Chapter 15
HEMMING
I watched Ariel tumble backward through the sky and felt the world around me begin to crumble. Instinctively, I launched myself after her, but instead of flying, I dropped like a stone. Eldrien snagged my arm as I cried out for Ariel, who’d disappeared into the chaos of the storm. Unable to support both Shayfer and me, Eldrien dipped lower into the rising whirlpool, the force of it sucking us into its deadly grasp.
The waterspout thrashed against my dangling legs.
Then I felt nothing at all.
A split second later, the three of us crashed down on a sandy shoreline as rain attempted to drown us. I shot to my feet to try and take in our surroundings through the torrential onslaught. “Ariel!” I called as I ran through the darkness, hoping that she had landed somewhere nearby. That she had somehow made it, as we had.
That the fate I feared most hadn’t befallen her.
“ARIIIEEELLLLL!”
“I’m going back to find her,” Shayfer said as he ran up beside me. “Stay here.”
“I’m going with you,” I yelled, grabbing his arm. But despite the tightness of my grip, he ripped away from it with a determination I hadn’t known him to possess.
“This will be precarious enough, flashing about in midair around the area where the boat sank while fighting against this storm. You will only weigh me down and drain my power. Stay here and search with Eldrien. I will be back soon—with our dearest in tow, I pray.” Before I could argue further, he disappeared.
Eldrien soon appeared where Shayfer had just been, concern etched deep in his brow. “I’m going to fly along the coast and see if I can locate her.”
As if the storm were intent on thwarting him, gale-force winds blasted us as we stood exposed on the shore. Sand whipped into our eyes, nearly blinding us as we coughed on the sediment-filled air. Eldrien spread his wings in an attempt to take to the sky, but he was knocked down savagely before he even left the ground. His wings were no match for the winds assailing us.
Wary eyes met mine as he stood beside me, and I knew what that look meant.
If he couldn’t navigate such winds, then Ariel’s luck would likely be no better.
That realization hit the beast and me both, and his deafening cry split the air, dwarfing the storm’s rage with his own. Letting him loose to track her seemed the best plan of action if she’d washed ashore, but with the high winds blowing erratically, scenting her would be nearly impossible. Instead, I stood there in the sand, terrified and useless.
Lightning shot down from the sky, striking the ground not far from where we stood, exploding sand and debris at us.
“We need to find shelter!” Eldrien yelled over the din.
“We need to find Ariel!”
“And Shayfer is out there attempting to, but short of combing the beach while dodging whatever the storm throws at us, there is nothing else we can do.”
I grabbed him by his collar and yanked him toward me. “She is your Aima Kori ! What if she’s hurt? Or drowning? You would just leave her to her fate?”
“I would trade my life for hers to save our people, but dying on this island trying to look for her seems foolish. If she reached the shore, then she is either alive or we can do nothing for her.”
I pushed him away and started down the shoreline. Lightning struck down again, directly in my path.
“ Hemming !” Eldrien shouted after me. “You cannot help her if you’re dead!’
“And I can’t if she’s dead, either. So I’ll take that risk to save her life, because I am her protector, not you.”
“Shayfer will not know where we’ve gone when he returns.”
“Then I guess you should stay behind. I’ll find her on my own.” I turned to face the storm before me. “I will always find her…”
I’d only gone a few paces before Shayfer appeared in front of me, half-drowned and gasping for breath. Leaning on his knees for support, he looked up at me through his hair with empty eyes that told me everything.
He’d found no sign of Ariel.
The haunting roar of the beast rang out once again.
“Listen, Hemming,” he said as he struggled to stand, “this does not mean that she’s gone. And if she’s landed ashore, she has the stone to guide her to us.”
“Unless it was lost,” I countered as I pushed past him.
“So what’s your plan?” he shouted after me.
The beast surged within me, and I knew I was losing the battle to repress him. At that point, I didn’t care who or what saw him. If there was even a chance he could help me track her down, then I’d release him, consequences be damned.
Shayfer’s eyes narrowed as he realized what I had planned. “Can you control it?” he asked.
“Control is no longer my concern.”
Before he could counter my reckless sentiment, I sprinted down the shore into the darkness—and became a darkness all my own.