22

  The next morning, Sabina watched Volusa and Simend dance together again. Naked, of course. Neither of the two tried any tricks this time, simply dancing together as fellow artists. Their movements were fluid, their poses passionate, and their performance divine. They were better than any dancer Sabina had seen, and each was made better by the other. She couldn't imagine why dancers this talented would be excluded from the Legion just because they weren't Homin. She knew full well that, whenever she saw a Sanguine dance in the future, it would look incomplete without the flourishes of a tail.

  Once they finished the seventh dance, however, Volusa paused. "You don't know the eighth, do you?" she asked.

  Simend folded his ears back and bared his teeth momentarily, but then he sighed and broke his pose. "No," he admitted. "Not well enough to perform alongside you. I've watched you go through it the past few days, but I don't know it." He hesitated. "Will you teach me?"

  "No," said Volusa. "We'll reach Alexandria early tomorrow, so I don't have time to teach it to you properly, and doing it wrong because you misremembered something is worse than not doing it at all."

  "I know," Simend sighed. "Still disappointing, though." They each took their bows, and Simend proceeded to get dressed. Volusa hadn't brought clothes out onto the deck, and just leaned against the mast to chat with Simend and Marcos.

  "Captain," Sabina called. "Can I ask you a question?"

  Volusa turned, arms folded under her breasts. "What would you like to know, Sara?" she called back.

  "I get why you exercise naked, but why are you making Gleb work naked?" Sabina asked. The young bear started at hearing his name but did not look up from his work. He instead tried to huddle in on himself as he vigorously scrubbed the deck on all fours, his bare, furry backside high in the air.

  Captain Cornelia smirked down at the naked bear. "Oh, that," she drawled. "Gleb there had a misunderstanding about my relationship with both him and the rest of my lovers and needed a reminder of some of the promises he made to get on my ship in the first place. He'll be working naked for the rest of the voyage to ensure he doesn't forget again. Because you will remember that I love this entire crew as much as I love you, won't you, Gleb?"

  Gleb took one hand off his brush to clutch at his balls. He did not look at Volusa. "I will, Captain."

  "And Marcos spoke with you afterwards, correct?" Volusa asked.

  At that, Gleb did look at her, his eyes wide in surprise. His gaze quickly snapped to the bull next to her. Marcos winked at him. "Oh. Uh…" Gleb stuttered, looking back down. He seemed to be trying to hide a smile. "He treated me real nice, Captain, yeah."

  Volusa scowled up at Marcos, who only smirked back at her. "You were only supposed to talk to him," she said.

  "We did talk, Captain," Marcos said, still smirking. "He got the speech about how everyone on this crew—myself excepted, of course—has made the same mistake as him. Then I offered to help him make sure all his bits still worked properly after your lesson. To ensure he'd be healthy and able the next time you called for him, of course. He accepted with enthusiasm." His smirk broadened. "I was very thorough."

  "I don't understand how you can always tell," Volusa muttered, shaking her head.

  Dalibor came out of hiding once he was sure the dancing was over and leaned against the rail next to Sabina, staring out at the sea. "I can't wait until we're clear of this ship and people start wearing clothes again," he said. "And poor Simend won't be scent-mad anymore either."

  "Scent-mad?" Sabina asked.

  Dalibor's tail curved into an arc behind him. "You really can't smell Volusa?" he asked.

  Sabina looked over at the lioness, still chatting with Simend, and took several deep breaths. "All I smell is the sea," she said.

  Dalibor shook his head. "It must be wild to have such a weak sense of smell," he said. "Volusa smells fertile, and overwhelmingly so at that. All the time. It's something related to her barrenness, she says. The smell affects some people, like Simend, more strongly than others. We call it scent-mad back home. It's weird that he doesn't recognize what's happening to him, though. He must not spend enough time around women. Though I guess Volusa does smell unusually strong."

  "Why isn't he crazy all the time around her then?" Sabina asked.

  "Because he's distracted by something else," Dalibor explained. "By dancing, or by Marcos. It's not hard to move past the scent if you know what's happening and have something else to focus on. But watch. As soon as Volusa does something to remind him of how attractive she is…" He pointed to where Simend and Volusa were finishing their conversation. The lioness giggled at whatever crude joke Simend had just told, turned her bare backside to him, and let her tail stroke the inside of his leg. Simend's entire body tensed, and he grabbed his bristling tail. Dalibor chuckled. "Every time."

  Sabina eyed her own jackal. "She does that to you too?"

  Dalibor shuddered. "No," he said. "She makes me feel like there's spiders loose in my fur. I very much do not want to sleep with her."

  "Speaking of sleeping with people…" Sabina trailed off and watched Edric stare longingly down into the ocean. His scarf fluttered in the breeze behind him. Simend, dressed in his customary shendyt and free of Volusa, came up beside the shark and punched him gently in the arm. She could not hear their conversation through the wind. "Do you think those two are sleeping with each other?"

  "Yes," Dalibor said with another shudder. "I have seen, heard, and smelled enough to be certain of it."

  Sabina sighed. "I suppose that's not surprising," she said.

  "I have also seen enough to know that Simend is far more dedicated to Edric than Edric is to Simend," Dalibor added.

  "Simend slept with Marcos readily enough," Sabina pointed out.

  "Perhaps," Dalibor replied. "He didn't smell nearly as much like Marcos the next morning as I would have expected. And as for Edric…" His voice trailed off and he watched Sabina closely, his head tilted to one side. "You're attracted to him, aren't you?" he asked.

  Sabina flinched. "It's not like that, Dalya," she said. "I mean, he's attractive, yes. I'll not deny that. I couldn't deny it even if I wanted to. Not to you."

  "No, I've seen the way you look at him," Dalibor said. "But I've also seen the way he looks at you."

  Sabina sighed. "Yes, and that's part of what makes him so frustrating," she said. "I've seen the way he looks at me when he thinks I don't notice, but when we're actually interacting with each other, he insists on treating me like I'm either a child or made out of glass. I'm an adult, Dalya! I'm nineteen now, and I can take care of myself."

  "You don't have to tell me," he replied, putting his hands up. "I know full well you're entirely capable of taking care of yourself."

  "So how do I get Edric to treat me like a woman and not a little girl?" she asked. Then she sighed again. "I'm sorry, Dalya. I know you don't want to listen to me complain about other men. Especially when you're still the one I want to be with."

  Dalibor turned away and looked out over the waves. Sabina studied him closely, waiting for him to respond. She wondered if he really was as attractive amongst the Sabwa as Simend seemed to believe. She found his fur adorable, from the white along the bottom of his muzzle and neck to the black speckling amongst the sandy fur of his tail. His clear golden eyes were particularly striking. She felt she could almost see his mind working behind them, always at least two steps ahead of her and gaining ground. Now his tail was still and his ears alert. He wasn't sad, but he wasn't happy either.

  Sabina hesitated, but she had to know. "Do you still want to be with me too?"

  He sighed, but his tail remained still. "It's difficult for me to imagine life without you," he said, and her true heart leapt. Her golden one stayed still. "You came into my life nearly a whole year ago and upended it in a way that I never thought would happen to me a second time. We've been with each other every day ever since, and even through the worst of it, I have enjoyed nearly every one of those days. So yes, I want to stay with you, which makes it very important I tell you this and that you hear me." He turned to look at her, and her breath caught in her throat. "Sara. I love—"

  "Attack!" yelled the Draig luminary from his perch at the top of the sail. "We're under attack! Prepare for battle!"

  "What?" Dalibor yelped, drawing his sword.

  "Star take you, you blasted lizard!" Sara shouted. "Not now!"

  "What's going on out here?" Volusa growled, storming out of her cabin now clad in her silken ribbons.

  "What do you see, Connor?" Marcos called up to the lizard. "Gleb! Get below! Alert the others!"

  "I don't see anything, officer," Connor called back down as Gleb tore open the hatch. "But my arm is going crazy. Something huge is coming!"

  Dalibor and Sara exchanged a glance with each other before both turned their attention to the bow where Edric and Simend had been talking. Edric was already rushing towards them, his gladius drawn, and Simend stood at the rail to the left, staring out at the ocean while the crystals on his arm flashed with a burning light that rivaled the scarlet of the sails.

  "Is it…?" Dalibor asked.

  "It's another of them," Edric said. "I'm sure of it."

  "How did they find us?" Sara cried. "Did the shield go down?"

  "It didn't!" Edric insisted. "I can feel it working! They shouldn't be able to hear you!"

  "Is it because of the glowing yesterday?" Dalibor asked. "Could that have pierced the shield?"

  "I don't know," Edric said. "Maybe?"

  Dalibor growled. "I hate having to plan around magic! Nothing makes sense!"

  Stolen novel; please report.

  "Here it comes!" Simend shouted. The water to the side of the ship began to bubble. Simend leveled his flashing fist out towards the water, supporting his left arm with his right. Faint vermilion sigils began to glow in the air around his outstretched hand.

  But what appeared was not human, and Simend lowered his arm in confusion. A single, suckered tentacle breached the surface, its slick, indigo skin seeming to glow with an internal light in the midmorning sun. It just as quickly slammed the surface and disappeared beneath the waves. Then another shot into sight, and another, each larger than the last as whatever was clawing its way to the surface grew closer and closer. A piercing cerulean light grew within the churning water until finally a face rose to the surface, its features stretched so wide that it almost seemed to have melted. Its skin was the same lustrous indigo as the earlier tentacles, and its mouth was a crooked, toothless gash beneath the cerulean flames that burned within its empty eyes. Around what might have been its shoulders rested a waterlogged and decaying green cloak. "I've got you, vile hussy," it burbled, its drenched voice seeming to come from somewhere deeper than its quivering lips. "And your little dog too."

  Sabina recognized the words and with them was able to place the cloak as well. "Navius?" she asked. Not even the vile medic deserved this. "What has my father done to you?"

  "Doesn't matter since he's fish food now!" Simend shrieked. The jackal raised his arm and unleashed his charged blast of fire, which struck the former Enforcer directly in the face. The flames washed over the monster's exposed head, sending off a cloud of steam. Navius dipped his head lazily beneath the waves and back up again. His damp skin was not even singed. "Balls," whimpered Simend. "That was a lot of fire too."

  "I've found you," Navius went on, still sounding as though he were choking on his own voice. His tentacled arms roiled in the water around him. "You tried to hide, but you sang so brilliantly yesterday that all of us must have heard."

  "It was the glow," Dalibor growled. "I hate magic."

  "And now you're mine," Navius said. He began to sink back beneath the waves. "So why don't you come join me?"

  Without additional warning, a single tentacle erupted from the center of the deck, sending splinters of broken planks spraying across the deck. It then slammed itself down onto the deck, swept to its side, and grabbed hold of the older Ursi sailor by the ankle. Nearly everyone on board the ship froze as the tentacle lifted the man into the air. Dalibor alone charged towards it, sword aloft, but it was too late. The tentacle flung the screaming man overboard just before the jackal managed to cleave straight through it, leaving it flopping bonelessly across the deck.

  "Man overboard!" Marcos bellowed, causing the frozen sailors around the deck to spring back to life. The bull rushed towards the rail where the bear had been tossed over. "Connor, get the—" Marcos's voice caught when he looked over the side of the ship, and he took a step back. Sabina couldn't see what he did, but she did notice that the thrown sailor's screams had disappeared. "Never mind. Get us out of here, Connor!"

  "Incoming!" Connor cried in response.

  "Breach!" Volusa shouted. "Supply hands, below decks! Patch that hole!"

  Albatoads and firegulls began to dive bomb the ship from above, their fiery eyes leaving burning streaks through the air behind them, even as another of the polypus's arms lanced up from below. "Archers!" Marcos called. "To the bridge! Connor, what's going on up there!"

  "Officer, behind you!" Gleb called. He charged across the deck and tackled Marcos to the planks just before a massive striped serpent that had climbed the outer hull could launch itself at his neck.

  "Simend, keep them off of me!" Edric called. He blasted away an albatoad with a burst of lightning from his crystalline palm. "I can lightcraft patches for the hull!"

  "A little busy, Ed," Simend said. More sea serpents were swarming onto the deck, and from the other side of the ship, multiarmed starhorses were clambering aboard to snap at sailors and rigging alike, their empty eye sockets all blazing with an internal cerulean flame. Simend danced among them, slashing and kicking them back into the ocean.

  Volusa tore past him, her twin daggers slicing so quickly as to almost be invisible as she dismembered starhorses and sea serpents alike. "For the love of the Lady of Love, snaggletooth, get these troops in order!" she shouted.

  "Aye, Captain!" Dalibor called back. He pulled Sabina with him to the central mast, looking seemingly everywhere at once. He began shouting orders, and voices called back in affirmation with each one, even as the melee raged and Navius tore apart the hull. "Archers, focus on the birds! Supply hands, first three keep them stocked with arrows, we can't let that rain stop. Anyone left, find a spear or axe and start killing! Let Edric patch the hull. Simend, scorch the sides, don't let them get on deck. Connor, I need lightning on that polypus! Sara, talk down Navius. His orders have to be to take you alive, and he can't do that if you drown."

  "Yes, warlord," Sara said. She rushed to the rail where Navius had submerged.

  "Sara, get back!" Edric cried.

  She ignored him. "Navius!" she shouted. "Stop this! If you sink this ship, I'll drown! Don't you need me alive?" She didn't even know if the monster could hear her. "Navius!"

  "Where's that lightning, Connor?" Volusa called. Connor's scream ended abruptly when he fell from the mast and crunched against the deck, a firegull plucking at his eyes the entire way down. With a terrifying growl, the captain darted over, severed both of the firegull's wings, and kicked it directly into the mast.

  "Navius!" Sabina shouted. "Are you listening to me?"

  She didn't know how he heard her, but he did. The arms stopped lancing through the deck, and Sabina could hear Edric's relieved Draigic oaths behind her, even as the ship began to list dangerously to one side. Soon, Navius's head bubbled up from the deep again. "You're right. They did order me to bring you back alive." His voice still chilled her spine. He sounded like a drowned man. "But you know what? I don't care. Look at me. Look at what they made me. I felt every second of every snapping bone, every twisting muscle, every burning lance of their Star-sent curse. So Arbiter take them all. I want to watch you drown. Rip off your clothes like you did to me then watch the screams bubble out of you while I hold you under until the light finally fades from your eyes. Then I'll do the same to every ship on this sea until none dare venture into my domain."

  Navius sank again, but this time one of his giant arms streaked up from the bubbling water straight towards Sabina, as if to grab her and make good on his promise. Dalibor yanked her away, and the arm smashed against the deck, crushing a pair of starhorses beneath it. But instead of rearing back up for another strike, this time it radiated a brief yellow light, and spears of ice lanced out from it in all directions, including through the deck.

  Simend gasped. "Did you see that?" he shouted. He seared another starhorse and rushed towards the retreating icy arm.

  "Was that ice?" Edric asked. He knelt beside the new holes in the deck to patch them with yet more lightcrafted planks.

  "That was ice!" Simend yelped. "I've wanted to make ice for years and Kamissa wouldn't show me! Make it do it again! I need to see how it did it."

  "Are you bloody daft?" Edric shouted back. "We have to get that thing away from the ship! I can't keep this up."

  "No! I need to see how it made ice!" Simend held his hands up to his muzzle and shouted at Navius. "Hey! Fish-face! Show me more ice!"

  "Why are you using fish-face like it's an insult?" Edric muttered.

  But Navius complied. He stabbed one of his countless arms out of the sea, turned the water splashing behind it into a spear of ice, and hurled it at Simend. The dancer dodged it easily, but the spear's upward trajectory caused it to tear straight through the main sail.

  "My ship!" Volusa roared.

  "Did you feel that, Ed?" Simend cackled. "It's an inversion! I know how it works now!" He grabbed his symbiotic arm by the elbow and began to tap at the crystals clustered there.

  "A little busy, Sim," Edric called back, zapping an albatoad that was trying to divebomb him.

  "Why are those albatoads getting so close?" Marcos called. "Where are my archers?"

  "We're out of arrows!" Gleb called back.

  "Weren't you listening to the warlord?" Marcos shouted. "Protect the hands on supply!"

  "I'll do it myself," Dalibor called. He kicked one last sea serpent over the side of the ship before rushing to cut a path through the starhorses blocking access to the hatches. "Sara! Follow my lead!" The princess fell in directly behind him, watching him parry and slash his way through the beasts with his curved sword. She did the best she could to exploit each opening, using both Dalibor's expertise at creating those openings and the pointers Simend and Volusa had given her on improving her form.

  "We're getting overwhelmed!" Gleb shouted. Even with the progress Sabina and Dalibor had made with clearing the deck, the archers were still barely able to avoid the acidic slaver of the swooping albatoads. One of them began to scream when a direct hit to the chest began to burn through his fur and eat away his skin.

  Edric growled, swatted aside a starhorse with his tail, and pointed at Connor's empty perch with his metallic hand. A lightcrafted thundercloud, its dark billows crackling from within, appeared atop the mast. With another racing flash of the lights on Edric's arm, lightning began to arc from the depths of the cloud to any nearby birds, knocking them from the sky with a clap of thunder and a pained squawk.

  "Why did we not start with that?" Dalibor growled. "I hate planning around magic."

  Suddenly, lances of ice began to rain down on the deck from above, each piercing straight through the deck or any creature in their path. Most hit beasts, but one lanced straight through the chest of the ship's horse, pinning his twitching body to the deck.

  "We have to stop those volleys!" Dalibor cried.

  "That's your cue, Sim!" Edric shouted.

  "Oh, I'm going to do better than that!" the jackal called back. With the tap of one final crystal on his arm, their typical red glow shifted to yellow. Simend cackled and raised both of his hands to the sky. His symbiotic arm flared brilliantly in the sun, and the water around Navius began to freeze. The cursed medic screeched as the ice began to capture and crush him. The rain of ice ceased, and the polypus's arms flailed about trying to smash the ice.

  Then there was a lurch that everyone, person and beast alike, obviously felt but that Sabina was entirely unable to place. The entire crew and every single beast staggered, though there was no corresponding movement of the ship. Sabina had never felt anything like it. It was as though her heart itself had jumped briefly. Or perhaps stopped.

  "Sim!" Edric screamed. "Stop! You have to stop!"

  "I almost have him!" Simend shouted back. The lights on his arm seemed to be dimming.

  "This ship is only floating because of my constructs!" shouted Edric. "If you put us into depletion, they vanish, and we sink!"

  "Excuse me?" Volusa asked. She danced about the deck, stomping on stunned sea serpents with one hand clutching her chest.

  "Then get us moving," Simend said, arms still raised. The ice continued to close around Navius.

  "You expect me to summon a wind big enough to move a ship when the radiance is already this thin?"

  "Balls!" Simend swore, and at last he lowered his arms. The ice, however, remained. Once created, it didn't need the radiance to maintain itself. Navius continued to smash the miniature iceberg that pinned him while the crew made quick work of the now-lethargic beasts left on the deck. The thinning of the radiance was apparently much harder on them than it was on the crew.

  Once there was enough of a lull in the fighting, Edric raised his arms and summoned a steady, if weak, gust of wind. "We need to patch that sail," he said.

  "Riggers, you heard him!" Marcos shouted. "Get up there! And hands on supply, find tar and wood to reinforce anything the shark patched."

  A chorus of "Aye, officer!" sang out around the ship as the sailors hopped to their tasks. The bustle on the deck shifted quickly from violence to repair. Volusa, Dalibor, and Sabina worked to clear the deck of any straggling beasts. It was not difficult work, even after the beasts began to perk back up as the ship sailed out of the area that Simend had depleted of radiance. Soon, it was difficult for Sabina to tell her heart had nearly stopped at all.

  That was when Edric lowered his arms and pointed back at the nearly-free Navius. From the clear blue sky above the twisted form of the Enforcer streaked a brilliantly blue bolt of lightning. It struck the polypus cleanly, and Navius, finally free of the ice, sank beneath the waves.

  "You got him," Sabina said.

  Edric shook his head. "I doubt that was enough to kill something like that," he said. "Hopefully it hurt enough he won't be back for a while, though."

  "And what was that lurch when Simend was calling the ice?" she asked, putting a hand to her chest. "I've never felt anything like that before."

  "We call it depletion," Edric explained. "Our symbiotes use background radiance to fuel their abilities. Normally it's fine, but if we use too much at once, the symbiote starts trying to grab radiance from people too, which causes problems. It's odd that it affected you, though. Homines normally tolerate depletion quite well. Maybe it's because of whatever's in your chest."

  Volusa knelt beside Connor's crushed body. "Get us to Alexandria, Marcos," she said. She closed the eyelids over the lizard's missing eyes. "And find me Gleb. I want him assisting me with the funerary observances."

  "I can help with anyone who's wounded," Edric said. "I'm Argent Flask."

  "Good," Volusa said. She stood and looked out to the horizon, fists clenched. "I've lost three lovers already today. I don't plan to lose more."

  Sabina too looked out, though her gaze was focused on where Navius had vanished. After the encounter with Lucilius, she had almost felt safe. They wouldn't kill her immediately, which, as Dalibor had explained back in Italia, would give her time to try to escape. But that was no longer true. Navius hadn't cared if she died. No. Navius wanted her dead. How could she expect better from any of the others? Especially after she and her allies had defeated them again.

  She felt a cold hand take hers and turned to see Edric looking down at her. "You're safe, you know that, right?" he asked. "We're going to keep you safe. Nothing's going to happen to you."

  She frowned at him, then turned to look at Dalibor. He looked back and shook his head. Dalibor would not tell her such lies. Her warlord knew full well that she was not safe, that nobody around her was safe. He probably knew a dozen different ways that they weren't safe that she hadn't even thought of yet. She glanced at the corpse of the equine sailor, still pinned by a giant icicle that steamed in the warm air. Then she returned her gaze to Edric and smiled. "Thank you," she told him, because right then all she wanted were his lies.