Young Writers Society

Mel was only able to see the the chest at the middle of the lake out of the corner of her eyes. The lighted orb almost faded away as she dropped her concentration for a second to see Aumrauth so casually walking into the water, and she wasn't sure if she should have been surprised or not.

On one hand, the man practically got incinerated. On the other hand, he seemed to be okay with getting incinerated.

She took a deep breath as she continued to concentrate, levitating the light orb closer to Aumrauth so he could see more in front of him. As she moved the orb, they could catch movement that something was approaching him.

"Please don't get eaten," she nonchalantly said out loud as she dropped the orb closer to the water to cast more light in front of him.

"Thanks for the advice!" Aumrauth called back, still shuffling forward as fast as he could manage. But in truth, his body was still just barely mended, and he couldn't move that fast. He didn't want to look at himself in a mirror, because he knew his vanity would make it a tragedy.

Something smooth and rather large brushed against Aumrauth's leg and paused there. A coil looped around his feet, seeming to test his location.

Elias glanced at the others, then down at his impeccable shoes. Well, formerly impeccable. They were a bit scuffed now and covered in cave dust. Still, he did want to preserve them; they'd cost quite a lot. Making up his mind, he bent down and removed first the shoes, then his socks, and moved around the lake until he reached a narrower area. Then he stepped into the water.

Aumrauth decided to strike first with violence.

He brought his dagger down into the water as hard as he could to try and slice down through the coil around his legs.

Whatever had hold of him writhed beneath the water, then released him. Elias was halfway to the little island. There was a moment of stillness, then something rose out of the lake.

It was a pallid white serpent. Not quite a snake--it didn't have any scales and the head shape was all wrong--but a serpent nonetheless. At its widest point, the body was about two feet thick. Needle-like teeth protruded from its gaping maw, and its eyeless head swayed from side to side as it located its prey.
Elias paused to stare at the thing, struck by the sheer ugliness of it. It was like a great bloody worm and smelled twice as bad as the water it had been lurking in. Whatever sadistic bastards had made this place their home, this thing had been in the lake for a good deal longer.
The serpent's nostrils flared, and it seemed to make up its mind, striking with lightning speed at Aumrauth's head. Elias bolted for the island, slipping as the water dragged him backward. He landed with an audible splash and floated face-down, fear-stricken.

Aumrauth wasn't exactly looking forward to getting eaten, as much as the others seemed to now assume offering him up as free lunch was just fine.

He heard a splash behind him (hopefully no one being stupid, but if they were, it was their fault) and he looked ahead to the island just up ahead. He had no idea if it would actually be a safe space or a trap, but at this rate, it was better than the dank water.

He stumbled forward as the serpent's coil writhed away, and he just as he pushed ahead in the water, hands flailing, the serpent's head came down right behind him.

How nice.

He started running as fast as his legs would take him up to dry land.

The serpent crashed after him, hardly shaken by the miss. It was unnaturally speedy in the water, ducking under and looping around his legs right as he came close the the island's shore. This was too close for Elias, who jerked back with a start as the creature's slimy skin brushed his arm.
"God," he hissed, terror in his voice. "God, somebody kill it!"

There was instant chaos.

Mel tried to blind the creature with the light orb, but it appeared to be ineffective, or so she assumed. It was hard to concentrate on keeping lights together and see if a fast-slithering water snake was getting blinded or not.

Giving up, she lost her concentration and their lights returned around their wrists. It seemed that Aumrauth and Elias were struggling, but what was she supposed to do? Chase the creature and hope it didn't eat her? It wasn't like she was immortal.

She heard the anxiety in Elias's voice, and it seeped into her own.

"How?!" she yelled back. "With what weapon?"

It was clear to her that, unless Aumrauth managed to kill it, their best plan was to escape its grasp somehow.

She then glanced over at Ainsley. He never answered her question on whether he had special powers, or could fight, or something. Was it naive to think that he could somehow save them from this random chaos?

"It's always up to me, huh," he muttered, sputtering as he tripped over the serpent's body hidden in the water. He flipped over and sprung back up. The dingy water stung in some of his still-open burn wounds. Add that to the current list of agonizing pains.

"I'm the only one who gets anything done, here, huh," he hissed through his teeth.

As his feet hit sand, he swirled around in time to see that:

1. Mel's light was doing nothing, and it had just gone out.
2. Elias, the doctor, was floundering somewhere out in the water, likely to get killed
3. He was the only one with a weapon, apparently

All of this "looking for a heart" stuff turned into killing monsters and opening chests. This really was just a monster-infested dungeon, huh? But a giant serpent was a bit of a leap from a giant scorpion.

With everything going dark, Aumrauth made the executive decision to be loud.

"Come over here you slimy bastard!" he shouted. "And no, I'm not talking about Elias!"

He backed up so he was knee-deep in the water and braced himself, with his knife ready.

"And for the love of aether, give me a light, Mel!"

The serpent, who had been about to go after Elias as it heard his voice, whipped its head back in the direction of Aumrauth. An awful hissing noise came from its throat, and it reared back to strike again.

Elias, against every one of his instincts, was trying to swim for the island again. He was very close now.

There was a short pause after Raptor finished speaking.

After a moment, Nikolai sighed. "There is no way we can do that, right? We have an axe and... Okay, we don't have much besides an axe." He glanced back at the creature. "I'm certain it's much bigger than what we can see. Something tells me we were lucky to stumble across it while it's sleeping."

Maybe I should be a little less pessimistic.

He was still keeping away from the entrance. Raptor might have bumped into whatever was inside without waking it, but Nikolai was nothing if not cautious. He kept glancing down at his hands, but they always looked normal despite feeling so odd. Maybe he'd bring the strange tingling feeling up when they didn't have to deal with a mystery monster.

Nikolai wanted to get out of here just as much as them, but he didn't have a plan after escape. As far he knew, there was nowhere he could run to. Maybe he could tag along with one of them? He wasn't sure if they'd like the sound of that, so he wasn't counting on it yet. Still, getting out was important, and he knew it wouldn't be easy for them.

They would need to use all their resources wisely, which probably meant he should be opening that bag of his soon. Just in case.

Nikolai took a deep breath.

"Okay. If we want to get past the not-crocodile thing, we need a strategy stronger than just whacking it with an axe. I don't think that's gonna be enough."

At this point, they were just yelling at each other across the water.

"Okay, okay, I am TRYING!" Mel yelled back, and then groaned as she took the light from her wrist and Ainsley's wrist and cast out another orb for them to see better.

She and Ainsley were in the dark, but it beats dying from a sea serpent.

Raptor faltered.

What was he thinking? Nikolai was right. An axe wasn't enough to fight whatever was in front of them right now, and Raptor doubted he'd be able to summon any dem-spirits in a place like this. That would be too easy.

He must have been spending too much time with Dresden and Bartimaeus.

"It's the only strategy we have right now," Raptor relented, "so it would probably be best to look for more supplies and a different potential exit."

Aumrauth only had a few seconds of reaction time.

The serpent turned its head back towards him, drawn by his voice, and Mel finally got a light back up just in time for him to see it headed straight towards him. Moments like these, he wished he had some kind of real weapon, but his dagger would have to do.

The burnt flesh on his knuckles finally started to close over, and he braced himself.

The serpent's head and its needle-like teeth came darting towards him, and at the last second, Aumrauth dodged. As the head came right past him, his dagger caught on its neck, and its own momentum pulled his dagger through. The more it tugged against it, the further he sliced down. Like filleting a fish.

He felt blood and/or something else splatter him, but he held his ground, unfazed.

The serpent shrieked as Aumrauth scored a good twelve inch cut down its neck. The light illuminated a dark blue liquid leaking into the lake. The serpent ducked back under the water.

Elias stumbled onto the island and lay there gasping for a moment, soaked and thoroughly frightened.