Page 79 of The Rusalka and Mr. Right

“I don’t know how to shoot this thing.”

“Then break his skull with it,” Leo says in a flat, factual voice.

Wolfie doesn't seem to be the excitable type, and that’s probably a good thing since I’m soaked with sweat and my heart is going triple speed.

The water ahead of us is beginning to churn. Five or six forms are making for the sinking miniature yacht, and I see tentacles curling around the edge, hauling it to its side.

“She’ll have water around her soon,” Leo sighs in satisfaction.

I nod, all the while praying, “Please be alive...”

WATER KISSES MY FEETand makes the floor slippery. Koshchei goes down while I tower above him, sucking in healing strength from the wetness encircling my ankles. “We’re sinking!” I say delightedly.

“Marina!” I hear a familiar voice bellowing.

“Calder!” I can feel my wounds sucking themselves closed, skin sealing up the gashes my “overlord” gave me. “Don’t have an army, huh?”

“You can watch them turn the water red when I’m done with them!” Koshchei latches onto me, and I instantly feel him leeching strength from me.

No! No, no, I don’t want this tug of war where he drains me as I refill! I need—

Sunlight suddenly splashes across the dark, sunken room, and I look up in shock.

Leo waves, and Calder’s face peeps through. “Tentacle strength. I’ve been working out,” he says.

“No!” Koshchei roars when two gray-blue tentacles rip me away from him.

I’m flung backwards into the water and caught in a tangle of limbs and cheering people—the selkies and kelpies who live in the lake at White Pines and the surrounding woods.

“Hi, guys!” I gasp as I surface, half-laughing, half-sobbing.

“Marina! Marina, baby, are you okay?”

My heart fills up so fast that of course it overflows from my eyes. My Kev. He came for me—and he’s standing on the prow of some shimmering ship, some big weapon on his shoulder...

This is not the time to be having lustful thoughts, but... My eyes water and so does my mouth. I thought I’d never see him again, and now he’s the vision of every hot commando I’ve ever seen.

“Traitor! Die with a human instead of live for your lord?”

Water swirls and sucks around us, a whirlpool forming as Koshchei slowly stretches, rising until his torso is out of the water, a gaunt mass of splintering black bones and gnashing teeth that stands thirty feet tall.

“That’s your little human. I can tell. He’s the only one who stinks of you.” Koshchei’s long fingers reach out as if he’s going to pluck Kevin right off the deck of the other ship.

“I can tell that you’re the motherfucker who enslaved her and hurt her—because you’re the only idiot stupid enough to try to mess with her!” Kev roars right back and pulls at something on his shoulder.

“P-POW!” a stuttering blast rockets through the air and connects with Koshchei’s sternum.

Black bits of bone go flying, and the monster towering above us seems genuinely startled.

“Don’t work alone!” I can hear Minegold’s voice even though I can’t see him. “Bring him down!”

Kevin’s missile did something. Koshchei shrinks. Only his neck is above water by the time Calder and I process what’s happening.

“Take him down! You heard the man!” Ardy yells from on deck, pointing in the water.

Take him down.

As one, Calder and I nod at each other and sink below the surface, attacking Koshchei at the knees, forcing his legs inopposite directions, bending him the wrong way, getting him off balance. He claws desperately at the surface, at anything he can grab, too weak to take on so many at once.

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