PAGE 11 THE ROOTS ABOVE THE RIVER 🌿

THE BOOK OF TAD
PAGE 11
THE ROOTS ABOVE THE RIVER 🌿

The river surged towards the ledge.

“Back from the edge. Marno, where will it hold? Nibble, where’s the flow going?”

Marno pressed a flipper to the nearest arch. “Here. The ledge beside it won’t.”

Nibble’s detector flickered wildly. “It’s following the violet lights. Something’s guiding it.”

Water struck. TurboTAD fired a short green burst towards the arch. Marno braced against the stone, and Nibble tucked behind them while bubbles tore past.

Below, the lights raced through the drowned pillars.

“We can follow from the sheltered water,” TurboTAD said.

They moved until the darkness opened into an enormous freshwater basin. Roots descended through blue-green light, their pale algae above long grass and drifting silt.

The river entered through Builder arches. One current continued towards the roots; the others dragged sideways into a deep cut across the floor.

Nibble lowered his detector.

“TurboTAD… it isn’t stealing from the nursery.”

“What is it doing?”

“Trying to reach it.”

Marno descended beside the cut and brushed away silt. “Forced inward. Like the conduit.”

The key warmed sharply in TurboTAD’s flipper. Violet lights spiralled down, and Nibble’s detector began to chime—once, twice, then too many times to count.

“Signals,” Nibble whispered. “A lot of them.”

Fresh cracks spread through the stone.

“If that cut widens,” Marno said, looking up, “none of the river will reach the nursery.”

“Then we find what’s widening it.”

A huge shadow passed beneath the basin. Silt lifted, grass flattened, and every violet light turned with it.