Realms of the Arcane - Brian M. Thomsen [26]
The shoreline was pocked with blowholes, caves, and grottoes carved by the relentless pounding of the Shining Sea, and Wiglaf and Sasha retreated from the warm sun and salt air into one of these hidden refuges. Once inside the grotto, they stopped short at the sight before them.
A gentle three-foot falls fed a still pool of crystalline water, perhaps thirty feet in diameter, surrounded by a navigable ledge. As their eyes grew accustomed to the dim light, they carefully stepped farther around the perimeter to a spot where the water level nearly reached the ledge. Wiglaf walked like a balancing artist, arms outspread, feet in single file, as Sasha dipped her hand into the luxurious pool.
"Now this is my kind of magic," she sighed. "It's warm!" She unclasped her sword and slipped into the water. A few powerful strokes took her to the center of the pool. "Ahh, perfect! Come on in, magic man."
As Wiglaf looked up to watch Sasha swim-for who could resist that sight?-his foot caught on an outcrop and he tripped into the pool, executing a perfect belly flop that reverberated through the cavern. Splashing and sputtering, he flailed for a moment, but then Sasha was there, and Wiglaf was in her arms, something he might well have enjoyed under other circumstances, but his pride was at stake-in fact, just now it was burning at the stake.
"Perfect form, o magic one," she snorted as she dragged him through the water to the ledge.
After he finally found a handhold, he blustered, "I'm, uh, a little rusty in the water. It's hard to navigate in this robe. I landed wrong."
Sasha was incredulous. "Wait, wait. You grew up in Calimport, on the ocean, and you can't swim?"
He took a breath to answer, then let it out. His belly was aching from the impact, but the terror was gone, and the water was soft and soothing, so near his body temperature that Wiglaf felt like he was floating in air. The ripples from his splat were subsiding and forming a beautiful shimmering glow just below the water line.
What?
"Sasha, there's something down here!" Wiglaf shouted. There, in the rock at knee level, something definitely glistened in the dark pool. He anchored himself to the ledge and reached underwater with one hand to pry it out, and with some effort slid it free.
It was a bottle, the kind you might use to cast a message into the sea; Wiglaf was barely able to hold it with one hand. He couldn't see clearly through its translucent surface, but something inside continued to twinkle softly. It looked as if the bottle was reflecting bright sunlight as he turned it in his hand. He looked up to find the light source, but no sun shone inside the grotto. He placed it carefully on the ledge and clambered up beside it as Sasha easily pushed out of the pool.
Dripping wet, he held the bottle up before him and reached toward the stopper, but where a cork might normally have been, there was nothing but smooth, sealed glass. In surprise, he jerked his arm back, brushing the bottle out of his other hand. It seemed to hang in midair for an instant, then fell to the rocky ledge and smashed to pieces.
"No!" he screamed. But his distress evaporated when he saw the glowing packet among the shards. Gingerly, he retrieved it and shook off the remaining glass.
It was squared, just larger than a double handful, and solidly packed. A smooth, opaque, milky white material stretched tightly over its contents. Wiglaf noticed that though the back of his hand was still dripping, the packet itself was as dry as a stone in the desert, its surface instantly consuming the moisture off the tips of his fingers as he rubbed. As an experiment, he dipped the tip of the packet into the water and fingered it again. Bone dry, and it left a tiny residue of fine white powder as it again consumed the moisture from his fingertips.
There was clearly something