The Shattered Land_ The Dreaming Dark - Keith Baker [33]
“All right. I’ll leave you to it, but if you need anything …”
“I’m fine. I’ll be fine.”
Daine looked at Pierce. “Up for a little combat practice on the deck?”
“As you wish.”
Pierce picked up his flail and followed Daine out of the cabin leaving Lei alone with her thoughts. She took her tools out of her backpack and found a focus stone that would serve for the job, but the image of her parents hung in her mind. Not the memories of a lonely child, trapped in a world of war and steel, instead she was haunted by the memory of a dream, lying on a slab next to Pierce while her parents discussed her progress. Perhaps it was just a manifestation of her insecurities—a fear that she was nothing more than another experiment, a failure to be cast aside? Somehow she felt that there was more to it, and it frightened her.
She rubbed the back of her neck, passing her fingers across her dragonmark, and set to work.
Daine’s first vision of Xen’drik was Shargon’s Teeth—a chain of islands rising out of the water, surrounded by sharp peaks of black basalt.
“Teeth of the Devourer,” Thaask said, stepping up to the rail next to Daine. “When he hungers, the Teeth shatter the hulls and bring the ships down.”
“I thought you were here to keep that from happening,” Daine said.
“As he wills.” Thaask ran a claw across his teeth; to Daine it looked like a ritual gesture. “Should he call storms, my path would not save you.”
“Where would that leave you?”
“I and mine scavenge the ships that sink to the bottom. We are the children of the Devourer, and we claim what he leaves behind.”
“So you want us to sink? And we’re paying you to be our guide?”
Thaask gave a croaking rasp, which Daine had come to believe was a laugh. “What has this little ship to offer? If the elders wished it, sea and stone alike would rise to shatter this vessel. Nothing travels the waves save by our leave. There are those beneath the sea who take their pleasure in pulling down your vessels, but those of my school have no wish for war between the land above and the deep water, not now. We serve as guides across the water. If the Devourer wishes to claim your ship, we will take what he leaves. If not, we take what you give and build the trust between our kind. We gain by either path.”
“You said you didn’t want war between the surface and the water now. …”
Daine let the sentence hang, and there was a moment of silence. Thaask turned to face him fully, and the sunlight gleamed across his scales. “As he wills,” he said, drawing a claw across his teeth.
The sahuagin dove off the edge of the ship, returning to the sea to scout the waters ahead. There was a creature waiting for him there, a huge ray with fins that made Daine think of wings. This beast served as Thaask’s mount, sliding through the water with speed that hinted at supernatural origins; Thaask clung to the ray’s back and it darted forward, making it seem as if the Kraken’s Wake was standing still. Daine watched the shadowy shape disappear into the depths, and wondered what lay hidden in the deep waters.
The attack came without warning. One moment Daine was standing at the railing of the ship, an instant later, he was engulfed in cold shadows that drew the heat from the world. He was weightless, falling, and though he could see nothing, every instinct screamed that he could strike deadly ground at any moment.
Let me take you from this place. The voice was calm, soothing … Tashana. Don’t fight it. Take my hand and you can have refuge in your memories, safe from the death that awaits you here.
Daine could feel her fingers just beyond his own, warm and welcoming. He clenched his fist. “None of this is real.”
Perhaps, but it is deadly all the same.
The wind grew louder, and Daine felt that he was falling faster, though darkness was still the only thing he could see.
Surrender to me. Tashana’s thoughts were cold fingers drifting across his skin. Let us return to your past. It’s the only way you’ll ever know the truth of that night—the only way you