Chapter 46
I should have stayed with Roiven. All I can think about is whether he’s alright.
We race through the ocean, past terrors of reapers and schools of smaller fish still fleeing the Hellion’s blast. The water gets murky as we draw near where Aveinor once stood, churning with sand and debris.
“Are they still here?”
I do not see them above me.
Hafgúa lifts me from the water. I squint and peer around, but all I see is smog.
Perhaps they—ah.
“What is it?”
Reapers, north of us, excited about the bodies thrown overboard. This way.
He pulls me back underwater and we’re off, flying through the ocean. The broad tip of his tentacle lies flat over the cut on my stomach, keeping it covered.
“They aren’t headed for the Tower?”
No. Their enchantment wall.
“What?” I hug Hafgúa’s tentacle tight as my familiar soars.
The last thing I expected the War-Father to do was retreat. But then, he’ll know the other ships went dark. Eight Hellions, possibly more if the witches sank them before I arrived.
It’s the worst loss I’m aware of in decades, and I’m part of the reason why. When I think of it that way, perhaps it’s surprising he stayed long enough to destroy Aveinor at all.
“Can you go faster?” I beg.
Hafgúa doesn’t answer, except to lengthen his body and shoot forward. My familiar drags me through the ocean, and it blurs around me, nothing but deep blue and the occasional fish gone so fast I can’t identify it.
We cover so much ground I could not begin to place us on a map.
“Look!” I shout. Ahead of us, at the ocean’s roof, I can see the hulls of three massive Hellions.
We’ve finally caught up. Hafgúa rams himself forward, but the ships dissolve into mist, vanishing before my very eyes.
The kraken swims faster, but as one minute turns into ten the ships don’t reappear.
Perhaps we should stop, little knight.
“We must be gaining on them.”
I think we are not.
“But we have to catch them. I have—”
They’re behind their barrier. We’re not getting anywhere.
I clench my teeth tight. Unlike when Sava tracked Roiven through the enchantment, there’s nobody on the other side to pull us through. If the War-Father really managed to retreat after destroying Aveinor, Hafgúa and I have no way to get through.
No witch can.
“So that’s it?” I rasp. “He’s gone. He wins?”
Wins? Hafgúa thinks dryly, as his tentacles float out around us and the kraken slows to a stop. We have chased him from our Wild Seas, little knight.
“But they’re still out there.”
Yes. And they’ll be back, Hafgúa says calmly. And we will be waiting.
I swallow the urge to scream in fury.
“Let’s go home,” I growl instead. I need to see how Roiven’s doing.
The kraken turns and begins to slide back through the water, towards home.
Evening is falling when he lifts me from the water abruptly.
I push back my wet hair and stare into the red sky as the silhouette of a dragon approaches us.
Hafgúa unfurls his tentacle beneath him until I’m standing on it, like it’s a rock emerging from the sea.
It’s the red dragon. She’s covered in even more spikes than Sava, and her tail is stubbier and clubbed at the end.
Relief fills me. Not mine, at first. Roiven’s, wrapping around me like a blanket over my shoulders. But that means he’s here, and now the emotion is my own, too.
The red skims low over the water, banking towards us. Avreen, the dragon’s bonded, sits at the base of its neck. And Roiven stands beside where the wing and shoulder meet, holding onto one of the dragon’s many spikes.
I duck as the dragon passes right overhead of me, and Roiven leaps down, landing on Hafgúa’s tentacle with a wince. I reach out to steady him. My hands grab him by the forearms, feeling his warmth and his strength.
His eyes burn again, a deep, warm gold.
“Nice to see you made yourself useful, knight,” Avreen shouts, and the dragon tilts up, circling higher.
“You’re alive,” I breathe. Tears well in my eyes.
“Fuck, they broke your nose?” Roiven asks. He grabs the sides of my face and tilts it up towards him, inspecting the wound.
“At least I didn’t get skewered.”
Roiven looks down without letting go, studying the rest of me. His eyes darken when he sees the wound on my stomach.
“Are they already dead?” he growls.
“Yes. And you’re one to talk. You nearly died.” My voice only shakes a little.
“Still.”
“Worried I’ll heal uglier?”
“No. Just worried I’ll hurt you when I do this.”
He tilts my chin up and presses his lips to mine, more carefully than I think he ever has, making sure he doesn’t bump into my broken nose.
I kiss him back, and hold onto his shoulders when he pulls his lips from mine.
“I’m sorry, Roiven. They got away. We tried to chase them, but…”
He shakes his head.
“They lost nearly a dozen ships today. We lost a dragon, but I don’t think they’ll be back soon.” He isn’t as flippant as he sounds, about the death of the green and Imili. And another member of the coven rode double with her, which means one of the baby dragons will need to bond someone new.
Hafgúa’s head rises from the ocean beside us, inspecting Roiven with one dark, inky eye. Roiven’s lips part as he stares in awe at my familiar. And then the Witch King bows low, teeth gritted in pain from his wound.
“It is an honor, ancient one.”
“He said—” I start to translate.
I know, Hafgúa tells me. Very polite. You may keep him. Are we going to stand here all day? I would like to hunt soon, if there are no ships to catch.
The mention of it reminds me that even if the Hellions escaped, our work is far from done.
“We set some of the ships aside, Roiven. There were Enchanted…”
“Four Hellions,” he tells me. “Nor and Torain’s dragons towed the ships to a bigger isle. They’re bringing them out already.”
“I need to help.”
“Do you want to fly back with us?”
I glance at Hafgúa, not wanting to delay him. The kraken is amused.
As if I would let my bonded fly when she could swim, much more sensibly.
“I’ll meet you there,” I tell Roiven, and rise to my tiptoes to press a kiss to his cheek.