Page 67 of Death’s Kiss (The Order of the Tide Raiders #1)
Kerau
A n eruption of ear-splitting cheers and thunderous applause explodes from the raiders surrounding us.
Their sounds of rowdy excitement are so obnoxious that I’m tempted to put a finger on either side of my head and blast out my own fucking eardrums.
Someone whistles so ridiculously loudly from behind that I actually find myself unsheathing a blade.
The crowd's annoying commotion signals the arrival of yet another cardinal's cruiser. Sure enough, the raucous noise is overcome by the announcer's voice as he introduces the third captain and crew to arrive. Anticipation is so dense in the air that I could probably wield it in place of lightning.
The final pillar will start up here fairly soon.
Shoving the jeweled hilt of my sword angrily back into its holder, I stalk after Lord Raimbaut down the newly cleared pathway, dividing rows of overly excitable raiders.
Keeping my eyes on the bright, multicolored cape before me, I’m sure to maintain the proper distance in the wake of the retreating TideLord. I’m extra careful not to step too far near any of those carrying cups of sloshing drink on either side.
There is nothing Regis Raimbaut hates so much as a stain. I’ve watched him kill a man, point blank, for the high crime of spilling no more than three red wine droplets along his cuff.
The murderous TideLord in question pauses here and there to chat with those belonging in the upper echelons of the three cardinals and members of the Driftwood Court’s lower levels. The ones that are not privy to the Raider King’s personal viewing platform.
I remain close by, not near enough to be counted in on his discussions but close enough to hear them.
Which is my main objective.
After several agonizingly long conversations regarding things of absolutely no consequence, Lord Raimbaut begins posturing through the massive iron colosseum, aiming for the TideLords box at long last.
One, if not the most tedious thing about working under TideLord Raimbaut, is his overly active mouth and how it loves to gab and gossip.
That irritating trait also happens to be precisely the reason I agreed to captain under him.
That and the fact that he doesn’t keep quite as close a watchful eye on his captain’s as the other lords have reputations for.
Another necessity.
As anticipated, the open-air box is filled to its barnacle-smattered brim with TideLords, their various crews, and even a few chosen captains, such as myself.
All of them mill about talking excitedly over their betting odds for the evening events.
Remaining close to the vibrant lord who commands me, I’m better able to catch the main headlines of their conversations.
“ Three hundred on the boy from the west. ”
“ On the boy? I’m putting four hundred on the girl. She’s been seated in the top two throughout every task so far. ”
“ I’ve got two hundred golds saying the northern boy surprises us all. With another two hundred on that girl from the south, just in case. ”
“ I’ve put down an entire trove guaranteeing the southern boy wins—the elemental. Did you see the size of his affinity markings? That first trial was pure talent, he’s got exactly the sort of power and ruthlessness we need more of in The Order .”
I bite my tongue, withstanding the bitter urge to laugh. If only they knew.
“And who will you be wagering your latest spoils on this evening, Blaine? Any captain’s manage to catch your eye in particular?” Lord Raimbaut questions Lord Dolion.
There’s a hint of amusement in my TideLord's lazy smile. As if he already knows the young Lord’s answer but wants all the others to hear it too.
The Lord of Leviathan’s matches Regis’s languorous smirk with one of his own. His clever eyes of ocean green flicker towards me and where I shadow Raimbaut a few meters back from their group. I find myself subconsciously adjusting my posture beneath his quick study.
TideLord Dolion’s notice is all the more unnerving when realizing, not for the first time, how slight our age gap is.
I remember him quite clearly from the time we shared together in the north, brief as it was.
Though I have to doubt he remembers me. I'd have been nothing more than an insignificant level-one at that point.
Blaine Dolion won The Vault at the end of my first year, making him the last raider among us to do so. To say he was a legend in the eyes of my level is putting it too lightly. He was more akin to a living god, one that we all worshiped from a respected distance.
“What great gambler would ever show you their cards, Regis?” Blaine inquires, his eyes returning to Lord Raimbaut, before taking a swig from the sterling cup in his hand. Those in their mixed group of raiders titter at his cleverness.
“So you are intending to take a gamble, then?” Regis pushes mildly.
Lord Dolion smiles faintly and shrugs, nonplussed. His casual demeanor doesn’t hide from me the subtle tightening of his grip around the gilded chalice.
Lord Kufko intervenes, having just swaggered in from his group of typical admirers. “Blaine is the last raider alive to have made it into The Vault, Regis.” His eyes rest coolly over sunset-tinted rims. “I don’t think I’d call any wager he makes tonight a gamble, would you?”
“I suppose we’ll find out,” Lord Raimbaut answers with a practiced chuckle and a breezy smile. The kind that tells everyone else he doesn’t really care much about the conversation at hand in particular. It’s just idle chatter. Another diverting game. A way to pass the time.
Which is, of course, a lie.
After being given a subtle but firm glance from my TideLord telling me to get fucking lost , I make my way down to the furthest edge of the box.
Being that I hold the lowest ranking seniority under Regis at present, my crew was put on posting duty tonight.
I’m therefore left to endure this whole taxing charade alone.
Standing aloof before the viewing exterior, I note idly that there’s nothing beyond this slim silver barrier to stop me or anyone else from falling down a thousand meters into the sea below and certain death just beneath. That also means there’s nothing obscuring my view.
My gaze is thrown out like a net and it sweeps avidly over the miles of ocean spanning from the colossal stadium we occupy to the location of the mythic vault itself.
Four monstrous pillars made of rough gray seastone rise out of the dark ocean waters and twist up towards the celestial realm above.
They reach so high into the night that four stars, the sundown stars, appear as if to sit atop each one.
It’s a sight I had hoped for a very long time that I just might get to see. Although I wished fervently to visit them under different circumstances. Tonight I’m viewing as a spectator only but there is nothing I wouldn’t have given to see them as a competitor.
Me and every other raider here.
Second-hand nerves begin manifesting themselves when lowering my gaze to the undertaking that phantoms the base of those otherworldly pillars.
Fifty or so meters tall stands the kórallian labyrinth.
The fabled maze glows a pale amethyst and wraps itself protectively around The Vault's location, like a sea serpent encircling its clutch. It’s the reason those competing tonight can only hope to reach The Vault’s entrance with a slim speeder.
The winding passages and many dead ends would tear apart any larger of a ship's hull.
Searching the ocean-bound docks spread horizontally below the hulking coliseum, I loosen a sigh of painful longing. There are eight docks in total, each spaced at a hundred meters apart. My painful longing would be due to the slick top-of-the-line speeders bobbing enticingly at the end of each one.
Letting out a low groan of appreciation, my hands rise up to grip the mollusk-encrusted iron railing in frustration. My fingers twitch with need at the sight of their untouched helms.
As if it's second nature when admiring racing vessels, my thoughts turn to the image of a girl with hair the color of fresh snow. No—a woman . A woman with hair the color of fresh snow.
The word jarring seems appropriate when recalling how it felt to see Merena the night of Luminalia. Two years. Two measly little years and she had utterly transformed into someone I wasn’t quite sure I knew.
Watching her spin in Captain Agni's arms couldn't have stunned me more than if a stray dancing disc had sliced me straight across the throat.
Her and that dress. That fucking dress.
The one that has starred in far too many of my nightly imaginings. Imaginings that no matter how many women I bed from every port possible cannot be satiated. That fact is at least partially to blame for my abnormally dismal mood of late .
Which is idiotic as shit to say the least.
Merena and I aren’t strangers, this wasn’t some chance meeting. We had history. We’d been intimate on more than one occasion. Yet somehow seeing her that night made it feel like any and all of our previous evenings together were surely just my own wishful fantasies.
It had been genuinely alarming to look at her, let alone talk to her.
Not that she hadn’t been beautiful before.
Merena has always been beautiful, damningly so.
But now, well, I couldn’t really place what had changed exactly.
There was this quality about her that was almost ethereal, shimmering just beneath the surface.
Like she was somehow more… alive .
More startling even than her striking appearance was the inexplicable restraint she’d cultivated.
All that prior wildness had been whittled down in the last few years, etched away bit by bit, sharpening in her a lethal edge of icy control.
I struggled in the short moments we had together to coax out traces of the girl I'd once known.