Crystal took a step back, scanning their surroundings. There was only forward, through the monster, or back to the underground lake. The tunnel wasn't thin, but she also wasn't sure if it would be wide enough for the two to get around the crystal monster. Maybe if she distracted the monster, Torrent would be able to get past it, and find Darkstalker? It was the only plan she had.
She sized up the thing. It was made of the glowing stones, and was much larger than either of the dragons. If it worked though animus magic, she didn't know if it could be killed, and it certainly didn't seem like it could be destroyed. She glanced at Torrent. Could his dagger work on it?
As if to answer her question, Torrent charged forward with a roar, trying to run beneath the creature's underbelly. He stabbed his dagger at a green talon of the crystal dragon, but it screeched ineffectively off the stone. The creature raised the claw and brought it down, Torrent ducking out of the way just in time to avoid being crushed. Apparently, Torrent's allowance of the enchantment on the caves let this thing exist too.
While the creature was focused on Torrent, Crystal had snuck around to its other side. She opened her jaws, and let out a blast of freezing death breath on the side of the creatures neck. After the mist had cleared, she saw that a few of the gemstones on the side of it had started to fissure. "Hit there!" she yelled at Torrent.
The rock creature started to turn to Crystal, and Torrent leaped up onto its back and slammed his tail into its neck, where Crystal had blasted her frostbreath. Stone crumbled onto the floor from where Torrent had hit it, leaving a large round dent in its neck. He had done some damage, but nothing effective. The SeaWing groaned in frustration.
"Get past it while I distract it!" Crystal yelled at Torrent. As the crystal dragon's claws came down, she nimbly evaded them, then let out a second blast of frostbreath.
Torrent hesitated for a moment, unsure if he should go on without Crystal, but he quickly jumped off the back of the crystal dragon, behind it. A few of the gemstones on the ground pulsed bright colors as he ran past, trying to get deeper into the cave. Suddenly, a giant stone tail hurled into him, knocking him into the wall of the cavern with a thud.
Crystal let out another blast of frostbreath while the creature was distracted, dodging beneath it and trying to aim at the base of its tail. "Torrent!" Crystal yelled in alarm. "Get down!"
Torrent's eyes blurred, and he started to stagger as he got up. He'd been slammed into the rock wall, but it felt like nothing had broken. That was good. Hearing Crystal's warning, he saw the giant rock tail of the crystal dragon swinging across the cave, going right towards him. He dizzily dove to the ground beneath it, folding his wings inwards.
As the stone tail hit the wall, Torrent scrambled away. From where Crystal had used her frostbreath on it, it started to crack. With a crash, the crystalline tail fell away from the dragon, crumbling apart on the floor below. Torrent, still wobbly, ran to the other side of the cave to avoid being crushed by the falling rocks.
The crystal dragon quickly positioned itself in between Torrent, Crystal, and the tunnel leading further into the cave. The gemstones on the wall behind it started to pulse black, and more large colorful stones rose up from beneath the cave floor. The stones quickly attached themselves to the crystal dragon, reforming the broken tail. Crystal winced. They'd done nothing. There was no way they could destroy this thing.
Torrent staggered away, still slightly unsure of what had just happened. Crystal gulped, and looked back and forth. If it could follow them, she didn't know how much danger they could be in. "Retreat," she yelled at the SeaWing, who looked at her in confusion. As the crystal dragon started to lumber towards them, Crystal started to run back into the caves, with Torrent following behind.
The two didn't look back until they were back in the cave with the reservoir. When Crystal glanced over her wings, there didn't seem to be anything there. "It didn't follow us," she observed with a frown. She glanced over at the underground lake, as if expecting the crystal dragon to rise out of it at any time. It didn't.
"We need to go back," Torrent said, panting heavily, "you got its tail off, maybe we can defeat it that way."
Crystal shook her head. "Did you see what it was doing?" she asked. "It was guarding the tunnel. It wanted to make sure we couldn't get to the Darkstalker." She glanced around at the surroundings, looking at the crystals. "There's less animus magic here," she hypothesized, "maybe it can't come all the way out here."
"So we could lure it?" Torrent suggested. "Then destroy it after it's drained of animus magic?"
"No," Crystal sighed, "even if it did come out here, which it probably wouldn't, I don't think destroying it would be helpful. You saw it repair itself, if it can do that, the caves might be able to make more of them. And we don't even know how much further the Darkstalker is. If the animus magic is more concentrated the closer we get, who knows what the caves could do. We've seen the caves change positions, for all we know, as soon as we get too close a bunch of spikes will impale us. Going on would be suicide."
Torrent banged a claw against the cave floor. "So what?" he asked in frustration. "We give up?"
"We don't have a choice," Crystal notified. "I don't want to give up either, but there's nothing else we can do. We're not going to get to the Darkstalker in there; we just need to wait until he wakes up."
"We don't know how long that will be," Torrent protested, "it could be tomorrow or a thousand years, or never!"
"I know!" Crystal replied. "Do you think I want this either? I'm just as frustrated as you are."
Torrent took a deep breath. "You're right. I'm sorry, this isn't your fault. I shouldn't be getting angry at you."
Crystal smiled. "It's fine." She glanced back towards the cave they had come from. "Maybe we can't kill him today, but if he ever wakes up, we'll be ready."
"And we're still alive." He looked towards Crystal, and relaxed a bit. "Alright. Let's get out of these caves. Darkstalker can wait."
Crystal looked around them again. The reservoir of water was to their left as they continued backtracking the path they had been on. The glow of light from the colorful gems glinted off the water, creating what looked like vivid stars in the reflection.
When the two reached where Crystal had thought the pit they entered through was, she groaned. Looking up, all that remained was an indented ceiling. It had closen off above them.
"Now what?" Torrent asked, worried. If the cave had shut above them, they could be trapped down here, and they could only survive so long with their limited amount of food.
Crystal turned back to the way they came from. "The cave is guarding the Darkstalker somehow, right?" she asked. "Maybe if the cave knows we've given up, it'll let us leave."
Torrent furrowed his snout. That sounded silly, but he supposed it was possible. "Cave!" he roared, his voice echoing through the chamber. "We gave up, you win! Now let us out!"
He received no response. The cave didn't seem to move at all. Why was he even talking to an enchanted cave? He doubted it had any idea what he was saying. Though, considering Griffin, it was possible. The SeaWing growled threateningly, and waved his dagger in the air. "If you don't let us go, I'll use my dagger to disenchant you! Then all of us will die, Crystal, me, you, and Darkstalker! You like that?" He didn't actually think it would kill Darkstalker, but it was worth a shot.
Still, nothing happened. Torrent paced along the shore of the lake. "Torrent," Crystal suggested, "what it doesn't know language, so it can't understand what you're saying? Maybe if we continue going away from the Darkstalker, instead of towards him, it'll figure out that we're trying to leave."
"We did go away," Torrent muttered, "and we're at a dead end."
Crystal shook her head, and pointed a talon to the underground lake. "We could go that way. We followed your dagger to get here, maybe we could go the opposite way to get out."
Torrent moved his dagger around again. Sure enough, going across the lake would lead directly away from Darkstalker. Maybe it wouldn't work, but it much better idea than just trying to disenchant the caves.
"Alright," he agreed, stepping into the water. He crouched when it got deep enough, laying his wings flat on the surface. His neck was partially turned and submerged, so that both his working gills and his lungs could be used. The water here was frigid, but a SeaWing and an IceWing would have no problems with that. "Climb on."
Crystal carefully stepped onto Torrent, placing her foreclaws on the bony tops of his wings, near Torrent's body. Her hind legs rested on his wing membranes, and she curled her tail to prevent it from dangling into the water. Fortunately, the fin-spines on Torrent's back were not sharp like an IceWing's.
Torrent sunk down a little into the water from Crystal's added weight, but fortunately, he was large enough that he was still able to keep himself afloat by spreading out his wings. Swishing his tail back and forth in the water and using his webbed paws to paddle, he propelled himself forward into to the lake.
The journey across the lake was long and slow, with Torrent and Crystal gently bobbing forward. The lake was still, and there were no waves to be seen except for those that the two dragons made.
"Maybe this was a bad idea," Torrent muttered.
"Going down into the caves?" Crystal asked. "It's not like we knew they were alive."
Torrent shook his head. "I mean, yes, that was a bad idea, but I just meant this in general. Going after animuses."
Crystal thought for a moment, keeping her head still so not to make the swimming any harder for Torrent. "Maybe," she replied, "but we did some good, didn't we? You stopped Adobe and saved Schist, and together we got rid of Gila. He was a crime lord, and with both him and Evergreen gone, that'll be a lot of dragons helped."
"Yeah," Torrent acknowledged with a sigh, "I know. But I killed a dragonet. Did Magma even deserve to die? She was just minding her own business. Same with Sunscorcher, even."
"You knew the risks of letting them live," Crystal notified. "Any one of these dragons could have potentially destroyed Pyrrhia. It's our duty to prevent that, right?"
"I know," Torrent responded, "but I just don't like killing innocent dragonets, and it's not like we even made a difference."
"What do you mean?" Crystal asked. "There can't be that many more animuses, right?"
"There aren't," Torrent answered, "but it's not like killing all the animuses will even get rid of magic. It's spread through families. Enchanted objects will still be out there, and more animuses will be born. I was once told that the MudWings made sure that they didn't have any animus dragons by killing all the sibs of the animus. So what does that mean? If I really want to get rid of magic, I have to kill more innocent dragons, just to prevent something that might not even happen.
"My sister, Orca, was an animus," Torrent reminded Crystal, "that means I'd have to kill every member of my family, including myself. I don't think I can do that, just for the sake of getting rid of magic. That can't be the right thing."
Crystal shook her head, rocking Torrent to the side. "You're right," she finally conceded. "I love you, and I'm not going to let you die for this. If it means risking more animuses, then we'll just have to take that risk."
The two continued on through the placid lake for what felt like an eternity. Finally, Torrent thought he saw something in the distance. A shore, and an end to the underground lake. Torrent regained a burst of energy, and splashed his tail faster. When they finally reached shore, Crystal climbed off of Torrent, and the SeaWing stepped onto the shore.
"Finally!" Crystal breathed a sigh of relief. She stretched her legs and wings out, glad to be off Torrent's uncomfortable back.
Torrent arched his back, feeling a load lighter with Crystal no longer there. He glanced down the path on the edge of the lake, then to the other end. "I don't see anything," he muttered. He tested his dagger again, and the wall they had reached was directly opposite the way Darkstalker was. The cave hadn't opened up an exit for them.
Crystal glanced at his grim face, and closed her eyes in worry. If the cave didn't open for them, she didn't know if they could ever get out. "C'mon, cave!" she yelled. "Let us out!" There was no reply.
Torrent tapped a talon against the wall. Nothing. It was solid. He growled, and paced back and forth for a minute, before letting out a sigh. He looked over at Crystal. "Now what?"
"I don't know." She glanced down to the floor, then back up, into the stone ceiling. "It has to be nighttime outside," she yawned. "Maybe we should just sleep, and hope that we can figure something out in the morning?"
Torrent fidgeted uncomfortably. He didn't want to just leave the matter; he wasn't even sure he could sleep, knowing that there might not be a way out. A quick glance into Crystal's eyes showed she felt the same way. Yet, she was right. He was tired. "Alright," he agreed.
He laid himself on the side of the lake, resting his tail and hindquarters within the chilled water. Crystal crouched down next to him, and curled her body around his, and placed a wing over him, her cold scales touching his own.
It might have been morning when they woke up, but there was no light other than the steady faint glow of the colorful crystals to show it. Torrent slowly rose to his feet, pulling his tail from the water and gently sneaking under Crystal's wing so not to wake her. She woke up anyways, her head perking up.
Torrent glanced around the cave again, then took a step back when he realized that his surroundings had changed. Crystal gave a gasp of surprise. On the shore of the lake, where there had just been the stone wall of the cavern, an upwards-sloping tunnel had now appeared.
"I think the cave answered us," Torrent grinned optimistically.
"Don't be so sure just yet," Crystal replied cautiously. Even so, she looked relieved.
After gathering their small set of belongings, the two set off into the tunnel. The slope was gentle, and at some points, it almost looked like the floor had been made into crude stairs. As the two continued upwards for what felt like hours, the colorful gemstones on the wall slowly shrunk, and started to creep back into the walls. Torrent felt his dagger occasionally. The magic around them was getting weaker; the cave was letting them go.
Torrent looked backwards with a pang of guilt. He was just letting Darkstalker go. The most famed evil animus of all had been right there, and Torrent gave up. Couldn't he have tried harder? Couldn't he have done something else? Was he just a coward?
Yet, he looked back at Crystal, and knew the two of them had made the right decision. Had they stayed down in the caves, one or both them could have died, and all for nothing. Here, they were alive. And they had each other.
As the two got closer to the surface, the tunnel started to expand. At the point where Torrent could no longer see any of the colored gems indicating a suffusion of animus magic, it was now a full-fledged cavern. Fortunately, there were no major offshoots, preventing them from getting lost. It wasn't much longer before the bright light of day hit their eyes.
Torrent turned away, his nightvision having to adjust to the sunlight, but Crystal was used to the bright light of snow blindness. "Look!" she exclaimed, pointing out a claw.
As Torrent's eyes changed to better see his surroundings, he saw what she was pointing towards. His eyes followed her talon, and landed on a peak in the distance, with a smooth field of snow sloping down its sides to another, muted, peak. Agate Mountain. "Wait," he commented, "if that's Agate Mountain . . ."
Crystal poked her head around the side of the cavern entrance. "There's another peak over there," she observed. "I think we're in Jade Mountain."
Torrent's eyes scanned the distance between the two in surprise. Had they actually traveled that far? It seemed possible, but based on how long he was swimming with Crystal, the distance seemed too short. Yet, Crystal had guessed that the cave could warp around space and make distances seem longer or shorter. If that was true, it definitely seemed possible.
Torrent turned back to the cave, and quietly thanked it, receiving a confused look from Crystal. "The cave let us go," he explained.
Crystal shrugged her wings, and turned away, back to Agate Mountain. They had been there so long, it had started to feel like home. "Shall we go?" she asked Torrent.
The SeaWing nodded, and the two spread their wings together, their scales glinting in the bright sun.