Page 11 of A Sea of Secrets
Hard-as-my-dick-when-Fallon-was-around pass.
Pass on the scary shit, mind, not Fallon. I’d never pass on my starfish.
As for the trial, the whole spooky aura just didn’t mesh with my vibe. As soon as you mixed scary and beach you got a pirate, and I was no eye-patch-wearing, bird on my shoulder, peg-leg dude with a penchant for overpronouncing my r’s.
No sir-ee.
I felt like I’d been going in circles for hours under the unnaturally purple sky. I had no idea where the maze was headed, and every turn looked exactly the same—endless rows of stupid hedges. I was a fish in a net with no way to get out. Besides, I had more important things to get back to… That sissy squid of an assassin had been within our reach. If it hadn’t been for the sleepy mist, we’d have caught him and brute-forced our way to answers. I was looking forward to another torture session with Ace. He taught me much about how to inflict pain during interrogations, and I had been keen to have my second lesson.
The Masters were always ruining my fun.
A cackle echoed from my left and I did a quick turn, heading in the opposite direction. I may have been a trapped tuna fish, but my brain wasn’t tiny. Only silly sea sausages and people with death wishes headedtowardthe sounds that could only mean danger.
Fog seeped out from beneath the hedge walls, hiding the dirt at my feet. I wondered whether I was about to be put to sleep again. I covered my mouth and nose with my arm, not wanting another snooze any time soon. Now wasn’t the time for naps.
I continued walking, keeping my pace cautious and slow. There was no way I was gonna stay still and let whatever was cackling nearby get close enough to read me a bedtime story.
“Holy halibut!” Something caressed my ankle, startling the life from me, and I jumped.
Nothing stood out of the ordinary, so I searched the fog as I stomped on the ground, hoping to crush whatever dared to touch me. I didn’t blame them, really. I did have impeccably nice ankles. But now was not the time to get all touchy-feely.
I scrunched my brow, tilting my head to one side as a fin zoomed through the fog. Yeah, that’s right, a fin. It zigzagged through the ominous ground clouds towards me, moving like ashark through water. Except it wasn’t water, it was fucking fog. A chill ran down my spine at how smoothly it moved, then more fins appeared like a fleet of ships sailing in my direction. I was no scaredy catfish, but I knew when I was outnumbered.
I ran.
I turned the corner and almost bumped straight into Dick.
The dude stared at me with wide eyes as I scooped him up and continued to sprint. Dick had to be one of the luckiest lampreys that ever existed. Imagine strolling through a maze, scared shitless and wondering whether the next minute would be your last, only for someone to come along and literally sweep you off your feet. That person being me. I was his knight in shining boardies.
“I got you, little Dick!” I sprinted, or should I say galloped, through the maze, my feet barely touching the ground as I went. I wasn’t gonna let whatever was attached to those fins touch me or my Dick. “You’re safe now!”
“What are we running from?” he cried, his eyes searching around us. He dangled in my arms, legs swaying limply as I ran.
“Tiny cackling sharks in a sea fog! Don’t worry, I won’t let them catch us!”
It must have been such a relief for him to have me around to protect him.
“Left!” Dick shouted. I turned as cackles echoed around us, which only pushed me faster. “Right!”
Dick continued shouting directions while I carried him like a new bride. The clouds puffed up around my feet in whisps, and then a sharp pain pierced through my bare ankle. I looked down and saw some sort of lizard thing’s jaws clamped onto my flesh, holding tight as I ran. The creature’s black fin stood tall along its back while the rest of its body was low and wide. Not a tiny shark at all.
I kicked out, trying to shake the thing from my leg as blood spilled from the wound. I chanced a glance behind me, which I regretted immediately, for my eyes became as wide as the sun at seeing more of those fins catching up. Finally, I managed to kick the thing off me, but not without losing a bit of skin. I hissed as the finned lizard went flying into the hedge, though I didn’t celebrate this small victory because I knew the others were fast approaching. There was only one thing we could do.
“Dick! It’s your time to shine!” I shouted, turning around.
I dropped his legs and spun him like we were doing the tango, hitting the little finned lizards as they lunged for us. Who’d have thought Dick and I would make such a good team?
The dude flapped around as wildly as a fish on a deck, knocking the lizards away from us and tumbling them back into the sea of mist. Each time Dick made contact with one of the critters, I whooped, laughing like a pirate after finding a chest of gold.
Maybe the pirate life did suit me. I did like rum after all.
When the finned lizards finally gave up, I spun around, collecting Dick in my arms once more, and ran away from that place. Dick bounced around in my arms, laughing along with me. The sound was enough to keep my attention away from the burning of my arm muscles. The dude was fairly light, but I’d been holding him for a while now. We came to what looked like a safe spot where I dropped him to his feet. Together, we moved through the maze and strangely enough, the fog cleared around us as we did.
I couldn’t help but think about my dad as we walked. True, he hadn’t nominated me for the trials as I had expected, but here I was, making him proud and succeeding like the king I was destined to be. I just needed to remember his warning in the letter he’d sent before the second trial. House Jupiter was a threat and there were crocodiles in the water.
The problem was, I didn’t know which croc was trying to sink its teeth in me. Fallon was obviously not a worry because my starfish was in my pod. There was no way she’d be out to get me, but that only left me confused about the House Jupiter part.
Had my dad been warning me about Victoria? Or was there someone else I needed to look out for? I wasn’t convinced that she was the threat either. That was too obvious. Besides, it was always the person you least expected who turned out to be the bloodthirsty psychopath.
