Dragon Knight by Dan Willis

Author:Dan Willis [Willis, Dan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-7869-3735-6
Publisher: Wizards of the Coast Publishing
Published: 2005-07-15T00:00:00+00:00

Karnac and his knights marched Davyn and his friends through another endless series of hallways and down a flight of stairs to a round stone room. A circular iron grate lay in the center of the floor with a hinge on one side and a latch on the other. As soon as they entered, the knights hoisted the heavy grate off the hole beneath.

The pit was full of black water, almost to the top. It was so foul that Davyn couldn’t see the bottom.

“In you get,” Karnac said, prodding Davyn with the tip of his sword.

“How deep is that?” Davyn asked, trying not to jump in until he knew what he was getting into.

Karnac chuckled. “Deep enough.”

The sword prodded Davyn again and he stepped off into the pit. The water was ice cold and hit Davyn like a punch to his stomach. It was barely deeper than Davyn was tall. He was forced to tread water. As soon as the grate was closed, he’d be able to hold himself up—at least until his strength gave out.

“You next, pointy ears.” Karnac pointed his sword at Rina.

“Wait,” Davyn gasped, trying to keep his head above water.

“If you put them in here they will drown.”

Karnac shrugged. “So?”

“So who’s going to dig out the crypt if everyone drowns?” Davyn sputtered.

“We might lose a few of you,” Karnac said, smiling, “but that’s just the way it is. Gurgut’s ordered you in the pit and I’m not going to argue with him right before pudding night.”

Without warning he shoved Rina in beside Davyn. Jirah and Set-ai followed. Set-ai was just tall enough to stand with his face out of the water so he let Jirah cling to him.

“You can’t afford to lose the dwarf,” Davyn said as Karnac moved to put Oddvar in. Davyn knew dwarves didn’t swim well and the water would be well over Oddvar’s head.

“That’s a risk I’ll just have to take.” Karnac grinned, shoving Oddvar on top of Davyn.

Davyn came up sputtering as the heavy grate fell with a clang. He grabbed the bars of the grate and held his head out of the water. Oddvar surfaced a moment later, cursing and flailing. Davyn grabbed the collar of his tunic with his free hand and hauled the dwarf up until he managed to grab the grate.

“I’ll be back for you in the morning.” Karnac grinned down from above. “There’s water if you get thirsty.” Then he leaned down and put his hand over his mouth as if he didn’t want the other knights to hear. “I wouldn’t drink any if I were you,” he whispered loudly, “that water hasn’t been changed in a long time.”

The knights all laughed and Davyn could hear them tramping out of the room. They left a single torch that barely cast enough light into the pit to see. So far his friends were managing all right, holding themselves out of the water by clinging to the grate. Davyn wondered how long they could hold out against the icy cold of the water and the numbing power of fatigue.

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