Chapter 18 #2
I blew out a deep breath and a wave of relief crashed through my limbs, the exhaustion from not eating or sleeping enough barreling into me until my arms slackened an inch. I caught Darcke opening his mouth when the sun speared through the clouds, blinding me.
At the same time a wave must have hit the ships, because the line snapped upward before stretching so tight my fingers lost purchase. My gut surged into my chest as the world retracted beneath me, and I found myself in free fall.
“Elvara!”
“Elvara!”
Two people screamed my name in fear, but the rest of the Hird erupted in triumph. The rope I’d been standing on burned my chin as I fell, and it was only at the last moment I managed to grab it with one hand, feeling weightless and heavy at the same time.
I swung back and forth in the air. Air rushed through my teeth, and a pained sound wound up my throat as I managed to get a finger, then two, then the rest of my other hand over the rope, holding on as hard as I could, my arms stretched as far as they could.
“Now that was close.” A dangerous amusement flitted across Darcke’s face.
I didn’t even have the energy to respond.
Biting down on the inside of my lip, I moved a hand forward, yelping when the motion made my body shift as well, nearly stopping me from grasping the rope again.
I was so close. There were perhaps fifteen feet between me and the lookout.
I moved my hands again.
And again.
Ten feet. Five.
Blood teased the back of my throat, and when rain started falling again—heavier this time—my arms trembled. I tried to drive my weight forward to make it easier, but when I reached for the rope this time I missed, and my surprised cry made Darcke snap straight.
Gasps mingled with the merry shouts.
When I looked down, I could make out Rakkel’s and Fedic’s terrified faces, and Viljan’s blanched one behind them. But it was Kilia’s arched brows and wide eyes, which shifted into something far more sinister when his eyes found mine, that made me cough from the burn in my throat.
Panicked, I tried to propel myself forward again. With the same outcome.
“Stop playing and pull yourself up,” Darcke barked.
I used more leverage, but my strength had waned entirely, and my fingers only barely brushed the rope.
“Pull yourself up.”
I can’t.
He moved forward on the lookout.
So close but so fucking far it might as well been Hel.
“Pull. Yourself. Up.”
A sound I’d never made before left me as I tried again, but it was futile.
I was almost not able to hold on with my left hand anymore, the fingers on it long since numb from the cold.
The sky opened at that time, and it filled my mouth when I laughed.
The gods must have been thoroughly entertained by now.
“Heir,” Darcke called, but I didn’t even acknowledge him.
This is how you want me to go? Before everyone?
I shut my eyes when my hand fell useless to my side, the rope quivering beneath the one I still held on with.
Then I was in the air, something hard wrapping around my wrist, but I was not falling like I’d expected.
Instead I moved upward, and I was slammed against something soft and hard at the same time.
When I realized it was Darcke’s body, I tried to fly backward, but the rope around me didn’t allow it and only fused us harder together.
He shook his head. “Fucking showoff.”
“Let me go,” I snarled, trying to push off his chest.
“This was not my choice.” His face turned to the mast. “You can let her go now, thanks,” he growled to the ship.
She only creaked in response, and when another bout of rain that felt like being drenched beneath a waterfall fell atop us, the rope tightened.
“What the fuck?” Darcke’s arms were stuck against his sides, and his face filled with a look of cold betrayal. “What are you doing?”
Screams started beneath us when the ship did nothing against the tall waves, and the vessel pulled at the others when she heeled, her hull licking the ocean.
“Stop, right now,” Darcke ordered. “I’m serious.”
She heeled again, sending my forehead into Darcke’s chin. His arms instinctively went around me, and I arched backward as far as I could, my top lip curling.
“Stop touching me,” I snarled.
“I’m fucking trying.”
Another wave hit, and more shouts of fear rose across the decks when we moved the other way. I slid backward until the wall of the lookout bit into my back and Darcke was pressed against my front, so close I could count every muscle lining his torso if I wished. Which I did not.
As I opened my mouth to say as much, a silent warning sparked through the air. I closed my lips again, and the tension coiling around us softened.
My head cocked. “I… I think she wants you to be nice to me.”
This time the ship crested the wave, expertly turning into the wind.
A shocked giggle trickled from my lips.
Darcke’s arms were locked around my back, his face so close I could count every angry line across his face. “Really fucking mature.”
I wasn’t sure if he meant me or the ship.
The mast groaned as she spun again, and Darcke rushed out, “Fine! I won’t make her do that again.”
The rope tethering us together tightened an inch.
There was a darkness across his face that made me look away when he spat, “And I’m sorry. Good enough?”
The world grew still when Darcke turned his gaze to me. My breath stuttered when the scowl softened, then vanished entirely. “Gods, no fucking wonder she let you sail her,” he said hoarsely. “You’re each as fucking stubborn as the other.”
I was very aware of every inch where his body touched mine. From the way his eyes dipped, the look too long for me to miss, so was he.
“Was that a compliment?” I said when a different tension, although as sharp and equally dangerous as the deadly one, charged the air.
His eyes widened for the briefest second. “If you must take it as such.”
The rope fell to the ground, but his hands remained around my back.
I cleared my throat as I shook them off. “I think I do,” I said, cursing quietly when my voice sounded strangely strangled. “I’m going down.”
Darcke did nothing to stop me. Still, confusion whispered all over my skin as I inched my way down.
It was also that daze that made me miss Kilia storming up to me.
But as he pressed his arm into my throat and leaned his face into mine, hissing “I know your dirty little secret,” any glimmer of that sense disappeared.
Only terror remained in me, even as Fedic and Viljan pulled the twin off.