Total pages in book: 154
Estimated words: 144411 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 722(@200wpm)___ 578(@250wpm)___ 481(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 144411 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 722(@200wpm)___ 578(@250wpm)___ 481(@300wpm)
“I’ll keep that in mind,” she says idly.
“You stay here, luv,” I tell her. “It will all be over in no time.”
I leave her, locking the door to my chambers behind me. It’s only when I’m on the ship’s boat and being lowered to the water, along with my crew of Cruz, Matisse, Lothar, Remi, Horse, and the page, John, that I remember I left my keys to the princess’s cage behind in my other trousers. I shake it out of my head. She can’t get out of the cage and no one else can get into my chambers. She’s safe.
I turn my focus to our plan and our surroundings. A heavy fog has settled over the water and islands, coating it with an eerie mist. We silently row the boat to shore in the dark cover of night, taking in the reverence of the area. Nan Madol is a city of half-submerged ruins by the water’s edge. Columns of basalt rocks rise up along built canals, giving the abandoned site the name “Venice of the Pacific.”
I have been to Venice and the nickname is a stretch, but even so it’s an impressive place with the residents, who were the elite members of the tribes, living here until a hundred years ago. In that time since the city was abandoned, the vegetation has taken over, vines stretching over the ruins, the sand and water swallowing the rest.
Our boat glides soundlessly along the stone walls of the canals built up on the coral reefs and rising up through the mist. If it were daytime and the sun were shining you would see down through the clear blue water to where old stones had sunk to the bottom, but in the fog and under a moonless sky it looks like we are slicing through ink. Above, statues peer down at us, big gaping eyes giving silent judgment. It’s the type of place you don’t even want to breathe for fear of pissing off some god that you don’t believe in.
Eventually, we reach the shore and we quickly step off while John turns the boat around and starts rowing it back to the Nightwind, the ship looking ghostly as it sits there in the mist, barely visible.
I take the lead and Cruz brings up the back and I lead my crew through the thick jungle, past the ruins. It’s even darker in here, the fog reaching through the trees like fingers, and I have to use my cutlass as a machete to slice through all the overgrowth. Strange creatures make growling noises in the pitch, and beady eyes watch us from the treetops. Every now and then I swear I hear a girl crying but I know it’s just a trick. After all, this place was completely normal until Nerissa decided to take over. Now it pulses with her witchcraft.
“Captain, I’m pretty sure there’s something following us,” Remi says, his voice shaking. Remi is the youngest of the full-fledged Brethren and isn’t used to being pulled away from his post at the cannons.
“It’s just me,” Cruz says. “And…something else. But the more you talk about it, the more it will follow us. Let’s keep moving with our mouths shut.”
Remi whimpers and his lover, Horse, utters some comforting words to him, and we continue on, our breathing heavy and quick, the sound of my machete echoing through the darkness over and over again.
Eventually, I see a bit of light through the trees, and I raise my hand for us to slow down and stay quiet. I get down onto my stomach and everyone else behind me does the same and we crawl through the jungle until the dirt turns to sand and we find ourselves on the beach. The thick fog parts just enough so that we’re staring right across the water at the ghost ship.
CHAPTER 14
Maren
“Skip?” I ask softly, looking around for the orange feline.
When the captain entered the room earlier the cat ran under the table. I don’t get the impression that the cat is afraid of the captain, rather that he’s afraid of being found complicit. In that sense I have to wonder if the captain is able to communicate with the cat too. He may not be a Syren, but it wouldn’t surprise me.
But there’s no sign of the cat. Perhaps he ran out of the room earlier and I didn’t see it.
I sigh and lean back against the bars of the cage and slide down until I’m on the floor, my mind still tumbling over everything that was said at dinner last night.
The pirates hunted mermaids for their magic blood.
Edonia killed the captain’s daughter and stole a book of magic.
The captain was once married to a witch.
The captain may or may not have been the ones who stole my mother from the depths of Limonos. Was my mother hunting them or were they hunting her? Or was it some other sailors or pirates that dragged her from the water, never to be seen again? I don’t need yet another reason to hate the captain, so I’d like to pretend he was never involved with her death.