Chapter 42
It took Audra longer than she’d have liked to cast the incra successfully.
At first, she was unsure which way to draw it, having to look down at her body and not at a piece of flat parchment on the desk before her.
Not to mention the inkless quill didn’t show up on her skin—the incra didn’t have to be visible for it to work, but for an incra this complicated, she needed to be able to see it, to get every loop and curl and switchback just right.
But worst of all, the cold made her fingers clumsy, her grip on the quill loose, and she kept slipping up, causing the magic to fizzle out, the spell to dissapate.
She’d had to begin again more than once, and only when she thought of reopening her wound, using her blood as ink, as a guide, did she manage it successfully—and even then, she was blinking back tears not just from pain but of frustration and self-hatred.
For not fucking being good enough—for never being good enough.
Finally, a shiver down her spine, a tingling warmth cascading across her skin, radiating from the incra scribed above her heart as the spell activated.
She held her hands out in front of her, turning them this way and that.
She could feel the spell—a thin, translucent shield that not only protected her from harsh elements but from objects too, all while allowing her free movement—which coated her like a second skin, but she couldn’t see it at all.
Even her bloodied wound, which still leaked after she’d reopened it to use her blood as ink, dripped freely from the shield. It was such a remarkable and precise spell—it kept everything out, and yet allowed nothing in.
Within a breath, she could no longer feel the cold air that, for the last hour at least, had whisked her body heat away faster than she could produce it.
Within moments, her limbs began to warm, and she could think more clearly—and less harshly about herself. She’d just managed a level-three incra on her body, in the freezing cold, practically naked.
She’d fucking done it!
She allowed herself a moment of joy, jumping in the air and uttering a shout of triumph.
Who cared if she looked ridiculous, hooting and shouting for joy? It was hard to imagine anyone was truly watching her when she was so utterly alone.
Now, to apply the other incras and brave the water before she lost all her nerve.
She could celebrate when she’d won this hellish trial, which, she thought, was way more difficult than the other guilds’, and there was something fucked about that.
The rumors must be true; they were testing Arcane at a different level because they suspected the Heir to be in the Arcane Guild.
Those more skilled at, or suited or drawn to, the arcane arts would have chosen this trial over the others, and by creating more complex, dangerous, and uncomfortable elements, the trial designers were hoping to force the Heir to reveal their hand, or if the Heir were unsuspecting of their true nature, they might be forced to reveal their powers when faced with death by freezing or drowning, whichever came first.
Joke’s on them; their rigorous academic schedule had just given Audra plenty of practice with concealing her true identity. This wouldn’t force her hand.
Now, to scribe the other two incras.
These wouldn’t be as difficult. She made quick work of the level-one incra—one that temporarily strengthened her muscles, increasing speed and dexterity, which would help her get past the breakers and to the glowing object.
The level-two incra was the final component to her plan.
This one was a bit more complicated, but nothing compared to the level-three shield, and she only had to restart it twice before it activated.
Immediately, her vision changed, and she could now see much farther and better in the dark.
She’d never tested this one underwater, and now she wished she had—scribed the incra and taken a bath or something—but she felt like it should help her to see underwater, if she had to dive far to reach the object.
Finally, with all three incras singing on her skin, she refastened the shift’s bodice, just in case, and placed the feathered quill between her teeth, biting down. The pocket on the shift would be useless in the water, and she’d nowhere else to put it.
Audra waded into the sea.
Despite the shield, the water still took her breath away when she dove beneath the crest of the first wave too large to jump over.
It was cold, so damned cold, but this was a temperature she was used to. She pretended this was her cove in Salt Hollow, her beach, and she had nothing to be afraid of.
Unlike her beach, though, the sandbar ended abruptly. One moment she was walking along the sandy bottom, and the next she had slipped off the edge of a steep drop-off.
Audra was a strong swimmer, thankfully, and recovered quickly, fluttering her arms, and with a single kick, she broke the surface. A quick glance back at shore, and she noted that her fortified arms had brought her farther out in less time than she’d ever managed before.
If only she could’ve inked these when she was an adolescent—it wouldn’t have taken her years of training and ice plunging to beat the others back home.
The hardest part was breathing while keeping the quill clenched between her teeth and not inhaling water into her lungs. She just had to get through the rest of the breakers, and it would be smooth swimming from there.
But that was easier said than done.
This wasn’t Salt Hollow, it wasn’t her beach, and the waves had no pattern she could discern.
Swells approached from separate directions at once, at various intervals, and just when she suspected the next wave would break, a wave came from a secret third direction, causing her to mistime the dive.
She found herself swept under, rolled beneath the wave, flailing in the white water, trying to straighten herself out.
Some waves were so vicious, so intense, that when she was forced under, beaten down by a barrage of water, she momentarily lost her bearings and dove down even farther, instead of up toward the surface.
Each time it happened, she almost broke.
The only thing keeping her from turning back toward the shore or panicking altogether were the years she’d spent training to win the races. That, and between sets, she could see the glimmer of the object she was swimming toward, and it bolstered her.
She was so close to being free of the breaking waves and out into open ocean.
Just another few yards and—a wave came out of nowhere, almost seemingly from behind her, from shore, and she was both pummeled down by the force of the crashing behemoth wave and pulled under by a rogue current with no warning.
Her lungs screamed, her mind reeling along with her body, and she didn’t have enough air to blow proper bubbles. Water shot up her nose as the current twisted her like a pretzel, and stinging, salted pain ricocheted through her body.
But after too long, too many moments, the wave relented, and she broke through the surface, hacking and coughing as snot and seawater ran freely from her nose.
Fuck, she’d lost the quill. So much for rescribing any of the incras if she needed to swim back toward shore.
She wasn’t sure she’d even be able to use incramancy while swimming and fighting for her life.
Though she always had her will and her finger …
Mist take them all, it had better not come to that.
This had better be a one-way trip to victory and not a “find the object, swim it back to the beach, survive the breakers again, and haul it all the way up the slippery dune of death” type of task.
That would break her.
But, in spite of that last-ditch effort by the ocean, she made it past the breakers, and as she swam, arm over arm, she had to deal only with the creeping cold as her shield lost its potency and the lightest of swells as the waves made their way toward the beach.
The object was deep, and Audra was exhausted. Her muscles screamed, her legs threatened to cramp, and there was a weak point in her shield because her fucking toes were going numb again.
But she’d made it.
She looked down, treading water, fighting the current to keep position above the glow of victory and salvation. She dove underwater and opened her eyes.
Yep, it was just as deep as the first time she’d checked.
With her heightened eyesight and the glow of the object, she could pretty accurately judge the distance between her and the thing, but it was still too fucking far down for her to swim to it and make it back up again.
She had no doubt she could reach it; the depth would be a feat, her eardrums might burst, but she would make it.
She just didn’t think she’d have enough air remaining to reach the surface again—especially if the object was heavy. Who was she kidding? Not herself. Because even if the object weighed no more than a feather, she wouldn’t make it back up.
But she’d known this was a one-way trip when she’d stepped into the water.
She wouldn’t make it back to shore.
She’d either get the object, be woken from this nightmarish illusion, and pulled back to the academy … or she would die out here.
She retied her braids into as tight a knot as she could manage while treading water and took one last big breath before hinging at the waist and kicking below.
She was powerful, she was strong, she was fast, she could do this.
The pressure didn’t take long to press in on her, starting with her ears. She paused her quick and even strokes long enough to pinch her nose and blow. Her ears popped, and she experienced temporary relief.
Until she didn’t.
Again, she popped her ears.
But the relief was even more short-lived this time.
Farther and farther down she swam; the farther down, the brighter the glow, though she still couldn’t make out the object.
However, she could feel a warmth radiating from it, which helped ease the blinding, incessant pain in her eardrums, her head, and even her throat, oddly enough.
Her arms began to shake, her kicks slowed, even as she urged them faster, faster, she was so close.
Her fingers began to spasm, and she could barely hold them together to help carve through the water—gods, she was in so much pain, and her lungs were close to bursting.
She exhaled a bit more, bubbles clouding around her before floating toward the surface far, so fucking far, above her, but exhaling didn’t help ease the budding panic.
Her mind was screaming for a breath of air. The muscles in her chest began to contract, as though she were breathing, but she clamped her lips closed, knowing that if she opened her mouth, she would inhale water and that would be it.
Not far, not far, warmth radiated now, and the light was so blinding, the small part of her still coherent was beginning to regret heightening her eyesight.
So close, so close, she could almost feel it. Her chest contracted again, along with her abdomen, her mind reeling, screaming for air.
Any moment now, she would lose the fight with her body, and she would gasp in water, pulling it first into her mouth, then her lungs—still, at least she’d heard it was less painful to drown in cold water than warm.
Despite the brightness of the object, the edges of her vision were beginning to darken, and she was panicking so much she was having a hard time swimming down and not turning and fruitlessly heading for the surface—
The blackness crept in; her lungs screamed, her muscles spasmed, and she lost the ability to focus on moving her limbs in sync. All she could think of was not inhaling. Don’t inhale, don’t inhale, please, legs, kick—do as I fucking command, fuckers—