Chapter 6
Then
We had weaseled our way through the throngs of people and were leaning on the railing overlooking the harbor. Front row seats to the explosion of color and culture. Ships of every size and make crowded the harbor. Row boats floated in between the ships, taking crewmembers to shore to participate in the drinking, dancing, and debauchery that Eserene provided.
“Holy Saints! Look at that one!” Larka said, pointing dramatically in the direction of a group of ships.
“You’ll have to be more specific,” I countered.
“The black ship with the silver sail. Have you ever seen anything like it?” Her eyes were wide, blinking rapidly, the sunlight reflecting from the water bouncing in her eyes.
The shipwasspectacular. The wood was the deepest black I had ever seen, at war with the brightly colored sails that flew from the ships around it. The sail gleamed in the sunlight, somehow capturing the essence of molten silver in the form of fabric. “Taitha, capital of Cabillia,” a smoky voice offered from our left. I turned to meet the same mismatched eyes I had earlier today.Benevolent Saints.
Larka’s gaze didn’t move from the ship. “Taitha?” she said. “I didn’t even know they had ships. Much less ships likethat. Aren’t they landlocked?” He didn’t have time to answer before she started again. “Must have some money if they’re paying for ships from the middle of the country.”
A wave of discomfort washed over me, my stomach souring at the feel of the stranger next to me. He looked out to the harbor. “Cabillia has hundreds of miles of waterfront. The capital would be mad to pass up the opportunity to have ships,” he said with the same playfulness that had struck me earlier.
“Huh,” Larka murmured. She didn’t even register the stranger beside us who had interjected himself into our conversation. I glanced sideways at the man. His clothes told me he sure as hell was not from Inkwell. Actually, his clothes looked like they didn’t come from Eserene at all. But the way the sunlight caught in his black hair was easily distracting me from surveying his clothing.
“Where do you live?” I blurted without thinking, my tone sharper than intended. Neither Larka nor the man seemed to notice.
“Oh,” he said with a nervous laugh, his hand gripping the back of his neck. “Ockhull.” Larka didn’t bat an eye at the mention of the middle-class district, but something in his tone made me grimace. It was hard not to look at him, not to study his profile as he watched the ships bob in the harbor, and at the same time my body tensed at the sight of him. “Remember what I said earlier,” he added in quickly, turning to the crowd to leave. “Be careful.”
“Who the fuck was that?” Larka finally exclaimed, tearing her eyes from the opulent ship.
“‘Don’t know,” I answered, trying to shake the prickly feeling the conversation left me with. “I ran into–”
The air cleaved with hammering bells and screams. “FIRE!”
Five hundred feet to our left in the harbor, the bow of a warship was engulfed in angry flames. The sails — lapis lazuli. Eddena. I froze in panic, the crowd around us scattering as the ship moved in our direction at a fever pitch and the flames spread to the masts. The crew began to jump overboard as the sail caught fire, their shocked screams echoing off the seawall as the frigid water stole their breath away. Nearby rowboats took on water as crew members pulled themselves aboard, frantically rowing out of the way of the inferno. At the rate it was moving, there were maybe forty-five seconds before it reached the seawall.
“COME ON!” Larka yelled beside me, and I realized she was yelling to the rowboats of men. Garbled screams erupted as the ship collided with swimming sailors that couldn’t move out of the way in time, the blunt force knocking them unconscious before the flames could reach them. Heads slipped underwater in the chaos, and I lost track of who resurfaced and who didn’t. Bodies began to float. Blood pouring from head wounds painted a rose garden across the water.
Thirty seconds.
The flaming ship was still heading directly toward us, a rowboat teeming with crewmen directly in its path feverishly paddling for shore. I could tell that if they cut to the side, it’d be too late. It was then that I realized what their only option was, what they were going to attempt. One man stood at the bow holding a bundle of rope, swinging it over his head.
“THROW IT!” Larka screamed, looking around her for someone,anyone, to help, and I knew what she was doing. She was going to try to pull the boat to the shore. It would be quicker than paddling if there was enough strength to drag it in.
Like a lasso bound for a calf, the sailor heaved the rope to where we stood atop the seawall. Three men had seen the plan set in motion and quickly crowded around Larka, ready to pull. The Eddenian ship blazed toward the rowboat, toward the shore, blue sails turning orange–
Larka caught the end of the rope, quickly pulling as much of it onto land as she could, the men falling into formation behind her. I stood dumbfounded, frozen in place, my mind running a million miles a second but my legs bound in invisible shackles.
Twenty seconds.
The rowboat began to pick up speed as their makeshift rescue team pulled and pulled. It was working. Holyshit,it was working. The craft glided over the water. The blazing ship was still speeding toward them, but they were closing the distance to shore.
Larka let out a war cry, her face blood red with the effort, veins popping from her neck. The men behind her heaved and heaved. All I could do was watch.
The ship was closing in on the rowboat and the men aboard screamed, some of them paddling furiously with their hands,anythingto propel them forward. They suddenly began to lose momentum.
“We need leverage!” Larka shouted, and all at once, the team of brute force shifted to the left, catching the rope on a railing post and pulling it taut. The rowboat gained speed again, heading for the seawall at breakneck speed. All they’d have to do is hop up and they’d make it. They wereright there.
The railing post snapped in half with a loud crack, Larka and the three men falling to the ground, the rope slackening.
Ten seconds.
The team rose, but the slackened rope had looped around Larka’s calf in the chaos of the fall, somehow wrapping around her leg in a knot. She flailed her arms out, screaming in pain as she clawed at the rope, but her cries were drowned out by the screams of people fleeing, scrambling, watching.