Cursed Throne: Lord of the Ocean #2 Page 16

  The mighty creature raised its tail and slammed it down hard. A wave rushed out, perpendicular to the whirlpool. Its momentum, combined with their desperate push forward, hurled Kai, Naia, and the two dolphins out of the whirlpool.

  For a stunned moment, Kai hovered in calm water, staring at the whirlpool as it moved away. The mother dolphin nudged his shoulder gently, and he released the baby dolphin. Both nuzzled him, then swam away.

  He turned to Naia. Willpower kept his arms at his side. He didn’t have the right to touch her, hold her. “Are you…?” He studied the slump of her shoulders, and had to grit his teeth against the ache in his chest. “I’ll take you back to the Endling now.”

  He gripped her waist, and she tensed but did not pull away. He raced away from the titan and the whirlpool that swirled between its four legs as it stalked slowly through the water. The vast spread of something—its body, perhaps, or its tail—extended out in the water, blocking sunlight, kicking off riptides.

  Kai swam around the titan, but panic clawed at him as Naia weakened rapidly. She was almost motionless by the time he surfaced next to the Endling, to the anxious gazes of Zamir, Ginny, Thaleia, and Badur.

  “What happened?” Zamir demanded as he reached down for Naia.

  “We were caught up in the whirlpool beneath the titan.” Kai glanced out over the water at what looked like an island, except that it was moving away from them. His mind reeled. Just how large was it? No one even knew exactly what it looked like. All he had seen were its legs and the back half of its body. “There are riptides, all along the length of its body.”

  “And twenty-foot waves around it,” Zamir said grimly. “Meifeng got us mostly unscathed out of the worst of it.”

  “Mostly?” Kai glanced around. As far as he could tell, the waves still looked twenty feet high.

  “The whirlpool pulled up sunken ships,” Corey said, his voice shaken. “This is the graveyard of the Atlantic. Hundreds of ships went down here during the first and second world wars, and we always thought it was the fighting, but maybe it wasn’t just the fighting. The ships are sailing again like a flotilla around the titan, controlled by the waves and the currents. One of the battleships struck the Endling. We’ve got hull and engine damage.”

  “What are you saying?” Kai asked.

  “That we’re trapped in the titan’s current. We can’t steer out of its area of effect. And we’re sinking.”

  Chapter 24

  “Can’t you fix the engine?” Kai demanded.

  “Meifeng’s working on it now,” Corey said. “My job is to not let the water get ahead of us. It doesn’t look good,” he said frankly. “Engine fixes take hours. We’re not going to last hours in this storm.”

  “We could have really used Ashe right about now,” Ginny murmured. “If Meifeng shows me what to do, can aether fix the engine?”

  Corey winced. “I think Meifeng will want to know that it’s real-world fixed, not just magically hocus-pocused into place.”

  “If the engine runs, it doesn’t matter whether the fix was manufactured in a Newcastle factory, or by Ginny’s Magic Freak-show Inc,” Ginny snapped at him.

  Corey shook his head. “Even if you fix it, there’s no engine built that will break us out of these riptides, currents, and the waves.”

  “You boys can figure that out, right?” She glanced at Zamir, her gaze taking in Kai and Badur too. She looked at Thaleia, who curled beside an unconscious Naia.

  The older mermaid inclined her head. “I’ll stay with her, keep her safe.”

  Ginny nodded, then clambered down the slick steps that would take her below decks to the engine room.

  Kai stared out at the storm. The sky was a dazzling, clear blue in stark contrast to the violent waves and the wind screaming over the titan’s back. Mentally, he added in riptides, and the whirlpool beneath the titan.

  What could he—or even they—do against the titan?

  “Do the old stories say anything?” he asked quietly, the words spoke almost to himself.

  “What?” Thaleia sounded surprised.

  “The titan. Ginny said you were a librarian at Shulim.”

  “Something like that,” she conceded warily.

  “Do the records say anything about titans, and how to defeat them?”

  Thaleia frowned. “There was the titan that protected Medea’s cave, and the kraken, with its many arms. This one...may be the one called the leviathan.” She stiffened, as if suddenly recalling something she preferred not to.

  “What about it?”

  “That it bore ancient enmity toward the royal Beltiamatu bloodline.”

  Kai growled. “Is there anyone or anything we haven’t turned against us?”

  “Live long enough and you’ll make enemies of everyone,” Zamir said softly.

  Thaleia shook her head. “It was here before the Beltiamatu staked their claim on the ocean. We drove it into the depths and imprisoned it there. The wars in the area must have weakened the doors of its prison.”

  “And now it’s free. Can it be reasoned with?” Kai asked.

  “There’s nothing to suggest it can’t, although it would be difficult when we’re smaller than a speck to it,” Thaleia replied.

  “If we were large enough to defeat and imprison it, we’re still large enough to get its attention,” Kai said. “Maybe I can bargain with it. At the very least, I’ll distract it, perhaps enough for the ship to break through.”

  The radio crackled, and Meifeng’s voice warbled through it. “Whatever it is you’re planning, do it fast.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The titan is pointed straight toward the eastern seaboard of the United States. Storm warnings are already going up. The twenty-footers here will be tsunamis by the time they reach the shore. You have to turn that titan, and not a hundred and eighty degrees, or the waves will hit Europe instead.”

  “There’s no safe way to point that titan!” Corey shouted. “Or did you want to drown Brazil?”

  “We’ll turn it north,” Zamir decided. “And apologize to Greenland later.” He looked at Kai. “You’re not going alone.” Zamir slid WASP knives and bang sticks into his utility belt before following Kai to the rail.

  “I’m coming too.”

  Zamir stared at Badur, but Kai spoke first. “It’s not safe for you.”

  “It’s not safe for anyone,” Badur pointed out with irrefutable logic. “I’m coming.”

  “Badur, there is no place in this insanity for a blind merman.” Kai’s tone was not impatient, but Badur stiffened as he had been struck.

  “I am coming.”

  “Badur, we cannot spare the time, the attention, to protect you. The…distraction could get us all killed.”

  “I do not need your protection, or your permission.”

  “I am your prince.”

  “I do not own you as my prince. I know I made that clear.”

  “Please,” Thaleia interjected, her voice quavering on the verge of tears. “Let him accompany you.”

  Zamir and Kai stared at Thaleia. Was she mad, sending her lover into danger that courted near certain death?

  “He will not be a burden,” she continued, “and maybe he can help. But please…whatever you say, whatever you command, he is going. And he will be safer swimming beside you than behind you.”

  Kai snarled, but his grip on Badur’s wrist was gentle. “Let’s get you back into the water.” Grunting slightly from Badur’s weight, Zamir and Kai raised Badur until he could lower his tail on the other side of the Endling’s rail and slip back into the ocean.

  “Look out for the opening,” Kai told Corey. “As soon as you see any break in the current and waves, get the ship out of here. We’ll catch up with you.”

  “All of you?” Corey asked.

  Kai did not answer. He dived into the water.

  Zamir entered immediately after him.

  The tossing waves gave way to riptides. Kai took Badur’s hand and guided it to
his shoulder. “Hold on. It’ll be just like when we were hunting.” He turned to Zamir. “The riptides are weakest closest to the titan.”

  “Where we could be killed if it changes direction?” Zamir asked.

  “They extend out for a league before weakening again. If we swim out that far, we’ll be battling all the chaos of the overcrowded seas. I’d rather dodge one massive titan than hundreds of large ships tossed by wind and waves.”

  There was nothing wrong with Kai’s decision, Zamir realized. It was the marginally better of two equally wretched decisions.

  Swimming beside the titan was akin to swimming beside a rocky seashore. The titan’s jagged hide looked like rocks drenched by waves. The sun glistened off the sprinkle of water on the ridge of the monster’s back, as massive as a distant mountain range. Up close, it was almost impossible to tell that the titan was moving, so graceful was its underwater stride. The landscape, however, scarcely seemed to change no matter how fast they swam.

  “We can’t get ahead of it,” Zamir spoke the words that seemed to occur to Kai at the same time. “We have to travel on its back.”

  Kai grimaced. “And Badur?”

  “There’s no time to take him back to the Endling.”

  “We can’t just leave him here,” Kai argued. “He’ll die.”

  But to burden themselves with a Beltiamatu—a blind Beltiamatu—on land?

  Kai’s eyes met Zamir. “I’m not leaving him.”

  “We’ll take turns carrying him on our backs, then.” Zamir glanced at Badur’s face. He didn’t know how to interpret the pained expression on Badur’s face. “It won’t be comfortable, but being alive seems a fair tradeoff.”

  Together, Kai and Zamir dragged Badur up onto the titan’s back. “I’ll take him first,” Zamir said, then combat-rolled over Badur, before coming up with Badur’s weight draped across his shoulders.

  Kai’s eyes narrowed. “That’s a slick maneuver. I’ll have to remember that.”

  Kai led the way, and Zamir followed. The landscape was as rocky and inhospitable as a newly born volcanic island. The ridges of the titan’s hide, however, was slick with algae. Zamir almost slipped once or twice. The third stumble, however, drove him to his knees, and would have planted him facedown if Kai hadn’t twisted around to catch him. Badur tumbled off Zamir’s shoulders, and crashed into Kai, his weight slamming both of them to the ground.

  Zamir grimaced as he pushed back to his feet. Blood trickled from the large gash that ripped his knee to his ankle.

  The metallic stink of blood, he realized, wasn’t just his own. Badur was shaken, but unhurt. Kai, however, was breathing heavily, the sound jagged and broken with pain. Zamir lifted the blind merman off Kai, then squatted beside his grandson. He touched Kai’s shoulder, but withdrew his hand when Kai grimaced. “How bad is it?” Zamir asked quietly.

  “I don’t know,” Kai said after a long moment of silence.

  Zamir eased Kai forward, then stared at the deep gashes on Kai’s back, torn open by the hard ridges of the titan’s hide. “I can see all the way to the bone,” Zamir said.

  “Yours too,” Kai murmured, his gaze on Zamir’s leg. “It could be infected.”

  “This titan has been imprisoned in the depths for millennia. Who knows what grows down there?” Zamir said, his tone ironic. “But dying in the distant future from an unknown infection isn’t high on the list of things that could kill us right now.”

  “Of course.” Kai nodded. He rolled onto his hands and knees before climbing slowly to his feet. The careful way he moved confirmed that he had not just ripped the skin and flesh on his back. He had torn muscles; possibly even bruised his bones.

  Their eyes met. Turning around wasn’t an option.

  The only way home was by stopping the titan—or going through him.

  “Go,” Badur said softly. “I’m slowing you down. You were right; I’ve only made it worse for you.”

  Zamir and Kai exchanged glances. Kai spoke, “No—”

  “Kai.” Zamir frowned. “Badur’s right.”

  “If we leave him now, he’ll die. He won’t be able to find his way back to the Endling. He comes with us.”

  “You’re not thinking straight, Kai. Neither of us is in any condition to carry Badur. You’re going to be king. You can’t make decisions based on one person. It has to be for the good of all.”

  “You’re a fine one to say,” Kai retorted. “What kind of decisions did you make?”

  Zamir ground his teeth. “I made the wrong decisions. You didn’t.”

  “Didn’t I? The last time I made a decision for the good of all, I landed up destroying Shulim,” Kai snarled. “Maybe it’s time to make decisions that save the least among us. I will take him.”

  “You can’t. Your back—”

  “I’m not leaving him behind.”

  “You can’t carry him.” Zamir scrambled for a solution. “Let’s carry him back to the water. We’ll travel along the water’s edge, and we’ll use my leather belt to pull him along.”

  The tension in Kai’s jaw lessened, but only slightly. At least he hadn’t lost sight of how precarious their situation was. Even if he had, the effort of returning Badur to the water was a stark reminder that neither Kai nor Zamir was well enough to carry Badur without help from the other.

  “Here, hold this.” Zamir set one end of his leather belt in Badur’s hand, looping it twice around the palm of his hand. He straightened, wincing against the painful tugging in his right leg, and met Kai’s gaze. “You all right?”

  Kai nodded. The bandages Zamir had applied to Kai’s back held the torn muscles together, but a crimson stain was already seeping through. He glanced down the length of the titan, the landscape more desolate than any on Earth. “How much farther, do you think?”

  “We’ve traveled half a league, at best. I’d say at least another two and a half.”

  “And no plan at the end of it,” Kai murmured. “Let’s hope we find its weakness along the way.”

  But if the titan had a weakness, it was not to be found on its back, which was so hard that it dented the tip of Kai’s platinum spear. Neither could it be found along its sides, where the hide was as thick and as impenetrable as its back.

  “What about its underside?” Zamir asked.

  “The whirlpool makes it impossible to strike anything with certainty,” Kai said. “It must be absolute madness there now as more sea creatures are sucked into it. An underwater collision, rather than the whirlpool itself, is more likely to cause injury, even death.”

  “What has happened to the cultists’ ships?” Badur asked from the water.

  “No less trapped than we are,” Zamir said. Out at sea, a league from the titan, one of the frigates struggled against the thirty-foot high waves. “But they may fare better. They’re larger, their engines more powerful. If anything can break out of the maelstrom, it would be the frigates.”

  “And their submarines?” Badur asked.

  “They’re light submersibles. They’ll be sucked into the whirlpool too. They won’t have the power to break free.”

  “Let’s go,” Kai said.

  “Let me.” Zamir reached for the leather strap. “I’ll pull him for now.”

  Kai nodded, his eyes betraying his relief. He unwound the end of the strap from around his hand. The straps had left indentations in his hand, and his flesh was swollen on either side of the straps, the skin rubbed raw. Zamir glanced over his shoulder at Badur. His hand was no less injured, but he said nothing either.

  “There they are!” Jacob’s voice shouted. The Atlantean scrambled over the titan’s central ridge, accompanied by several cultists armed with assault rifles. “Kill the mer-prince! I want the aether core he’s carrying!”

  Instinct and training dropped Zamir to the titan’s back. He pulled Kai down beside him.

  “No!” Kai gasped as the leather strap slipped from his grasp.

  Badur flailed as the riptides tugged him toward open water,
but Zamir lunged and grabbed the strap before the merman was swept out to sea. His muscles strained against Badur’s weight, but he did not let go. “I’ve got you.” He glanced at Kai. “Go! Get out of here!”

  Kai stared at him incredulously. “Go…where?” He shook his head. “I’m not leaving you. You can’t fight this alone.” He shot to his feet, and leaped high to land in a battle crouch. The impact of his landing drove his spear through one of the cultists. The man stiffened, and Kai swung him around like a living shield. The man’s body jerked spasmodically as his companions’ bullets struck him instead. His head lolled against his punctured chest.

  Kai kicked the man off his spear, then dropped into a forward roll, bringing his spear up to stab another cultist. He twisted aside as a third cultist swung his assault gun like a club, then grabbed the other end of the man’s weapon and slammed it back into the man.

  Zamir grimaced as he pulled Badur through the water, back toward the titan. How much longer could Kai hold out? How far could he go on just adrenaline?

  Movement flickered at the corner of his eye.

  Zamir dropped the leather strap, ducked and twisted around in a smooth motion. The cultist’s attack swung over Zamir’s head, then the man doubled over when Zamir’s fist slammed into his stomach. He was already toppling, but Zamir did not wait for the cultist to hit the ground. He lunged forward, barely grabbing the leather strap before the riptides carried it beyond his reach.

  Badur’s eyes were wide with terror, but his hands were tight around his end of the leather strap. His lifeline. If Zamir let go, Badur would die. Zamir knew it with absolute certainty.

  The sounds of battle continued to ring behind him. Bullets firing. Men gasping. Screaming. Yet more firing.

  If he did not help Kai, Kai would die too. Zamir, too, knew it with absolute certainty.

  To choose between his grandson and a blind merman…it was not even a choice—

  A reflection quavered in the water, a shadow looming over him. Without releasing the leather strap, Zamir rolled onto his back. A bullet pierced the ground, where Zamir’s head had been. Shrapnel flew into his eyes. The soldier bared his teeth in a maniacal grin, and his finger tightened on his trigger.