by Lux Miller
She hoists herself up beside me. I must say that I’m quite impressed to see that someone as slight and fairy-like as this girl has been able to scale a tree right alongside me. What I’m not thrilled about is the fact the she’s frowning, seemingly perturbed at me about our current situation. “Now what? The tree is literally shredding beneath us. It’s not going to hold much longer. I don’t know about you, but I certainly can’t fly…”
I frown, because though she’s being a bit melodramatic about it, she’s right. Between the beasts chewing at the trunk of the tree and the earth-shaking that’s making the whole world feel like it’s tilting on its axis, this tree’s not going to hold. Certainly not with my two hundred and fifty pounds and probably another hundred or so from her flopping around in its crown like a couple of wet noodles hanging on for dear life.
“Jump!”
Her eyes widen as she gives me that ‘you must be crazy’ look again. I shake my head quickly, snatching hold of her hand and reiterating more desperately, “Now! Jump!”
I’m not really sure if she actually jumps or not, but I certainly do and she comes with me. Whether she jumped of her own volition or if she was dragged from our perch in the canopy of the trees, I may never know, especially if we don’t survive this fall. The tree we just leapt out of topples over to the forest floor with a sickening thud. I breathe a sigh a relief as one of my arms wraps tightly around the trunk of a tree that’s about ten feet shorter than the other, but seems to be holding for now.
Below us, the hounds are in a blind panic, yelping and running in circles as the Earth continues to shift and shake. Now is our chance, but there aren’t many choices of where to go. Judging by the look of sheer, stupefied terror on the girl’s face, I’d say the decision making is going to be up to me. I gather her against my side and take another leap of faith followed by another. We're jumping from tree to tree as the branches and trunks begin to give way one by one under our combined weight.
There’s hardly anything of substance to the last few trees, and I barely stick the final landing. Without any significant branches to catch us as we slide down the trunk, the twigs that are there snap along the way. They slap and scratch us on the entire way down as my leather bindings rip and shred against the unforgiving wood. As my feet hit the ground, I tuck myself into a ball in an effort not to break my legs upon impact, folding myself around the girl as we roll away from the tree. I land in a sprawled position on my back on the rocky surface below, the girl draped across me like a rag doll.
Groaning, I push myself to a sitting position, wincing as I look above and see that the sky has begun to turn brilliant shades of orange and pink. Sunrise. The dangers that lurk in the night will soon give way to a whole new set of foes that prowl in the light of day. And a sharp snarl behind me is a reminder than some predators hunt until they make their kill. Pulling the girl into my lap, I slap at her face gently. “Hey, hey, we gotta move. We’re out of the trees, but we’re not out of danger…”
She groans, shaking her head and snuggling her face into my neck. The warmth of her breath on the skin that’s been exposed by the damaged leather sends a shiver down my spine as I try to focus on the task at hand. “Can you swim?”
The girl nods faintly, but she seems like she’s out of it. I realize with a frown that despite my best attempts to shield her in our fall, she may have still hit her head and suffered a concussion. She loops her arms around my neck, giggling softly, “I’m a child of the Lost Isles… can I swim? You’re funny…”
Okay, so maybe it seems like a silly question when she puts it that way, but I wasn’t even completely sure that’s where she was from. I mean, I was pretty sure, but I wasn’t a hundred percent, oh screw it… I climb to standing, the girl still halfway hanging from my neck as she deliriously mumbles something that isn’t quite coherent.
I whip around quickly when I second growl join the first. Crap! Both of the hellhounds have found us. I may have been able to fight off one if I was armed, but empty-handed and facing two? We’re doomed… I back away from the beasts slowly, knowing good and well that I’m essentially narrowing down my options to one, but she did say she could swim. We’re about to put that to the test because there’s only two ways off this cliff.
I shake her pretty roughly and force her to look at me. “The hounds have found us, we’re going to have to jump.”
Now, I’ve got her attention. The bleary look fades from her face as she finally focuses on me and shakes her head. “Jump? Jump where? You said we’re out of the trees?”
I nod as I grab her hand, backing us further away from the hounds and ever closer to the edge of the cliff. She glances over her shoulder and squeals in panic, gripping my hand so hard that her knuckles are probably turning white. I know my hand certainly feels like it’s losing circulation. If she was daydreaming before, she’s completely awake now as she yells, “You can’t be serious! That’s a hundred feet down!”
I nod, swallowing hard. “Yeah, trust me. I know. But it’s that… or them…”
I motion to the two beasts that’re stalking toward us, closing the distance in record time with every step. The bigger of the two stamps the ground with its paw, baring its teeth as it growls hungrily. The girl looks up at me, at the hounds, then over her shoulder before looking back up at me. “I’ve done a lot of crazy shit in my life, but I swear today takes the cake…”
The bigger of the hounds lunges forward and that’s our cue. We both turn and take off at a full run, leaping as we reach the end of the cliff, our legs and arms flailing as we sail through the air, falling, falling, falling… until finally, we hit the icy water below, our hands still clasped together as we sink beneath the inky surface into the depths of the Atlantic Ocean...
Chapter Three
Nova
The inky darkness of the swirling sea below rushes up to meet me as the Kingsman and I plummet off the cliff. Crossing my ankles to brace for impact, I jerk my left arm in close to my body and cover my mouth. I squeeze my thumb and forefinger together to plug my nose just as the ocean below opens up to swallow us into its icy depths. We sink together like rocks, my right hand enclosed in his left in an absolute death grip as everything around me goes darkly silent. I’ve been swimming since before I could walk. But when our downward descent slows and my eyes pop open underneath the surface of the abyss, a feeling of panic creeps up inside me. We’re so far down, I can’t see a damn thing.
There’s no doubt that I’ve probably spent more time in these waters than the average human. But I’ve never found myself submerged without gear… and certainly never at night without a way to figure out which direction is up. We haven’t been under that long, but I can already feel my lungs starting to burn as I blink rapidly to try to get my bearings. I look over at the Kingsman to see if he’s struggling to orient himself in the murkiness like I am. I admit that I’m relieved when he squeezes my hand in response. He tugs me against himself and begins to propel us through the water in the direction of what feels like up. I silently pray, at least, that it’s up. Whatever it is, it’s as good a shot as any, so I start kicking my feet alongside his, hoping that we break the surface of the water soon.
My chest starts to tighten and the icy tendrils of darkness begin to crowd into the corners of my vision. The Kingsman grabs hold of my waist with both hands roughly. Everything feels like it’s going to implode as I struggle to pull away from him. Try as I might to escape his grip, I’m no match for his strength. He flings me like a rag doll through the swiftly moving current that comes upon us out of nowhere. I’m befuddled as I spin awkwardly in the water, then bob to the surface. I suck in a startled breath as my lungs fill with air instead of the water I was expecting.
Blinking in shock, I glance around quickly, treading the freezing water as I pant. I draw air in and out of my lungs so rapidly that my staccatoed breaths barely have time to puff in front of my face before being obliterated by the next. How did he sense a rip like that when I couldn’t
even figure out which way was up? And where the hell is he?!?
I look this way and that, trying to find a disturbance in the surface of the water that might give an indication of where the Kingsman is. Aside from the telltale ripple across the surface a dozen feet away from me indicating the rip current, the sea is almost glass-like it’s so still. I know he survived the jump, since he just propelled me through that current like it was nothing. Even an experienced aquahunter like Skink would’ve surfaced by now, and I swear he’s got gills! There’s no way that Kingsman could still be underwater… not unless he’s…
Expletives in several languages spew out of my mouth as something massive surfaces from beneath the water right in front of me. The wake pushes me backwards as it splashes up into my face. I spit out the salty seawater with a fresh round of choice words as I glare at the bright green eyes of the Kingsman, illuminated by the first rays of the morning sun. If the look on his face at the moment wasn’t one of near-panic, I’d probably launch myself at him and give a physical lashing with my fists. There’s something about the way he’s staring at me in disbelief that gives me pause.
Spitting out the last of the water, I groan, “Fucking hell, don’t tell me those damn dogs jumped!”
The Kingsman chuckles slightly, the water around us radiating outward in vibrating circles. “Nah, those overgrown mutts can’t swim. They’d have sank like stones. Some might say this is actually worse, though… I guess it all depends on your point of view.”
I narrow my eyes at him, watching him carefully as he swims several yards away from me, heading out to sea. I glance over my shoulder at the shore behind, then at his retreating back. I call after him, “Uhm, I know we got all twisted up and turned around underwater, but the shore is that way.”
He ignores me and continues to gracefully throw one arm over the other as he pulls away from me. He's swimming parallel to the shore as his body slices through the water like he’s part fish. Ha, maybe he really does have gills. Even if I have a great story to tell, I swear… if I ever see Skink again, he’s going to have so much ass-kissing to do to make up for all the hell I’ve been through tonight.
First a psycho Navian chases me down and tries to feed me to his hellhounds. Then a batshit crazy Kingsman, who seems to enjoy tossing me around like a toy, takes me on a wild adventure through the treetops and over the edge of a cliff! It’s been a heck of a night. And I get the feeling that it isn’t anywhere near over. I couldn’t make this kind of story up if I tried.
“Nobody can force you to see things objectively here, Lost Girl. If you go back to shore now, don’t cry foul when that Navian bounty hunter picks up right where he left off. And with one of his hounds dead, you can bet he’s not going to be very forgiving. As far as the sea and the monsters it holds, they haven’t yet awakened. But if you think that current was a natural thing, you’ve got another think coming. Besides, you’re the one who cried Parley. Can’t say I’ve ever seen someone throw down a request for Parley, then turn tail and run like a coward, but to each their own. We’ll be seeing each other again, though… call it a gut feeling...”
I stare after the Kingsman for several moments, then shrug my shoulders and turn toward the shore, shaking my head as I let my body do what it what born to do. Now that I’m not flailing about in an underwater death trap of doom, I can put my strong leg muscles to good use and be to the shore in minutes. Then I’ll dry off and move on with my life. I’ve had enough of the gloom and doom at the hands of men for one night. What I really want is the warm campfire and roasted meat that’ll be sitting heavily in my belly by breakfast. Especially once I hand over that troublesome parcel that Skink sent me after. Which, after everything I went through to get it, instructions be damned, I deserve to see what’s inside it.
I pause on my journey, treading water as I peek once more at the retreating Kingsman, though he isn’t nearly as far away from me as he should be. I lift my trusty pig bladder bag up out of the water and squeeze it to see if I can figure out what’s inside the carefully wrapped parcel that Skink had me steal. My heart skips a beat.
Shaking my head and laughing, I tell myself that surely, I’m being paranoid. There’s no way I dropped it! It’s physically impossible. Tonight’s adventures have admittedly been a bit more rambunctious than my normal adventures, but that bag was a gift from Skink himself. He said it’s a relic of the times when the hordes hunted every corner of the Earth. It's built to withstand and protect its contents against anything nature could throw at it.
Except, apparently, a rogue Kingsman who’s hellbent on making my life a living hell. I whip myself around in the water and stare across the expanse, squinting to see where his form is poking up out of the water some hundred yards away from me. Though the sky is lightening quickly, I can’t see much from here. But I really have no other choice. I don’t even know what I’m risking my life for, but I do know that I can’t go back to see Skink without it. Groaning loudly, I throw my head back and belt out a shrill battle cry that echoes off the cliffs above. I about about-face, kicking my legs furiously in the water as I take off after the form that’s up ahead of me. I hope I can reach him before he disappears beneath the water or otherwise out of sight.
That Kingsman had better hope he’s a faster swimmer than I am, because when I get my hands on him, I’m going to make him sorry he didn’t drown me back there. I might be a thief by trade, but nobody steals from me and gets away with it. I may not know what was in that parcel, but I do know that Skink offered me a month’s worth of rations if I’d bring it to him. And it’s already almost gotten me killed twice. I’m going to get it back or die trying, because without Skink’s generosity, I probably will anyway. If Skink finds out I lost his precious parcel to a Kingsman, he’ll kick me out of the clan for sure and leave me to fend for myself.
Taking off after a man who’s likely shown me mercy up until this point and is probably more dangerous than the Navian could ever hope to be, is probably not the smartest thing I’ve ever done. But nobody’s ever accused me of being smart. Artsy and scrappy, yes… I‘m definitely scrappy.
Those that survive on the Lost Isles are. And we’re proud of it. We’re good at making something out of nothing, so I guess you could say we are smart. We’re just not “scientists saving the world with cures” smart, although that didn’t exactly work out the way it should’ve, so not sure it was the brightest move ever, either.
He pulls away from me easily. I’m panting as my arms strike the water, but I’m not letting him get away. He’s fast, but I know I have it in me to catch him if I can find a way to turn my anger into fuel. Growling to the open water, I curl my arms angrily over my head, digging them into the waves like knives into a fresh kill. I can feel my speed increasing with every stroke. I glance away for a moment, and when I look back to where I last saw his outline against the horizon, he’s gone.
Blinking in disbelief, I shake my head and pause for the briefest of moments, scanning the waves ahead. Narrowing my eyes against the glare of the rising sun, I spot his head pop up just around the bend of the mountain, but that’s not what catches my attention. I shake my head in disbelief as I rub at my eyes furiously, then look again. Standing in sharp contrast to the brilliant blue of the early morning sky is a modest wooden sailing vessel flying no colors. That means it’s either been decommissioned, or it’s under the leadership of pirates.
My mouth drops open in surprise as the Kingsman glides gracefully along the surface of the water. I damn-near have to slap myself silly to refocus my attention on the matter at hand. I reintiate my pursuit of the Kingsman, driving my feet in the water like I’m being chased by something. For all I know, in water this deep and open between the Isles, I probably am.
He maintains course straight for the ship. By the time I’ve closed about half the distance, he’s pulling himself up the side of the ship along a knotted rope that hangs down to the waterline. Even I have to admit that watching the man climb is a sight to behold. He’s obv
iously highly skilled and athletic, considering the bruising torture he’s put his body through in the last hour. Yet he’s still got enough left to haul himself up the side of a large merchant’s ship with nothing but his own sheer strength to pull his weight out of the water.
Once he reaches the top of the rope, he grabs hold of the upper railings and flings himself aboard the vessel. I realize quickly that my chances of catching him are waning. If he pulls anchor before I can get aboard, he’ll be gone with my treasure, and I’ll be left soggy and adrift.