Page 24 of The Arcane God

“He definitely could have swum out under ordinary circumstances, but not if he was unconscious. Didn’t you say you saw him unconscious?” Turner asked, even though he already knew the answer.

“I think so, but I’m not positive,” Ena said, terrified uncertainty palpable in her voice. “I only saw him for half a second.”

“So there’s a chance he did go down here,” Turner admitted reluctantly.

They both knew what the other was thinking. If there was even a chance that Ty had gone down there, then they needed to check, but they couldn’t easily search the narrow canyon without putting their own lives in danger. There were rocky ledges all along the canyon walls that one could climb, but it would be risky.

But could they afford not to even try? There were a hundred places down there in the depths where Ty could be stuck, or trapped.

He hated to say it, he hated to even think it, but even if all they found was a body, they had to know. He had to know. There was no way he could abandon his friend here, and he knew Ena wouldn’t either.

“Okay, here’s what I think we should do,” Turner said decisively. “You’ll tie a rope on that tree there,” he said, pointing to a sturdy-looking pine nearby, “then you’ll lower me down in the canyon.”

“Turner—no. You can’t go down there,” Ena protested.

“Ena, I have to. You can’t do it, and Ty could easily be down there, in Iblis knows what state. It’s our only option. I can climb along the edge of the canyon. There are enough ledges for me to hop across. I’ll keep searching until the river emerges again.”

“That could be miles,” Ena said. “You can’t stay down there indefinitely.”

“Okay,” Turner said, contemplating a different plan. “You’re right. Give me two hours, I’ll go as far as I can, and come back if I get stuck, but at least…at least we’ll know what’s down there.”

Ena seemed unsure, like she was hesitant to lose him too. “Turner, I don’t know. What if something happens to you too?”

“There’s no other alternative. Can you live with not knowing?”

Ena stared down into the canyon, her face exhausted and cut with worry. “No, you’re right. I can’t,” she said, her voice broken with grief. “Search for as long as you can, but please, for the love of Gaia, Turner, be careful.”

Turner nodded, meeting her steel-blue gaze.

Together, they prepped him for the descent, tying their sturdiest rope around his waist and thighs to form a harness, and leveraging the rope across two sturdy trees so Ena could lower him down safely.

Before long, he was standing at the edge of the canyon, ready to descend, when Ena grasped his shoulder, turning him back around.

“Find him, Turner. Please,” she said, her voice cracking with emotion.

Her body felt small and cold in his hands, both of them so saturated with grief and worry for Ty that they’d barely had a second to take stock of themselves or each other.

He squeezed her into him tightly, hugging his friend, both of them drawing strength from one another. “No matter what happens to me, you keep going. Okay, Ena? Find Ty’s mother, find the Omnis worshippers. And keep going.”

Ena paused, not moving or speaking, until eventually, she nodded wordlessly into his shoulder. He released her, and she went to take her place by the tree, ready to feed him the line as he went down.

Nodding to her once he was in position with the rope taut, he took a step backwards into the canyon. Slowly, slowly, he lowered himself into the narrow rocky passage, the waterfall thundering beside him—spraying him and drenching him in icy-cold water within seconds.

The rope seemed to hold, thank fucking Iblis, so he felt less afraid after a few minutes, going steadily down to the nearest ledge. It was covered in snow and rocky debris, but it was sturdy enough when his feet hit it, and he let out a sigh of relief.

“I’m down!” he called as loudly as he could. He felt the rope go slack as Ena released it, and he disentangled himself from his harness. His clothes were soaked and his hands freezing from the water already, but he ignored it and took stock of his surroundings. The water churned menacingly below him. One wrong move and he’d slip into it himself and become as lost as Ty.

He had to keep his shit together.

He crab-walked along the edge, sidestepping and leaping from one plateau to the next. Occasionally, he had to find hand and foot holds in the rock wall of the canyon and climb to bridge the gap, but the surface was bumpy enough that it wasn’t too hard to find them and hold on. He kept an eye out for holes, caves, or eddies in which Ty could be hiding—maybe hurt, maybe too cold to swim or climb out, but alive—but he saw no sign of him.

Before long, the low light of the afternoon started to dim the canyon, but he kept going. It had probably been more than two hours and he needed to head back, but he couldn’t go back to Ena without any sign of him. Without some indication of whether Ty had fallen down here or not. Whether he was alive or not.

At some point, the ledges stopped as the canyon got steeper and dropped again, and Turner had nowhere to go. No spot to climb to—not safely without a rope to lower him more.

A wave of grief hit him, nearly causing his knees to buckle as he realized: this was it. This was the end. He couldn’t go any further.

Iblis, had Ty come down here? Where in the fuck was he? Had he emerged above and they just hadn’t found him? Had he made it out of here somehow?