Chapter 23
Reva
Well, fuck.
I barely know what to do with myself. Not while there are so many thoughts and sensations zinging through me. And most of them don’t even belong to me.
It worked. I can tell that, even without slipping on my skin. Because I can hear Noush. She’s back.
You’re welcome.
I can hear her all the time now, and not just while I’m wearing her skin and we’re sharing a body.
Well, that’s going to be fun.
I can’t mind too much because I have missed her.
The great, ragged hole in my chest is gone, and while I feel a bedraggled mess right now, it’s the kind of mess that’ll be fixed by a good night’s sleep.
It’s a different feeling from the bone-deep fatigue that even endless sleep would do nothing to fix.
I fixed us, so we never have to be separated again, Noush tells me.
Uh huh. And the mate bonds? Tying us to every male in the vicinity? I pause as a terrible thought hits me. It is just these five, right? Because Frannie specifically told me she had no desire to be our mate and I don’t see her that way, nor do I see the rest of the crew either—
Calm down. It’s just the males here. She pauses for a moment, and I can just imagine her throwing her head back coquettishly. You’re welcome.
I roll my eyes at her. Everything is such a mess that I don’t have time to argue it’s not a good thing to force a mate bond onto people. How she managed to do that, I have no idea. And whether it’s something we can undo is something I’ll have to worry about later.
It’s not, she huffs.
Please, please just shut up talking for one moment and let me think.
She huffs again, but actually does as I ask for once. Probably because despite her insistence that this is a good thing, she’s also aware that we have a dozen other issues currently battling for top spot.
Like, where is Torin? And why is there a blinding column of light shooting right up to the ceiling?
I really hope it ends at the roof, or we’re going to have a lot of grumpy crewmembers woken up, because the light is absolutely dazzling.
What are you talking about? Noush interrupts my train of thought, unable to stay silent for long. Torin’s right there.
My view of the room isn’t great, on account of the light that forces my eyes away every time I glance anywhere close to it. I can just make out Kit and Jack, who seem to be locked in an argument that’s being hissed under their breaths. Captain Finch is inspecting the light source. And Torin—
Is nowhere.
I know you don’t have eyes or a head right now, but Torin seriously isn’t here. I head toward the door. Maybe he got blasted out of the room when we all got thrown backward.
I can feel him, she replies. He’s right there. Focus on your connection.
But my chest is just as messy as the rest of me. Odd feelings that don’t belong to me keep flitting through and fading before I can even identify them.
He’s there, she insists.
And then Jack stumbles sideways with a, “Hey, what the—”
“You idiot,” Torin’s voice grumbles.
He’s definitely here somewhere. He’s just... invisible.
I don’t get a chance to try to pinpoint his location, though, as there’s a hammering of footsteps, followed by Bones and Dagger barreling into the room.
A low-pitched growl vibrates through the air, followed by a guttural snarl. Everyone freezes, turning to look at me.
Which is the moment I realise that my throat and chest are vibrating with the horrible, animalistic sound.
Oh Mother Ocean, I’m growling.
They’re naked. Don’t let them see what’s ours.
So, not only is Noush back, but she’s also decided she’s territorial.
“Sorry, sweetheart,” Kit says, grabbing the pile of blankets and tossing them around the room.
So it seems like Noush’s latest communication wasn’t just with me, which means they all got to hear just how crazy she is.
How fantastic.
I fight to stifle the sound, but it keeps on coming out of me until all the men are covered up and my cheeks are burning.
“Cap, we have a situation,” Bones says, barely sparing a glance at me.
“All the wards have been shattered,” Dagger adds. “There was a massive wave of power that hit every one of them at once. Disintegrated all of them.”
“That’s not all. Your, er, beacon here is blasting right up as far as your eye can see. Kilter reckons it can be seen for miles around.”
“Damn.” Kit steps forward, glancing at Aster. “Think you can get the wards back up and running before anyone notices?”
“There’s more,” Bones blurts, shifting from foot to foot nervously. “Lights spotted on the horizon. Looks like a whole fleet of ships is headed this way.”
“They know we’re here.”
“That’s not possible,” Kit sputters. He glances over his shoulder to meet Finch’s eye, giving a slight headshake.
“Right. Clothes on, everyone. We need to find out what’s going on and be ready to move if needed,” Finch says. “Sound the alarm. Wake everyone who’s slept through the appearance of this.” One tentacle gestures to the beaming shaft of light that’s still blasting through the centre of the room.
The room’s then a flurry of movement as we scramble for clothing.
I ram my feet into my boots and shove my dress over my head.
I’m disgusting and could really do with a bath or shower since, despite the effort Torin went to cleaning me up, I still sweated a lot and my hair feels like a matted mess on top of my head.
“Are you all right?” Aster asks me quietly as he yanks his trousers up. All the candles have blown out by this point and the room looks like a destructive wind has come through and wrecked the place.
“That was a lot more powerful than I was expecting,” he continues, shooting an anxious look at the shaft of blinding light before he has to turn his face away.
“It worked though,” I tell him, squeezing his hand. “For me, at least. And I couldn’t be more grateful, even if there were a few unexpected hitches in the plan.” Reaching up on my toes, I press a kiss to his cheek, tasting the remnants of salt there. “Thank you.”
A flutter of pleasure zips through my chest before fading just as quickly as it appeared. I rub at my chest, zeroing in on the blush forming across Aster’s cheeks.
“We need to get a move on,” Torin rumbles. His voice is right behind me, and I suck in a sharp breath, peering over my shoulder to find him.
But if he’s here, he’s still entirely invisible.
“Torin?” I reach out a hand in the vague direction his voice came from. “Are you... there?”
A warm hand squeezes mine, and then I’m crushed against a giant, invisible chest. Sucking in the scent of ginger and cinnamon that’s uniquely him, I let out a shuddering breath.
“What is happening to you?”
“I’m here,” he replies. “Still all in one piece, even if you can’t see me.”
A sharp whistle pierces the air from outside, one that sounds a lot like the warning sounds to say the ship is under attack.
“Shit. Shit. Shit.”
Torin grunts, his hand going to the small of my back, ushering me to the door. “No time. If they reach the island, we’re like sitting ducks stuck here. We need to get back to the ship. Grab anything you can’t be without.”
Aster grabs his boots in one hand and my fingers with the other before heading for the door, and I fight the urge to smile. Apparently, I’m something he can’t be without. Although I don’t think he’s at all aware of what he’s doing, and that makes it even sweeter.
The world outside is even more chaotic. It’s still the middle of the night, but the shaft of light is shooting up right through the roof of the house and is lighting up the entire island.
There are crew running all over the place, heaving belongings over their shoulder.
Cookie has his cauldron wedged under one arm and is hauling sacks that must weigh more than several people.
Trailing behind him is Bones and a few other crew members who are rolling barrels and dragging yet more supplies with them.
We dodge a runaway barrel and the two crewmembers chasing after it and then join the horde in grabbing whatever looks essential to take back to the ship.
Aster and I both have our arms laden by the time we reach the shoreline, where there’s a whole crowd of crew gathered and champing at the bit to get moving.
That whistle pierces the air again, even more frantic sounding than it was before.
And then I see the ship gliding through the water. My vision is abnormally sharp, and I can make out the flag flying from the mainmast. The familiar burgundy plastered over the flag and the sight of the crew's livery has my stomach cramping.
The king’s colours.
“They’re here,” someone growls from beside me. “The bastards have found us.”
My mind reels. Why now? Have they really been scouring the waters all this time, just waiting for a beacon to tell them our location. Or is it just a horrible coincidence that they happened to be close by when the shaft of light appeared?
However they might have found us, we need to get off this beach. Right now.
The tide is out, and the causeway is ready and glistening, our path out of here. Looking at the way water is sloshing over the sand, we don’t have long before the causeway is covered over by seawater, and then we’d be trapped here.
I pull my sealskin from my shoulders, about to slip it on and transform into Noush for the first time in months.
While I might not be able to get many people across to the ship in my human form, I can drag at least two or three of them in Noush’s body.
They’ll have to be responsible for keeping their own heads above water, but we’ll do our best to swim them out to the ship safely.
But before I can even shift form, the water turns an ominous shade of black in front of us as a single gigantic tentacle creeps through the water. The guy to my right freezes, letting out a strangled yelp.
My breath catches in my chest as an icy sense of dread slithers down my spine. The primal part of my brain is telling me that there’s a ginormous predator heading this way, even if the rational part is aware that it’s Finch.