Witch Born (34 page)

Grendi slowly turned, her face unreadable. “I offered them forever sleep or more torture. They chose to sleep.”

Senna’s muscles melted and she collapsed, barely feeling the pain as her knees hit the deck. “No.”

Grendi watched her, satisfaction etched in her face. “Torture is a complicated art, Brusenna. The line between pain and death is very thin. And the human body can only take so much.”

Hatred burned in Senna’s chest. Words poured hot from her mouth, seeming to coat her tongue with ash. A song that could set the very world on fire.

Ember to flame

Scorch and burn

To Cinders and ash

“Stop her!” Grendi screamed as smoke rose around her feet. Waves of heat roared up from the ship, hot enough to blister Senna’s knees through the thin fabric of her dress.

A sharp blow to the jaw silenced her song. A gag was shoved in her mouth, her wrists bound with rough cords. As they dragged her away, she cast a glance back at Krissin.

The Head of Sunlight looked away, shame coloring her cheeks.

Senna was too horrified to cry, too horrified to think. She only knew she wanted to die.

Joshen was dead, and it was her fault. After all, she’d dragged him to Tarten knowing full well how dangerous it was. Her eyes refused to focus, sounds became muddled, and her body lost all feeling. She was so full of pain, her senses were shutting down.

Through the link, Cord kept trying to reach her. She ignored him as she would a fly ramming a window.

Grendi stepped so close Senna could smell her sickly sweet perfume. She watched in satisfaction as they hauled Senna’s hands above her head and tied her waist to the foremast.

“We’ll be in Haven in two days. And then you can watch your people—your home—fall apart around you, as you made me watch mine.”

Senna wet her lips. “You promised Ellesh you’d turn over the survivors. You break that promise, and she’ll sink your ships.”

Grendi leaned in so close her hair tickled Senna’s face. “Let her sink them.” She observed Senna’s sickened expression. “When it is over, we’ll hang you and display your body in Tarten until you crumble to dust with everything else.” She stepped back and addressed the soldiers around her. “No food. No water.” Then she turned and was gone.

Senna closed her eyes, her body racked with sob after sob.

***

For two days and a night Senna was tied to the mizzen mast. During the day, the sun baked her skin. Blisters formed during the night. Her tongue swelled in her mouth. She couldn’t work up any saliva or tears, so she kept her eyes and mouth closed.

Her arms felt like dead weight above her head. She tried to wiggle her fingers, but she couldn’t tell if she succeeded or not. Perhaps her hands were already dead. She couldn’t drudge up enough emotion to care. She couldn’t sit, couldn’t rest. She was thirsty—so thirsty.

She actually took comfort in Cord’s presence, more so the closer he came. She was able to retreat into him just a little. Even though she was sharing her suffering with him, he seemed to take it gladly. She suspected that without the link, she’d be dead already.

She must have dozed, for when she woke again it was night. She was hyperconscious of the waterskin under her tunic. She felt the liquid through the bladder, heard the slightest slosh whenever she shifted.

Under cover of darkness the night before, she’d tried for hours to reach it, until the blisters around her chin had cracked and oozed down her shirt. She had to try again.

She wiggled her chin under her filthy tunic and stretched her tongue under the gag, trying to curl it around the waterskin’s neck. She dropped her body weight, using the pressure of the ropes to force the bladder further up. She worked for hours, until her neck cramped and something wet ran down her neck—more fluid from her blisters, or perhaps blood.

Suddenly, she realized someone was standing in front of her. Her Tarten guard. How long had he been watching her? Surely he knew of the waterskin’s presence by now. He studied her, his face drawn. He looked furtively around before carefully pulling the waterskin free. He held it to her lips.

She was so shocked she gaped at him.

He nudged her and she drank, water dribbling out the sides of her mouth because of the gag. The water tasted wonderful, and her body absorbed it like parched earth. When she’d drained the waterskin, the guard carefully tucked it back out of sight. His movements slow and gentle, he reached inside her tunic, pulled out some of the hard bread, and slipped it in her mouth. The gag was too tight for her to chew, but she managed to soften it enough to swallow.

She tried to catch his eye to give him a nod of thanks, but he refused to look at her. When he’d fed her all the bread, he took up his position again.

Eventually, she slept. And unlike last time, she knew when she woke up, she’d still be alive.

She stirred at the distant sound of thunder. She blinked the sleep from her eyes, then squinted into the distance. Black clouds rolled toward them, lightning leaving jagged images in her aftervision. She felt a change in the air—a heavy kind of expectation. A hurricane.

Through the link, Cord felt so close she knew he must be on one of the Caldash ships. She had the presence of mind to wonder how he’d caught up to her.

Closing her eyes, Senna listened to the Four Sisters’ songs—oppressive chanting that twisted the Sisters’ natural songs into something dark and sinister. The Haven Witches were trying to force the ships back. The Caldash Witches were countering the storm, creating unnatural pockets of calm for the armada to slice through.

The two opposing songs clashed, creating chaotic noise that grated against Senna’s ears until they felt raw. She clenched her teeth, trying to think past the shrieking cacophony.

The wind surged toward them. The ship scaled a wave as big as a mountain, until it seemed they were climbing to the sky. They slowed near the top. Senna was certain they weren’t going to make it. She imagined them sliding back, the craft rolling over.

The ship clung to the top of the wave at a standstill. Suddenly, they rushed down again, sending Senna’s stomach into her throat. They smashed into the trough. Spray exploded across the deck and slammed into her. It was so cold it stole the breath from her lips. She gasped, water streaming down her face and stinging her eyes.

Tarten sailors flashed in and out of sharp relief with each flash of lightning. A bolt shot through the sky, heading straight for their ships. But before it hit, another bolt cut into its path. The two collided with a percussion that shook the air and made Senna’s ears ring.

The war had begun.

For what seemed like hours, they fought their way through the storm. Helpless as the ship she’d been anchored to, Senna tipped her face to the rain, letting her mouth fill with water until she felt nearly normal. If only she could stop shivering.

And then, through the unnatural twilight, she saw waves shattering white against distant cliffs. Haven.

Senna wanted to scream at the Haven Witches to move the island. She could imagine the scene. Witchling messengers running everywhere. Witches singing in the Ring, firm in the belief the Tartens and their Witches could never cross their walls. The Haven Witches would see it as a siege, one they would simply outlast as the sea battered their enemy’s ships into pieces.

When the ships were in range, the captain shouted orders for them to turn the broadside cannons on the cliffs. Senna didn’t understand. Surely they didn’t think they could beat down sheer walls hundreds of feet thick with mere iron balls.

Cannon fire boomed beneath her feet, but instead of cannon balls, modified anchors arched through the sky, ropes trailing behind them.

A few anchors exploded in a deadly rain of shrapnel against the cliffs, and some bounced harmlessly to the sea. But a few caught hold. A wave hit their ship, pushing it away from the cliffs, dragging its anchors back into the water. The anchors were hauled back and fired again. This time they held.

Senna’s apprehension suddenly, inexplicably spiked.

Guns strapped to their backs, Tarten soldiers were tied to the ropes. They climbed hand over hand from the ships toward the waiting cliffs. There was no one to stop them. A cry left Senna’s lips, a warning the Haven Witches would never hear. If she hadn’t been tied to the mast, Senna would have fallen to her knees. The guard who had given her the water turned to look at her, pity in his eyes.

With a mighty crack, one of the anchors gave way. The guard’s head whipped back around. On deck, the sailors grabbed the rope and heaved it across the deck, hauling swamped soldiers back toward the safety of the ship. Before long, the half-drowned soldiers sprawled across the deck, gasping for breath. There weren’t nearly as many as had left. At least half of them must have drowned.

The cannons were fired again and the sailors started across it for the second time. The rest of the anchors held.

By the time the Haven Witches realized their peril, it would be too late.

Senna pictured Haven as it had once been, shining and filled to the brim with Witches and Guardians who were lauded for their power and skill. If Tarten succeeded, Haven would be a burned-out ruin of ash and rot.

She couldn’t bear it. She pulled at her bonds. They cut into her chaffed wrists, but they wouldn’t give. She sagged against the ropes, letting them take all of her weight. It was hopeless. She’d done everything she could, and it hadn’t been enough.

Suddenly, lightning struck the side of the ship. Electricity jumped across the water-soaked deck, sending a shock through Senna. She could smell burning, hear shouting, and feel the tremble of dozens of running feet, but she couldn’t see what was happening.

A soldier shot past her, his fist colliding with the man guarding her. She tried to wrap her mind around the idea of one Tarten soldier attacking another. But the man who turned to her wasn’t a Tarten soldier.

It was Cord, the too-small soldier jacket half-buttoned over his chest. With his dark features, he could easily pass for a Tarten in this chaos.

Kneeling over the semiconscious guard, he yanked a knife free of its ankle strap.

“Don’t!” Senna cried through the gag. She couldn’t bear for Cord to kill him.

With a grunt of exasperation, Cord reversed the knife and hit the guard on the temple. He pulled the unconscious man out of sight, then pressed up against her and peeked past her. The warmth of Cord’s body suffused her with beautiful heat.

His breath stirred across her mouth as he spoke, “I don’t think anyone noticed.” His face twisted as if the sight of her pained him. “I’m so sorry, Brusenna.”

He cut the gag from her mouth. Her jaw trembled as she closed it for the first time in two days. His sharp knife cut through the ropes holding her hands. Her arms dropped down in front of her, so heavy she couldn’t lift them, but the skin on her wrists wasn’t black, just a lurid purple. At least the tissue was still alive.

“How?” Senna had to shout to be heard over the storm.

“Did you think I wouldn’t come for you?” Cord cut through the bonds tied around her waist. The knife sliced into her skin and she didn’t care. With a sudden burst of ropes, she was free. Unable to support her weight, her legs buckled.

Cord guided her to the deck, where she collapsed in a wet heap. Kneeling before her, he braced her up and pulled the rest of the ropes off her.

The feeling in her arms and hands was coming back, thousands of white-hot needles wheedling into her skin. “How did you catch up?” she asked through the pain.

Cord ruthlessly rubbed the circulation back into her hands. “The Composer went into a fit when I told her you had escaped. She put me in a smaller, faster vessel and made sure I caught up. Krissin and I watched you from our deck. She even sent a bolt of lightning to hit this ship—nice distraction, huh?”

“But how did you get onboard?” Senna’s voice sounded broken and disused.

He brought out another waterskin and held it up for her to drink. Lukewarm, rich broth filled her mouth. The taste brought her out of her stupor. She grasped the skin and chugged greedily.

He watched her, guilt at letting her slip away from him seeping through the link. “I swam.”

She choked, wasting the wonderful broth. She caught some in her hand and slurped it up without shame. “Through this?”

He nodded.

In these freezing, thrashing waters? Just to save her? That’s what must have caused her spike of apprehension earlier. She’d felt his fear when he jumped into the water. She dropped her gaze. “You shouldn’t have. It was too dangerous.”

He peeked around the mast and watched the Tartens. “We need to get out of here.”

Senna felt stronger than she had in days, but she still couldn’t seem to get warm. She looked past Cord, at the sea rolling as if a giant, invisible hand stirred the surface. “How? I don’t think I can swim in that. I don’t know how you did.”

He pulled a vial from his trouser pocket. “With this, we can make it back to the Caldashan ships.”

She recognized it immediately as Ioa, the potion that allowed a human to take the shape of a seal. She took the topaz-colored potion from him, the glass slick under her fingers, and studied the hundreds of soldiers dangling over the open waters like laundry on a line. They were almost halfway there. “I have to warn Haven.”

His arms on her shoulders, he pushed her back against the mast. “You can’t stop this. No one can. All you can do is help the survivors.”

“There won’t be any survivors. Grendi doesn’t care if her lands are restored or her ships sunk. My mother’s in there, Cord.”

He flinched as if Senna’s words had burned him. And through the link, she could tell they had.

“If we leave now, we can warn the Guardians. They can reach the cliffs,” she said more gently.

Cord lowered his head. He’d known what her answer would be when he freed her, and he’d come anyway. “I have to take you back with me, Senna.”

Impulsively, she took his hand. “Come with me to Haven! Help me save them.”

“You go back and you’ll die with them. And that’s if they don’t throw you in a cellar to rot first.”