Page 59 of A Sea of Fate and Starfire

The blasts, when they did happen, were so erratic they caught me unaware every time—even though I was the one to coax them. They were bright, blinding, hot. They lifted not just the fine hair at the back of my neck but the strands framing my crown, and the crack of them in the deadened air was like a tree splitting in my ears, an afterburn of sound almost numbing to my senses.

Nori and Olinne watched, pride in their eyes. Aitne watched Hadrian when he coughed, a quiet knowing in her eye, though she never voiced her thoughts. Hadrian cleared his throat, a rosy stain at the tops of his ears, especially when Diara loomed nearby. My healer watched this in curious amusement, drinking in human dynamics but unwilling to step fully inside.

We joked and swapped stories, curled together on the frozen banks under the icy stars, groaning with pleasure at the warmth of the flames when we dragged our wet bodies from the water. In the evenings, I listened to their voices, blending and humming as I trained. The melody of Olinne’s cadence or the peal of Aren’s laughter, the loudest I’d ever heard.

I faltered only once, lightning half-spun in my hands.

It was our last night on the mainland. In the morning we’d dive into the ocean, free of the twists and turns of the wild river, liberated to open water and speed. A small confidence had settled over us. We’d traveled within our estimated time, maybe even slightly ahead, a feat with the encumbrance of four humans.

I stood just beyond the foam in dry sand. A wet floor, Aegir said, was dangerous. Starfire used water as a highway for travel, and Naiads had electrocuted themselves by wielding it carelessly. That was when the first bird landed, staring without blinking its beady black eyes. And then a second crow, and a third.

But they weren’t looking at me, nor Aegir, nor any of the Naiads who hissed as they surged to their feet. They stared at Kye. Our beach fire spat as we kicked sand into the bright flames. The confused humans followed our lead, aware of a danger but unsure what it was. The gentle whoosh of the salty tide became a hammer in my ears, or perhaps that was the sound of my own blood, the breath I held deep in my chest.

More of them flocked around us. They drew a curtain of ink across the sky, dappling the moon’s radiance as they flew, carving a generous arc under the clouds and landing on the shore between us and the water.

I suddenly wished I’d brought my own colony instead.

Fear latched its grip around my throat, the kind of fear that blooms from forgetting for a moment that nightmares exist only to walk right into one. It bloomed—but only for an instant.

Then I snuffed it out.

My hand beckoned to the waves behind the crows, and I drew the sea over the murder like a boot over a thick patch of ants, hard and fast, armoring our small stake of beach against the lashing flood that followed.

The crows tried to disperse. They rose, retreating into dusk, but weren’t fast enough to evade my strike. Small bodies tumbled, feathers ripped from wings, tiny talons and squawks that pierced the coming night. Some of them managed to break from my grasp, fleeing toward the stars. Most of them surfaced, unmoving, legs curled over their bellies.

Only one approached us a second time. It twisted from between the waves as easily as a drop of oil carves through water, emerging glossy and proud, its small beak and shining gaze aimed directly at me.

“Why do you hide?” I asked, raising my chin as I glared down at it. “Why do you always use something to hide within? If you have something to say to us, by all means, return to your true form and say it.”

A shadow skimmed my right side; Aegir was standing at my shoulder. He’d been beside me, leading my star-wielding, when the crows appeared. Now his lips peeled from his teeth, his brows so low and ruffled I couldn’t see his eyes.

Warmth sank into my left as Kye covered my opposite shoulder, and I felt the others move closer to us. We stared down at it, eight against one small bird, the ocean wind sweeping brine and frosty mist over our skin.

The crow took one small step toward Kye.

And a whistle lanced the quiet.

A dull metal clink jolted the bird backward; the shaft of a long arrow embedded in its throat. Its small talons flinched once, then stilled over its round belly, the green and silver arrow fletching reaching directly toward the sky like a flag had been staked to the ground.

Diara lowered her bow, strawberry strands of hair veiling her cheeks.

“Sorry,” the Pirou beauty said, stowing the wooden arch back onto its brace at her back. “I didn’t see the point in waiting to see if anything would happen.”

26

Maren

“She didn’t kill him,” Aegir said, watching as the soft rush of ocean lifted the dead crow away. Its feathers ruffled against the wind before it vanished under a cresting wave.

“What else would it have been?” Nori snapped.

He angled a brow at her, calmly daring her to take that tone with him again. She swallowed and schooled her features.

“A spy,” I guessed aloud. “A vessel. No different than the way he used Pheolix.”

I glanced up to find Aegir’s eyes on mine, though whether he studied me or my words, I wasn’t sure.

The crow’s visit had shaken our group. We sat around the fire, silent. Every stroke of tide, every click of wind raised our skin. The laughter and easy conversation from only minutes ago now buried under the reminder of why we’d come. I waited to hear the flap of dark wings again, dreading it the way a farmer dreads an early frost.