shuddered, and bucked, and finally released its grip on Banshee’s tortured flanks.
Another wave hit their starboard, almost sending them over. But the helmsmen bent their backs, muscles straining, Banshee’s spine twisted almost to breaking, and the ship managed to hold on, slowly righting herself. The oceans still thrashed, the tempest still rolled, the skies were still black as night. Mia and Tric stood back-to-back, blades dripping black on the main deck. Sigursson was gathered with a half-dozen salts, their black wolf pelts drenched, glaring at their captain and queen.
“This is no mortal storm!” one shouted.
“I told you, she’s fucking cursed!” another cried.
“She’s brought the fury of the Daughters down on us!”
Mia knew sailors were a superstitious bunch. Knew she stood in peril now, within and without. After four turns of punishment, of whitedrakes and leviathans and waves tall as mountains, her crew’s nerve was all but gone. But she knew Einar Valdyr was a captain and king who ruled through fear, and Mia Corvere had learned the color of fear when she was but ten years old.
“I thought you lot were supposed to be the hardest crew on all Four Seas!” she spat. “And here you are, wailing like babes off the tit!”
“She’ll be the death of us, Sigursson!” a tall salt yelled.
“Put her over the side,” came the shout. “The goddesses will let us go!”
Tric squared up, his blades glittering as the lightning flashed and the Banshee shook. Mia looked her first mate in the eye, saw the malice and mutiny boiling there.
“Take hold of your jewels, Ulfr!” Mia glanced meaningfully at her greatcoat of faces. “Goddesses they might be, but Maw knows, you’ve far more to fear from me!”
The darkness flared around her, each man’s shadow clawing and twisting along the deck. A wolf who wasn’t a wolf rose up behind Sigursson, hackles raised, black teeth bared in a snarl. The Hearthless boy beside her tightened his grip on his bloody blades. The dark about Mia seethed. Lightning split the skies, catching the spray and rain and seeming to set the air about her aglow.
“Get back to your posts, you gutless bastards!” she demanded, raising her sword. “Or I’ll feed you to those fucking drakes myself!”
The storm seemed to still for a moment. The thunder held its breath. Mia looked into Sigursson’s eyes, saw that he was afraid. Of her. Of them. Of all of it.
The only question was, who did he fear more?
And then, something hit them. A colossal something. An impossible something. Rising up from beneath them, soundless and vast. Mia felt a thunderous impact. Heard the roar of the tempest and splitting timbers, the cries of the crew as they were sent flying. Banshee was lifted clean out of the water, and Mia only kept her feet because of the shadows holding her in place. Massive black tentacles rose up from the water, crashed about them in a deadly, crushing vise grip.
Another leviathan.
This one so big it almost beggared belief. Arms crusted in barnacles, long as years. Pale serrated hooks bigger than Mia was. A monster from the tallest tales, woken by the Lady of Oceans. Pressed by her hatred and rising up from the depths with only one intent: to drag Mia back down into the lightless black with it.
The beast’s limbs crashed down on the deck, snapping the booms off the mainmast like twigs. Sails shredded as if they were damp parchment, wood cracking as if it were wafer-thin. Banshee groaned, stretched to breaking. Mia spun toward the beast, her shadows flaring. Tric turned also, black eyes gleaming, rain falling about them like knives.
Ulfr Sigursson dragged himself up from the deck, dripping seawater.
“Wulfguard!” he bellowed.
Mia’s first mate raised his sword as lightning cracked the clouds.
“Kill this fucking bitch!”
CHAPTER 29
STANDING
Well, so much for monarchy …
Mia hadn’t expected it to last, truth told. A tyranny will always fail when men have nothing left to lose but their lives. But she’d hoped they might’ve gotten a little closer to land before it finally broke them.
As Mia’s former crew charged behind her and the leviathan’s tentacles seethed before her, she grabbed Tric’s hand and
Stepped
up on the aft deck, landing in a crouch beside the astonished-looking helmsmen.
Sigursson turned on his heel, found her through the downpour and roared the attack. The Banshee’s crew seemed to have abandoned all thought of the leviathan, intent only on killing their queen in attempt to appease the Ladies. They charged up the twin stairwells, port and starboard, their blades gleaming in the