The Never King, page 21
part #1 of Lost Lands Series
I look to Gav anxiously. His face is on the sky before it lowers to find mine, and in his gaze I find everything I’m feeling. Fear, anxiety. Acceptance. We’ve been running from these storms for weeks, falling farther back into the dark than we’ve ever done in our lifetime, and the fact that they’ve caught up to us is not a surprise. It’s our worst fears come to life, but it’s like we’ve been waiting for it.
“The Moles are running,” Mother whispers, her hands tightening on my arms.
She’s looking to the land, the continent that’s always on our starboard. Dark shadows scurry across the landscape with torches in hand. They’re running for their holes in the mountains to hide from the storm like rats abandoning a sinking ship.
I shake off my mother’s hands and take hold of her arm. “We should get below decks,” I tell her firmly. “We’ll sit in the parlor and play cards. The worst of it will pass soon.”
She looks to the south where the other ships sail ahead of us. “Your father—“
“Will be fine,” Gav assures her with a practiced, winning smile. “The other Dashers are farther ahead of it than we are and once we speed up we’ll be clear of it. There’s nothing to worry about.”
“Yes, you’re right. Livandra,” Mother says to me as she steps closer to Gav. To his reassuring warmth and strength. “Get your shoes and follow us down.”
I smile kindly at her, nodding my head, but I don’t speak. I hold my tongue that dies to thrash against the order.
She frowns at me before she turns.
That’s the last thing I see; my mother’s frown. It’s fitting in a way. My father’s frown was no doubt the first thing I saw when I was born. Abject disappointment should be the last thing I know before I die.
The world explodes as lightning strikes the ship. It pierces the deck, digging deep into the hull where lives, breaths, and babies lie. That’s what occurs to me as I’m thrown backward, spiraling toward the water again with no hand to reach for this time. I think of all the lives on the boat that are already lost. Of all of the lives that will be lost in the coming moments.
I think of Gav; my life, my light, my sun that I’d follow to the ends of the earth.
As I hit the icy water, the world going black as the night, I’m screaming his name.
Even in the muffled world under the weight of the sea, I can hear the ship crack and groan. It’s a lost cause, I know it. Dead as its passengers. And it isn’t the first time. Sailing the seas like we do isn’t as easy and blissful as the people living on the land like to think. When a storm hits, and they always do, Moles can escape into the safety of their mountains, digging and burrowing down. Not us. When a storm strikes at sea you have nowhere to hide. We have to ride it out and pray we survive. And we do it alone.
If a ship is struck as my home has been now, the others don’t come back for survivors. It sounds calloused, and maybe it is, but there’s no other way. The survival of our tribe depends on us making port when planned and remaining in the perfection that is the Seventh hour. For any of us to stray outside of it, ahead or behind, is deadly. We’re not conditioned for the cold or the heat. I can barely see in the dark and when we ride too close to the Sixth hour the glaring light makes my eyes ache in my skull. The heat hurts my skin like a burn from boiling oil.
So I know when I hit the water that I’m alone, as is every other person living on this ship.
I kick hard, reaching with my arms as my lungs scream for relief. I fly through the bubbles and currents that swirl around me, try to confuse me, trap me, bury me. My hands strike against something solid that cracks my bones painfully. I take hold of it in blind desperation. My wide open, terrified eyes see the outline of the object through the water – a broken piece of the hull most likely. I don’t care what it is, it’s floating and it can support me so I pull on it until it brings me topside in a flurry of limbs and gasping breaths.
I break the dark surface just in time to see the ship snap nearly in two. The mast is in flames, the sails being devoured angrily as a violent wind picks up and whips them harshly. There’s screaming coming from every direction, pieces of the ship and the contents of the hull already spilling out into the water.
It’s darker than I’m used to. I can’t tell what’s human and what’s floating garbage. Our lives are scattered across the surface of the water, bobbing like bloated corpses. Despite my blindness, in the distance I spot the receding shape of the other four Dashers. The imposing shape of the massive city slowly moving on. Leaving us alone. Leaving us to die.
“Gav!” I shout, searching frantically for him in the bedlam. “Gav!”
“Help,” a weak voice calls.
I barely hear it over the wind rushing through the flames, fanning them higher and higher.
“Where are you?” I cry.
Silence.
It wasn’t Gav. It was a kid, a little girl I think. I look for her everywhere but all I see are floating barrels. Soaked clothes and cloth. Planks of charred, broken wood.
“Hello?!”
“Help.”
I see her. If it weren’t for her bright blond hair I’d never have found her in the rubble. I surge toward her, using my board to keep me afloat as I kick with all my strength.
The girl is holding onto a rope hanging off the side of the ship, one that’s disappearing into the water. I take hold of her small hands to help her take hold of the board. Once she’s holding on tight enough I kick to turn us, putting our back to the sinking wreckage. I push us away from the danger.
Just as I’m beginning to hope we’re clear I hear a sharp snap followed by the rush of flames. I don’t think. I don’t plan or consider the folly of my actions. All I can think of is saving this girl.
I cry out as I push her and the board forward. I shove with everything I’ve got, my face going underwater with the effort. She surges away across the water. She’s heading toward the building black waves surrounding us as the storm increases with incredible speed. She might not make it. She may capsize out there or be swept off of the safety of the board. Either way, she’s better off than I am.
I don’t see the flaming section of our ship before it hits me. I barely even feel it before I’m pulled from the world into infinite darkness, but I hear it. I know it’s coming.
And I have nowhere to go but down.
Chapter Four
Gray
I shake my hand loose from Karina’s to push her toward the mouth of the cave.
“Get inside!” I shout over the thunder.
I don’t wait for her to reply before I’m running hard down the last leg of the hill where it spills onto the rocky beach. I hear her feet following fast behind me, though. Still, I don’t look back. I knew she’d follow. She’s stubborn like that. Always has been.
I skid to a stop on the smooth, wet rocks of the beach. I blink twice against the misting rain, the drizzle playing preamble to the downpour that’s on its way. Out over the ocean I can make out the line of ships heading west. One massive ocean liner like an island in motion, four Dashers with full sails and engines probably working at top speed to power through the storm. It’s the fifth Dasher that’s the problem. It’s broken in half, burning on the water and slowly sinking under the waves that try to put it out.
It’s a surreal sight. We’ve seen storms hit the ships before but they’ve always made it out. I’ve never seen one burning. It’s eerie and ominous, sending the hair on my arms up on end.
“Oh my God,” Karina whispers behind me.
I look over my shoulder to find her standing with her hand over her mouth, her green eyes wide with amazement. The sky snaps behind her, lightning hiccupping inside the clouds.
“You should get inside,” I tell her again.
She lowers her hand. “How many?”
“How many what?”
“How many people do you think were on that ship?”
I frown, looking back at the wreckage still burning. “I don’t know. A hundred maybe? Most of the Eventide are on the big ship.”
“A hundred people dead. Just like that. It doesn’t seem real.”
“No.”
“What do we do?”
“What can we do?”
Rocks click together as Karina stumbles toward me. “We have to help them, right?”
I shake my head. “It’s not our business.”
“Grayson,” she scolds breathlessly. “Of course it is.”
“No, it’s not. Their people will pick them up. They’ll take care of it.”
“I don’t think they will. Look.”
She points to the west where the other ships are pressing on, leaving the wreckage. No boats turn around. None even hesitate. If anything they pick up speed, leaving their dead and dying behind.
“What the hell?” I mutter to myself. “They aren’t going to save them.”
“We have to do something,” Karina says decidedly. “Come on. We’ll take the fishing boats out to gather survivors.”
The rain starts to fall in earnest as she hurries away. I look back toward the mountain where our people are hurrying inside out of the storm. We would be too, if we had any sense.
I chase Karina up the beach. She’s run straight for the small fishing boats tied to poles driven into the shore. She’s already untying one when I get there.
“Karina, we can’t,” I tell her. “The storm is picking up. You saw what happened to that ship. What do you think will happen to us in this row boat?”
As if to prove my point lightning cracks again, illuminating the beach in a garish light.
Karina shakes her head, her wet hair plastered to her face. “We’re a smaller target. We’re less likely to be struck by lightning.”
“If the lightning doesn’t kill us the waves will.”
She doesn’t listen to me. She’s tugging hard at the ropes securing the boat, a crease of determination cutting across her smooth forehead. I take hold of her arm and pull her toward me.
She opens her mouth to protest but I cut her off. “Listen to me. Think about what you’re doing. The wind is picking up, the rain is getting worse, and once those waves get to churning nothing is safe out there. Definitely not a fishing boat. I know you want to help them, I do too, but what help will we be if we’re dead before we find anyone?”
Her eyes tighten in protection against the now pelting rain. Her eyelashes are dark and clotted together, her pale face streaked with wet. I can see it in her eyes that she knows I’m right. We’d never make it to them, and even if we did we’d never make it back. Not in one piece.
Thunder vibrates the rocks at our feet, sending a shiver through her body under my hand.
“You’re right. I know you’re right, but… Gray, they’re out there and—“
“I know,” I assure her gently, “but we can’t help them.”
A wave crashes to shore. It races up the rocks, reaching past our ankles.
“We have to go,” I remind her.
She nods shakily before taking off at a run. She splashes through the receding water that’s turning to yellow foam between the rocks. I follow close at her heels, glancing sideways at the sinking wreckage. The fire has gone out on one half. Maybe it’s underwater now. I don’t know, I can’t tell for sure with the thickening storm clouds blotting out the last light we had left.
A discordant banging picks up behind me. I turn to look down the beach, cursing under my breath. The boat Karina was untying is loose, banging against the rocks as the tide tries to pull it out to sea. It’s barely hanging on. One more rush of the waves will yank it loose.
“Grayson!” Karina calls. She’s paused to wait for me up the beach. Lightning scours the sky, making both of us flinch.
I wave for her to keep running. “Get inside! I’m right behind you!”
“What are you doing?”
“I have to tie up the boat! We can’t afford to lose any of them!”
Her face is torn. She bites her lip and looks between me and the boat, between herself and the safety of the mountain. Up to the electric sky above her.
“Go!” I shout before turning my back on her.
I don’t know if she listens. She probably doesn’t. The only voice she hears lately is Easton’s.
If he was here he’d be in that boat rowing for all he’s worth out to sea, being the man Karina is asking me to be. But that’s the problem with her. With all of us. She’s beautiful and good and the best friend I’ve ever had, but lately she looks at me like something is missing. And when she looks at Easton I know she thinks she’s found it. He’d go back again and again looking for survivors, his big body full of strength mine will never know. I’d never make it. Not even if I wanted to.
It’s not that I want these people to die, but I’m realistic, not heroic, and I can see from the wild way the ocean is churning and the clouds are swirling that there is no hope of heading out past the breakers and making it to the wreckage. I’d die trying.
I slip on the rocks, nearly falling. My long arms flail, my tall, beanpole body wobbles gracelessly, but I’m able to right myself at the last second and push on down the beach. I’m fast on my feet. So fast that I nearly make it. I’m almost to the boat before the loosened rope lets go completely, but a wave rushing to shore slows me down while simultaneously lifting the wooden hull off the rocks and pulling it away from my grasp.
I have half a second to make a decision. Only half a second to say ‘to hell with it’ and let the boat go or salvage one of our most crucial means of survival. There’s still time for another day or two of fishing once this storm passes, and fishing means meat. Protein to help get us through the long night and into the next Seventh hour when we can come out and fish again. More fish means fewer cows and goats go to slaughter, meaning more milk. More resources. A better, fuller diet for the kids inside who are still growing.
Everything is connected. Everything has consequences, and in that half second when I see the fishing boat slipping away, I see the strength of the Gaians going with it.
I lunge for the rope. My body splashes into the receding tide, rocks digging into my knees and crashing against my shins, but my fingers wrap around the thick, coarse line, and I hold on for dear life. I’m pulled underwater as the boat and I are pulled out to sea. Luckily I get a good breath. I’m a strong swimmer. I’m able to pull on the rope and kick with my feet until I find the surface.
My fingers find the edge the boat. I break just in time to see a wave cresting, coming to crash down on top of me. I gasp in a gulp of fresh air and go under again. I feel it when it hits, when it rolls and jerks the boat nearly out of my grasp, but I hold on tight. I wait it out until the bubbles are dispersing and the rope feels taught but calm in my hand. Kicking for the surface again I reach up for the feel of the hull, grab the edge, and launch myself inside with all the strength I can muster. The water is getting cold, colder than I expected it to be, and I have to remind myself as I settle into the seat, shivering and teeth chattering, that it’s getting late. The Eighth hour is nearly on us and no one should be in the water right now.
Luckily the oars for the boat are strapped inside where they’re supposed to be. I pop the snaps quickly to release them. I just barely get them in the water and manage one powerful stroke to align myself with the next wave when it comes at me. I push through it, forcing myself forward, out to sea when what I really want is to let it carry me home. I’m facing the wrong way, though, and if I don’t row to help myself ride the waves back, I’ll never get there. I’ll end up in that shallow hell where the surf crashes me around, never getting me back to shore and never pulling me past the breakers. I have to go out farther to come back in first and my cold, shaking body is almost as bitter about that as my mind is.
My arms are screaming when I finally make it past the breakers. It’s calmer out here but not by much. The storm is raging. I’m in the eye of it, already surrounded by debris from the wreckage. It’s a lot of wood, some small scraps of sails and rope. No people, thank God. No bodies floating face down that I’ll have to avoid hitting with an oar if I ever plan on sleeping soundly again. I turn my boat slowly, taking a moment to wipe the water from my eyes, useless as that is. I’m drenched again in an instant, water pouring through the dark brown hair that hangs over my forehead. It drips down my face, into my eyes, pools at the corners of my mouth. It’s strange to be this wet and cold after months of scorching heat just outside my door. Months of drought and burning, and now here I sit freezing and soaked to the bone.
Taking several deep breaths I ready myself for the return to shore. My heart is pounding with a very real fear, with the very real knowledge that I might not make it. That I might die out here. It’s going to take timing and an insane amount of effort in these shifting currents, but I’m hoping I can manage. Looking back to the beach I see Karina still there, waiting with her hands over her mouth and her eyes glued on me. I wonder what she’s thinking. I wonder if—
The boat is jerked to the side, destroying my alignment with the shore. It sends me toppling forward. The handle of one of the oars stabs me soundly in the side making me bark in pain like I’ve been punched. I’ll bruise for sure and for a second I can barely breathe through the pain that burns into my stomach. The back of my throat closes up tightly against it as I gasp curses and rants of anger.
As I lean over the side of the boat I see what hit me. A piece of wreckage, a beam with a torn sail, a piece of rope wrapped around it, and a girl.
I blink against the blur of water in my eyes, but she’s still there. Tangled in the sails, pinned to the wood by the rope, her brown skin vibrant in color and so unmistakably alive. Her long, chocolate hair is matted over her face, hiding her eyes, but I know she’s not dead. It’s like I can feel it. Feel her life in my gut where it burns and aches angrily, throbbing with the rhythm of my heartbeat.
I reach into the water as the waves begin to lift us both. I take hold of her arm stretched out over the beam and I pull, yanking on her so hard it would hurt if she was awake. Luckily she’s not and I’m able to lift her, pull her free of the debris, and toss her into the hull of my small boat before we’re separated by the cresting waves.
