Chapter 21
Chapter Twenty-One
HOOK
F ear struck behind my ribcage, but I refused to let even an ounce of unease show as I strode to the edge of the deck to see how close the sea monster was. Water churned around us, battering the ship. We’d sailed through the night, bound for the Summer Isle to find a replacement sacrifice for this damn god. Too late. It had come to exact its price.
“Get the fucking cannons loaded,” Wendy yelled, racing up the stairs after me, exploding onto deck like a force of nature as if she wasn’t injured. “Shoot the damn thing!”
“You heard the woman,” I snapped when no one immediately ran to obey, and a handful of crew abandoned their tasks to race belowdecks. “Fire everything we’ve got at it. Take out its arms.”
My heart quickened at the thought of the damage those things could do. Had done.
“Hoist the sails!” I roared, the wind carrying my voice. “Get us moving. Now!”
We’d been lazily cutting through the waves overnight but now we needed all the power the Banshee had. Every last sail needed to bulge with wind to carry us through the dark ocean before—
“Watch out!” someone screamed, either Vea or Joanna, and I snapped my body towards the sound of that voice right as a twelve foot tall, sucker-covered limb vaulted from the ocean and smashed right through our bowsprit, taking out three sails. God fucking dammit. I ground my teeth.
“Sails up. Now!”
I heaved on the helm wheel, trying to carve a path away from the monster with the sails we had, and the Banshee began to turn but slowly, too fucking slowly. I dragged my stump through my hair with a growl.
“Anton,” I yelled, but he was already scurrying to the bow to check the damage, barking his own set of orders as he went. I allowed it because the man had a healthy dose of common sense and usually helped in a crisis rather than hindered. Speaking of hindering…
“Get away from the fucking rail, Wendy,” I shouted, my eyes on her when I should have been keeping my attention on the blackness of the ocean, searching for another writhing tentacle.
“I can probably take that thing!” she yelled back, a light in her eyes that sent a ripple of cold down my spine.
“Get over here!” I snarled, wrenching on the wheel, making actual progress when ropes hoisted and a sail snapped taut from the mizzenmast. “I mean it, Wendy.”
But she kept eyeing the sea, like she was measuring up the monster despite knowing it was a sea god.
“Wendalyn,” I growled.
She gave me her middle finger without turning. “I told you that in confidence, Kingston.”
My nostrils flared on a heavy sigh, growing when she wiggled her fingers at the sea like she was greeting the monster.
“Wendy, what the fuck?” Joanna screeched, slapping the deck with rapid footsteps. “Get away from the railing. There are— monsters!” The last word was screamed when three suckered arms exploded from the sea at once, allowing me to finally locate the god. Too fucking close.
I heaved on the wheel, giving it all I had when the wood fought me every second, the muscles in my arms burning with the effort of keeping it there. It was a relief to hear the gunports opening, to taste the first bite of gunpowder in the air.
“Took you long enough,” I muttered to the master gunner.
“It’s coming!” Wendy warned, her voice a strange blend of fear and excitement. “Everyone hold onto something!”
Sterling picked up her shout and repeated it, carrying it down the deck, and my chest filled with a strange, new sense of pride. That was my woman, a force of nature as deadly as any storm, any sea.
“It’s never got this close before,” I heard one of our older crew grumble over the thrash and howl of the ocean. “I told you it was bad luck to keep a woman on board.”
Wendy turned and bared her teeth in a smile. “You must be pissing yourself to have three women aboard.”
“It’s not right,” he declared, apparently deciding now was a good time to discuss ship etiquette despite the tentacles waving around us, poised to snap down at any point. I kept my eyes on them, my heart quickening, a shiver racing across my skin. The god had saved me, had led me to this ship, this crew, but I would always be beholden to that bargain. I’d never be more than the scared boy who made a deal with a god to escape his abuse. Every waving limb was a reminder of who I was, those midnight, pitch, and acid green scales a memory I couldn’t run from. A boy so flawed that his own father had sold him.
I shook away the past when the sea lashed the hull, spraying over the deck, drenching my hair to my skull. The cold of it was a relief, a reminder that I was here, the captain of my own ship, my own fate. I wasn’t a boy now. I wasn’t anyone’s property. Not even this god’s.
“I say we give the thing what it wants—”
I could have warned the old man to quit talking while he was ahead, but Wendy shrugged and moved before I could intervene. The ship pitched, her willing accomplice as she grabbed the old man’s coat and pitched him into the railing.
“You know what?” she said, her voice sharp enough to carry over the wind and sea. “You’re so right.”
I could have stopped her before she threw him against the railing so hard he toppled over, but I was too focused on the little thrill that went through my stomach when Wendy smiled. This wasn’t a kind smile, wasn’t bright with happiness. It was a fox’s smile, sharp and dangerous, and I loved it. By the time I dragged my stare away from her golden face, bathed in glorious moonlight, he’d pitched into the ocean.
“What?” Wendy asked innocently when she caught me and others looking. “I tried to save him. He fell.”
I pressed my lips together to kill a smile. She broke the only damn rule I gave her, and I still found her charming. That had to stop. I had to find some level of professionalism. Wendy couldn’t, literally, get away with murder. A man had to have some pride.
The issue was I loved her smile and killing people put it on her face.
“Get away from the rail, you madwoman,” Joanna barked, finally catching up to her sister, shaking her head in exasperation, water drenching her black hair to her head instead of its usual halo.
“Don’t even think about it,” Vea snapped, sharply enough that I whipped around to look at her, narrowing my eyes at the way Rolando and some of his buddies crowded her to the main mast. “That thing would spit me right back out. I’m not fish food.”
“No,” I agreed, loudly enough that they’d hear me, “she isn’t.” I spotted my surgeon among the group and narrowed my eyes in warning. “Keep at it, Armstrong, and I’ll give her your job.”
Vea grinned and sidestepped Rolando, skipping to my side. “Any orders, sir?”
“Don’t get yourself killed,” I muttered, setting my eyes back on Wendy, my heart skipping until I found her with Sterling knotting a rope into place.
“Brace yourselves!” a shout rippled down the Banshee, nerves carrying with it. I held onto the helm, planting my feet, and gritted my teeth when a tentacle collided with the side of the ship with so much force that we tipped.
“Move it!” I screamed when the crew froze. “Get us level or I’ll let the creature eat all of you.”
I hauled on the wheel, my heartbeat rapid, erratic, as the crew scrambled to right us, the wind working against us, determined to tip the Banshee.
“Faster!” I yelled. “We’re tipping!”
Ice trickled down my spine, making me shiver as we hovered on the precipice of tipping into the ocean. The wheel fought to rip itself from my hand, but I held on so fiercely I got splinters, my stare jumping from crew member to crew member as they hauled on ropes, heaving sails to catch the wind until we could finally tame it, make it our tool again. I only breathed again when we began to right ourselves on the waves, but I was shaky. Breathless.
I did a rapid scan of the deck, taking stock of the crew, searching for Wendy and exhaling hard when I found her side by side with her sister and Maceo. She was fine. As drenched as a drowned rat, but fine.
Sensing my eyes on her, she turned, her eyes cutting me to the bone. She didn’t look afraid, not even a little bit worried. Thrill and happiness shone in her storm eyes, making my stomach ripple with a sudden influx of butterflies. She held me there, transfixed in her stare, in her happiness. I should have looked away.
A dark, oily tentacle shot out of the ocean and whipped towards her, moving with power and speed. It cut the night, cut across the deck, and I was already releasing the wheel, already throwing myself across the ship towards her.
I braced to catch her when the monster slammed into her, ready to lock my arms around her when it sent her crashing into the mast, ready to protect her even if she was broken and bleeding, but— I staggered, throwing my panicked stare around, faltering at the empty space where she’d been. She wasn’t thrown against the mast, wasn’t splayed bleeding over the deck. She was nowhere to be seen.
The sea god had taken her.