the rolling pieces of the huge icicle.
“What was that supposed to do again?” Kewyn asked the half-blood.
He frowned, stepping forward and peering at the floor.
“I was sure that would work. Look,” he said, pointing where the icicle had fallen. Besides a shallow crater full of pulverized ice, there was nothing. I shrugged at him and he shook his head. “Below the ice. Look again.”
I squinted and tried to look through the foggy ice. There could be something down there, but all I could see was shadows.
“What is it?” I asked.
“That’s what I’m trying to find out,” Rio said. “Maybe that was a bit too brutish a technique, but at least now that great big thing won’t be making us nervous.”
The half-blood crouched beside the crater, dusting ice out of it before pressing his hand to the ground. I shook my head, chuckling softly. He could have done this originally, but the big icicle had made him nervous.
“There we go,” he murmured happily after a few minutes working melting the ice.
I could now see a metal square of some sort, now free from the ice.
“As exciting as that is,” I muttered sardonically, “I repeat, what is it?”
“Let’s find out,” the half-blood said before he stuck his feet down through the hole he created and stomped on the metal. The square slowly sunk deeper into the floor beneath his weight. There were several, slow clicking sounds.
For a moment, nothing happened. Then, the huge door slowly swung open, throwing snow across the room with a groan. The light that was released into the room was blinding after so long in the darkness.
“See? I’m a genius!” The half-blood cheered, still standing in a now nearly 2-foot deep hole.
“Sure you are,” Kewyn said, walking toward the now open doorway.
The dragon-kin and I followed her, not bothering to wait for the half-blood as he scrambled out of the hole with a curse. As we walked forward into the chamber, we squinted against the light. Rio flipped his eye patch down with a satisfied smile.
The orange light of the setting sun filtering through the thick ice that surrounded us, illuminated and reflected off the frozen moat of water that surrounded the white Manavell statue at the center of the room. The chamber was very reminiscent of