“If I were you,” she said to Rain as the stench got stronger, “I’d row faster.”
Rain grunted as she tugged on the oars, but otherwise ignored Eris.
A scream pierced the air behind them, followed by the sound of teeth ripping into flesh. Across from Eris, Safire spun, gripping the sides of the rowboat and staring into the fog. More screams erupted, half-cloaked by the roar of the sea. Rain andLila strained on the oars. Eris listened, completely still, as Kor’s crew was dragged one by one from their boats and into the water.
They were coming up on the shore. Half a dozen hard pulls on the oars would get them there. Behind Safire, in the back of the boat, Kor screamed for them to row harder. His black hair had come free of its band and now glistened with sea spray as he yanked on his oars.
That was when Eris heard the wave. She heard it a heartbeat before she felt the boat rising end over end. Her heart lurched as the sea spilled her out of the rowboat, sending her headfirst into its waters.
The icy temperature sent a shock through her body. The salt stung her wounded wrists. Her shoulder struck the ground beneath the waves. And as she struggled against the pull of the tide, she felt the world tilt. Heard the islands shift and murmur.
There, in the throes of the sea, the past rose up like a nightmare.
She heard their dying screams. Smelled the scorched timbers and tapestries. Felt the heat of the flames devouring it all.
Suspended in water, trapped in her memories, Eris stopped fighting. Instead, she willed the tide to drag her down to the depths. She begged the sea to drive the air from her lungs.
After the horrors she was responsible for, it was no less than what she deserved.
Before the sea could do her bidding, someone grabbed her. Fingers drove into Eris’s arm as their owner yanked her to her feet, dragging her toward the shore, sloshing through the wavesand away from the danger. When the ocean receded and the wet sand squished beneath her feet, Eris fell to her knees. When she looked up, Kor stared down at her.
“Get up,” he said, shoving her shoulder with the pommel of his dagger. “We need to keep moving.”
“Where’s Safire?”
Eris looked back over her shoulder to find Rain dragging their rowboat up above the tideline. It was one of only two rowboats that made it. Nearby, Safire spluttered as she, too, was dragged up the shore by Lila.
At the sight of her alive, Eris let out a breath. She looked farther out, over the water. Beyond the mist, she could just make out the shapes of several sea spirits watching from the waves.
She forced herself to get to her feet and started walking.
Jemsin would realize they were gone by now. He would hunt Kor down—or get his summoner to do it for him. But Kor might easily drag Eris to the empress before Jemsin found him. Eris needed to escape, track down the Namsara, and bring her to the captain.
It was the only thing standing between her and freedom. And right now, as Eris looked from the corpse-infested waters to the man about to hand her over to her worst enemy, she wanted freedom more than ever.
But as Kor forced her up the beach and toward the mist-shrouded trees, a stinging pain halted Eris’s thoughts. She looked down at her now-enflamed wrists, locked in stardust steel. In just a few days the steel would eat right through her—skin, muscle, and bone.
First, she needed to find a way to get these off.Then, she would track down the Namsara.
And if she couldn’t get the manacles off, so be it. Kor would not be handing her over to the ones who’d taken everything from her.
Eris would escape and locate the Namsara—with or without her hands.
Shadow Isle was the smallest and most southern of the Star Isles. For the first eleven years of her life, it was the island Eris called home.
She tried not to think about this fact as they trudged through the woods.
Rain, Lila, and a few others hacked at junipers and balsam firs, trying to clear a path through the muddy, silty soil until they found the footpath. Kor and two more pirates walked behind Eris and Safire, watching them like hawks. But Eris could feel the tension in them. Mere moments ago they’d heard their crewmates get eaten alive, and now they were walking through an eldritch forest. Who knew what would come for them next?
Safire hadn’t said a word since they left the shore. The whole way from the ship, she’d sat stiff with terror. Now, with her feet back on solid ground, her face softened as she took in her surroundings. Eris watched her study the twisted, silvery trees; the sheer cliff edges; the barren, mossy rock.
Eris knew that look. The Star Isles lured you in with their beauty and mystery. And only when you were good and trulysnared did they reveal their true nature. But by then, it was too late.
At that thought, Eris checked the sky for ravens. Part of her hoped Jemsin’s summoner—as much as she feared the creature—would come for her. It would be the easiest way out of this. But the only birds flying overhead were gulls.
When she looked back, she found Safire studying a hedge of white berries they were passing.
“Scarp berries,” Eris told her, their shoulders brushing. Safire glanced up. “The dart I pricked you with the other night? It was made from a scarp thistle thorn. Their berries can be used the same way.”
