Page 71 of Silver Slayer

Dark blue water stretched to the horizon. Beneath the twin suns, light broke across the churning surface in fractured silver paths, each wave catching brightness before collapsing back into deep blue. Far below, the sea hammered against the coast in rolling lines of white spray.

“So beautiful.” Quin drew in a sharp breath. “Where are we going?”

“You will have to wait and see.”

“Ugh.” She released a long, dramatic groan. “I hate surprises. Can’t you give me a hint?”

“You do not appear displeased.”

“I’m reserving judgment until I know whether your surprise involves something trying to eat me.”

“Nothing will eat you while I am present except for me.”

Heat crept into her cheeks. A slow, lopsided grin tugged at one corner of her mouth, and she regarded me beneath hooded lids.

"Well..." She cleared her throat. "As long as it's you, I suppose I can live with that."

The bubble craft dipped slightly before the guidance sphere compensated beneath my palm.

"Eyes forward, pilot." Quin laughed.

I returned my gaze to the flight path, unable to suppress my grin. "Yes, my female."

She shifted on the cushion to get a better view of the water beneath us, one hand still pressed against the hull while the other rested near my leg.

We flew farther from shore. The Caspeen Sea darkened beneath us until its depths became impossible to judge. Swells rolled in broad, powerful lines, rising and collapsing without any land to break them.

“Squidlin live in these waters,” I told her.

She looked up. “What are squidlin?”

“They are carnivorous and possess many tentacles. Some are long enough to seize a male from the shoreline.”

“You’re kidding.”

“I am not.”

As though summoned by the conversation, the sea erupted several hundred fates to our right. A massive tentacle breached the surface, dark and glistening as it rose above the waves. The appendage curled through the air, exposing rows of pale gripping discs along its underside before crashing back into the water with enough force to send spray high into the sky.

Quin scrambled onto her knees for a better look. “Holy shit.”

The sea boiled where the creature had disappeared. A second tentacle surfaced briefly, farther away, then vanished beneath the dark water.

“That looked like every sailor’s nightmare rolled into one creature,” she said. “On Earth, there are old stories about enormous sea monsters called krakens. They were supposed to wrap their tentacles around ships and drag them beneath the ocean.”

“A kraken?”

“People believed they lived in deep water and attacked sailors. Most of the legends probably came from sightings of giant squid.”

“Your people have squidlin as well?”

“Nothing like that.” She stared at the water with equal parts terror and fascination. “At least, not that we know of.”

I guided the craft higher as another disturbance moved beneath the surface. A shadow longer than several huts passed beneath us before fading into the deeper blue.

“You must never wander too close to any shoreline,” I warned. “A squidlin can reach several fates inland. The coast may appear empty, but the creatures wait beneath the surface.”

“How several are we talking?”