*Retreat!* he signed to the others. *Swim for the open sea!* More than one saw his sign and relayed it. Tails flipped, and the mer fell back before the surging wall of teeth and hooked tentacles.
Chaser flipped his tail and dashed back toward the closer of the two ships. He dove deep to gain enough speed, then arched and flipped hard for the surface right beside its hull. He pierced the shimmering ceiling of the sea, arched over the edge of the ship and landed hard on the deck. He was immediately surrounded by armed and wary sailors, so he signed frantically, but they seemed not to understand. They just gaped at him, their mouths moving, making weak sounds that his sea-attuned ears could barely discern, let alone understand. He settled for the simplest form of sign language: he pointed.
The sailors surged to the side of the ship and stared at the school of writhing myxine below the surface closing on the ship. The big landwalker who seemed to be in charge bellowed something, and everyone scattered. Chaser scrabbled to the rail and stared at the approaching school. He had done his duty and warned the landwalkers. Now he had to survive.
He pulled himself over the side and plunged into the water. Flipping his tail madly, he tried to build up as much speed as possible. Tailwalker had once taught him the trick that had earned his friend his name, and it might just save Chaser’s life if he could pull it off. He was the fastest mer in the school, but was he fast enough? He stripped off his baldric as he swam; it was slowing him down, and he needed every ounce of speed he could muster.
Chaser dashed right at the onrushing myxine, arching up at the last second. He cleared the water’s surface at a shallow angle, and kept flipping his tail as fast as he could, holding his arms down, palms flat to skim the surface. This was Tailwalker’s trick, to skim along the surface like a startled flying fish evading a predator, which was exactly what he hoped to do.
He skimmed over the top of the school of ravenous myxine, touching the water only with his flat palms and the lower fin of his tail. He felt them brushing the tip of his tail in passing, but he was flying so fast that he was past them before they could react. He strained to stay up, to keep going, to clear the entire school before he plunged back into the water. If he fell too soon, they would tear him apart.
He saw a gap, the trailing edge of the school, and dove for it. Hands grasped him, clawed fingers skittering along his scales, but their short arms were weak and he slipped past before they could get a grip. Then he was in open water, past the entrance to the harbor, free…and alone.
Chapter 22
Fire and Water
Everything was going perfectly.
Eelback held the swaddled babe in the crook of his arm, the knife snugged against its throat, and watched the landwalkers bicker in their incomprehensible air speech. The big warrior glared and pointed at Eelback with his ridiculous weapons, but didn’t dare attack. The seamage lowered her head in defeat and answered the warrior. The two landwalkers behind remained quiet, and he paid them little mind. The main contention seemed to be between the seamage and warrior. Undoubtedly he was telling her to use her magic to save the child. But Eelback had warned her that if he felt the slightest twinge of her power, saw the tiniest ripple of water moving at her whim, he would slit her finling’s throat. Eelback would have fluttered his gills in laughter, but the invocation of air-breathing held his gill slits clamped closed.
He grew impatient and slapped his tail against the floor with a splash, snapping the landwalkers’ attention to him. *Enough talk,* he signed to the seamage with his free hand. *You have no choice. Move into the chamber or your finling dies. Now!*
*I will go, Eelback, but first I will say goodbye to my husband.*
*Your husband?* Eelback signed with curiosity. *You are betrothed to Tailwalker.*
*Not anymore!* she signed in agitation. *The mer betrayed me. Why would I ally myself with those I cannot trust?*
Eelback narrowed his eyes at her, suspicion rising in him like a tide. His sight was blurring, his eyes unaccustomed to the dry air. He blinked, but it did no good. *Say goodbye quickly,* he signed, *then enter the chamber.*
*Agreed.* She turned to the big warrior with the wooden leg and spoke, touching his cheek. Their faces pressed together briefly—A curious gesture, he thought—and she turned away. *I will go now, but you will hand my child over when I step into the chamber.*
*Agreed,* he signed. Again, he would have laughed if he could. He fully intended to hand over the child, ensuring the seamage’s cooperation. She couldn’t know, of course, that the child’s fate was already sealed; no landwalker would survive the myxine outside.
The seamage walked toward the chamber, water swirling around her twin tails as she took step after slow step. He glanced at the others to make sure none moved to attack him, but it was the seamage’s magic he feared most. He knew she could kill him in an instant, crush him in the jaws of the sea as she had done to his friend, Sharkbite. But he also knew he would feel such a powerful use of her magic if she did, and he would kill her finling first. He might not be as gifted in sensing Odea’s power as Tailwalker or Broadtail, but he could feel her holding back the sea even now, and would detect it if that changed.
Eelback had always known his plan would succeed. He had known how strongly Seamage Flaxal felt about this, her first and only offspring. He had watched her change as the child grew within her. She had become more guarded, more defensive and, in the end, more easily angered. She feared harm to her child; he had known it then, and he knew it now. That fear had hatched this entire plot, for he knew that this was the only way she would go willingly into the Chamber of Life.
She stopped at the dais, one foot on the first step, and turned to him. *Are you sure you want me to do this, Eelback? You don’t know that Akrotia will live again if I step into the chamber.*
*Akrotia will live, Seamage Flaxal,* he signed. *It is in the scrolls.*
*Then, through the city, I will oppose you. Your school will never reign here.*
Eelback hesitated a moment to consider this. The possibility had occurred to him, but he had studied the scrolls for many seasons, and they never mentioned the seamage exerting his own will after he was joined with the city. It was the other landwalkers who had betrayed the mer. Akrotia and the seamage were one, and they existed only to be Akrotia.
*You will not be able to oppose me, Seamage Flaxal. You will be one with Akrotia, and Akrotia will be one with the mer.* His eyes stung with the dry air, and the seamage’s image grew blurred. He reached down to wet his hand so he could moisten his eyes, but his webbed fingers came up wetted not with water, but with a clear slick substance. The fumes of it stung his eyes even more, and he looked down. On the surface of the water all around him floated a layer of multi-hued, oily liquid.
Before he could move, before he could slit the finling’s throat, before he could even think, the water about him shimmered and burst into flames.
Terror unlike anything Eelback had ever felt surged through every fiber of his being. A tornado of fire roared up his body, the forgotten dagger tumbling from the charring fingers of his hand. He let out a high-pitched squeal and gasped reflexively, gulping air. Pain seared through him as flames crisped his sensitive gills, and he flung himself down into the shallow water, thrashing to cool the burning. The oily substance clung to his body, his hands, his face, his eyes...and the fire feasted on his flesh. All of his life he had been afraid of even the idea of fire, never actually knowing what it was, how it felt. Now he knew, he understood that it was a ravenous living monster that wanted to eat him alive, and that he had been right to be afraid. He thrashed and rolled, but the fire clung to him like a searing shroud until his scales curled and peeled away with the heat. In agony, he tore at his eyes and throat, slapped his sides as the inferno burned away his fins. It tore at him like scorching claws until all he could do was twitch and writhe and pray for death to take him.
>
Akrotia was to be his new beginning; instead, it had become his end.
≈
As Eelback screamed, Cynthia whipped a bubble of seawater up and around her baby, washing him out of Eelback’s grasp and into her own. But even as the sea enfolded the child’s body, she marveled at Edan’s control over the fire he had wrought. True to his word, the flames had not touched her child, but had coursed up the mer in a tight vortex, scorching Eelback’s face, gills, eyes and even the hand that held the dagger. Now, it engulfed the mer in a pyre of yellow-white flames that didn’t stop burning until Eelback was nothing but a thrashing heap of seared scales and flesh. The body sputtered and charred, half on the dais, half in the water, still convulsing in the last throes of agony. She had known Eelback, but she could not feel pity for him. He had taken her child, killed Quickfin, and incited the mer to war. Whatever agony he felt was not enough to atone for the deaths of so many.
Cynthia collapsed onto the stairs and held her son for the first time, enfolding him in her arms like she would never let him go. She rocked his tiny body, so fragile, so cold, his cries like knives in her heart. Mouse crawled out from hiding and patted the baby’s head, tears tracing down his cheeks. She silently thanked Odea for the gifts she had used to save her son. And, she realized, she had to thank Edan.
Before, when she turned away from Feldrin, she had smelled the naphtha, heard the tiny splash as Edan tipped it into the water. She had felt the oily liquid floating atop the water and she had cupped it, urged it over to surround the mer, masking its passage with her sloshing steps. As she turned to Eelback with her final plea, Edan had given her what she could not give herself; the only distraction with the ability to completely seize Eelback’s attention and stay his hand from killing her child.
“It’s all right. It’s all right,” she murmured to her son. She heard Feldrin splash over to the dais, cursing, his wooden leg finding no purchase on the slick stone. Then he was by her side.
“Is he all right, lass? Tell me!” Feldrin begged, his face a mask of worry. “The flames! Tell me he’s not burnt! Not cut!”
“He’s cold and scared, but he’s not hurt.” Cynthia gently freed the baby from the sodden wrappings that swathed him. Less carefully, she jerked open her shirt, sending buttons splashing into the water. “Here you are, my baby. Here you are.” She pressed him to her breast, felt the chill of his tiny little hands clutching at her. Immediately, his cries hushed, replaced by contented mews.
“He’s suckling?” Feldrin asked as he lowered himself to the step beside her. He tore off his shirt, and helped to wrap it around the baby without disturbing his feeding. “But, how… Cyn, it’s been weeks.”
“Before we left Plume Isle, Paska showed me a trick that wet nurses use. It’s uncomfortable, but it kept my milk up.” She grinned at him as the babe suckled noisily. “He’s hungry.”
“It’s a wonder he’s alive after so long in their clutches.” He helped her to her feet.
“Doubtless that’s why Eelback recruited a priestess of Odea,” Ghelfan said. He beamed at her, his thumbs in his sword belt and his calm unruffled.
“Kelpie,” Cynthia said, with a dark memory of the priestess’ betrayal.
Cynthia heard a splash and looked up, then cringed. Edan was pouring another bottle of liquid onto Eelback’s twitching body, which he then ignited with a surge of his power. Noxious black smoke billowed, dimming the soft light of the chamber. Flicker flew in a tight orbit around his head, cheering at the spectacle.
Edan saw her look, and shrugged. “Just making sure.”
Cynthia coughed, half a laugh and half a sob of relief, filled with overwhelming gratitude. These past few weeks, their wills had been as opposed as their magics, and she had treated him none too kindly. Yet Edan had done as she asked, overcome his fear to help her save her child. It was over. A monumental relief flooded through her—body, heart, and soul—and her tears finally began to flow. After all the weeks of holding back, it was as if a dam burst within her. Feldrin put his arm around her, kissed her hair as he gingerly touched his finger to the baby’s cheek. They were a family now.
“Edan,” she said when she could speak without choking up. “You were amazing. Really. Amazing. Thank you.”
“Aye, lad,” Feldrin said. “I guess I misjudged you. You done good here.”
“Does that mean we can go home now?” Edan asked, grinning at them. His face was flushed nearly as red as his hair—a response to using his magics or a blush at the unabashed praise, Cynthia couldn’t tell. She grinned back.
“Just as soon as I can—”
There was a splash by the door, and Cynthia’s heart leapt into her throat, fearing some new mer attack. But no, a boy had emerged from the wall of water that filled the door they had entered through. A sailor, by the looks of him. Cynthia looked more closely, but didn’t recognize the boy on his hands and knees, coughing and sputtering, his clothes sodden and hair matted flat. One of Feldrin’s crew? she wondered.
“What the…” Feldrin took a step toward the bedraggled form, but Ghelfan was closest.
“Are you all right?” the shipwright asked, reaching to help the boy up.
The kneeling figure reached up for Ghelfan’s arm, then flung out a leg to kick the shipwright’s feet out from under him. Ghelfan landed hard, and the boy was on top of him, a knee in the middle of his back before anyone could move. One hand grasped Ghelfan’s flaxen hair and wrenched his head back as the other pressed a black obsidian knife to his throat.
“What the hells?” Feldrin swore.
“One twitch from you, sea witch, and your shipwright friend gets a new smile.” It was a girl atop Ghelfan, with short hair and a rictus grin of pointed teeth.
Cynthia stared, unable to think. Who was this? How did she get here? What did she want? Then she heard Edan stammer a single word, and a horrific realization dawned.
“Samantha?”
≈
The crew grunted, shoving with the oars. Hardwood groaned against coral and Manta moved closer to the edge of the reef. The ship was canted, her port-side hull afloat, the starboard still grounded on the coral.
“Again!” Uag shouted. Once again, they placed the blades of their oars firmly in the coral and pushed. The ship groaned, and they pushed harder. They had been working thus since daylight, chipping away bits of coral with their pikes, prying with their oars and pushing from the deck. All were exhausted, but now the end was in sight. One more shove, and the boat rocked, coral cracked and Manta bobbed free.
“It floats!” Prak shouted, raising her pike and stabbing the air.
“Yes,” Uag agreed, his chest heaving with exertion. “Man oars! Keep us steady! Braf, set your pike in the coral and tie the line to it. We wait here for Capt’n Sam.”
“Why must we wait for that skinny, pale, lying, animal fornicator?” Prak asked, spitting onto the deck at his feet. She remained where she stood, still holding her pike, refusing to man her oar as he had ordered. The other crew watched, tentative, wary. Prak had challenged him before and lost face. Now she confronted Uag with a weapon in her hands; the stakes had been raised from words to blood.
“I told you, Prak,” Uag began, keeping his voice calm. Her pike was longer by an arm-span than the cutlass at his hip. If she was quick, she could gut him before he cleared his blade from its sheath. “Capt’n Sam is the only one who knows how to use the magic glass that tells her where we are and how to get home. If we leave without her, we will never see home again. We will die at sea.”
“Lies! We go north, we find home. Simple!” She glared at him and grinned in challenge. “What did she promise you to make you a coward, Uag? Did she spread her skinny legs for you? Tell us, what is it like to mate with such a bag of bones?”
“She promised to make our people great, Prak. She came here to rescue the wie
lder of fire magic that the seamage is holding prisoner. I have seen him! He will be our ally, and will burn our enemies. Our people will take all of the islands for our own. She tells of a great, wide land where we will feast on the hearts of the pale-skins as their cities burn down around them.” He didn’t dare take his eyes off Prak, but now he directed his words at the others. “Is that not worth waiting for?”
“More lies!” Prak glared at him, advancing until the broad blade of the pike pricked his chest. “She brought us here to die, Uag! She cares nothing for our people. She cares only for herself!”
“Capt’n Sam brought us to the smoking island where we killed many of the flat-tooth people. We took many captives; more than we have taken in many seasons. We will feast on their flesh!”
“We will have no feasting!” Prak argued. “By the time we get back, all the prisoners will be bones and offal. There will be none left for us.”
Uag looked into Prak’s eyes and realized that she would not listen. He tried one more ploy. “You saw her kill Tingo the night we found her. You saw her eat his heart. She is one of us.”
“She is not one of us!” Prak insisted. Furious, she glanced away for an instant, gauging the expressions on the others’ faces.
Uag struck.
He snatched the haft of her pike just behind the blade with his left hand and thrust it aside as he turned in a quick pirouette, drawing his cutlass. He brought the blade around in a flat backhand arc. Steel flashed in the sun, Prak’s head was swept from her shoulders in a single pass. Her body toppled forward, painting his chest in warm blood, a parting gift. Her head bounced to the deck and rolled; her lifeless eyes gazed without sight and her mouth gaped without sound.
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