“It gets worse beyond it,” Engle said. “There are too many.”
“Turn around!” Melda yelled, rushing up to the upper deck. Tor tried, yanking to the side with all of his might. But the current was stronger, and it pushed him back into the path of the rocks.
There had to be something they could do, something they could use. Tor squinted, digging deep inside himself, calling the Night Witch forward.
Help me, he pleaded.
But there was no response.
His hands turned to fists. Just a few more yards and they would be shipwrecked, tangled in the Devil’s Mouth for eternity.
Where were those powers he had supposedly inherited? Where were the gifts the Night Witch had given Tor to help him fight the darkness she promised would come?
Where—
With a crack, the wooden siren carved into the front of the ship animated, its top half breaking free. She looked back at them with sea glass eyes, the ones the blood queen had gifted her. She held a sword, covered in barnacles.
With her head high, the mermaid turned to face the rocks, blade raised. And carved a path through them.
Each monstrous rock the siren struck crumbled into powder. She wielded her sword expertly, slicing through each one that dared block their way, and Tor watched as the great shards of mountain sunk back into the ocean like pieces of broken glass.
She cut each down with long slices, only to turn and slay another.
When they had cleared the wall of rocks, the siren broke completely free and slid silently into the sea. Tor spotted her glimmering tail far ahead, reflecting fractured rainbow beneath the sun, and then the mermaid leapt from the water to cut down the leftover rocks. He navigated the ship easily through the rubble, following the siren like a guiding star.
And as suddenly as the Devil’s Mouth had pulled the ship in, it spit them out.
The current left them in calm, sparkling waters.
“Did she…leave?” Melda said, staring down into the sea. She jumped back with a shout as the siren leapt before her, found its place against the mast, and went still.
“Thank you,” Tor said, unsure if the mermaid could hear him. He turned around, heart still a racing roar in his chest, and watched the maze get farther away. His arms felt heavy and already sore at his sides. At his command, the ropes at his wrists unraveled, and Tor winced as his knees buckled.
“Up ahead,” Engle said.
Tor jerked his head around, fearing another obstacle had entered their path. But there was only a golden line smeared across the horizon. Just a tiny smudge. “Indigo Isle.”
How many had died trying to get to it?
“It’s ridiculously small,” Melda said as they approached.
Indeed, Indigo Isle was smaller than their ship, a single palm tree in its center. Not much more than a sandbar.
They came to a stop before reaching it, the waters too shallow. The moment Tor thought they would need a rowboat, one appeared, tethered to the vessel with rope.
Shoulder to shoulder in the small dinghy, it was a short trip to the isle. The waves were smooth and frothy, and soon Tor’s paddle dug into sand.
“Could they be any more literal?” Engle asked. “I mean, I know they say X marks the spot, but…”
X, did, in fact, mark the spot: a red X of colored sand, right in the palm tree’s shade. Engle shrugged. “Got to love the uncomplicated,” he said, then began using his hands to dig. Tor joined in, then Melda. Vesper spotted a large conch shell a few yards away, with spots along its spiral.
“These are rare and coveted in Swordscale,” she told them as she picked it up.
An hour later, they had a hole almost large enough to climb into, and Vesper was resting against the tree, conch shell in her lap. Tor began to doubt the obviousness of the X, whether it was a trap—or a distraction.
Until his fingers slammed into something solid.
Vesper lifted her head at his gasp. He dug more furiously, fingers finding the edges of something hard and square. Melda and Engle leaned back as he pulled it out and dusted off a golden jewelry box, covered in an ornate seashell pattern. One that might have held a ring or necklace once.
“Well, open it,” Engle said, sand caked into the sweat on his brow.
Tor did.
Vesper sighed from behind his shoulder. “That’s not a compass.”
He gritted his teeth. It wasn’t. Seated on the cushioned bottom of the box was a ripped, yellowed piece of parchment.
So sorry to disappoint—I’ve taken the enchantment. Send my best regards to your very blue hair.
Signed Captain Forecastle.
Engle fell back onto the sand, eyes closing. “You’ve got to be joking.”
“Blue hair?” Vesper said, an eyebrow raised.
Melda shrugged, undeterred. “Well, then, we have to find this Captain Forecastle.”
Engle snorted. “And just how do you expect us to do that?”
She held her head high. “I have an idea.”
Tor didn’t dare ask what this idea was, in fear that the small scrap of hope he still harbored in his chest would shrivel up and burn in the unrelenting sun.
Melda took the note from the box and held it carefully. They rowed back to the ship in silence, Vesper leaping over the side to swim for a few minutes, complaining of the heat. Once aboard, Melda did not waste a moment. She strode across the deck, up the stairs, and to the helm. To the mermaid. She gripped the railing, and leaned dangerously far over it, note in her other hand. Tor watched as she pressed the parchment to the mermaid’s delicate nose as if she were a hound.
Engle whispered, “She doesn’t actually think that will work, does she?”
Tor watched as the mermaid’s head dipped in a silent nod.
And the ship began to move.
* * *
The ship sailed quietly away from Indigo Isle, away from the coast, guided by the mermaid at its helm, who had apparently charted a course to the mysterious Captain Forecastle. For the first few hours, Tor,
