Page 29 of Dare

The castle, the town, and the Royal had me cornered. All that was left was the deep. But if the undertow swallowed my weight, it would still be more pleasant than the prince ordering my painted throat on a platter.

As he scaled down the cliff, his head swung toward me. With mock excitement, I flapped my arms and waved. More to the point, Winter saw both of my middle fingers pointing upward like masts.

“Over here, motherfucker!” I called.

The prince stalled while gripping the facade, with his body twisted in my direction. It wasn’t as if he could read my lips from this distance and without the aid of sunlight. Instead, I’d assumed my gesture alone would catch his attention.

Yet once again, the prince reacted as if he heard me. Not that I had time to ponder.

If an escaped prisoner was trying to avoid a shark hellbent on ensnaring her, it wouldn’t make sense for that prisoner to signal his attention. Not when the prisoner had a decent chance of getting away. Flagging down the predator might hand him the advantage.

But if that shark had already spotted his quarry, and she stood exposed, waving might confuse him. He might tense, and she might take that opportunity to shock him for a second time. The bastard would expect her to race either left or right, along the shoreline. He wouldn’t expect the fugitive to veer toward the ocean, and he wouldn’t lay odds that she’d kick off her sandals and sprint across the sand, then plunge.

But I did. And when I did, liquid caught me in its embrace, the surf curling, the abyss urging me down. That great big force rolled, taking my body with it, my legs and arms pumping. I held my breath, which was tough considering the laughter rushing up my throat. The dumbstruck look on his face had been precious.

Now if I swam far enough, he wouldn’t be able to see where I’d gone. My head breached the surface, my lips sucking air. I had traveled closer to the wharf, so I kept going, slicing through the waves toward the silhouettes of gangplanks and spars and rigging. From the gaunt to the colossal, boats and ships crowded the platforms. Some were slim, built for crossing the kingdom’s rivers and the castle’s interior streams. Others were long, shallow, and narrow, each fitted with a dozen oars and prows that curved like seahorse tails. The rest were larger than whales, with hulls constructed from swordfish bones.

The ships groaned under their weight. Although sentinels patrolled the docks and quays, the night watch’s numbers were few. Nowhere near as many as in town, or at the castle, or in the tunnels, where they anticipated me.

Mama and Papa’s tidefarer had been stolen after Summer had caught us, and wharfs commonly stored the vessels of prisoners. Usually the conveyances were auctioned off, but if unwanted—such as a boat owned by the parents of a born soul—they remained property of the monarchy, left abandoned and unused.

I pressed my palms to the ships’ hulls and glided between them. A wave sent me careening toward an algae-laced pole, forcing me to dive before the water could shove me into it.

Resurfacing, I almost rammed my head into a stern, then nearly got squashed to a pulp as two boats knocked into one another. The sea pushed something at me, slamming the object against my arm, but I kept swimming. My feet kicked, the water tossing my frame about like a cork. My limbs battled against the waves and then clung to the rim of a catamaran, where I slumped to catch my breath.

Faith and strength waned. Maybe the tidefarer wasn’t here. Maybe it had been moved, burned, or dismantled. Or maybe it had indeed been sold.

I went for another round, because sand drifters didn’t give up easily. I guided myself here and there, here and there, here and there.

Nestled among the larger ships and secured to a stub, the tidefarer—our tidefarer—bobbed like a floating wagon, its shiplap painted the color of marigolds. I recognized the deck’s upper cabin and the arched roof like a peddler’s cart, fronted by two square sails. At the stern, a third sail fluttered, and a trapdoor would lead down to weapons, tools, and chests for storing treasures.

Ten years later, the boat was here, weathered and probably colonized by moths, but not hopeless. Summer shipwrights built the greatest water transports in The Dark Seasons.

I gripped the boat’s ledge, sloshed over the side, and collapsed onto the deck. Gooseflesh popped across my arms. The wet chemise stuck to my body like paste, my nudity visible through the material, and Poet’s sheathed dagger still blessedly affixed to my waist.

Hooks flanked the upper cabin’s door, each one meant to hold a lantern on those calm nights when Papa would sing, and Mama would rub oil into newly woven nets. Homesickness engulfed me as I darted into the cabin, the interior’s musty odor overwhelming. This room had been our home for voyages. It had been a place to narrate stories, legends, and fairytales. We’d outfitted it with stenciled trunks and decorated the floor with vivid pillows.

Mounted on the wall, I found my parents’ spear. Unhooking it from the bracket, I stroked my fingers down its surface, then I curled up on the ground among the larvae-chewed bedding and hugged the weapon to my chest. I clung tightly and begged for forgiveness, because Mama and Papa were gone. They had died because of what I had done, because I’d gotten caught and thrown in a cage.

The castle drum tore me out of the trance. I abandoned the spear and scrambled from the cabin, then ducked as something sharp whizzed past my head and vanished into the night. At the wharf, a sentinel launched across the planks while nocking an arrow to his longbow.

He aimed. I moved to dodge the weapon but halted as a steel object flew in the man’s direction, impaling the side of his neck. The blade drove clean through and jutted from the opposite end. Crimson sprayed from his throat and splattered the dock as he crumbled.

My eyes widened, swerving toward the figure who stood twenty paces from the dead guard. The livid prince straightened, his arm lowering from its throwing stance. Was that fury directed at me or the sentinel?

It had to be me. Not only had I gotten away, but my escape was also causing him a shitload of trouble. For certain, that lethal expression wasn’t meant for the guard who’d tried to lance me through.

The prince launched in my direction. Panicking, I untethered the boat and bid the wharf farewell. My fingers tingled as I worked the rigging, my frantic heart demanding me to be swift. Mama and Papa had taught me how to navigate tidefarers, but I was a child the last time I’d done this. With haste, I fought to resurrect the knowledge and yanked on the tiller.

The sails flapped and rode the current. When I hit a point of no return, the waves sucked the boat into its grip. The tide lifted and dropped the vessel with a mad clap, and the motion repeated, then repeated again. Water doused my chemise anew, fluid lashed my cheeks, and liquid pooled on the deck.

I could let the sea take me. I could let it sink me, and I might be happy to float in that void forever, where Mama and Papa might be waiting, where nobody would find us. But I had Poet and Briar to ally with, and I had my tower mates to save someday, and I had even more born souls to defend after that, and I had my sacred rainforest to find.

In my head, I heard the song.

Seek not, find not, this Phantom Wild.

Sea paths, golden rays, to this Phantom Wild.

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