Page 15 of I Summon the Sea

A scent of smoke and leather wafts over me, laced with a whiff of bitterness like tea and burnt wood.

He shakes me a little, looming over me, his square jaw clenching, dark eyes flashing. “Did you hear me?”

“She’s mute, Athdara,” one of the guards says. “Can’t speak.”

At this pronouncement, I have the satisfaction of seeing his dark gaze go wide for a few precious moments, shock glancing through it, before I’m unceremoniously shoved away.

Why the shock? What does he care if I cannot speak?

I watch him stride away, crossing the barge and jumping down onto the dock, hair lifting like a raven’s wing.

And he’s gone, an angry storm, leaving me shivering in his wake.

CHAPTER FIVE

Most of us remain on the flat barges as the night comes down. The fleet still needs to be guarded against attacks, and that includes our barge that only carries guards, not to mention the ones carrying the precious cargo of the sacrificial victims.

A stench wafts downwind from the cages, that of unwashed bodies and waste. It turns my stomach, as much as the knowledge that all those humans were caught like rabbits in a snare and are now sent to theanaktorto die in the trials of the festival.

Tru catches my grimace as he steps back onto the first barge, carrying baskets with flatbread and what looks like cured meat. “The humans are headed for the Death Games, little lady.”

Gods.He thinks I don’t know? That’s what the humans call the trials, and I wonder now if the fae call them the same.

I gesture at the cages, then mimic cleaning. Mimic eating.

“Yeah, yeah, we’ll feed them,” he says. “Grab something for yourself now, before the men fall on the food like wolves.”

Frowning, I reach into one of his baskets and tear out a chunk of bread. Then I grab a slice of ham. That settled, I point again at the cages.

“I said we’ll feed them. Arkin!”

“Coming!” his friend bellows, following him onto the boat, carrying his share of baskets with food. “Greetings, Rae.”

“You know her name?” Tru stops in the process of turning away from me. “Your name is Rae?”

I nod. Tentatively, I form the name with my mouth. It will have to do.

Tru smiles. “Well, you should have said so!”

Arkin groans and kicks at Tru’s leg. “You’re too stupid to live. Get moving, or the men will fall on us and eat us together with the bread.”

I watch them go, nibbling at the bread and ham. But my attention is caught by movement inside the outpost camp. Several fae are gathering and pointing up.

It’s a drak, circling overhead, a light blue with a darker belly and wings. A Jay drak, named like the bird for its colorings, its rider wearing a gleaming helmet and breastplate.

It’s coming down, I realize, at the same time as I realize that Athdara is there, near the group, muscular arms folded over his chest, his dark head bare as always. He’s standing apart from the men, a towering dark presence, brutally elegant in his black leathers and his crown of wild black hair.

Up in the air, the drak’s circles grow tighter as it comes down, until it’s right on top of the barracks, the surge of wind from the descent pushing me backward. I resist, sitting down on the barge’s side, making myself small as I watch this spectacle play out.

I’ve rarely seen a drak with a rider from up close before. The draks I’ve seen have always been wild, only diving down headfirst to grab an animal off the earth or water, like birds of prey, then swinging back up into the sky.

Flames and screams and death…

Yes, apart from that one time.

Draks are the size of horses and are used as winged mounts by the king’s elites in battle and to carry messages, unlike the Great Dara whom nobody can command. Draks were commandeered to save humanfolk as well as finnfolk during the last Reversal, something most people forget.

Whereas the dara are big like houses, dangerous and unpredictable. Intelligent, some say. Old. Highly magical. Keeping to themselves since they fell through the cracks in the firmament three hundred years ago, who knows from which world.

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