Crisanta Knight: The Lost King

CHAPTER 2 THE TEMPLE OF MALBONA-4

“We need to get to that door, but first we need to amp up the light,” Blue said. “Crisa, can you bring something bigger to life to illuminate the entire room?”

“There’s nothing around here for me to enchant,” I responded. “I can’t bring the bricks on the wall to life. It could destabilize the whole temple.”

“Could you enchant the water?”

“I don’t think so. I’d either need to see or touch it and I can’t do either here. If I have no connection to what I’m putting my magic into, I don’t know how to enchant it.”

I studied what I could make out of the column bridge in the glow of my shield. It was narrow and made of stone, but didn’t look very sturdy. Certain sections had disintegrated and it seemed risky to charge ahead with such limited light.

“I think I have an idea for how to light our way,” SJ said, sliding Excalibur back into its sheath. “And I have something for you to enchant.”

SJ opened her potions sack, then closed her eyes and concentrated as she placed her hand inside.

“What are you picturing?” Blue asked.

“The beach by the pier where we came out of the wormhole,” SJ responded softly, as if in a trance. “After we ran out of the tide, we raced up a pretty steep embankment before we reached the main boardwalk. I am trying to focus on a specific spot of sand by a clump of seaweed that I nearly tripped on.”

“Why?” Blue asked.

SJ removed a handful of sand from inside her potions sack. “This is why.” She turned to me and I don’t think I’d ever seen her look so brilliant and devious. I mirrored her grin. Amazing!

I put my hand over hers—touching the sand—and concentrated. It lit up with golden energy and I willed the grains to swarm around the room like a collection of tiny bees.

“Can you get some more?” I asked.

SJ withdrew several more handfuls of sand and we repeated the process until we had a huge swarm of golden, glowing sand. With a wave of my hand, I commanded the sand to stick to the narrow stone column that lay ahead. In the blink of an eye, our path was clear. We had created a glistening bridge in the darkness.

I changed my shield back into a wandpin and clipped it to my bra strap. One by one, we leapt onto the column—careful not to touch any more of the floor bricks—and crossed the expanse with care. The path was never more than a foot and a half wide and followed a steep, downward angle.

When we arrived at the rectangular door, I reached for where I’d assumed a handle would be; only now we noticed the door didn’t have one.

Hm. This had to be an exit; it had hinges and we could see light around the edges. Maybe we had to push it open?

I gave the door a shove, but the moment I touched it the whole thing ignited bright white and the sound we’d been hearing rang through the room. This wasn’t simply a door; it was one massive brick in disguise. While other bricks with symbols on them glowed consistently, this brick’s markings hadn’t lit up until I touched it.

Crud.

“Uh, guys.” SJ and I turned to see Blue pointing down. Now we could see the churning water below. It was glowing a radiant purple and it was rising.

I reached for a stone hinge on the door, hoping to use my magic on it, but the second I touched it I received a very familiar unpleasant swell of dizziness followed by a shock of pain. There were only two things that prevented the use of magic—Jacobee stone and anything coated in Stiltdegarth blood.

I staggered back. “It’s probably Jacobee stone,” I said. “My magic is not going to work.”

“How about your potions, SJ?” Blue asked, glancing at the rising purple swell.

“Not an option,” she responded. “Slime and ice will not help. An explosion could bury us. And if a lightning potion ricocheted off the water, we would be doomed.”

The level of the water lapped at our feet. At the rate it was rising, if we didn’t find a way out soon we would drown here.

“Can you slice through the hinges of the door?” Blue suggested. “Crisa, your wand is magic and can hack through nearly anything. Transform it into a sword.”

“It won’t work,” I replied. “Jacobee stone repels anything magical; I’ve tested my wand on it before.”

“Wait! What about Excalibur?” SJ exclaimed. “It is the most powerful blade in existence. It can cut through anything—even things that are resistant to magic. That is why it will work on Glinda’s memory stone, which means—”

“Maybe it can work on Jacobee stone!” I cried.

SJ handed Excalibur to me. My friends took a few steps back, giving me room. I clutched the hilt with both hands, aimed the sword at the uppermost hinge on the right, then slashed through it as if it were butter.

I repeated the process with the other hinges. Then I returned Excalibur to SJ and gave the door a forceful shove. The stone door reacted with another white flash and a high-pitched sound, but it plowed inward and collapsed on the ground of the room beyond. I fell on top of it.

The new room was like a big corridor, which was well-lit thanks to being covered with glowing bricks from ground to ceiling. But that caused me a great problem. When I toppled in I had instinctively braced myself against the floor. My hand touched the ground and I instantly activated another trap. A high note sounded and a cannon popped out of the ceiling down the hall to my left—spitting out a swirling fireball. SJ leapt onto the door behind me and rapidly sent a silver portable potion to meet it. The potion exploded and created a giant fragment of ice that shielded me from the fire. The fireball melted on impact, producing a big burst of water that soaked us all.

As our SRBs dried us off, we all stood on the fallen door to keep from activating any more bricks. The cannon that had fired waited for us to make our next move. Looking into the room we had come from, I saw the water was now descending. We were safe from that at least.

Our new corridor had a high roof and descended at an angle to my right. Twenty feet down was an intersection connecting to three large arched doorways. To my left was just an empty hall.

Blue studied the vicinity, frowning. “Okay, let’s think this through. This corridor doesn’t look big enough for those snakes to get though, so we only need to watch out for the brick traps. They must be activated by pressure and the lack of true darkness that Joe mentioned. Missing that is definitely what has been causing the temple to turn on us.”

“How does thinking that through help, Blue?” SJ said. “We do not possess true darkness so we cannot get past the traps.”

“Wouldn’t you prefer to understand why this place keeps trying to kill us?”

“I would simply prefer not to get killed.”

“Guys,” I said, holding up my hands. “I have a plan. If we don’t touch the bricks, we don’t activate the traps. So we’re not going to touch the bricks.” I pointed up.

About eight feet overhead, iron bars stretched across the width of the corridor. Several feet above them, nestled on the ceiling itself, more cannons waited to pop out.

“They’re like monkey bars,” I said. “We can swing to the exit.”

SJ narrowed an eyebrow. “And what about those of us who do not spend our free periods at school working out and who have regular human levels of upper body strength?”

I considered. “Easy. Give us your slingshot. When Blue and I get to the other side, you make a run for it and we’ll cover you with the silver potions.”

SJ pouted but acquiesced. “Fine. But hurry.”

“Give us a boost first.”

She sighed and released a silver potion beside us, which exploded into a mini iceberg, its edges clinging to the wall and floor. SJ handed Blue her slingshot and fished out a handful of silver portable potions from her sack. Blue put them in her pocket then staggered, barely catching her balance before tumbling off the door.

“You okay?” I asked, steadying her.

Blue sniffled and shook her head. “Um, yeah. Fine.”

She sounded congested, but before I could ask about it, she took a steadying breath, braced herself, then leapt off the door onto the jagged formation of ice. Quick as a jungle cat, she bounded off the iceberg’s various outcroppings until she was high enough to jump and grab the nearest iron bar. She began to swing. The space between the bars was about a foot, so it was doable but dangerous work that required keeping up momentum.

“She makes it look so easy,” SJ commented as Blue swung from one bar to the next. “Can you do that?”

“Let’s hope so,” I said.

I followed Blue’s lead, launching myself off the iceberg. Thankfully, I could “do that.” I grasped the first iron bar and began to swing across the corridor.

The downward slant of the passage helped, but soon enough my shoulders and hands were aching. If we ever made it to the end of this quest, I’d definitely need a good massage at our school spa or an appointment with a chiropractor.

Ahead of me, Blue swung off the last bar and straight past the threshold of the center archway. She landed within the connecting room, avoiding touching any glowing bricks.

“The floor in this room is marble,” she called back to us. “We’re safe in here.”

When I reached the end of the bars, I followed her example—propelling myself forward with my legs and letting go with my hands when my body was angled toward the archway. I sailed forward, but instead of landing on my toes, I hit heels first and started tipping backward.

Eep!

Blue grabbed my hand and yanked me forward. Then she positioned herself with the slingshot and prepared to cover SJ.

“Okay! Go!” Blue shouted.

SJ sprinted toward us. As expected, every brick she stepped on lit up and created a high-pitched sound. The cannons began to lower and shoot. Blue impeded the fireballs with silver potions until SJ rushed through the arched entrance beside us. A large rush of water splashed us from the cumulative ice that had stopped all the temple’s attempts to roast our friend.

I let out a sigh of relief. Another set of traps avoided.

The space we’d landed in was small and empty. A dozen feet away, a door led to another room. We trod there carefully. I did not trust any surroundings in this temple.

The next room was way grander. The floor was amber again. Meanwhile the rounded walls were composed entirely of glowing bricks. At spots along the otherwise smooth walls, sections of the treacherous brick jutted out, creating steps. As my eyes traced the steps higher, I discovered three things. First, the steps led to several doorways embedded in the upper parts of the wall. Second, this room was at least sixty feet high. And third, a dozen stone cages were built into the ceiling . . . and there were people inside them.