The Deepest Ocean (Eden Series) (29 page)

“Here.” He pushed her hands away and freed the laces, his touch much gentler than his tone. She peeled the suit off her shoulders and got up to slide it off just as the steward opened the door.

Darok moved in front of her, his hands clasped behind his back as the steward stopped. Coffee slopped a little in the cups he carried, but nothing spilled.

“Leave it on the table,” Darok said, and the steward did so with his gaze firmly averted. The door closed behind him and Yerena kicked the suit off. She dropped her mask and flippers and gloves on it, for once uncaring about neatness. Her elbows and knees felt raw where the grease had worn away, and the crust of salt on her skin itched unbearably.

Darok turned to look at her, and despite his silence, his face might as well have been a mirror. She could tell exactly how exhausted she looked. He poured clean water into the basin and gave her a handful of rags.

She dampened and used them, silently grateful, and wrapped herself in a towel as he poured water and coffee. “Finish yours,” he said. “Then tell me what happened.”

It was safer to take sips of the water at intervals while she spoke, so Yerena did that. She said very little about the fight against the whales, because the only important thing was the result—that the killers were no longer a significant threat, because something else was rising to eclipse them. “I don’t know what it is…maybe a greatwhale. But it’s most likely headed this way.”

Darok’s hand tightened on the cup’s handle. “The inlet’s not deep enough, surely—those beasts are used to hunting in the ocean. And didn’t you say no one in Seawatch had linked with greatwhales?”

“He’s not in Seawatch any more. If he could try linking with my shark, when he’s never been close enough…” She’d had a lot of time to consider that, but putting her thoughts into words was another matter. Anything in her mind seemed to be working its way to the surface like a bubble through tar.

“I think he used those whales as stepping stones to reach the shark,” she said slowly, “but doing so exposed his mind to the shark as well, and through him it saw something that made it want to flee. Besides, how far do you think a Denalait would get among the Tureans once he had no more allies on his side? He was keeping something in reserve.”

Darok rested his elbows on the table and rubbed his forehead. “Wonderful. As if I didn’t have enough to deal with.”

“What happened?” She looked closely at him. He had shaved that morning, but the sunken hollows around his eyes made them look darker, and there were fine lines at the corners of his mouth.

“Someone looking like a Lastlander prisoner came aboard and killed one of my men. I put my sword through him, but he only broke off when Alyster tried to set him alight. Then he threw himself off the ship. We might as well have been in the damned Strait of Mists again.”

At least those phantoms hadn’t been anything recognizable as human. “A sword didn’t affect him at all?”

“Not as far as I saw. Alyster said when the men attacked him, they might as well have been stabbing a jellyfish, except that would have leaked more. No blood, let alone vital organs, and his bones were like—well, like coral. Hard enough to turn a blade.”

She wondered what those might do to a shark’s teeth. “Did he drown?”

“I don’t know.” Darok finished his coffee. “We hit him with a barrel of pitch, so maybe that hurt him enough that he sank straight to the bed of the inlet. Then again, he could survive a knife in his back, so maybe he’s fine. He had a man’s skin, but there was something…else underneath.”

We both have unknowns to be afraid of now
, Yerena thought, but dealing with someone else’s concerns rather than her own made her feel better. “I can see if he’s drowned.”

“What do you mean?”

She tilted her head at her suit, which lay in a waterlogged pile on the floor. “I can swim down and take a look. The inlet’s not that deep.”

Darok’s brows came together. “No. That’s too dangerous.”

“I have the shark.” Though that was a lie, because the shark was too weakened to fight, and she wasn’t going to let it be hurt any further. “And if the Tureans sent some kind of unhuman creature all this way to kill you, I doubt he’d just give up and go away. Especially if swords and drowning don’t stop him.” Darok opened his mouth to argue again, and she said, “To guide and to guard, remember?”

His gaze traveled over her from bare shoulders to bare legs, and her skin tingled despite there being more concern than lust in his eyes. “I don’t think you’re in any condition to guard us.”

“I’ll be fine after I’ve rested.” She didn’t say what she really thought, which was,
What else can I do? Once the shark dies, can I even call myself by my complete name any longer?

“Ah. I’m sorry, but another woman is using your cabin.”

“Another woman?” She wondered if there was any other meaning to read into that.

“A Lastlander prisoner. I didn’t think you’d be coming back, so… Anyway, you can sleep in my bunk and I’ll put up a hammock.” He paused. “When was the last time you ate?”

“A day ago.” She wished she hadn’t remembered that. “A dead man’s lunch.”

“A what?”

“A fisherman I killed. I still think of him from time to time.” It was like having a splinter under a nail.

Darok called for his steward and asked for a meal before he turned back to her. “You’ve killed people before. Why is this different?”

Yerena undid her braid and shook her hair loose to dry, mostly to give herself something to do with her hands. “I finally did myself what I’ve ordered that shark to do for years.”

“I see.” Darok sat down again, facing her. “And their eyes were opened, for they had gained the knowledge of good and evil.”

“What?”

“Just something I read once.” He took her hand, and her fingers meshed with his of their own accord. His skin was roughened from years of gripping ropes and sword-hilt, she remembered that so well, but his hand was warm and strong against hers and she longed to feel all of her body held as closely. She steeled herself and he went on.

“It’s different when you have to take a life yourself, instead of ordering someone else to do it,” he said. “But I’ll wager you didn’t have much of a choice, any more than I did when I first killed a man—and he wasn’t even a Turean. He was a Bleakhavener, but I’ll tell you that tale another time.”

The steward came in with their meal, and Darok let go of her hand, waiting until they were alone before he continued. “Besides, you’re a woman, you come up to my chin and you have wrists like wineglass stems. I’m sure that gave the man at least something of an advantage.”

That made her feel a little better. She wouldn’t hesitate to defend herself again, but she didn’t think she would feel the same cold detachment. Let alone the shark not being of further use, she wasn’t sure she would be so valuable as a Weapon of Denalay either.

“Eat up.” Darok put a full bowl into her hands. It was leathery dried beef that had been stewed soft, but she was so hungry she would have eaten it without the cooking.

Sleep came less easily, because it was a long-held habit to reach out to the shark as she lay in bed. When she was warm and relaxed, she didn’t need to fake the comfort and safety that flowed through their link, and she slept better when she reassured the shark of her presence. Or maybe it was the other way around. But what could she do—let it feel her contentment when it was too weakened to feed itself and waiting to die? When she withdrew, the emotions she’d superimposed on its mind would fade, and it would be only too aware of its wretched condition.

I wouldn’t blame it if it attacked me
. She shivered involuntarily. No, there was nothing to be afraid of, because the shark wasn’t going to die surrounded by nets. The dreams were empty as eggshells, and she was too tired for them to disturb her.

Instead, what woke her was Darok shaking her shoulder gently and saying her name as she struggled up on one elbow. She felt groggy but no longer exhausted, which gave her an idea of how long she had been asleep.

“Get dressed.” He left the cabin.

She got out of the bunk. Blue light filtered in from the open window, but the lamp was lit as well and she had hung her watersuit up to dry before she’d slept. She didn’t have any grease, but it didn’t matter, because she guessed the reason for Darok’s terse words.

Rest and food had helped. Although her right arm was bruised dark where the oar had struck her, she no longer felt punch-drunk as she put her suit on and collected the gear she would need. All the crew seemed to have gathered on deck, and she had to slip through their ranks to reach the prow where Darok stood with the spyglass to his eye.

Not that she needed one to see the Turean galleys. Two of them, side by side, filled the other end of the inlet, and she guessed others were just beyond, hidden by the curve of the cliffs and the morning shade.

Their voyage was over. Darok lowered the spyglass and pushed it into his belt. His face was stern and composed, mouth set to a line that would not have been out of place on a Seawatch operative’s lips, though the dark eyes lingered on her.

“You’d better go,” he said. “It’ll be too dangerous later.”

Yerena nodded. “Do you have a knife?” It was the one part of her gear she lacked, but a deckhand offered her a blade and she turned to leave, though she paused as she saw Lady Lisabe. For some reason the woman was decked in all her red-and-gold finery, making her more of a target. Yerena wondered what she was thinking, since the Turean archers probably knew what colors the Voices of the Unity wore.

None of my concern
. The Tureans were likely to have their own spyglasses, so she crossed the deck to the stern. It was so early that shadows of the cliffs lay on the quiet water of the bay, and she couldn’t make out the familiar fin anywhere. She could have used the link, but that was likely to end in one of two ways—either she would be crushed by guilt as she felt what the shark did, or she would sense nothing at all.

No, she couldn’t think of the shark. She had to make sure
Daystrider
was safe, where it lay anchored at least, before the battle began. She lowered herself down to the waterline. Gripping the rope, she spat in her mask and rinsed it off before she put it on.

The solidity of the hull beside her helped. The ship felt large and strong, a little like the shark’s body, and her usual self-possession settled over her like a cloak as she drew in slow deep breaths, one after another. The last inhalation was the one she had to keep until she came back up to the surface.

She let go of the rope and dropped into the water.

Chapter Eleven

Out of the Depths

Darok watched the two Turean galleys approach, oars beating in measured strokes. From that angle, he couldn’t see the galleys’ names, but the broken chain flew high from their mainmasts, and their prows pointed towards
Daystrider
. A single catapult rode just behind each prow. Early-morning light struck sparks off the great chunks of granite nestled in the catapults’ cradles, probably ballast stones being used as projectiles. Just two catapults, but they could hardly fail to hit an unmoving target once they were within range.

Though they didn’t seem hasty to close, and under any other circumstances, he would have smiled. So they remembered
Rorqual
’s sinking. The oars were shipped when the galleys were still half a mile away, but Yerena had not said she would use her shark to cripple the galleys as she had done before. He had an unpleasant feeling about that.

A sliver of sun glowed over the cliffs in the east, and still the captains of the galleys made no move. Darok wondered if they planned to wear him down with waiting. He would have felt better if Yerena had been on board, because she’d been gone too long and yet he didn’t dare show just how heavy she weighed on his mind. He wished he had been able to tell her how much she meant to him, but there had been no time.

What difference would that have made to a Seawatch operative?
his more cynical side asked. He’d kissed her once, when she was deeply asleep. He had pressed his mouth to the smooth skin just above the arch of her left brow, on the curved tip of the black tattoo. And remembering that, it felt as though he had kissed her goodbye.

No
, he thought as flatly as Yerena herself might have spoken the word. He loosened his sword in its scabbard and cast a look over the deck to make sure his catapult crew was ready—as they had been for the past two hours.

“
Daystrider
.” The word rang out from a Turean galley, magnified by a hollow horn but distorted too, so it wasn’t clear if the speaker was a man or a woman. “I am Captain Jash Morender of the freeship
Dreadnaught
, and this is your last chance to save lives rather than throw them away.”

Darok thought he would have been far better off facing a male captain in battle—a man would be direct and easy to fight. Jash Morender was subtler than a serpent and seemed to cloak her most vicious tactics in seeming acts of mercy. He waited to hear the rest of her speech.

“All the Lostlander prisoners are on board,” she said, and Darok knew a Turean accent wasn’t responsible for the mispronunciation. “I will trade them all, alive, for one man. For the captain of
Daystrider
.”

Ah.
He wouldn’t have entertained any ideas of fair dealings with a pirate, but that was a good way for Jash Morender to both inflame his crew and rid herself of inconvenient ballast—simply murder the prisoners while making it clear he could have saved them, but didn’t. He glanced sideways at Alyster.