Page 19 of Wicked Tides #1

Vidar

They say kindness is laughter and madness is a scream.

But evil… evil is but a whisper.

~Bishop Doyle II

I did not think I would die on a rock in the middle of the ocean, but there I was…

about to die on a rock in the middle of the ocean.

It was a pity Dahlia hadn’t killed me before the nightmare creatures appeared.

I wasn’t sure what they were, but they seemed to strike fear in the sirens and that didn’t bode well for humans.

I glimpsed the one lying nearby, her innards strewn about like coils of wet rope. Her white face had lost all of its luster and glow. She’d been killed so quickly. Without bronze or a beheading, it baffled me.

Behind the cluster of rocks, there was no telling what they’d done to Dahlia. By her silence, I assumed they killed her which meant I was next once the monsters had eaten their fill.

So… a species that ate sirens. The irony had me smiling inside.

It appeared they were not at the top of the food chain.

I tested my bonds ag ain, but they only seemed to get tighter.

My wrists must have been swelling. Great.

I rested my head back on my post to stare up at the thin clouds moving across the dark sky.

Waiting to be eaten seemed to be a repeating pattern in my life.

Looking down at my legs, I was glad I didn’t wake to see them severed.

I’d been lucky once again. And if I wasn’t mistaken, Dahlia had some odd reservations.

I would have loved to get to the bottom of them. But alas, I was about to die.

The faint slosh of water behind me made me pause those thoughts.

While sloshing water wasn’t unusual when the ocean around us was undulating nonstop, this particular sound caught my attention.

I heard something slide on the rocks and as one of those fowl creatures made a half-assed patrol of the island, I watched him, wondering if he’d noticed the disturbance as well.

When he turned and started venturing back toward the cluster of rocks where his companions were, the movement continued, creeping up behind me.

Then the hushed sound of metal on stone drew my eyes.

I glimpsed at the ground beside me to see a bronze blade near my hip.

It looked old as if it had been fished from the bottom of the sea.

“How well do you fight, hunter?” came a whisper, so soft I barely thought it was real.

I stared toward the rocks, trying not to be obvious as I said, “Well enough that you know who I am.”

She hesitated. “Your ship is far out at sea. You cannot get to it without us. You cannot get to your ship without your boat.”

“What boat?” I said, almost laughing.

“You do not think we could bring your fragile human body here without one, did you? You’d have drowned before Dahlia had her fun.”

I sighed, leaning my head back against the post. “What do you want?”

“I cut you free, you help kill the xhoth.”

I wasn’t going to ask her to clarify that. There was only one thing on that island that could possibly be “the xhoth.”

“I’m prepared to die here,” I said. “Why would I help you? ”

She inched closer to my ear, still not coming out of the shadows behind me.

“Because your crew doesn’t know what’s coming. You could change that. If you care for them, that is.”

I tried to bite back the worry that sparked.

I was going to try and negotiate with the woman, but my options were limited.

I knew she was implying that I help her free Dahlia, which meant she was still alive.

I also knew she couldn’t do it alone. To be desperate enough to enlist my help meant she had no other choice.

It also meant she and Dahlia were close.

It was a weakness I could exploit if it ever came down to it.

I weighed my options quickly and ultimately, if I had a chance of getting off that rock alive and back to my crew, I had to take it.

“How many?” I asked.

“Four. My sister waits on the other side of the island to aid us.”

“I help kill them and then what? How do I know you’ll help me in return?”

“You don’t. But I promise that right now, a whole skryll of us is under the belly of your ship just waiting to eat your entire crew alive. You get Dahlia out of this, she calls them off.”

She slid the blade closer to me, tempting me to take the offer.

I deduced a couple of very significant things in those brief moments.

One, the creatures that had interrupted Dahlia’s playtime were no friends of hers.

Two, she was very important to her companions.

It wasn’t surprising considering she was Reyna’s daughter. It was enough to pique my interest.

With another sigh and a glimpse at the moon, which I thought only moments ago would be my last, I nodded.

“Better get on with it, then.”

She sliced my binds instantly, freeing my wrists. My shoulders were cramped. My hands were numb. I was stiff as a goddamn cripple.

But I’d been worse.

I picked up the blade and took a quick survey of the area to know the terrain I had to work with.

Rolling my shoulders, I rocked forward into a crouch and glanced over my shoulder to see the woman hiding in the shadows.

Like the dead one, she had silvery hair, pale skin and faintly glowing freckles on her admittedly beautiful face.

Her white eyes caught mine and she moved back an inch, untrusting.

I wanted to refuse her offer, jump into the sea, and take my chances, but I knew it would have ended quickly, either to drowning, sharks, or one of the many fiends beneath the waves. I shook my head and hissed with aggravation, knowing I had no other choice.

Fuck .

Standing at full height, I tested my mobility as I marched toward the gilled beasts across the little rock island. The water was getting higher and soon that whole place would be under the waves just like Dahlia had said. I was the only one there at a true disadvantage because I didn’t have fins.

The first “xhoth” I spotted had his back turned and was staring into the dark sea.

I lifted the old sword and kissed the cool metal of its blade before rushing him.

He spun as soon as I put my leather boot down hard enough to be heard.

I thrust the blade up through his chin until it hit his skull, but it went no further.

Tough creatures. His bones were dense, but all things had a weakness.

He gurgled on black blood before clawing at his wound.

I slid my blade free and then jammed it between his ribs, searching for soft tissue.

At that point, the little island of horrors was up in arms. The creatures made a terrible wheezing screech as they moved in to fight.

I spun just as my first kill crumpled into a twitching mess of unnatural limbs at the edge of the rocks.

I kicked him into the water, but just before I took my eyes off the waves below, I spotted something I could use.

A goddamn boat.

I growled to myself, watching for a moment as its wooden edge knocked against the rocks.

So, all sirens were liars. No matter. I needed to kill everything I could lest they follow me on my trip back to the Burning Rose, so I renewed my grip on my weapon and turned as one of the slimy beasts charged my way.

I really would have liked my night to go differently, but death and murder it was.

Suddenly, a figure leaped up from behind the creature and latched onto his back.

It was the woman who freed me. She was small in comparison to the xhoth, but she wrapped her skinny limbs around him and her sharp teeth came down on the fleshy bend of his shoulder, ripping a thick chunk right off of him.

Dark blood fountained out of his neck and I took that chance to drive him through with my blade.

Chaos ensued. If it was moving, I killed it and I did it furiously.

I would have liked to slaughter every last thing on that island, but something in the back of my mind was stopping me.

Instead, I held up my end of the bargain, reluctantly avoiding the sirens with every swing of my blade until the island eventually fell silent.

Of course, I’d only agreed to help kill the creatures. What I did next was entirely improvised.

I saw Dahlia’s body tied up within the cluster of stones. Her blood painted the wet slate and trailed in red streams deep in the stony grooves beneath her. Black hair fanned out around her head. She was unconscious. Perfect.

Before the excitement of the fight had left me, I bent and scooped Dahlia’s body over my shoulder.

She was heavier than she looked or I was weaker than I thought after the whole ordeal.

Either way, I groaned as I straightened, holding my sword in one hand as I turned to face what was now two silver-haired sirens standing in front of me.

The second one must have joined in the fight, but I was too consumed with the slaughter to notice.

And clearly, she was wounded by the way her hands were pressed firmly over her side and blood was trickling down her right leg.

The one who’d given me the blade glared daggers at me and I let my lips slant into a smirk, pointing the tip of my blood-drenched bronze at her .

“I held up my end,” I said. She stepped forward as if to try and take Dahlia from me and I quickly lifted the blade until the point of it was pressed up against Dahlia’s abdomen.

So many organs there to slice through. “Ah, ah,” I warned.

“Now, I can tell she means a lot. She can call off her sisters whether she’s with you or with me, but I don’t trust her to do it if I hand her over. ”

“You can’t—”

“Get to the boat that’s washed up on the other side of this island?” I chuckled. “Not as good at hiding things as you are at lying, are you?”

“If you’re going to kill her,” the other one grimaced. “Just do it.”