Daja, Briar? Lead the way, Niko said.
At first Daja wasn’t sure of her path, until she remembered all she had to do was drop. The hot springs filled a vast bubble in the ground under Gold Ridge castle. Down she sped through stones, bits of metal, air, more stone, and mineral-soaked ground, until she popped into a huge rock chamber. I started here, she said, looking around. And I left through one of the springs….
That one, Briar told them, directing their attention to it. I saw her go into that one.
Daja led as they raced through water heated far beyond what their bodies could stand. When she felt rising heat, she slowed. There was no grid to save her from the lava this time, nothing to prevent her being melted down. With the instinct of every nail, wire, blade, or strap she had ever forged, she dreaded that immense heat as it loomed nearer.
Tris raced by her.
Don’t! cried Daja. That way’s the lava! You’ll get—
The hot mass rose before them, its volcanic heat beating on their power. Daja shrank back. Tris, still moving, struck it and sank like a hot iron in snow. The others felt bliss drift back from the place where she had entered the molten rock.
Her nature cannot be harmed by it, Niko explained, halting beside Daja. Her magic helps her to mingle with it.
Daja was vexed with herself, resentful of her friend. How could she forget that Tris was at home deep inside the earth? It wasn’t fair! She was the smith-mage, not Tris Chandler—why couldn’t she exist here?
I don’t know about Tris, but my roots are starting to crisp, Briar complained. How can we pass this stuff?
My power has no connection to it—I can pass easily, said Niko. Frostpine?
Out of the miniature sun that was the other man drifted a large, shieldlike plate of white fire. Briar, Daja, get behind this, Frostpine ordered. Daja, remind me, when things are quiet, to teach you how to do this for yourself.
Briar and Daja tucked themselves behind Frostpine’s creation. The moment the shield stood between them and the lava, the awful pressure of that immense heat fell off. They felt its power grow as they advanced, but it was no longer impossible to bear.
Dripping from the vein in the ground, they entered the molten rock. Bubblelike, Frostpine’s shield spread and encircled them. Which way, Daja? the smith-mage asked.
She pointed to an opening overhead, different from the entrance they had used.
Tris, come on! called Niko, drifting freely beside their shield. We have work to do!
They sped toward Daja’s escape route and passed through. Frostpine’s shield evaporated. Now that the dreadful heat was behind them, Daja happily took the lead, speeding through the many cracks in earth and stone. Open air beckoned, and she leaped into it gladly. She was aboveground, and safe.
Frostpine, Briar, Niko, and lastly Tris soared out of the pools of the mountain hot springs, their magical forms pale light-globes to Daja’s vision. The water and boiling mud showed not even a ripple to mark their passage. She watched, fascinated. They were all so strong in this form, but in terms of the physical world, they didn’t really exist.
The glacier valley is through those trees, she told them. Now what?
Now we see if the faults—the cracks in the stone—reach from here to some place well under the glacier, said Niko. Will you help us, you and Frostpine?
She wanted to stay here, in open air. The thought of getting so near to the lava again gave her the shudders.
I can do it, said Frostpine.
Can I help? Briar wanted to know. The tree-roots here run into some of those cracks you want.
That shamed Daja—everyone wanted to work but her. Taking her courage in hand, she followed them back into the ground.
Tris brought up the rear, keeping an eye on the cracks that fed the hot springs and, much farther below, the lava that heated them. How close to the underside of the glacier might the warmth—from molten rock or from boiling water—come?
They soon found a series of cuts in the ground that paralleled the mountains on the eastern side of the glacier. Several came to dead ends. At last they found a deep fault between two gigantic slabs of granite that crossed miles beneath the ice river. It reached back under the mountain hot springs. Niko spread himself through the ground in every direction, then rose up into the glacier ice to see how deep it was.
We must be very careful. So careful that I’m not sure it can be done, he told them at last. If we bring the lava too close to the surface, there’s a chance it can blow through the glacier.
Niko! cried Tris. It’s almost five hundred feet thick up there! And I wouldn’t use a lot of lava!
There are crevasses in that ice, said Niko. Once your lava breaks through into open air, do you really believe you can stop the force in a volcano?
There was nothing Tris could say to that. She had tried to counteract the power of the tides once. After reading about the fate of others who had tried similar experiments, she knew she had gotten off lightly with just a few days in bed.
We must think about this, Niko added. As I mentioned yesterday, we have more than a volcano to worry about. There is the chance of floods and mud slides.
Why did we bother coming, then, if you don’t believe it can be done? Briar demanded. He wanted to find Rosethorn and tell her that tiny plants grew in the ice. He didn’t want to sit here listening to Niko fuss.
Because it can be done, was the stern reply. Are we to have another chat about rushing in with magic?
No, Niko, chorused Briar, Tris, and Daja.
Then start exploring. All five of us should know the ice and ground in this area by heart.