Shattered by the Sea Lord - Starla Night Page 0,76
crashing waves. The other warriors disappeared as well.
They left the women and children behind on the forlorn shore.
Bex glared at the horizon.
Val leaned on the staff Bex had made for her. “We’re as cheerful as a funeral.”
Angie and Meg snorted.
Then they dispersed.
Dannika sat by the firepit staring at the sand until darkness fell. Bex asked her, “You going to sleep in the lagoon tonight?”
Without Ciran? The wires around Dannika’s heart tightened. “I don’t know if I could bear it.”
“I felt that way.” Bex hung two hammocks by Val and patted one for Dannika. “I’ll be on the other side if you need me.”
The wires loosened. Dannika sniffled and rubbed her nose. “Um, thanks. That’s really kind.”
Bex nodded shyly.
Dannika helped her tidy, then clambered in the hammock. The routine and noise of the women putting their children to bed elsewhere on the island faded away. The stars spackled overhead, and a breeze flushed away the stinging insects.
She pressed the cracked Sea Opal to her chest.
This was wrong. Ciran should be here. She should have been stronger.
Sending him away was just like when she’d sent off Eliot. She’d made a mistake. She should have gone with him.
But then he might have died in front of you. Because of you.
Now he might die out of sight. She might never see him again.
Her bones ached and the anxiety lifted her out of the hammock, forcing her to toss and turn.
She’d made a mistake. She knew she’d made a mistake.
But it was too late.
It was far, far too late.
They warriors swam in standard V-formation with Konomelu in the lead. He and Itime had sheathed old daggers to their biceps and thighs. Chipped tridents rested in the crooks of their arms.
Ciran carried a shiny new trident. Lieutenant Orike’s was well-balanced and finely wrought, with the points twisted into tentacles. It was not what he would have chosen—his trident was solid, plain, and forthright—but it was much better than the human crowbar or a coral trainee’s dagger.
This would have been a perfect test for the women and their budding powers.
Dannika. Have faith. I am strong enough to be your warrior. When I successfully return, please, please finally believe.
His heart beat akimbo.
He forced his mind clear.
Unlike the tumultuous trip to the island, the sea life no longer agitated their currents. Squids rilled past him peacefully. Sharks emitted their warning sirens with territorial swagger and faded away as the warriors passed out of their territory again. The off-tune yodeling of far-away giant cave guardians, utterly absent from around the island, marked their distance.
“Two more songs,” Itime vibrated for Ciran’s benefit. “Then we will drop beneath the echo point. That is where the current patrols like to hide and ambush unwary travelers.”
They passed two more giant cave guardians, which the humans called giant octopi. In surface time, each giant cave guardian lived a day’s swim apart, but under the water, time had little meaning. Unlike the circadian dictates of the surface, Ciran could swim for weeks without food or rest. There was only current, fish, and ocean.
His strength flagged and flourished on a rhythm. Was Dannika thinking of him? I feel you. I believe in you. I am healed. You too can heal.
Konomelu dove, and he and Itime followed. They entered a slower current and coasted to the vortex that carried vibrations across the oceans. Konomelu suddenly veered into a reverse current and held up a hand.
They both joined him. Ciran readied his trident.
“…come here? … attack…exiles will not pass. Undine thinks…do…Atlantis…”
Five or six voices sounded too close.
Itime drew his thumb across his throat. Luscans.
Konomelu nodded and tapped his index and thumb together five times, hesitated, and another five times. Two patrols of five.
This was an ambush.
Curse it.
Ciran’s attempt to get Lieutenant Orike to brag into the echo point about having beached him had backfired. He might slip past one patrol, but as soon as he spoke a word, they would hear and capture him. Two patrols? He would never reach the echo point.
Konomelu raised his fist at the echo point—silently insulting the patrols with an obscene gesture—and then kicked into a fast current flowing away from the echo point.
When they were at a safer distance, he vibrated his change of plan. “We cannot reach the echo point. The queens must make their powers first. We will take the elixir to Angie and Meg, train them in the lagoon until they have the same force as Bex and Dannika, and then we will conquer the echo point.”