Septimus Heap, Book One_ Magyk - Angie Sage [57]
As Boy 412 sat with the ring, he began to relax. He realized that he was not afraid of the dark, that he felt quite safe, safer in fact than he had felt for years. He was miles away from his tormentors in the Young Army, and he knew that they would never be able to find him here. Boy 412 smiled and leaned back against the wall. He would find a way out, that was for sure.
Boy 412 decided to see if the ring would fit. It was far too big for any of his skinny fingers, so he slipped it onto his right index finger, the biggest finger that he had. Boy 412 turned it around and around, enjoying the feeling of warmth, even heat, which was coming from it. Very soon Boy 412 became aware of a strange sensation. The ring, which felt as if it had come alive, was tightening around his index finger; it now fitted perfectly. Not only that, but it was giving off a faint golden glow.
Boy 412 gazed at the ring in delight, seeing his find for the first time. It was like no ring he had ever seen before. Curled around his finger was a gold dragon, its tail clasped in its mouth. Its emerald-green eyes glinted at him, and Boy 412 had the strangest feeling of being looked at by the dragon itself. Excited, he stood up, holding his right hand out in front of him with his very own ring, his dragon ring, now glowing as brightly as if it were a lantern.
Boy 412 looked around him in the golden light of the ring. He realized that he was at the end of a tunnel. In front of him, sloping down even deeper into the ground, was a narrow, high-sided passageway cut neatly from the rock. Holding his hand high above his head, Boy 412 stared upward into the blackness through which he had fallen, but could see no way of climbing back up. He reluctantly decided that the only thing he could do was follow the tunnel and hope it would lead him to another way out.
And so, holding out the ring, Boy 412 set off. The tunnel’s sandy floor followed a steady downward slope. It twisted and turned this way and that, leading him into dead ends and at times taking him around in circles, until Boy 412 lost all sense of direction and became almost dizzy with confusion. It was as if the person who had built the tunnel was deliberately trying to confuse him. And succeeding.
And that, reckoned Boy 412, was why he fell down the steps.
At the foot of the steps Boy 412 caught his breath. He was all right, he told himself. He hadn’t fallen far. But something was missing—his ring was gone. For the first time since he had been in the tunnel, Boy 412 felt scared. The ring had not only given him light; it had kept him company. It had also, Boy 412 realized as he shivered in the chill, made him feel warm. He looked about him, eyes wide open in the pitch blackness, desperately looking for that faint golden glow.
He could see nothing but black. Nothing. Boy 412 felt desolate. As desolate as he had felt when his best friend, Boy 409, had fallen overboard in a night raid and they had not been allowed to stop to pick him up. Boy 412 put his head in his hands. He felt like giving up.
And then he heard the singing.
A soft, thin, beautiful sound drifted over to him, calling him toward it. On his hands and knees, because he did not want to fall down any more steps just then, Boy 412 inched his way toward the sound, feeling along the cold marble floor as he did so. Steadily, he crawled toward it and the singing became softer and less urgent, until it became strangely muffled, and Boy 412 realized he had his hand over the ring.
He had found it. Or rather, the ring had found him. Grinning happily, Boy 412 slipped the dragon ring back onto his finger, and the darkness around him faded away.
It was easy after that. The ring guided Boy 412 along the tunnel, which had opened