.
    Bruenna levitated into it as well, disappearing from view after a
bloop, bloop
.
    Glissa looked after her friend. “I don’t know, Bosh—”
    “Time to go,” interrupted the golem and shoved the elf into the serum.
    Glissa slipped through the wall, her mouth still open from her last word. The world around her was thick and slow. She felt the weight of the pool on top of her, and her chest seemed empty. Her ears felt as if someone had his hands cupped over them, and everything had gone silent.
    Opening her eyes, Glissa looked up. The world was blurry. The top of the pool looked like the wall she had just passed through, only it was a long way away and wasn’t in focus. Ahead she could see a small, frantic green thing that looked like a child’s drawing. That must be Slobad, she thought. Behind him, a fluidly moving blue streak raced toward the surface. Though