Page 13 of To Snap a Silver Stem
Captain chuffs out a sound of disgust, strain etched around the edges of his pale blue eyes. “I don’t trust the slimy words of that agitator, even if she does claim to know everything.You shouldn’t either.”
A deep red creeps up Vanth’s neck and across his cheeks. His grip on the trigger tightens, blanching the tip of his finger and halting my heart.
My foot slides forward an inch.
Don’t do it. Please.
“Well, I count at least ten ofyourmen down there who were raised around her fire, feeding on her legends—”
“You shoot that thing,” Captain growls with merciless candor, “and all you’re going to achieve is to anger it, earn yourself ten lashes, and a court-martial once we dock. Finger off the trigger, before I snap it off your fuckinghand and throw it to the gulls.”
Vanth’s eyes glaze with resolution, and he looks to the creature, strangles the trigger—
I leap, slamming into him as theboomof the discharged weapon knifes my gut.
The bolt plunges toward the snaking shadow at lightning speed, striking the water with a sickeningwhump.A serrated moan rips from the ocean, a swirling symphony of pain that rips my heart in two.
Hands fisting Vanth’s shirt, I release a sob as the creature writhes into a knot of soft and sharp frills. As it bulges above the surface like a glittering mountain birthed from the sea, spewing a river of red from the fleshy wound staked by that brutal bolt—straight through a fold of fins.
Silence sweeps across the ship as its tortured cries squeal through the still and ripple across the ocean, battering my skin like a tangible thing. Like the ocean’s crying—its tears a pattering attack I can’t wipe away.
I look at all that blood-tarnished beauty and fail to blink away the needling sting in my eyes.
The creature unspools in slow, spineless increments, slithering below the surface …
Gone.
All that’s left is a blossom of blood bigger than the ship; a temporary gravestone that fades a little with each of my hammering heartbeats.
“Youmonster,” I rasp through the fire in my throat and whirl on Vanth, looking past a sheen of tears into merciless eyes. “What have you done?”
“What haveIdone?” Vanth yanks me so hard our chests collide, his warm breath popping against my face with every blasted word. “I was aiming for the head, and I definitely missed the fuckinghead. You may have just killed us all,Mist—”
He’s blasted from my grip by a shove that lashes him against the railing. Captain charges forward and clenches his collar, bending him backward over the handrail, hanging his life in the crush of a fist. “Damn fool.”
The shrill jingle of a familiar bell has me searching the aftermast, finding Zane halfway up—clinging to the rungs and looking at me.
Pointing at the sea.
I frown, a deep sense of unease rooting through my chest.
“Cap … the aftermast … look.”
Frowning, he does, face blanching when he spots Zane. “I locked that boy in my quarters. The hell is he doing up there?”
Zane continues to point portside, screaming one word over and over again.
“That blasted wind ... Can you tell what he’s saying?”
“Bubbles,” I murmur, stepping forward to look past the balustrade. Leaning over the rail, I catch sight of something shimmering beneath the froth floating on the restless waves, stomach dropping. “Everyone, hold on—”
The ocean erupts, and I’m ripped backward, gasping as the serpentine beast punches through with a torrent of water that pelts the ship like a storm. The world bucks beneath my feet and I lurch to the rail, squinting through the cold spray to make out the creature’s head—boxy and barbed and dusted in jeweled scales, its piercing green eyes shaded by a mantle of shards.
It’s beautiful. Statuesque.
Huge.
Towered above us, it sways, the sharp fins on one side of its body unfolding like a fan, revealing a stretch of webbed, triangular panels.
