But if he’s here, he’s still entirely invisible.
“Torin?” I reach out a hand in the vague direction his voice came from. “Are you... there?”
A warm hand squeezes mine, and then I’m crushed against a giant, invisible chest. Sucking in the scent of ginger and cinnamon that’s uniquely him, I let out a shuddering breath.
“What is happening to you?”
“I’m here,” he replies. “Still all in one piece, even if you can’t see me.”
A sharp whistle pierces the air from outside, one that sounds a lot like the warning sounds to say the ship is under attack.
“Shit. Shit. Shit.”
Torin grunts, his hand going to the small of my back, ushering me to the door. “No time. If they reach the island, we’re like sitting ducks stuck here. We need to get back to the ship. Grab anything you can’t be without.”
Aster grabs his boots in one hand and my fingers with the other before heading for the door, and I fight the urge to smile. Apparently, I’m something he can’t be without. Although I don’t think he’s at all aware of what he’s doing, and that makes it even sweeter.
The world outside is even more chaotic. It’s still the middle of the night, but the shaft of light is shooting up right through the roof of the house and is lighting up the entire island. There are crew running all over the place, heaving belongings over their shoulder. Cookie has his cauldron wedged under one arm and is hauling sacks that must weigh more than several people.Trailing behind him is Bones and a few other crew members who are rolling barrels and dragging yet more supplies with them.
We dodge a runaway barrel and the two crewmembers chasing after it and then join the horde in grabbing whatever looks essential to take back to the ship. Aster and I both have our arms laden by the time we reach the shoreline, where there’s a whole crowd of crew gathered and champing at the bit to get moving.
That whistle pierces the air again, even more frantic sounding than it was before.
And then I see the ship gliding through the water. My vision is abnormally sharp, and I can make out the flag flying from the mainmast. The familiar burgundy plastered over the flag and the sight of the crew's livery has my stomach cramping.
The king’s colours.
“They’re here,” someone growls from beside me. “The bastards have found us.”
My mind reels. Why now? Have they really been scouring the waters all this time, just waiting for a beacon to tell them our location. Or is it just a horrible coincidence that they happened to be close by when the shaft of light appeared?
However they might have found us, we need to get off this beach. Right now.
The tide is out, and the causeway is ready and glistening, our path out of here. Looking at the way water is sloshing over the sand, we don’t have long before the causeway is covered over by seawater, and then we’d be trapped here.
I pull my sealskin from my shoulders, about to slip it on and transform into Noush for the first time in months. While I might not be able to get many people across to the ship in my human form, I can drag at least two or three of them in Noush’s body. They’ll have to be responsible for keeping their own heads above water, but we’ll do our best to swim them out to the ship safely.
But before I can even shift form, the water turns an ominous shade of black in front of us as a single gigantic tentacle creeps through the water. The guy to my right freezes, letting out a strangled yelp.
My breath catches in my chest as an icy sense of dread slithers down my spine. The primal part of my brain is telling me that there’s a ginormous predator heading this way, even if the rational part is aware that it’s Finch.
In the distance, another enormous black shape lifts from the water. Great rivulets of water are sloughing from it into the water as it hovers menacingly over the side of the ship.
“What’s happening?” Someone beside me asks.
My newly improved vision allows me to see everything in minute detail. I see the moment the men recoil back from the side of the ship. The weapons being discharged, their purple zig-zagging light hitting their mark. Then the moment Finch brings his tentacle down onto the ship with enough force to level a building.
A deafening CRACK sounds as the ship is smashed in two with enough force to send the different parts flying.
A chorus of yelps, mixed with raucous jeers ring out around me. And in the distance, there’s a desperate whistle sounding over and over, until it stops entirely.
“Holy shit.”
The tentacle closest to us reaches the shoreline and pauses there, writhing slowly from side to side.
Come on, he wants us all to climb on,Noush says. Even she sounds more subdued than she did earlier. It’ll be quicker to get back to the ship that way.
He what?I yelp back at her.
