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I dive under the waves and away from the sides of the ship, just in case. When I break the surface, I look around for the shark’s fin, but to no avail. Abe’s cry brings my attention to the ship as they push him along the plank. He handles it a lot more gracefully than I did, making it all the way to the end of the plank before one of the pirates shakes the other end, and he goes falling into the surf, sinking with a splash.

I quickly start kicking my legs over to him, moving my bound hands over like I’m pulling myself forward.

“Abe!” I yell, but he hasn’t surfaced.

I dive under, opening my eyes to see him hovering in the darkness, looking at me.

What do we do? he asks. Go to the surface? Start swimming? Which way? Where are we?

I blink at him, the salt stinging my eyes, trying to figure out a plan of action. We can’t drown, so we aren’t in any danger there, but drifting in the ocean for eternity doesn’t sound very enticing.

Then the shark comes up behind Abe like a ghost from the darkness, a shadowy shape that would strike fear in the heart of any man, mortal or not.

Behind you! I yell.

Abe whirls around just in time to see the shark, his mouth opening in a watery scream, bubbles rising to the surface.

But the black-eyed fish pays him no attention and keeps gliding over toward me. Its mouth is open slightly, displaying rows of serrated teeth, and in an absurd instance of longing, I’m reminded of Larimar.

The shark comes right to me, and I’m getting ready to fend it off. If it bites off my hands, at least I’ll be free of the chains.

It veers off to the side just before we collide, and I swirl around, watching it circle me, unable to take my eyes off it. It’s a large, sleek, graceful, killing machine, and the way its empty eyes stare at me suggests an intelligence greater than I thought.

The shark continues to swim around me in lazy circles, expending as little energy as possible before it suddenly swims over to Abe with giant sweeps of its tail. It goes around him for a few revolutions and then suddenly takes off into the deep, disappearing from view.

Abe turns to look at me. Do you think it’s going to come back?

I shake my head, staring into the inky black depths where the shark—Nill—disappeared. I have no idea.

Suddenly, there’s a splash in the water from the direction of the ship, and two heavy ropes sink below the waves.

Perhaps this is a parlay, Abe muses.

The two of us swim as well as we can over to the ropes, grabbing them with our bound hands before kicking up to the surface.

Despite the fact that I can’t drown, I still instinctively gasp for air. Then, I look up at the ship to find the crew peering over the sides at us.

“You passed the test,” Ramsay yells at us with a big grin, the kind you want to punch right off his face. “Come aboard, mateys. Welcome to the Brethren of the Blood.”

I give Abe a tired look, spitting out water as we start to climb the rope. “And you thought joining a band of pirates was a good idea.”

Chapter Twenty-Four

PRIEST

“When was the last time you ate?” Ramsay asks us. It’s been a couple of days since our trial by shark, and frankly, I’m still a little discombobulated by the turn of events. I have a hard time remembering the last time we fed. I have a hard time trying to remember what life was like before we boarded the Nightwind. It’s as if everything that came before was just some hazy dream.

Or, in my case, a nightmare.

Though I still have Larimar at the forefront of my thoughts.

Her face is all I see when I close my eyes.

I try not to close my eyes.

“Five days ago,” Abe fills in as we follow Ramsay and his brother, a grumpy-looking fellow named Thane, down the length of the ship. We just spent the day swabbing the decks and straightening the lines, same as the day before. Apparently, tomorrow will be more of the same. There’s not a lot of variety on this ship, at least not for newcomers. I suppose I should be grateful we’re not on latrine duty.

“Five days? Then you must be starving,” Ramsay says. “You’ve both been working hard enough, I reckon. Best you sample some of our goods.”