Page 157 of Of Nine So Bold

“Gwyneira needs us to get through this,” Lars pressed, his voice still low. “She’s our future, brother. So don’t fuck that up over the past.”

He met my eyes firmly. Anyone else would have believed his expression was the calm counterpoint to my simmering fury.

But I could read the pain and anger tightly controlled behind his blue eyes, and more than anything else, that caused my own rage to drain.

Forget childish. I was being selfish. He was struggling with this too, and I wasn’t helping him. “Sorry.”

He nodded, accepting the apology. “Now tell me, what are you picking up on?”

I hesitated.

“I know you, Clay. Something’s up. What is it?”

My heart pounding, I lowered my voice to a whisper. “We’ve got more than aproblemon our hands.”

His eyes turned wary.

“Something went wrong with the water supply. Maybe a collapse inside the mountain or because of that avalanche that took out part of the temple. I don’t know. But after that happened and the magic here started fucking up because no one was around to fix things, it trapped the water.Allof it.”

“Shit,” Lars whispered.

I nodded. “But the water still had to go somewhere, right? So the pressure of the magic pushedwaymore groundwater into the surrounding rock than it could naturally hold.”

My brother looked sick.

“I’m not Oz, but from whatIcan tell, the water weakened the stone around us, and now if we try to draw the water out or fuckingtouchthis rock the wrong way…” I swallowed hard. “The ground will collapse, the tunnels won’t hold, and the destruction could take down everything above us—including the temple.”

Casimir’s head snapped back toward us with shock. Ignatius paused, seeing our reactions even if he hadn’t heard our words, while Ozias didn’t turn, though his shoulders pulled up with tension.

So the big guydidfeel how this place was basically a fucking death trap. Great. Why the hell hadn’thesaid anything?

“Can you do something?” Lars asked me quietly.

Gods, it grated to admit the answer wasfuck no. Not when we were talking about a sinkhole big enough to turn this whole place into a crater.

He saw the truth on my face anyway.

“Do what you can,” he said with a short glance at Dex, as if reading the guy’s mind. After all, the words were probably what our fearless leader would have said too. “And if it comes down toit, you focus on a way to stop it from hurting Gwyneira and the folks above us. Nothing else. Okay?”

My mouth tightened, everything in me fighting what I knew I had to say.

“Clay?”

“Yeah, okay.”

Gods, that hurt. So did the way he nodded.

But not as much as the way I knew he was right. Gwyneira was up there. Roan and Niko too, and they’d be on board with this. There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that they would.

We’d all sacrificed for each other over the years. And gods, we’d do anything for her.

Even drown if it meant our treluria survived.

41

LARS

Imay not have said them out loud, but right now, the litany of curses running through my head would have put my brother to shame.

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