Eighth Circle

A tremendous explosion lit the morning sky.

Allain tensed and Bryn shuddered. Neither spoke.

Liala felt their agony.

The guardians had taken out their village.

They knew it was coming but it was no easier to take. A drone had flown in and dropped an air bomb. That was what the guardians did when they didn't like what you were doing.

Allain had explained the principle. He said a gigantic canister of highly combustible gases would descend on a parachute and discharged its contents above its target area. The resulting gas cloud would then be ignited and everything below would be incinerated.

The good news was that the village had been evacuated and the villagers taken to safety. That wouldn't stop the guardians from going out and hunting them for sport. Their deaths would be blamed on monsters that were said to roam the moors and other wilderness areas.

Allain said the monsters were real enough but not the result of mutations caused by radiation as the guardians claimed. The guardians were the monsters and they bred monsters called trolls.

***

There was no sign of the dolphins when they entered the cave. Liala guessed that her friends had retreated into the maze of passages that led off from the main chamber. They could survive there for a long time, eating fish and fighting off any orcas that dared go after them.

She sat with her feet in the water and began to sing. If the dolphins didn't hear her they would catch her scent. They would smell the presence of a human being in their sanctuary and know who it was. But, that didn't mean they would dash out to greet her. Dolphins were cautious animals by nature.

A long time passed before anything happened. Then she sensed their presence. She couldn't see or hear them but she knew they were there. Something told her that they were close and were talking about her. Perhaps it was the high-pitched noises they made when they whispered. They were too high for the human ear but resonated through your whole body if you were attuned to them.

They had not summoned up courage to return to the main chamber. It was vast and could be entered from land as well as from the sea. In shape, it reminded Liala of a gigantic mushroom with a jagged roof and a pool below. There were numerous places where danger could lurk.

Allain flicked his flashlight over the water.

'There's no sign of them.'

'Be patient, Allain.'

'You said they would be here.'

'They would have left the pool when they heard us coming,' Liala explained. 'They are sea creatures. They become anxious when their sanctuary is invaded from land. They would have sought refuge down the passages.'