Page 93 of Beneath the Veil of Tides
A wide smile split Duscharne’s face. He snapped his fingers, and it echoed through the air.
“Oh, I am still getting blood.”
Three of his beasts soared from hiding along the side of the ship, one carrying a large mass. Brown hair and bronzed skin sat comfortably in the claws of one of the beasts, but it wasn’t what immediately caught my attention.
The creature cradled a smirking Laziel as it fled, reverent as a mourner, while the trident glinted from his grasp, gleaming with something far from holy.
Zahara threw a throwing star for the Varaxis, but he dodged it, readjusting his black trenchcoat over his squared shoulders. It seemed too easy for him to move, like he floated across the deck on light feet.
Fury burned through me, both from my own emotions and the god’s, who shook with rage beside me.
Go get the trident,I rushed into Noctis’s mind.
I will not leave your side,his words rumbled.
You will, because that relic is our only hope.
And you are my only salvation.
Noctis lunged sloppily, orchestrated on pure anger. His blade swiped across Duscharne from shoulder down, but the weapon went through the Varaxis as if only an image. It struck the deck and split the wood, splinters flying in all directions on impact.
Duscharne laughed. It was raspy, yet somehow charming, as if he had spent his entire life getting what he wanted with his words. His other two beasts surrounded him from above.
“Don’t take it personally. He’s been with us for months, trying to save his brother. Genius, isn’t it? Gained your trust onlyto signal to me when the trident was forged? It was his idea, too.”
Noctis worked to release his sword when a hidden fourth of the feline, winged creatures swooped from the shadows behind. Claws closed around my abdomen before I even realized I was dragged into the air, the ship dropping away in a violent blur. I yelped, my arms bound beneath the claws of the beast. The grip tightened unforgivingly, and panic quickly flooded in me. I might as well have been drowning, even in the sky. We soared through the sky, ripping through the clouds in a breath I wished I could take.
The crew fought off the other two attacking creatures, but Noctis tore through the sky, ravenous, chasing after me. He shot power toward the beast, but we flipped, my stomach dropping with the aerobatics. A raw bellow ripped from his throat. One second, I saw my Blood Tie reaching for me through the clouds, and in the next, I dissipated and reappeared in absolute darkness.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
The cemented cell moved like a breathing being, contracting and repelling. Over and over. Water dropped from a calcium formation in the corner, the dripping sound one I couldn’t keep myself from focusing on, trying to drown out the screams and cries through the chambers.
Rough and calloused unknown hands had thrown me into the cell during the utter void. It took me only minutes to realize the walls reacted to my emotions. The stone around mimicked my own panicked breathing, frantically squeezing me so small my shoulders touched each face. I listened to the falling water sound, counted their hits into the puddle below until I lost count and started again. When my nerves calmed hours later, the walls slowly inched their way back to their original positions.
The gash running along the length of my face from when I’d collided with the floor seared, grime and mud burning the wound that would soon cause infection. Wyrmsteel shackles cuffed my wrists, disconnecting me from talking to Noctis and summoning my powers. It’s what they were intended for, yet I wouldn’t tell them I was powerless. They didn’t work on me. Just like my body didn’t work for me.
Seven hundred and sixteen, seven hundred and seventeen, sevenhundred and eigh—
A slit in the wooden door frame offered little light from the torch-lit corridor; however, it also presented the multitude of prisoners beyond my own cell. My stomach lurched at the smell of rotting flesh, green sludge pooling from the cell across and into my own. Their wailing waned with the hours, some going completely silent when they gave up… or died.
The chamber door crashed into the wall.
“Get up, sea scum,” a brute guard demanded, standing in the door frame, iron links chained along his torso.
Absolutely fucking not.
When I was first captured, I had beat at that door for a solid few hours, but ultimately, they left me like all the other prisoners––alone, drowning in fear and panic, my throat raw from screaming. They’d have to drag me out themselves if they thought they would take me elsewhere.
The walls closed in, grinding against the stone flooring, rattling as they shifted toward me. They would crush me if I couldn’t keep my emotions in check.
I’d have to get out of the room and then fight.
I rose to my feet slowly, making sure not to look at the walls. They taunted each step to the opening of the chamber, grinding little by little with every inch I traveled.
The guard huffed when he noticed them enclosing. He knew I was scared, and that terrified me even more.
He reached forward and yanked me by the tarnished chain trailing the wyrmsteel shackles, and I inhaled sharply. Brutal scars covered his face, shades of white and light ruby freckling the healed marks.
