Snake Heart (Chains of Honor #2) -Lindsay Buroker Page 0,50

they would throw their lives away. He never would have expected pirates to fight so fiercely.

Knowing they were out of time and already regretting how many deaths he was responsible for, Yanko opened the chest to see what they had found. A small book lay inside. He pulled it out, feeling stunned. A book? That was it? He checked again for a hint that it might be magical. It wasn’t. He dropped the chest and flipped through it quickly, enough to see that it was someone’s journal rather than a collection of Kyattese poetry or some such.

“Trap gone?” Lakeo asked, stepping up to his side.

“Yes, I—”

Someone grabbed Yanko’s arm. Arayevo.

“Dak’s hurt,” she said. “We have to go. Now.”

With nothing to show but the journal, Yanko nodded his agreement and followed her to the door. The lodestone wasn’t there. He would have felt it if it were. Unless this journal was the Mausoleum Bandit’s diary, this whole trip—all of this death and destruction—had been for nothing.

Don’t throw it away, a voice spoke into Yanko’s head.

Sun Dragon, he thought, not intending to respond but surprised into doing so. Where are you?

I’ll be there soon. Keep the book for me, and maybe I’ll spare your life.

I see you’re more generous than ever, Honored Opponent.

That’s right, boy. Don’t forget to respect your elders. They—

A second after the communication broke off, a great boom came from somewhere above. It was too loud to be a cannon firing. Yanko hoped someone had blown up Sun Dragon’s ship.

Lakeo snatched up a chest, the same one she had been carrying earlier, before the pirates had taken all of their gear. “Mine,” she snarled.

Someone leaped down from above, landing on the treasure pile and swinging a hatchet at her head. Startled, Lakeo scrambled back. She lifted her machete as two more pirates jumped through the hole in the ceiling. All three sprang toward her.

With fear swelling in his throat, Yanko launched an attack, again reacting on instinct instead of thinking it through. All three pirates flew backward, slamming into each other and into the corner of the cabin. Lakeo sprinted for the door, and Yanko charged after her. He was the last one out of the cabin, so he pulled the door shut, wishing he could lock it.

There was no room in the passageway. Dak might be wounded, but he was still fighting, keeping the pirates back with determination and skill.

“We have to get back to that doorway,” Arayevo said, waving the pistol at the officer’s cabin where they had come up from the deck below.

Bodies half blocked the way, and they would have to cut through at least two pirates to reach it. Other men waited behind those two, firing when they could.

Dak was keeping the pirates from advancing, but even he couldn’t press so many back, especially not with the floor at his feet littered with obstacles. Yanko tried to summon the same force he had used on the men in the cabin, a wave of energy he had almost reflexively hurled, but that easy, instant power eluded him now. He concentrated on building it again, methodically, carefully funneling the air around Dak.

A bang came from behind him. Arayevo shot at one of the pirates trying to escape the cabin.

“A lock would be good,” Lakeo said, kicking at someone. Arayevo’s pistol drove them back, for the moment.

Yanko unleashed the wave of power he had been crafting. Dak’s clothes rustled as the wind blasted past him on either side. The power struck the pirates, knocking them back several meters, as if an ocean wave had slammed into them.

Dak sprang over the bodies and ran past the cabin door they needed to enter. Making room for Yanko and the others to go inside while he protected them. Yanko wanted to yell at him to go through first, that he was the only one who could pilot the underwater boat, if it was even still attached, but there was no time, not with pirates coming at them from both sides. Yanko lunged into the cabin first. He waved for Arayevo and Lakeo to follow him, turning as soon as he got inside so he could watch the door to Pey Lu’s cabin. The pirates had been driven back by the pistol fire, but they were sure to try to get out again. He readied an attack to hurl if the door opened.

“Dak,” Yanko called as soon as Arayevo and Lakeo joined him in the cabin. He waved them toward the