Chapter 9
The break cracked like thunder against the beach, bellowing off the smooth stone walls.
I turned to face the opening. From here, the coast was invisible, and all I could make out were the midnight waves and the star-dotted sky.
Foamy water trickled over my toes. The tide was rising—it had already filled most of the grottos, and would fill this entire chamber, soon.
I lightly swept my fingertips over my tattoo. The vision was clear: the Pearl of Truth was in a crevice, but there were a million of those. And they all looked the same.
Legs still adjusting to the soft ground, I took an unsteady step forward, tiny pebbles and fragments of shells sticking to the soles of my bare feet.
Wait a minute. Where the hell were my shoes?
Turning back towards the waterline, I eyed my drenched pair of high-top sneakers that’d somehow slipped off me, flopping against the small beach with the swash.
I snagged them, thrust them onto my sandy feet, and trudged deeper into the cave, dipping my arm into the small pools, peering into the many nooks and holes.
Droplets of condensation plinked in a steady rhythm, keeping time with my heart.
A shale outcrop jutted into my path. Light flickered behind it, pulsing like a fire. I swallowed hard. I thought no one else had access?
Dwarves, goblins, and trolls hadn’t been able to cross the boundary… but I had. Was that who this cave was for—people like me? People descended from angels?
Outside of Ryder and Leif, I’d never met another Nephilim. And after dealing with them, I wasn’t sure I wanted to.
Creeping closer, I eased my dagger back out of its scabbard. I was probably holding it wrong, but whatever—it was better than nothing.
Air locked in my lungs; I stilled, waiting for a sign of who or what I might be facing.
Brandishing my weapon in front of me, I rounded the corner.
No one was there.
Blinking, my hand dropped to my side. But there was…
An altar?
The warm light from burning, half-melted candles danced across my face. Wilted orange and white petals littered the floor and an oval tabletop.
What was this place?
Lowering to a crouch, I ran my fingers along the curved stone, my skin scraping over the blue gems studding its surface. Lapis. Just like my missing necklace.
Realization barreled through me, tightening my lungs until my breath hitched.
This wasn’t just a cave. This was a shrine dedicated to the Angel of Water. My mom.
The starfish statuettes, the dried sand dollars, the winged figurines placed in the center of the slab… offerings, to a guardian who would never come.
A draft swept through the chamber, but it came from the wrong direction. From the back, where there should have been… nothing.
Slowly, I stood. Grabbing a votive, I followed the rustle into the dimming light, into the heart of the cavern.
“Hello?” I said, my voice disappearing into the shadows.
I wasn’t ready for what might answer back. A ghost? A Nephilim? My mom? She’d died ten years ago, condemned for leaving Empyrea and choosing to live and love amongst mortals, but something was in this chamber. I could feel it, a curious, cautious essence, hovering in the unlit corners.
Soft light glowed from within the darkness. Hues of red, green, and yellow radiated from a wall, reflecting in a small, stagnant pool. I peered across, but the shapes were fuzzy this far out.
I slipped into the pool, my leggings, hoodie, everything, already sopping, and held my candle aloft. The silt was velvety against my skin, the water cool but not as frigid as the ocean.
It was the depth and the darkness that had my heart racing.
Halfway across, I was up to my waist. Then quickly after, to my chest. And even faster, to my neck.
The candle flickered, and I tried not to shiver as I gazed at what’d been carved into the wall: the Empyrean symbols for the Watchers.
All burned with color, as if they’d been painted on with bioluminescence. All except one.
I went to move closer, but the bottom dropped off. With zero energy or desire to tread the murky water, I stayed where I was.
A green circle with a four-pointed star in the center. That was Gaia, Angel of Earth.
Two yellow spirals with three four-pointed stars. Fei, the Angel of Air.
Four stars curling around a red flame. Akosua, the Angel of Fire.
And a teardrop with two four-pointed stars, but it was unlit.
Because the Angel of Water was gone.
A heavy boom echoed through the chamber, a wave against rock.
Shit. The tide. The Pearl.
Scanning the symbols one last time, I waded back to the edge of the pool, vowing to come back with a wetsuit and a surfboard soon.
When I stepped out of the water, the night air hit me in one frigid punch. I wrapped my arm around my stomach, trying to lock in the heat. It was useless.
Shivering, I headed back to the cave’s entrance, my feet shuffling over gravel and sand. I placed the candle on the altar and whisked past the jutting shale and continued on towards the front.
The dips and hollows that held nothing more than puddles when I first came in were now full to the brim, seawater trickling over the edges. I stood in the outer chamber, the tide lapping at my ankles.
Think, think, think, River. My mom must have known this artifact was here. Where would she hide it? Would she be okay with me giving it to the Night Stalkers? I shook that worry away—it wasn’t like I had much choice. And she wasn’t coming back to claim it.
Water trickled in, faster and farther, sloshing in my high-tops.
In my last vision, the Pearl lay half-submerged in a grotto. Between then and now, the water level had risen by, I don’t know, a few feet? And there’d been hints of darkness, but not enough to swallow the little bits of candle and moonlight.
Which put it somewhere close to…
Spinning on my heels, I trekked towards an outcrop halfway between the entrance and the altar. It had to be in one of these pools, flanking the sides of the cave.
I hurried to the one on the right, nothing intuitive guiding my decision. But the liquid looked slightly less foamy, which was a plus. Wincing, I stepped in, the freezing ocean water numbing my skin. I dipped down to my waist, my arm skimming the rock, blindly reaching in crevices.
The next set hammered the beach, whitecaps rushing towards me, knocking me back.
This wasn’t going to work. It was too aimless. I closed my eyes, inhaling a steady stream of air. I opened my palms and held them at my sides, my fingers bobbing on the water’s surface.
“Come on. Help me!” A whisper, a plea, an unfinished prayer, spoken not only with words, but with my heart, with every fiber of my being. Was anyone listening? The universe, the angels, the essence in this cave. My mom. I felt a vein in my temple pop.
PLEASE. HELP. ME.
Wind rustled through the cavern, whipping at my sodden hair, swishing the tide. Shadows whirled before my lids, crackling candlelight. My hands met cool air.
I stumbled back a step as my eyes shot open, my spine digging into the pool’s rocky edge.
Water, there should have been water, I should have been up to my waist in water. But the element was gone, as if… as if it had been sucked back out to sea.
Jaw tight, I turned around.
Every grotto had emptied. Someone, something had answered my call. I flexed my fingers, Source tingling from the tendons up and over my body in one shimmering wave.
Wobbling out of the hole that was once a full pool, I strode to the other side of the chamber. The pull on my instincts turned heady and visceral—magnetic.
Hermit crabs clicked their claws angrily, skittering into the nearest divot as I slid into the hollowed-out space. It was identical in size and shape to the other across the cave, but something about this one felt… different.
Reaching into a damp crevice, I brushed away the loose pebbles, my hand grazing the slime and the grit and the chipped shells of sea snails, until it landed on something round and smooth.
Muscles shaking—from the cold, from excitement, from the dwindling magic—I pulled out the Pearl of Truth, cringing when I scraped its side on the narrow cavity. Removing the bits of algae stuck to its glossy outer layer, I weighed it in my palm.
It was like I held the entire world in my hands. Nothing felt more right. More true. I was meant to find this, to hold it. How was I supposed to give it up? I wouldn’t, I couldn’t—
A burning sensation tore through my scabbed wrist. The flash of pain cut off my train of thought. This wasn’t me. It was the tattoo. The true challenge wasn’t finding the target.
It was turning it in.
I considered the consequences of not giving it back as I flipped it between my hands, the extra touches fueling the rush, the Pearl glistening with every twist.
Beneath the surface, its shimmering white substance parted at my movements—as if this wasn’t a pearl at all, but a glass object made to mimic one.
Huh. So it really was like a Magic Eight Ball.
Maybe I could just give it a little shake.
A flare of green, a hint of blue broke through, growing brighter, more alive.
As soon as I stopped, the misty interior thickened, shrouding the secrets within its core.
“No!” I surprised myself with the cry that echoed off the cave walls.
Without thinking, I shook the Pearl harder, throttling the damn thing until my arms felt like they might fall off—until my teeth ground together so tight it gave me a pressure headache and, finally, the inside diluted with color.
This time when I stilled, fragments of a scene floated to the surface.
Full, flowered meadows. Deep valleys, winding rivers. Black, volcanic sand. Miles of untouched beach. Moss-covered cliffs, roosting birds. Rainbow streets, cozy taverns. Glaciers, ice—so much ice.
What was I looking at? A glimpse of the future? Another world?
A pale building on a bluff with a red-roofed tower. A lighthouse. Someone knocking—no, banging on the door. A young woman in a blue sweater, hair in a messy braid, desperately trying to get in.