Our search for the grimoire led us to a beach just outside the city of Little Conberg. Indena had the brilliant inspiration to check around there for a storm drain so we could get into the sewers.

  The ever crashing waves and grains of sand under my feet would have been a comfort if we weren’t looking for a big pipe to run into. The thought of exploring a sewer to find an evil book made me feel so yucky, but few other plans seemed as efficient during our time crunch.

  “You ever been to the beach?” Indena sparked up some small talk as we continued walking along the sandy shore. "I mean, for fun... Not to hunt down pirates in big magic towers."

  I giggled as she reminded me of that recent adventure.

  "Back home in Elysium, Uncle took me swimming at a beach all the time. He’d make me swim all the way to an island and back to get my legs and arms all strong."

  It might have sounded like a grueling process, but I liked swimming, and I was pretty good at it too.

  I had to admit one thing though... The beaches on the surface world were a lot more lovely. The night sky here was beautiful, what with the twin moons shining down on us and the prettiest assortment of stars imaginable to indulge my imagination. I might have had a little bias for space though, since it was a dream of mine to see it.

  “How about you?" I asked, fairly certain she probably has been to one as well.

  “My Priestess Sovereignty used to take us to them too. It’s where I learned how to melt sand into glass.”

  She picked up a clump of sand and lit it hot red with her magic. It melted quickly, then she dipped it in water to cool it. Next thing I knew, she was holding a cool looking glass chunk shaped a little like an hourglass.

  “Woah!” I clapped my hands with cheer.

  “It’s not stardust or anything, but I think it’s the closest I’ll ever get to using that stuff again.”

  Oh, that’s right. She did know how to use it in that dream memory as a kid. Was it possible for her to learn it again? It seemed strange that she just forgot how to do it over time.

  Indena had a thin bandolier with pockets around it. She hid the glass thing in there, then we got back to searching for the pipe.

  “Tell anyone I can do that and I’ll bury you six feet in sand.”

  “I won’t.” I was serious about keeping quiet, but I knew she wouldn’t actually do that to anyone. Still, keeping such a cool ability secret seemed like a waste to me, but oh well.

  "My friend Sasha, she's an earth mage. Part of the reason we trained on a beach was because she needed to learn to use her magic there."

  That probably wasn't a bad place for an earth mage to train. She probably was able to manipulate the sand pretty easily. Well, as easy as any of us could with the proper training.

  "Who's stronger... You, or Sasha?" I asked.

  "Sasha. Her magic is good against mine, and she's a bit bigger then me. But she sacrifices speed for durability and strength. She pretty much become a tank when she powers up. Hit's like one too..."

  Wow, I didn't expect her to flat out admit that.

  "That's pretty humble of you to say," I commented.

  "Nah, I still kick her ass during sparring matches," Indena laughed loudly. "She's got a good thing going for herself, but she's still learning to apply it against someone fast like me. Still, she's no pushover..."

  Her humbleness didn't last quite as long as I was hoping, but I sensed a fun rivalry in her words. She clearly had a fondness for her friend Sasha, and she seemed pretty cool too. Yet another person from Indena's past I wanted to meet.

  "I kinda' want to spar with her," I said.

  "Yeah, she'd love that. You'll probably get along with her better then me..." Indena's lips twisted. "No... Hell no! Nevermind. You're not meeting her!"

  "Huh?" I turned back with a confused look. "Why not? Why'd you change your mind?"

  She took point and marched ahead of me, stomping pretty hard across the sand. "Forget it! Let's just keep looking for the storm drain."

  That was such an odd twist of emotion... Was she jealous I'd make friends with her friend? No way!

  "Tee hee..." I snickered behind her. "You're jealous, aren't you?"

  "Oi, shut it!" Indena barked, blushing. "I said let's keep looking!"

  I continued to tease her a bit. Seeing her so flustered was kinda' adorable.

  ~☆☆☆~

  We ran into an issue while marching up and down the beach... We'd been advised that many storm drains let out around here. But for the life of us, we couldn't locate a single one in the side of the cliff.

  These pipes were normally used to expel water out of the flood tunnels under the city, but the cliffs just past the dunes were completely overgrown, meaning the pipe had to have been hidden somewhere in all that brush. That complication made it very difficult to spot our destination.

  “Hey, let’s look around for immigration,” Indena said.

  If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

  “Excuse me?” What on earth was she talking about?

  “You know. When water flows, it immigrates down and makes a big dip or something.”

  Good Lord. I think the word she was looking for was ‘irrigation.’ And the actual word she was describing was ‘erosion.’ I can’t believe I was the one who needed to correct her. Guess I wasn’t the only one who messed up words around here.

  But she was actually correct regardless of her error. If we looked for where the water caused the land to erode, we’d find the pipe. Sure enough, there was a big dip in the land a few meters down that we followed.

  “I guess the pipe is behind all these plants,” I said, trying to shove around branches to see deeper into the dense brush.

  Indena’s hand lit on fire. “Want me to burn it all away? It’d be quick.”

  “No!”

  That’s the last thing we’d want to do if we wanted to keep a low profile. Plus, animals probably called these overgrown shrubs home.

  “Relax, I was just kidding.” Indena drew a knife and started cutting down some of the branches like we were exploring a jungle. “But we can't do this without cutting something away, so help me out.”

  Now with her less destructive method, I spawned a stardust saw and began to carve away at some of the excess brush alongside her. Slowly we worked our way deeper in until we hit the cliff wall. Luckily, we found the pipe pretty quickly, since that part already seemed scarce of shrubs.

  “Has someone been here recently?” I asked, noticing the clearance seemed like a path. I could almost make out what looked like footprints leading along the cliff side dirt and sand mix.

  “Maybe. Look over there.”

  Some of the bushes had already been cut down. We couldn’t see that from where we were on the beach.

  “You think those mafia guys did this?” Indena asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  I spotted something weird caught on one of the trees. I pulled down a flimsy and weird looking latex glove, but someone glued silver spray painted cardboard where the top of the hand would be on it.

  “What’s up with this?” I asked.

  Indena took a close look, poking her finger around the glove and cardboard for any hints of its purpose. “Looks like part of a costume or something.”

  So, why would it be here then? Did those mafia guys like to dress up?

  Something very strange was afoot, and not just because we found a bunch of spray painted shoes here too... Whatever the reason all these costume items were placed around here, I’m sure the answer would be just as strange, if not stranger.

  Our minds could only come up with so many conclusions before the lack of evidence stumped us. Surely the answer to these things awaited us inside the big storm drain.

  ~☆☆☆~

  As we went deep into the pipe, a clear and rhythmic beat graced our ears, like muffled music funneling down a tunnel.

  A paper taped on the wall offered a possible explanation. I pulled it down and gave it a look.

  The paper said “Welcome to the fourth annual Maho no Dansu. All are welcome. (Please drink responsibly)” I turned to Indena. “I think it’s some kind of dance.”

  “Maho no dansu is Kanai,” Indena nodded. “It means ‘magic dance.’ We’re probably walking into an underground rave.”

  “What’s a rave?” I asked.

  “It’s a thing where punks like me go to dance and do whatever. They’re not as great as they sound.”

  So I could expect a lot of people with bad attitudes and lots of swearing.

  “Why’d they pick a place like this?”

  “The law isn’t watching,” Indena claimed, “and there’s plenty of space. It just makes sense for kids needing to get away from the world.”

  It sounded like bad people could be here too then if the law wasn’t around. Indena made sure to warn me that my suspicion was true, forbidding me from letting go of her hand.

  Not much further down we started to hear the beat of the music far more clearly. This stuff was super poppy, full of energy. If it was making me want to dance now, I wondered how crazy it would be when we got to the actual dance floor. Samael didn't seem happy about it though.

  A big fence appeared at the end of the pipe, which fed into a flood tunnel. All kinds of crazy lights and effects were shining past the little wires, giving me an idea of exactly what a rave looked like.

  A big guy in a suit was guarding the fence gate, probably selectively letting people in.

  “Hold up,” the bouncer held out his hand. “You got the password?”

  “Yeah. It’s eat crap,” Indena said.

  “No one in unless you know the password. Sorry.”

  Dang it. I was surprised he didn’t get mad at what Indena said. But if people like her come here often, maybe he was pretty used to it.

  “So now what?” I asked Indena.

  She pushed me away from the bouncer, just far enough that he wouldn’t hear us talking.

  “Remember that thing you did where Samael could see for you or whatever?”

  Oh yeah. Since I could use my crystal hearts to see and hear, either the main one or the spare ones, I could ask my snake to sneak around and see if we can get the password from someone.

  “We just need to wait for someone to get here who actually knows what it is,” Indena said.

  Lucky for us, a couple in fantasy costumes started walking by.

  Samael snatched up one of my crystal hearts and snuck close enough for the heart to pick up on their words.

  “You got the password?” the bouncer asked the woman leading the way.

  “Yeah.” She leaned in close to his ear. Samael slithered just a pinch closer to hear. “The password is dance all night.”

  He immediately let her and her boyfriend inside. Samael slithered back to us and I made sure to give him a good petting for that one.

  We approached the bouncer again. His brow raised and he tapped his foot.

  “You kids back? Might as well turn around if you don’t know the password.”

  “Bah, we figured it out.” Indena cleared her throat. “Dance all night.”

  “Heh…” he chortled with disbelief, but opened the gate for us. “'Course you two did figure it out... Welcome to the party.”

  -(From left to right) Marek (Shirtless), Chibi Gremlin Cynthia, Indena and Yalda ready to party, Yamin looking at the brightest stars of the night-

  Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed, please support me, Taylor The Writer, here on Royal Road! :)