Chapter 18 #2
The child yanks me forward. Off-balance. Throws me across the deck with strength that shouldn't exist in a body that small. I hit the opposite railing hard enough to crack wood. Stars explode across my vision.
Moira finally moves. Salt water rises from the Sound, responding to her will. It forms into a barrier between her and Elspeth. Protection. Defense.
But Elspeth just walks through it. The corrupted soul doesn't care about clean magic. Doesn't fear it.
She reaches for Moira again.
I force myself upright. Shadow-walk across the deck. Emerge between them with the knife raised.
"You want her, you go through me."
The child laughs. All those voices laughing together. "Gladly."
She moves like water. Slick. Impossible to pin. Her attacks come from angles that shouldn't work. Arms bending backward. Legs kicking in directions joints don't allow. Every strike is precise. Calculated. Lethal.
Panther reflexes. Shadow-walker speed. Seven years of surviving after I was exiled by being faster and meaner than anyone who came at me.
I dodge left. She follows. I spin right. She's already there. I shadow-walk behind her. She turns before I can strike.
We dance across the shattered deck. Blade against hands. Shadow against water. Death against darkness.
I'm faster. Stronger. More experienced.
But she doesn't tire. Doesn't slow. Doesn't feel pain.
And I'm only human. Well. Mostly human.
The child moves like something from a nightmare. Her joints bend backward with sickening cracks. Her head tilts at angles that would snap a living neck. Every movement is precise and calculated, guided by Catalina's will and powered by necromantic magic that makes the air around her taste of rot.
I aim for the binding. Try to get close enough to cut the threads that hold her soul captive. But she's too fast. Too aware. She knows what I'm trying to do and prevents it with brutal efficiency.
The knife slashes through empty air as she ducks beneath my strike. Her hand shoots out and catches my wrist. For a heartbeat, I feel the binding—right there, wrapped around her small torso, pulsing with blue light. So close.
Then she twists. My wrist screams in protest. The knife clatters to the deck and skitters toward the edge.
Her hand rakes across my ribs. Shallow. More warning than real damage. But the cold spreads from the wound immediately. Catalina's corruption trying to take root.
I grit my teeth against it. Keep moving. Keep fighting. Buy Moira time to deal with Catalina. That's all that matters. Keep Elspeth occupied. Keep Moira alive.
The child feints left. I counter. She goes right instead. Fast.
Her hand closes around my throat.
The cold is immediate. Overwhelming. Like being dunked in winter water. My lungs seize. My heart stutters.
Elspeth leans close. All those voices whispering. "You can't win, Rafael. You're already dying. The corruption is spreading. Soon you'll be just like us. Just like me."
Black spots dance across my vision.
Then Catalina's voice booms across the water. "Enough playing, child. We have other prey to catch."
The pressure on my throat vanishes. Elspeth releases me. Turns toward the sea-walker who commands her.
I collapse against the mast, gasping. Trying to pull air into lungs that don't want to work. The corruption spreads from the wounds on my ribs. Black veins running under my skin. Crawling toward my heart.
Catalina stands on the water like a queen on her throne. "Rafael. My faithless betrothed. Still fighting for the sea witch. Still so predictable."
I try to respond. Can't. The corruption has reached my lungs. Speaking takes air I don't have.
"I wanted you by my side when I remade this world." Her voice carries disappointment wrapped in rage. "But you chose her over me. Chose this island over what we could have become together."
She raises one pale hand. Water rises with it. Corrupted liquid forming into a spear. Sharp. Deadly.
"So now you die."
The spear launches.
Shadow-walking should save me. My body won't respond. The corruption locks my muscles. Roots me in place.
The spear punches through my left shoulder.
An old injury. One that's plagued me since Spain. That still aches on cold nights and never quite healed right.
Not barely healed anymore. Destroyed.
The corrupted water magic tears through muscle and bone like they're paper. The shoulder joint shatters. My arm goes numb. Then the pain hits. White-hot. Overwhelming. Worse than anything I've felt since my exile.
Down. Hit the deck hard. Blood pours from the wound. The deck beneath me turns red.
Darkness eats at the edges of my vision. The corruption spreads faster now. Black veins racing up my neck. Across my chest. Toward my heart.
Dying. The word surfaces in my mind with absolute certainty.
Somewhere distant, I hear Moira scream my name.
The sound tears through the night. Raw. Agonized.
Then the ocean responds.
The water around us goes still. Completely still. No ripples. No waves. Like the entire Sound is holding its breath.
Power builds. Even through the corruption eating my system, the magic is palpable. Rising from the deep places. From the trenches where ancient things sleep. From the heart of the ocean itself.
A wave forms.
Not like the waves that crashed against the shore earlier. Not like anything natural.
This wave towers over the Sound. Massive. Unprecedented. The kind of wave that swallows ships and drowns coastlines. The kind of wave that reminds humanity why they built walls and why they fear the sea.
Raw power. A sea witch's fury given form.
At its heart, Moira stands on what's left of her boat. Arms raised. Eyes blazing with power. Salt water streams from her hair, her clothes, her very skin. She's glowing. Radiant with magic unleashed. Beautiful and terrifying and absolutely unstoppable.
She's let go of the control she's maintained for a decade. Let go of the fear. The restraint. Everything holding her back.
This is what Moira Flynn really is. What she was always meant to be.
A force of nature in human skin.
Catalina sees it. Understands what's coming. And she laughs.
The sound carries across the water. Delighted. Triumphant.
"Yes!" The sea-walker spreads her arms wide. "Show me what the great Siobhan Flynn's heir can really do! Show me the monster you'll become! This is what I wanted. This is what I've been waiting for. The moment you stop being human and become something more!"
Moira doesn't respond with words.
She unleashes everything.
The wave crashes down.
The world becomes water and fury and magic so powerful it makes reality scream.
The corruption reaches my heart. My vision tunnels. The ocean rises around me, and through the roar of magic and water, I hear Moira screaming my name.
Still alive. Still fighting.
I let the darkness take me.