the log to Kip and Ironfist rang a loud bell. “Man overboard!” Ironfist shouted. “We’ve got two in the water!”
“Move it,” Tremblefist said. “And you’d better get completely wet. Fast. Help will be here in seconds.”
Kip clutched the hollow log and jogged down the ramp between the rollers. The first big wave knocked him cleanly off his feet. His head smacked one of the great wooden rollers and he saw stars. Then the water was over him.
The water was shockingly cold at first. It was a cold that you quickly got used to—the Cerulean Sea was fairly warm—but Kip didn’t have moments. He gasped and inhaled salt water as another wave passed over him. As he coughed his lungs clear, flapping his arms like an injured bird, he could feel the riptide grab him. Where was the log? He’d lost it. It was gone.
Someone was shouting, but he couldn’t hear what they were saying over the crash of the waves. The swells were only a pace high, but it was enough to blot out Kip’s vision. He turned in a circle.
There was a bell ringing, ringing. Kip turned toward it, and despite the swells, he could see the looming black of Cannon Island. It was still receding. He started swimming. A wave pummeled him, drove him under the water and spun him. He kicked, kicked, trying not to panic. Failing. He had no air. Orholam, he was going to die. He kicked, desperate.
He bobbed to the surface like a cork, but he was lost once more.
His panic receded. He’d floundered somehow to the side of the riptide, and now the waves were bringing him in toward Cannon Island, but not toward the boat ramp. He was headed for the rocks. He swam hard sideways toward the sound of the bell.
He was rising with one of the swells when he saw something impossible. Ironfist, with a rope tied around his chest, was running—through the air. He was wearing blue spectacles, and both of his hands were pointed down. He was hurling blue luxin toward his feet, sprinting, making a platform to stand on even as he ran.
As Kip watched, the blue luxin platform—anchored only somewhere back on Cannon Island—cracked with a report and began to crash toward the waves. Ironfist leapt as the platform fell, releasing the luxin and executing a perfect dive.
He surfaced right next to Kip, his spectacles and ghotra ripped off by the waves, and grabbed Kip with one arm. Then the men on the beach began pulling in the rope as fast as they could. In less than a minute, Kip and the big man were staggering up the ramp. Well, Ironfist was striding, one hand holding a fistful of Kip’s shirt in case he fell, and Kip was staggering on jellied, naked legs.
“We couldn’t save your master, son. I’m sorry,” Ironfist said. There were a dozen soldiers crowded on the narrow portico outside the back door of Cannon Island. One threw a blanket over Kip’s shoulders. “Take this young man inside and take care of him,” Ironfist commanded. “I’ve got business on Big Jasper, I’ll take him with me and notify the family. Ten minutes.”
As the soldiers ushered Kip inside, he heard Ironfist swear quietly, “Damn, those were my best blue specs.”
Chapter 30
Liv Danavis walked briskly over the luxin bridge called the Lily’s Stem that connected the Chromeria on Little Jasper Island to the markets and homes on Big Jasper Island, trying to ignore the tension knotting her shoulders. She was wearing rough linen pants, a cloak against the chilly wind of the bright morning, her dark hair pulled back in a ponytail, and the same sensible low leather shoes she’d worn when she’d first come to the Chromeria as a terrified fourteen-year-old. She always felt the temptation to dress up in her nicest things when she was summoned, but she always resisted. Her rich, imperious handler would make her feel shabby no matter what she wore, so she might as well be defiant. If Dazen Guile had won the Prisms’ War, Liv would be Lady Aliviana Danavis, the daughter of the celebrated general Corvan Danavis. Being Tyrean would have been a badge of honor. She wouldn’t have owed anyone anything. But Dazen had been killed, and those who sided with him disgraced, her own father narrowly avoiding execution despite being held in higher esteem than any general on either side. So now she was plain old Liv Danavis from Rekton, the dyer’s daughter. And Ruthgar