CHAPTER 24
Keenan
Keenan came up spluttering with laughter. “That was good, Princess!” he chortled, brushing the water from his eyes. He hadn’t expected that move from the perfect princess, but he’d been asking for it. “Heavens, this water is cold!”
She didn’t respond. Where was she? She should have been right in front of him.
He swam his arms through the deep water to turn himself in a circle. Something brushed his ankle, and his amusement morphed into horror.
He and Hugh had learned to swim in a creek that ran through their part of Hartford. But Princess Sakura wasn’t even allowed to openly study her favorite subject – what were the chances she’d learned? And with that fancy dress weighing her down—!
Unfastening his cloak, he took a deep breath, flipped forward, and dove into the murky water. Tiny bubbles and a haze of dirt stirred up by the waterfall’s churning floated past as he waved his arms blindly. The undertow tugged at him, and he let it.
There—his fingers brushed fabric. Lunging forward with a strong frog stroke, he swiped his right hand through the water, mentally cheering when he caught a handful of skirt. It jerked in his grasp.
Good. She was still conscious.
Keenan reeled her in. Wrapping an arm around her trim waist, he aimed his face toward the bouncing sunlight and propelled himself up. Princess Sakura flailed about, moving water in the wrong direction and nearly whacking him in the face.
He paused and slapped at her arms. Cut it out!
She must have understood, because her arms immediately dropped.
The burning in his lungs warned him that he’d been under for too long. He ached for air, to open his mouth and take a huge gulp. But if he submitted to his body’s desperate demands now, he and the princess would both be lost.
He kicked harder, dragging his free arm through the water with more force than when he pounded a blade. Air. He needed air, and the princess had been under longer than he had.
Just when his instincts were about to overpower his will, his head broke the surface. He gasped for breath and tipped back, arching his spine so he could float with the princess on his chest.
But her wet dress dragged him down. Just staying above water was a struggle, and resisting the waterfall’s pull with her skirt tangling in his legs was next to impossible.
“Is something wrong?” The princess’s voice was muted by the water in his ears. “This doesn’t seem to be working.”
Blast, her face was barely above the surface. But while her voice shook, she didn’t sound nearly as panicked as Keenan felt.
Feeling himself sink, he gulped a breath, then spouted off a quick reply when he came up again. “Your dress. I can’t—” He dipped under. “—swim with it.”
She struggled a little, then stopped when he gasped out a desperate command. “Can you undo the buttons?” she asked.
“Not while holding you.”
He missed the first part of her reply when his head went under. “—cut it off?”
“Need my hand to keep us up,” he replied, guessing at her question.
“Then I will.”
Before he registered her response, her right arm wrapped backward around his waist. Her hand banged against his back, and then he had to fling his arm out of the way as she pulled his dagger free. She stabbed it through the outer layers of her skirt and began ripping.
“Watch it!” he yelped as his dagger glanced off the side of his jerkin. She might have muttered an apology before prying his arm up and rolling onto her side. He let go and used both arms to fight the water.
Holding the dagger out to the side, the princess wrapped an arm around his neck and dragged herself up his chest. “I can’t get the back,” she panted. “You’ll have to do it. Breaths on three. One, two—”
Keenan grabbed the hilt just above her hand, and she released it as he stopped treading water and let them sink. He fisted his left hand in her skirt, then yanked his blade through the last few inches of fabric.
As soon as it was free, he thrust it away, clamped the dagger’s hilt between his teeth and tightly pressed lips, and surged upward. His muscles were becoming sluggish from his time in the frigid water, but they made it back to the air before he ran out of breath.
“You need to roll over,” he gasped, grabbing the dagger. He gripped her waist and leaned back again, then fumbled behind his back until he found the sheath. “Keeps the water out of your face and your legs clear so I can kick.”
As soon as she was situated, he glanced over his head to get his bearings and started swimming.
It was much easier to stay afloat now, but swimming with only one arm while towing another person was hard work.
But they were finally making progress. And since no one knew where they’d gone and staying in the snow-chilled water while he rested wasn’t an option, he kept at it.
Princess Sakura twisted in his arms. “Bunta?” she called. A faint yipping broke through the sound of the waterfall and Keenan’s own labored breaths. “We’re over here!”
The air in his lungs puffed out as she dug her elbow into his gut, pushing herself up and waving her other arm. Sliding his arm up to her chest, he pulled her back down and righted himself before they could sink. “What’s the fox going to do?” he growled. “Cut it out before you drown us both!”
She lifted both arms in the air and waved them around. “He brought Oliver!”
The heavens bless that little fox. Keenan tilted his head and saw the older guard drop to one knee beside the bank and plunge his hand into the water.
Keenan renewed his efforts, hoping that if he got close enough to the shore, his friend would hold out a branch or something for the princess to grab and pull her the rest of the way in.
Or maybe he had a rope Keenan hadn’t seen?
He must have reached the edge of the waterfall’s pull, because swimming soon became easier, almost as if the currents were tugging him toward the bank instead of away. Letting his arm float on top of the water, he took a moment to relax and breathe before resuming his swim.
That was strange. It truly felt like he was caught in a current. Had he reached the one drawing water down the stream?
But when he checked, he still appeared to be heading for the bank.
Shortly after, a hand grabbed the neck of Keenan’s jerkin and pulled him the rest of the way to shore. Dropping his feet, he grabbed the arm with his free hand to anchor himself. “Her first. She can’t swim.”
While Oliver pulled her out, Keenan latched onto a root protruding from the bank and tried to haul himself out of the water. But his muscles quivered, and he slipped back in.
He really needed to stop landing himself in this sort of situation.
A hand appeared in front of his face, and he gladly accepted it. Once he was out, he flopped back on the rocks. He simply laid there for a minute, soaking in the sunshine above and the radiant heat from the stone below.
“Care to explain?” Oliver huffed.
Shoving himself to a sitting position, Keenan glanced over at Princess Sakura.
She was wrapped in Oliver’s cloak, her hands pinching it closed to cover what was left after destroying her overdress.
But though she shivered and her hair was plastered to her skin, she stood straight with her pleasantly disinterested expression firmly in place.
He waved vaguely in her direction. “The princess thought I looked a little warm. I made the mistake of using her to keep myself upright.”
The guard’s sharp eyes turned a suspicious look on her. “Did you know he could swim?”
Lifting her chin, she returned his look. “I did not consider that before I acted. I did not expect him to tumble in,” she said, her voice icy. But her hands clenched around the edges of the cloak.
Oliver frowned, but Keenan spoke up before he could say anything else.
“I asked for it. If she was trying to drown me, she could have pushed me from behind before I knew she was there.” He cast his eyes over a flash of yellow that briefly appeared before plunging back down under the force of the falling water.
“Losing the skirt was her idea and her work. She did good.”
Better than he’d expected. Better than he would have had their positions been reversed.
She swallowed and looked away. “Not all of it.”
“I cut about three inches of fabric.”
“You kept us alive.” She unwound enough to kneel down and pet the fox leaning against her legs. “You gave Bunta time to fetch help.”
It was probably the closest he would get to a “thank you” from her, but he’d take it. Besides, he was the one who’d pulled her into the water.
“We need to get you dry,” Oliver grumbled, still not his usual unflappable self. “Can you find the others without finding more trouble?”
“You say that like you aren’t coming with us.” Keenan narrowed his eyes. “What will you be doing?”
The guard glanced over his shoulder at the waterfall. “You’ll need your cloaks later. I’ll attempt to fetch them.”
“Without getting soaked yourself?”
Oliver gave him an unimpressed look. “I’ve been watching out for the crown prince for longer than you’ve been alive.”
Translation: he knew a trick or two, and he didn’t plan to share them with Keenan.
As Keenan rolled to his feet, Oliver turned to Princess Sakura. “Do you need your discarded skirt?”
She gave Bunta one last pat and straightened. “If Kasumi mends it, I can keep the dress as a spare. But it is not essential if you are unable to retrieve it.”
He nodded and stood next to the pool, apparently unwilling to begin until they left. Shrugging, Keenan turned to Princess Sakura. “Shall we?”
Carefully holding the cloak closed around herself, she freed one arm and wrapped her hand around his soggy elbow. “We shall.”