Page 168 of The Sea Witch
Shouts arose from the remaining marines, still fighting the witches. Seeing their admiral and mage lying dead on the beach, they fled for the cutters.
“Ben.” Alys ran to him, wrapping one arm around his waist and he pulled her close.
They stared down at Strickland’s body. It seemed much smaller now.
More bodies littered the beach, and marines and seamen piloted their cutters back to the broken naval ships listing in the bay.
Ben waited for a sense of relief, of victory. He stared up at the cloudy sky. “It’s over. It’s all over.”
To his own ears, his voice sounded hollow, as if he was deep in a cave.
Alys cupped her hand against his jaw and angled his face toward her. He stared into the hazel of her eyes, all the greens and browns and golds. Smudges of exhaustion ringed beneath her eyes and she was filthy and bedraggled and beautiful.
“They’ve taken so much from you,” she said gently. “Don’t let them take your heart.”
She lifted onto her toes and kissed him. The touch of her lips to his roused something within him, the pain and sorrow and fury and feeling awakening at once. He gasped into her mouth.
“There you are,” she murmured. “Don’t worry, Sailing Master. I’ve got you.”
He held tightly to her as shudders wracked his body. And she held him. And there would always be pain, but that was all right, so long as he had her.
“Ben...” There was worry in Alys’s voice.
“We’ve won the day, Flame,” he said. “There’s naught—”
“Look.” She pointed toward Warne’s severed hand.
It was moving.
The hand continued to twitch. Yet they weren’t the last spasms of a dying creature. It formed complex shapes and forms in the air.
“It’s finishing the spell Warne began,” Alys said in alarm.
Alys ran and stabbed the hand with her cutlass, and it went still.
Then... screams went up. Three of the fleeing sailors dropped to the sand, curling in on themselves. They shook and shouted, and tore at their clothing. Their bodies twisted, their muscles stretching horribly. Markings appeared on their flesh. Markings that Ben knew all too well.
Torment tore through him. Something... something lived in the husk of his body. It pushed against the inside of his skin. The thing inside him fought to break free. He doubled over as his vision dimmed.
“Ben,” Alys shouted. She moved toward him, but he pushed her back.
“Stay... away.” His voice had changed, becoming raspier, deeper.
She gasped as his clothing tore. His shoulders grew impossibly wide. The breadth of his arms split the seams of his coat. His feet lengthened, as did his now black-clawed hands. His skin shivered and peeled. Gray blue scales emerged from beneath his flesh. His rangy form knotted into thick muscles. Piece by piece, his clothing fell away as he continued to change. Inch-long spikes emerged from the skin along his arms and down his back.
“Run,” he grated.
But she couldn’t. She stared as he rose up, stretching and lengthening to ten feet tall. His hair hung limply around a face that was and wasn’t Ben. His mouth widened.
He tried to speak. But his teeth were now jagged and sharp. Gills erupted along his throat.
She gazed into his azure eyes, seekingBen. For a moment, there was terror and awareness, and heartbreak. And then a gray film covered his eyes. Her connection to him was clouded by animal ferocity.Bendisappeared.
“My love,” she whispered.
The creature in front of her stood still for a moment. They stared at each other. There was something familiar about it...
She could reach him, somehow. Use the threads that wove them together to—
