Page 73 of Waves
Whatever Raj had in store for me, I could at least give the others time to escape.
He wanted me, not them.
Inhaling, I lifted my arms. Desperation ripped away my hesitance. My uncertainty. My self-doubt.
Instead of seeking out the song of the sea, I imagined yanking it inward, not calling to it, not asking, but clawing it toward me. Grabbing and dragging it across the velvety mud of the ocean floor and forcing it to heed my demands.
A roar filled my ears, and I wasn’t certain if it came from my own magic or the dragon. Not until I saw the beast’s terrifying maw gape open to reveal a second row of gleaming teeth. A sulfurous stench billowed toward me as the dragon’s tail whipped out in a wide arc that stretched so far the tip tapped a distant hill and sent rock tumbling.
Fear punched through my gut and bile coated the back of my tongue, but I tried to cloak both those sensations in anger. I tried to wrap myself in fury. Bind myself with the dark intentions that lurked inside the shadowed cavity where my heart once lay.
Because at this moment, my evil was my strength.
One didn’t fight a terror like the Sultan of Cheryn with kindness and flowers—one fought with fury and hatred.
Beneath it all, I knew I had what it took.
Perhaps not to survive. But at least to fight.
I could deceive others with the facade of my goodness. My kindness. Manners. All those trivialities that burned to dust in moments like this.
They meant nothing.
Deep down, beneath any hope about restoring goodwill to Okeanos, I was well aware that taking on this kingdom was a matter of jealousy. Of pride and peacocking and privilege.
The desire for the crown, to become queen was selfish—because my entire life I’d hungered to be special. Something more than human. More than a second daughter. And…once I’d discovered the truth, more than a pawn for an evil mother. More than a container for an evil heart.
More.
So here I was, set to face a monster.
The worst the world had ever known.
And yet…I couldn’t deny that I was on the same path as that monster myself.
I was the reason Watkins was dead.
The reason so many innocent bodies had been fed to the glacier to become part of the freeze. I was the reason Julian and his inventions were ripped away from the world.
Me.
The wicked versus the diabolical.
Two fiendish, despicable beings canceling one another out.
The sun would probably shine brighter once we both were gone.
Inhaling a breath I didn’t deserve, I filled my lungs before I slashed my arm through the water in front of me. Instantly, a barrage of a dozen ice spikes erupted and hovered before me, harp strings pinging inside my eardrums and striking me dumb for a moment. Shocked.
My magic never came that easily. Never—well, only once. But I didn’t have time to dwell on why it might be working, nor even appreciate that it was. The beast was far too close. Flicking my wrists outward, the ice shards shot toward the dragon so quickly that they whistled through the water. Another flick sent myguards flying backward, away from where they’d been swimming up to uselessly posture to protect me. But I didn’t spare them a glance. My gaze was solely focused on the dragon.
The obsidian monster jerked his head to the side and my spears flew past him. Useless. Tiny toothpicks, unlikely to even dent the armor of his scales even if they had hit him. That was pathetic. I posed as much challenge as a child.
Better. I need to do?—
His undulating tail smashed into my side. Thick as a man’s skull, even just the tap it managed sent me flying sideways. Pain rippled through me as my top rib cracked and then the one below it. And then the one below that. I felt like a stone tower crumbling story by story.
Automatically, my back began to arch as my body moved to cradle my injuries. Fighting against that need, I straightened, refusing to let the beast see me cowed. But doing so made white hot pain slash behind my eyes and I had to swallow down a thick scream.
