Page 32 of Jewel of the Sea

By the position of the sun and the quality of its light, it was late afternoon. He should’ve been on his way to the beach right now. Should’ve been on his way to see Aymee.

His eyes shifted to the colorful fish all around. Most of them were safe to eat. Between the twelve kraken in the hunting party, they could catch enough fish to equal the meat they’d obtain from a sandseeker, and they’d be done in less time.

Sandseekers provided ample bounty. They were larger than adult kraken when fully-grown, and despite their armored tops, they contained an abundance of tender meat, but they were patient predators. They buried themselves in the soft sand of relatively shallow waters, leaving only their top fins exposed. The appendages looked like stone, down to the tiny plants that sometimes grew upon them.

Frustrated with the wait, Arkon signed to Jax.

Need to bait them out.

Jax shook his head, brow low. He flattened his hand, fingers extended, and flicked his wrist down.Patience.

Arkon clenched his jaw; he should have acted sooner, should have forced this hunt to its completion before he’d wasted hours of time in wait.

Features hardening, Jax signed again.She will understand.

Aymee likelywouldunderstand Arkon’s reason for missing their meeting, but that wasn’t good enough. It wasn’t that he was afraid or unwilling to explain the situation to her; he simply didn’t want to disappoint her to begin with.

His eyes flickered to the fish near the reef. Many had already crossed the open seafloor, but the sandseekers would only be roused by large enough prey. That meant either an entire school of fish or a single, sizeable creature. The possibility of using himself as bait flashed across his mind. It was the most direct method, the quickest, and he was confident that his reflexes were quick enough to avoid the initial lunge of any waiting sandseeker.

His reflexes wereprobablyquick enough.

And what will Macy write to Aymee after I am killed by a sandseeker? That I died in a sudden bout of impatience and stupidity?

Arkon returned his attention to the fish, focusing on those clustered in groups. Though he’d seen countless thousands of fish in his life, had he ever truly observed them, had he ever studied their habits and movements with care?

Most fish scattered when they saw or sensed a predator nearby, but the fish that swam in schools remained close to each other in their escapes. If they were spooked in a controlled fashion, by multiple predators…

Rising slightly, he signaled to Dracchus. Within a minute, Arkon, Jax, and Dracchus were drifting on the surface, their heads above water.

“What?” Dracchus asked with a frown.

“Arkon…” There was warning in Jax’s tone.

“We need to force some fish to swim across the sand,” Arkon said. “If we work in unison, we can funnel them exactly where we want them to go, and their passage should lure out the sandseekers.”

“That is not our way.” Pupils slitted, Dracchus lowered his brows. “This is unlike you.”

Arkon blew water out of his siphons. “I have ever questioned our ways.”

“Not with this impatience.”

“We have no reason to lay in wait when we could lure our prey out. Weren’t you the one ready to charge into The Watch blindly when Jax was imprisoned just because you thought we’d waited too long?”

“Neither of you charged in blindly,” Jax said. “You were sensible about it. This is a different situation, but requires equal caution and planning.”

“We do not know how many sandseekers are hidden there,” Dracchus said. “If we scare fish across the open ground, we may disturb all the sandseekers at once, and they will go into a frenzy.”

“So, we can pick one off the edges.” Arkon thrummed with a strange energy; anticipation and dread pulsed through his limbs. Despite his impatience to get to Aymee, the allure of a new hunting method excited him.

“The chance for danger—”

Arkon cut Jax off. “Is little greater than at any other time. We are hunters. Sometimes, that means we must make our own opportunities.”

He and Jax stared at one another, and he saw Dracchus’s concerned gaze shift between them at the edge of his vision.

“This is important enough to you to warrant the risk?” Jax asked.

After inhaling deeply, Arkon nodded. “Life requires risks to have meaning, doesn’t it? And our people must continue our advancement and refine our methods as much as possible if we want to overcome the limitations designed into us.”

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