Page 8 of A Curse Carved in Bone
I had no understanding of why that was cause for concern, but everyone cried out in alarm and caught what handholds they could.
“Freya!” Bjorn roared. “Hold on! There’s a child of—”
Whatever he’d been about to say was drowned out by a loud moan beneath our drakkar, and then the stern of the vessel lifted out of the water. Steinunn screamed, clinging to the mast even as Skade risked another shot before flinging herself at the edge to hold on. Fear clawed my insides as we rose higher and the drakkar tipped sideways. I saw the flash of a gray shape.
Child of Njord.
There was a child of Njord among the Islunders and they’d called awhale.
I had only a heartbeat to wonder what such a person could accomplish in battle before the whale flung the drakkar over. I sucked in a mouthful of air just before I was cast into the water.
I plunged deep and could not see anything but froth and darkness, my body flipping end over end as a wave rolled. It was impossible to tell which way was up. Which way was air.
Water surged, instinct screaming at me to move just before a massive fin swept before me. Then lashed back again, barely missing me a second time.
I kicked hard and broke the surface in time to watch the massive gray whale overturn another of the drakkar. Warriors spilled into the sea, and the whale disappeared into the depths.
It was chaos, made worse by the third drakkar having reached the beach only to encounter dozens of Islunders waiting, including the infamous Arkyn. Lightning flew from his fingers, blasting holes clean through Nordelander warriors and spraying smoking blood across the beach. At his side stood a man whose gaze was fixed in concentration, whatever plans he had for those of us in the water far from finished.
Something bumped my arm and I thrashed only to find Tora floating limp in the water next tome.
“Freya!” Bjorn shouted. “Swim!”
His eyes were on something farther out to sea.
Turning in the water, my stomach lurched at the sight of a black fin shooting through the water toward Tora andme.
Many black fins, and unlike the gray whale, these whales had teeth.
Terror filled me but as I turned to swim for shore, Tora jerked and coughed. Still alive but clearly addled from a blow to the head, blood streaming down her cheek.
Leave her,my anger whispered.She killed Bodil.
The fins were closer now. Bigger than I’d realized.
There is no honor to be had in this death,my conscience answered, the first I’d heard from it in a very long time. But it had power over me still, and I reached for Tora even as I called Hlin’s name. Magic bloomed from my fingers to cover Tora’s body and my own.
A black-and-white shape attacked, mouth opened wide to reveal sharp white teeth, and I screamed.
Yet it was magic the teeth bit down upon, not Tora’s body, and the whale was flung back with incredible violence.
But more cameon.
An entire pod of whales attacking one after another, from all sides. Teeth flashing and biting. Water from their thrashing fins sending Tora and me twisting and spiraling, all of my strength needed to keep hold of her. They couldn’t break through my magic but neither could I escape.
Tora was half again my size and I struggled to keep our heads above water as the whales came on and on. Drowning us in water and fear. Through it, my fury blazed hot because these creatures were being used in a way that was against their nature. The child of Njord on the beach was no better than Vragi. No better than my dead husband who had used the lives of innocent creatures to tormentme.
A wave washed over me, and though my magic flung it back in a burst of spray, we still sank in the water. I gasped for breath and twisted, trying to see over the attacking whales to the beach where the monster who controlled them lurked.
My heart lurched. We’d drifted far out to sea, the figures fighting on the beach now tiny in the distance. The whales didn’t need to kill us, because the water would do the work for them.
“Tora!” I choked on a mouth of salty water. “Wake up! Swim!”
She blinked at me. Then her eyes sharpened and a shriek tore from her lips as a whale struck.
It had a mouth large enough to cut a grown man in half and swallow one of those halves whole, with teeth longer than my fingers.
Teeth that clamped down on her outstretched arm—only for the whale to be flung through the air to land with an explosion of water that set the ocean to rolling.
