Tide (The Sarah Midnight Trilogy)

by Daniela Sacerdoti

  There was an eerie silence on deck, men standing in clusters, some of them armed, holding onto the rails and waiting for orders. And then Niall started singing, his head to the sky, his eyes closed, the words of his ancient song sounding soft and sweet like a lullaby. Mike blinked – was that a song of war? Because it didn’t sound like it.

  The boat was still undulating violently, but there was nothing to be seen, nothing emerging from the waves. The men were staring at Niall – what was the daft Irishman doing? Singing? At a time like this?

  Suddenly something grey and vast burst out of the water, soaking them all. “Shoot!” screamed the captain and his men let rip with a volley of bullets.

  Niall opened his eyes at once, and the song nearly choked him. He had been trying to soothe and stun the Makara until they were ready, but the men had started shooting too soon. Now the Makara’s tentacles, thick as cables and covered in suction pads, were flailing around in a terrible dance, as the Surari was hit over and over again. Sprays of seawater were everywhere, and screams echoed across the vessel – then those tentacles hit the boat blindly, smashing skulls and breaking bones. Crewmen were falling all around, and the guns were ripped out of their hands, rolling down the deck as the ship tossed in the water and then overboard into the sea.

  Mike watched in horror as a man fell just beside him, hitting his head on the deck with such violence that something white and sticky began pouring out of his ears, immediately washed away by a spray of frothing seawater.

  Mike was thrown backwards against the metal cargo containers piled up in the middle of the deck, his breath knocked out of him. Slowly, he dragged himself back onto his feet, holding onto the handle of a container, trying to remain upright in the chaos. A shout resounded in his ears, above the screams and moans of the hurt crewmen. “Help!”

  It was Anders. He had fallen overboard and was desperately holding onto the handrail, his legs thrashing above the frozen waters – above the mass of tentacles. Mike let go of the handle and made his way, wavering and slipping, towards the rail. He knelt before it, holding onto the bars, and looked into Anders’ terrified face. Mike tried to reach him with the hand that wasn’t holding the gun, but he was just out of reach. Mike attempted once more to take hold of Anders’ hand, as the crewman’s body was thrown around by the roaring sea, but it was no use. In a split second, he made a decision: he let go of the gun.

  The ship undulated again, hit by the waves born under the Makara’s enormous flailing body, and Mike watched the weapon slipping away across the wet deck, away from his grasp and into the sea. Anders’face was contorted with terror.

  “Don’t let me go,” he mouthed.

  “Grab my hands!”

  “I can’t!”

  “You have to!” Mike implored, desperately trying to close his freezing fingers around Anders’ wrists. All around them there was panic, men shouting and bodies falling, but Mike couldn’t hear a thing, he couldn’t see a thing; he was hypnotized by Anders’ frightened eyes, and he couldn’t look away.

  What happened next seemed surreal, like a bad horror film. In a massive effort the Makara lifted itself above the surface of the water and opened its body up in a fan, its tentacles like a huge, dripping crown around the black centre. In the middle of its body, just above the opening that was its mouth, there was a bony beak bigger than a human being.

  The next few seconds were so horrific that Mike could never quite describe what happened. All he knew was that Anders was still holding onto the deck, even without a head. And then his decapitated body fell into the bloody waters and disappeared as the Makara closed its tentacles around him.

  Mike felt his gorge rising as the full horror of what had just happened sank in. He looked around, just in time to see another crewman lifted by a flailing tentacle and thrown against the containers, his chest crushed and smeared against the metal boxes, suspended in the air in a strange crucifixion. And then the man fell in a heap, like a broken doll.

  Mike looked towards Niall. Clearly, guns were nothing against this demon; their only weapon was his song. They had no other hope. Niall was still singing, standing with his arms open and his head thrown back. The tone of the chant had changed; it was cruel, hard, with words that spelled pain and hurt.

  Mike winced as the Makara hit the deck to the left and right of his friend, in a desperate attempt to silence the sound that was hurting it so. By luck, or destiny, or simply because the creature was too damaged to fully control its movements, it kept missing.

  Out of the corner of his eye, Mike saw Captain Young firing the last of his bullets into the creature, barely denting its thick, slippery skin, and then throwing the gun away in fury and despair. A tentacle hovered over him, ready to lower and crush him. Mike could hear a voice shouting.

  “Captain! Move!”

  That voice was his own. He ran, and his movements felt to him slow and frustrating, like trying to run in a dream, but he made it in time, throwing himself onto the captain just a second before the tentacle could crash down and put an end to the man’s life. Mike and Captain Young lay one on top of the other on deck, and their eyes met. Mike saw hatred in the captain’s gaze, and it wasn’t for the Makara: it was directed towards him. The man flung Mike aside violently and stood up.

  “Shut up! Shut up!” Captain Young screamed and leapt on Niall, holding him by the waist and throwing him onto the deck with a thud. The song had been brutally interrupted, and the ship fell instantly and eerily silent. No more screams. There was nobody left to scream. Just silence, but for a deep underwater moan: the Makara wailing in pain.

  “Let him go!” Mike yelled, breaking the silence and throwing himself at the captain. Niall was lying nearly senseless, in shock from having had his song interrupted. His body started convulsing, as he came out of his trance.

  “Niall’s the only chance we have!” growled Mike as he grabbed Captain Young and flung him to the ground and into a puddle of blood and saltwater. Then he lifted Niall up by the shoulders and slapped him softly on the cheek. “Niall! Niall, wake up! Wake up!”

  Niall groaned, his eyes unfocused. “I must … I must sing,” he whispered.

  “Yes. You sing or we’re dead,” said Mike calmly. His words were accompanied by another deep, otherworldly moan coming from the watery depths.

  “Help me,” replied Niall, leaning heavily on Mike. Mike supported him as Niall closed his eyes and started singing again. At first Mike was supporting most of Niall’s weight, but as the song took flight it seemed to carry Niall’s body with it, lifting him upright and throwing his head back once more.

  As the song rose the Makara stirred again, agonized, its tentacles sweeping the deck blindly. Now its grey, thick skin was stained with black blood. With a terrible howl the Makara opened itself up again, its tentacles arranged around its centre like a crown – but now two of them were just stumps, and others were crumpled and bloody. Mike finally allowed himself to hope they had a chance.

  But it took him just a few seconds to understand what the Makara was doing. It wasn’t surrendering. It was trying to open itself up again, to do to them what it had done to Anders. The Surari opened its black mouth, and its deadly beak was ready to strike. Mike knew he had to make a decision, and make it fast. Try to move away and interrupt Niall’s song, or stay put and hope the Makara would miss its target? As his mind struggled to choose, he felt a terrible pain cut through his head. Niall’s song, resounding right beside him, was beginning to hurt him too. It was as if two blades had been inserted in his ears and they were twisting painfully, cutting him inside. He pressed his hands against his ears, and he was not surprised when he saw that his fingers were covered in blood.

  Mike was determined to stand firm in spite of the pain, ready to help Niall if he needed it. There was no way he could interrupt him again. The Makara went to lower its beak to attack, desperate to put an end to the terrible sound that was ripping it apart – but its movements were slow and jerky now, and its huge body fell
sideways, in a splash of foamy water and black blood.

  Mike felt Niall swaying. “It’s nearly finished. Niall, do you hear me? You can do this!” he whispered in Niall’s ear. Niall seemed to hear, because his song rose even higher, roaring like the sea and the wind. Mike moaned in agony and fell on his knees, holding his bleeding ears, while the Makara thrashed and flailed and flung itself from side to side, until finally its movements juddered to a halt and the huge body was still.

  And just in time, because Niall was spent. He doubled over and fell soaked and trembling onto the deck.

  Mike shook his head, trying to get rid of the high-pitched sound that still resounded in his ears. He stood up slowly, slipping once on the wet deck and rising again, head spinning and every bone sore. He looked around him. Niall, drained but alive; Captain Young, standing frozen, leaning against the cargo; one, two …five men lying broken, senseless. The others had disappeared.

  Mike forced his shaking limbs towards the parapet, panting in fear. He wasn’t convinced that the Makara was dead, he expected a tentacle to rise from the waters at any second – followed by that bony beak, ready to take his head off as it had Anders’.

  Step after step, in the surreal silence, Mike reached the rail and wrapped his shaking hands around it. He looked at the waters, now calm and black, with patches of red. The crewmen’s blood.

  And then the eye appeared above the waves, and the mound of its enormous, battered body. Mike let out a gasp and fell backwards, then scrambled to his feet quickly, sliding on the wet deck as he tried to make his way back to Niall as quickly as he could. He had to protect him at all costs.

  “It’s dead!” called a voice. It was Captain Young.

  Mike stopped for a tenth of a second, but he still made his way to Niall, throwing himself over him, ready to take the coming blow.

  “It’s dead!” The captain repeated.

  The blow wasn’t coming. Mike let himself rise slowly and crawled to the rail again. His heartbeat was hammering in his ears.

  The eye was still there – Mike breathed in sharply as he saw it, but stayed where he was. He noticed the white film over it, and how the grey mass rolled and floated, carried by the ebb and flow of the waves.

  Captain Young was right. The Makara was dead.

  And so were most of the crew.

  Even without a crew, the cargo ship was still afloat, together with the giant squid’s body. The waves, gentler again, cradled them both. Mike would have felt compassion, had he not just seen fourteen men being dragged down to their deaths, cut in two by the Makara’s beak, or strangled by its tentacles. Quickly he and Captain Young checked the men lying on the deck, looking for a pulse. Only one was still alive. Captain Young shook uncontrollably, his teeth chattering and his hands covered in the blood of his men.

  He turned to Mike. “Why are you alive?” he whispered in the ghostly silence.

  “You’re in shock,” said Mike kindly, but urgently. “You need to get this boat back to harbour. Any harbour. Now.”

  “I said, why are you – and your friend – still alive?”

  “We have no time for this, understand me? Snap out of it, man! Take us ashore!”

  “We need to get out of here,” Niall reiterated. He was slumped against one of the doors, still white and weak, but recovering. Next to him was the only surviving crewman. A pained moan came from him.

  “Did you hear that, Captain? Your man needs a doctor. Get your ass back inside. We need to go.” Mike took a step towards the bridge.

  “You’re not going anywhere,” the captain answered in a low voice, his face full of despair for his lost men. But there was something else there: fury. He pointed a shaking finger, first at Mike and then at Niall. “It was you who called that thing. With that weird song. I know it. I feel it in my bones.”

  “Captain Young,” Niall began. His voice trailed away. The man was right. It had been them who had called the Makara to the cargo ship, in a way. But Niall couldn’t explain that had it not been for people like them, the sea would be full of Makara – and other things – and there would be no ships sailing safely across any of the world’s oceans.

  “My men are all dead. Or as good as,” he added, gesturing at the injured crewman. “You shouldn’t be alive,” he said calmly, and without warning picked up his gun and pointed it straight at Niall’s chest. Without hesitation, Mike lunged forward, grappling for the firearm.

  It was all so quick, as the sound of shots filled the air. There was blood on the deck and on Niall’s hands as he crouched beside the captain, who lay with his eyes closed.

  “Captain Young! No! Mike, what did you do!”

  “What do you think I did? Look, it’s just a graze.” Mike pulled back the Captain’s jacket to reveal a small wound.

  “He’s unconscious!”

  “He knocked himself out. He’ll be fine. Now, let’s get these men downstairs. Shit, how do you steer a big-ass cargo ship?” Mike ran his hands through his cropped hair.

  “I’ve steered motorboats before, but nothing as big as this. I can try.”

  “Take us ashore. Before another of those big-ass squids comes calling.”

  9

  Listen

  How can we speak

  How can we listen

  If there is no time and place

  For us?

  Sean and Elodie ran all the way to Sarah’s house. They were covered in soil and still reeling from the terrible encounter. Sean kept taking deep breaths, relishing the feeling of air entering his lungs. He opened the wrought-iron gate with his sgian-dubh, and they stepped inside. No locks could keep Sean out. He had ways to get wherever he wanted, leaving no trace of himself.

  Sarah’s bare oak trees whispered a swaying welcome.

  “Come inside,” whispered Sean to Elodie. “I can’t have you out here on your own.”

  “Defenceless?” Elodie finished for him, grinning.

  Sean brushed a smudge of soil off her cheek. “Hardly!” he said, smirking at the thought of how black her lips had been, how painful the Surari’s agony had looked as it died slowly. “But I still don’t want you to be alone.”

  Elodie nodded and followed Sean onto the gravelly path and up the stone steps. Shadow was sitting in front of the door, a still and silent sentry – it was as if she’d known someone was coming. Sean admired the way Shadow came up to him, circling him with her tail tapping the ground, as if she had to defend Sarah – she was infinitely loyal. Shame she wasn’t able to tell friends and enemies apart.

  She looked up at Sean with sheer hatred, refusing to let him by. Sean did what he had so often done before, quickly touching her between her eyes so fast that she couldn’t run away – she was asleep on the stone steps at once. One of the skills he had learnt in Japan, sending any creature to sleep with one touch. Like invisibility, like his runes, one that seemed to come easily to him, almost as natural as breathing.

  Sean and Elodie made their way past Shadow’s still form and into the house. With a brief nod Sean went up the stairs, leaving Elodie standing sentinel against the front door in the darkness, silent and alert.

  Sean stood in the doorway of Sarah’s room, and for a moment the desire to see her was so strong he had to stop himself from barging in, picking her up and holding her in his arms as he used to do. He made himself stop and draw a breath before opening the door slowly.

  Sarah was in a deep sleep. The air was full of her perfume – something between peaches and a darker note, richer. Sarah’s own scent, the unique chemistry of her skin and her breath. Sean knew that scent from the many times she’d been close to him, from the many times he’d been in her room. He breathed it in – it was oxygen to him, the chance to fill his lungs with life again, to fill his heart with her presence.

  He desperately wanted to hold her hands and keep her close to him. He wanted to see her eyes fill with relief when she saw him, as they had when he used to go to her after one of her terrible dreams. But he knew that when she woke
up and saw him standing in her room, it’d be fear, not relief she’d feel – and he braced himself for it.

  He also knew that her eyes, and her hands too, could hurt him badly – which was why he couldn’t wait a second longer, as much as he would have loved to have kept looking at Sarah’s black hair spread on the pillow, a white hand uncurled beside her lovely face, the rhythm of her back rising and falling under the sheet as she breathed in and out, slowly. He couldn’t risk for her to wake up, panic and use the Midnight gaze on him, or touch him with the Blackwater. He did what he had to do.

  Sarah screamed as she felt someone grab both her wrists – she barely had an instant to see Sean’s face over hers, before he covered her eyes. She was blind, and his knee was on her chest, stopping her from filling her lungs – she instinctively started thrashing, trying to free herself, but it was no use. Sean was reeling with the absurdity of it. He was scaring Sarah, he was hurting Sarah. It made no sense. It couldn’t be happening.

  It needs to be done. It needs to be done to save her life. But God, I wish there was another way.

  “Sarah. Sarah, it’s me. You’re safe. It’s Sean …”

  “Let me go!” Sarah struggled, trying to free her hands – she growled, and Sean knew that given half a chance, she’d strike, she’d hurt him. No sign of the vagueness that gripped her when Nicholas was around.

  “Please, Sarah. Please. I need to speak to you,” he whispered.

  “Let me go!”

  “Just listen. Just give me the chance to explain.”

  “Go away!”

  “Sarah, please.” Sean begged again and again, but she wouldn’t stop writhing. He saw no other way but to lean on her with all his weight, waiting for her to exhaust herself and stop. He heard something snapping, a thin, small ripping somewhere – was she hurt? Sarah’s fingers felt hot already. She’s so much quicker in calling her power than she used to be, thought Sean, and for a second he felt proud of her, in spite of the circumstances.