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The only source of light for Herrick and his friends came from the torches Maude had lit for them.

She and Gunnar had worked through the day carving torches from the last of the wood they had used for the longboat, soaking cloth in oil and then wrapping it around the top.

When they had crossed the barrier into the Caverns, the torches had flickered but stayed lit, thank the gods.

Every few hundred feet, one of them would place a torch in the dirt to mark the path back out.

They quickly reached a crossroads, the tunnel they were in breaking into two directions.

With no discernible way to decide which route was the correct one, Maude opted for the right, saying that it made more sense to go further inside the Caverns as opposed to skating around the edges.

The path quickly began to descend beneath the earth.

“I think you choose correctly, Maude,” Hakon said from behind him. “My ears are popping from the pressure; how far below the water do you think we are now?”

“The path is flattening,” Maude called over her shoulder, the intensity on her face bringing her features into stark relief in the firelight.

From here, Herrick could see the scar that lined the side of her face, adding to her fierce beauty.

At this moment, she looked exactly as she had the first time Herrick ever laid eyes on her.

The strands of hair that framed her heart-shaped face were a deep red now instead of the dull black she had used to disguise herself, and the concentration in her eyes now focused on their mission instead of him.

Herrick still thought the same thing he had on that night in the fighting pits; she was the most bewitching woman he had ever met, and he would follow her to the ends of this earth.

Feeling his gaze on her, Maude peeked at him over her shoulder. She still had the same anxious look in her eye that she had before he had kissed her on the rocky shore of Ljosa. Herrick gave her a reassuring half smile, his dimple appearing, before she turned back around.

After what felt like hours later, they came to another crossroads. Eydis, this time, suggested their path.

“We should go left this time.” She wrinkled her nose. “The right smells like damp mold. I think it leads to an underwater grotto.”

Herrick slammed a torch into the ground, marking their path, and followed Maude. The path began to incline now, and Herrick knew they had to be getting close. After a few minutes, Maude slowed her pace so she would walk next to him.

“This seems too easy,” she said to him, eyes forward.

He agreed. The stories that came from that man who escaped from the Caverns when his friends did not speak of monsters, pitfalls, and traps.

“Keep a watchful eye open,” he said to her.

“Obviously, Herrick.” Maude rolled her eyes.

Herrick chuckled and motioned for her to keep going. He was about to speak when Maude increased her speed a bit, coming to a near run.

“I see something,” she said, drawing her bowstring back. “A light, up ahead.”

“I see it,” Herrick confirmed, the silver light of the moon beginning to grow brighter .

Soon, they were all running. Gunnar was breathing a little harder than Herrick was used to seeing him do. The morning he had his seizure flashed before him, and he was about to tell Gunnar to take it easy when they entered a large space housed in what looked to be the center of the Knotted Caverns.

The room’s walls were rounded, the only source of illumination being the moonlight and the torches in their grasp.

“Look,” Maude breathed.

Herrick followed her gaze up to the ceiling, where a large, square hole in the ceiling hung above them. It looked like a window, the moonlight streaming through it to illuminate the area.

What had Maude so stunned, however, was that while it looked like a window, it was not open air that hung over them. It was water. They were still below the waterline by about 30 feet. The currents flowed over this square opening and occasionally dripped into the cavern they stood in.

“Something is keeping the water from flooding this space,” Eydis observed. “See?”

She pointed one slender pale arm up to the corner of the square in the ceiling where one could see the rippling of the water clearest. Nothing but air was holding the water out of the cavern.

“That’s not all,” Liv said, her voice grim.

Herrick saw where Liv was looking and understood immediately what the problem was.

Directly below the cut-out in the ceiling that had water being held up by some kind of galder that was unknown to them, an altar stood up from the rocky ground.

And on top of the altar was the dalkr Hela .

Its smooth white blade and black hilt were simpler than he would have expected from a legendary weapon.

Besides the altar that held the weapon, the rest of the room was smooth and empty .

“Fuck,” Hakon whispered, the reality of their problem becoming obvious.

“Yep,” Gunnar agreed, his face gray and sickly.

“If we touch that dagger—” Eydis started, eyes moving to the dalkr Hela lying innocently on the stone.

“Then the barrier will fail, and the water will drown us before we can get out of the Caverns,” Liv finished.

“No one touch anything,” Maude’s order rang out from across the cavern.

She was circling the room, observing the ceiling as well as the dalkr Hela . Maude must not have sensed any danger in the area because she had lowered her bow and held it in one hand. Herrick walked over to where Gunnar was crouched, still breathing heavily.

“What ails you, Gunnar?” Herrick crouched to see his friend eye to eye. “You look like shit.”

Gunnar laughed. “I don’t think being this far below sea level agrees with me.”

He waved a hand and sat on the hard ground, head between his knees.

Eydis noticed Gunnar’s position and started rummaging through her pack. When she found what she was looking for, she kneeled in front of him and extended the object in her hand. A knobby root was sitting in her palm, the strong spice of ginger radiating from it.

“For the nausea,” she said.

Gunnar took it gratefully and gnawed on one end. While his color didn’t much improve, he breathed a little easier now. She sat with Gunnar while they each tried to figure out a way to get a hold of the weapon without triggering the trap in the ceiling.

“What should we do?” Hakon asked as Herrick stood and walked to his brother's side .

“I don’t know,” Herrick said. “But I don't think we can linger here.”

Hakon nodded, scanning the room but seeing the same thing he and Maude seemed to notice. Liv was walking with Maude now, both women bouncing ideas off each other and both agreeing there didn’t seem to be a safe way to grab the dagger without causing the water to drop into the cavern and drown them.

“Are we even sure the barrier holding the ocean water will break once we remove the dagger?” Liv asked Maude, the skepticism in her voice clear.

“I think it would be foolish to try without considering all our options,” Maude replied, eyes on the opening in the ceiling. “It’s not like we can test the theory without drowning ourselves and ruining our one chance at getting the dalkr Hela .”

Herrick knew they needed to come up with a plan before they ran out of time. He prayed that he hadn’t brought his friends to their deaths.

“That is a terrible idea,” Maude groaned as Liv walked her through the latest of her schemes to get the dalkr Hela off the altar.

“Why?” she whined.

“We are not going to build a ladder to climb out of the cavern through the ceiling when the water will be pouring out of it, crushing us all if we tried that route.”

“Well, you haven't come up with any other ideas,” Liv grumbled as she crossed her arms and leaned against one of the far walls.

Maude had come up with something, but she wasn’t sure it would even work. It was simple but had too many variables attached to it. She would have to practice the maneuver she would need to execute a few times before she tried to snag the dagger .

Herrick was circling the cavern and looking up at the hole in the ceiling, trying, as she had, to determine if the water really would rush down to greet them on the removal of the dalkr Hela from its resting place.

They had been in this cavern for an hour now, brainstorming.

Maude didn’t see what other reason there would have been for someone to place a giant hole in the ceiling above the weapon if it wasn't meant to drown whoever attempted to remove the dagger. Rather than sit through another suicidal scheme of Liv’s, Maude stood and walked over to Herrick to try and talk through this plan she had stewing in her brain.

“Hey,” she said softly, reaching his side.

Herrick met her gaze, and she saw the same worry that lay in her own heart. Maybe this was all for nothing.

“Hi,” he said, giving her a brilliant smile.

“Any luck?” Maude looked up at the water rippling over the invisible barrier, which was keeping their deaths at bay for now.

“Nothing, you?” Herrick sighed.

“Maybe something,” she said, meeting his eye again, a sly smile playing around the corner of her mouth. “Will you help me?”

“Hold on, I can do it,” Maude insisted from where she stood across the room from Herrick.

“You’ve tried a million times, minn eldr ,” he called back. “I don’t think this is going to work.”

“One more time,” she said between her teeth.

“Fine,” he agreed and then nodded to Eydis, who was crouched in between them, holding an unlit torch flat on her palm .

When Maude told Herrick about her idea, he began to feel some slight hope for their success. She had said she needed to practice a few times to get the movement right, but that had been forty-five tries ago.

Maude took off at a run toward him, concentrating so hard he thought her head might explode from the pressure. Once she was a few feet from Eydis, he saw her bend her elbows and then straighten them, palms facing the floor, like she was pushing herself off it.