Igraine gasped. Screams broke out across the deck, and Tenaj turned just in time to see something raise its head, a golden snout breaking through the surface, water sheeting off its rippling skin. It was beautiful and horrible, she thought, a creature cast in transparent, pearlescent gold, with the scales of a fish and eyes as red as rubies.
Another head broke the surface beside it, then another, three of them, huge, mantled necks bulging, glistening. They reared back, sending air whistling past her ears, her hair whipping into her eyes.
The captain was yelling something unintelligible. Ogres were shouting, running. Igraine was the one pushing her now. She bumped into Lyrralt, standing with his back braced against the bulkhead.
“Brace! Brace!” the captain was shouting.
The creatures were surging forward, churning white froth in their wake, their huge blunt heads lowered for battering. She had only a moment to think, to act, before the creatures bashed into the side of the ship. Surely its timbers couldn’t withstand the tremendous blow!
Tenaj threw up her hands, making a shield with every ounce of magical power at her disposal. The monsters’ heads struck the invisible shield with such force that she felt the tremor. One of the heads crashed past and rammed the ship.
The ship rocked with the impact, pitching wildly back and forth. Wood groaned and splintered, threatening to give way. The blow threw Tenaj to the deck. Her head struck the planks. She rolled onto her back, dazed, and saw the sea monsters preparing to ram again.
She pushed to her knees, muttering under her breath the words to another spell, hoping to strengthen it.
An instant later, Igraine was there beside her, and Lyrralt, helping her to stand. Then others, crowding in close, added the strength of their own magic to hers.
The creatures attacked again, coming up hard against the invisible shield. Bugling in fury and frustration, the creature reared back, rising up another fifty feet into the sky, and attacked again. It struck a blow that tossed them all to the decks as if they weighed nothing. The shield shook with the force of the blow, but held.
From behind them, a cheer went up. Anticipating the creatures’ next attack, Tenaj shouted, “Concentrate!” There was another shout as Lyrralt grabbed her. “They’re going!”
A human sailor went running past, and Igraine grabbed him. “What are they?” he demanded.
“Not they. It! A Xocli. It’s trying to feed its young! We’re the food.”
“It’s heading for the other ship,” Tenaj said dully. She ran toward the railing, waving her arms and shouting as she went, hoping to distract the creature.
It sailed past, half submerged. As she reached the end of the deck, she cast a spell with all her might. Something like a thunderbolt sizzled through the air and fell short. She threw fireballs, one, then two, more. They flew through the air, but fell short.
By her side, Igraine also cast a spell, and something hit the water very near the monsters, sending a geyser high into the air.
The Xocli swam on toward the smaller ship.
“There’s no one on that ship with the power to stop it,” Tenaj said, her voice defeated. The ones who were more advanced in magic and spellcasting had sailed together, hoping to spend their time on board learning from each other.
She watched numbly as the creature repeated its performance with the smaller ship, ramming it repeatedly. She saw bodies fall into the water, heard thrashing and screaming, then stillness. On her ship, there was moaning and songs of sorrow.
The smaller ship tipped over on its side, like a toy in a pond. Bodies slid off the deck, scrabbling to hold on. Something beneath the water tore at the Ogres as they hit the water. Still the creature butted its golden heads against the ship. Again and again.
Tenaj tore loose from Igraine and ran back up to the captain. “Go back!” she screamed. She scrambled up the ladder to the upper deck. “Go back! We’ve got to help them!”
“We can’t.” The human met her gaze squarely. “It would sink us, too.”
“Doesn’t matter,” said his second mate gruffly, pointing. “It’s going.”
Tenaj turned. The sea monster was sailing away, gracefully, beautifully, gradually disappearing beneath the water as it moved.
The second ship was still afloat, but listing badly to the right. Starboard, she corrected herself.
As they watched, signal flags slid up the mast. “Taking on water,” the captain translated. “Able to sail, though. Signal them back. We’ll fall in beside. Help out as best we can.”
Tenaj insisted they circle close and check the water for survivors, but she knew it was useless, even as the captain acquiesced.
How many lost?
She went back down the ladder to her place at the bow. The people behind her on deck were subdued now, crying softly, speculating in whispers as to who among their friends and family was lost.
Igraine joined her, then Lyrralt. The sun set. Still she stayed, watching the black water ahead, lit by Solinari so that it sparkled like diamonds. The wind grew colder. The stars came out.
She was still standing there when the lookout shouted. “Land!”
She looked this way and that, then realized it was right in front of her. The blackness she’d taken for starless sky was an island.
A large island.
Igraine and Lyrralt joined her once more, pushing through the Ogres who had crowded up from below deck.
For a moment, Igraine stared at the black finger of land on the horizon. Then he spoke quietly. “We will be called the Irda, Children of the Stars, Watchers of the Darkness. As we have found our way to this place, we will make our own way into the future.” For the first time since Everlyn’s death, he felt hope and peace and a wonderful calmness in his heart.
Khallayne sat for days, silent and uncommunicative. She ate when food was put before her, slept when a slave led her to bed. She shivered when the room was cold, sweated when she sat too near the fire.
She hurt. Her teeth, her skin, her fingers. Her muscles, her eyes. Everything ached, and for days, a sound, even the tiniest one, made her cringe. But she knew all that would pass. Her aches would recede, and her ears would return to normal. She wasn’t so sure about her sanity.
It was all hazy, like an early morning high in the mountains when the clouds haven’t lifted and the air hangs heavily moisture laden and nothing has sharp edges.
“Why are you keeping her alive?” Kaede’s voice, tinged with jealousy, broke through the haze.
“Because it amuses me,” Jyrbian’s voice answered, his despicable voice as smooth as silk.
She watched it all as she would have watched a play, waiting for her heart to wake up and tell her she was alive. The thing that made her look, listen, made her at last return to the world of angry whispers, was a scream, the scream of a dying man.
“So,” a voice said from near the window. “You are going to wake up.” The voice didn’t sound very pleased with the prospect.
Slowly, Khallayne sat up. She spotted Kaede standing at the window, a crystal from Jyrbian’s collection held in her palm.
Bakrell’s death came back to her. “Bakrell…” she choked out.
Kaede put the crystal back onto its bronze stand and turned toward her. “Ummm. I always thought you liked my brother a little more than you let on. No doubt he’s one of Igraine’s most loyal followers by now. He never did anything halfheartedly.”
She didn’t know! Khallayne understood immediately. Jyrbian hadn’t told her. She opened her mouth to tell her, to let the anger and pain come pouring out. But she didn’t. That revelation might be something she could put to good use, later.
With effort, Khallayne pushed her legs over the edge of the bed and pulled herself up. Wobbly and weak, she made her way toward her scant wardrobe. “What does Jyrbian want with me?”
Kaede shrugged, but Jyrbian answered her from the door. He was dressed beautifully in a red uniform,
