Page 84 of Wrath of the Dragons (Fear the Flames #2)
“Elowen!” she screams, trying to catch my ankles, but I leap forward with my sword drawn.
Arrows fly all around but don’t manage to hit me as I vault over the gap between ships.
My boot slams into a woman’s face, and the starfire torch falls from her grip as she collapses on the deck with my feet on either side of her.
I jam the heel of my boot into her temple to knock her out, muttering a curse as another soldier recovers the torch before it hits their deck.
I’m swarmed in an instant, swinging my blade without looking just to keep enemies away from me. Someone else sails over the railing, barreling into the three soldiers on my left as arrows are fired from behind.
“Always surprising me, angel.” Cayden offers his back to me so we’re able to battle together.
“It keeps our marriage interesting.” I stab someone through the throat and flick a bloody curl out of my face. “No thanks necessary for my service and devotion.”
Corpses pile up around us as we fight dirty, watching from the corner of my eye as our ship sails safely past and Finnian’s arrows no longer reach me. My limbs burn nearly as much as my lungs, and an axe flies above my head, splitting a charging soldier’s face in half.
“I had him!” I shout.
“No thanks necessary,” Cayden replies.
The blazing starfire captures my attention again as the soldier now holding the torch rushes toward the railing. We’re too far to pry it from their grip and douse it. I call to the flames, beckoning them toward me as the man carries them farther away.
You are mine.
You belong to me.
You answer to me.
The flames flicker, slowly inching toward me, but the connection is severed when Cayden’s arm wraps around my waist and he throws a knife through the person’s neck.
Starfire swallows the ship in an instant and singes the back of my arm as Cayden vaults us over the side, sending us crashing into the shark-infested waters.
The cold swallows me whole, and my ears ring at the sudden silence.
He keeps us beneath the surface, the corpses and sunken ships illuminated by the firing cannons and blazing starfire.
Even beneath the waves, I can feel the heat.
The salt burns my eyes, but I don’t risk closing them.
Sharks swarm beneath my ankles and I force myself to slowly blow out the final breath I took, needing to savor the oxygen.
I cling to Cayden and force the scream that bubbles up my throat to stay locked behind my lips when a tentacle shoots up and wraps around a dead body, and then two more, dragging them down where I can no longer see.
Two eyes that look like rubies blink open and stare at us.
One eye alone is as tall as Cayden, and it’s so dark that I can’t see the full size of the monster’s body.
Though maybe that’s a blessing considering at least fifty tentacles fan out around its rounded head.
Cayden shoves me behind him, keeping a hand pressed to my back, rendering me immobile as the ancient creature gets closer.
My lungs beg for air, but the fire is still too thick, and I don’t think it’s smart to offer whatever monster this is our backs.
Black spots dance in my vision and a soundless scream flies from my lips when another tentacle shoots forward, wrapping around Cayden’s boot, but he doesn’t stab it with the sword still in his hand.
I tug at his shirt to free myself from his hold so I can stab it.
I’m not proud enough to believe I can best a sea monster in its domain, but I’m not going to watch it drag Cayden down without a fight.
His thumb rubs against my back, but he doesn’t let me move away.
The monster clacks its razor-sharp teeth, the eerie sound vibrating and echoing throughout the space and sending the sharks darting away.
It retracts its slimy tentacle while creeping up farther from the shadows and Cayden pulls me to the surface in time to see it wrap its tentacles around a handful of Thirwen and Imirath’s ships.
It drags some beneath the sea but swallows others whole, feasting on whatever soldiers swim to the surface.
“All hells,” I say in a daze. “What did you do?”
He shakes his head, still keeping an arm around me as we swim through the burning wood and bodies. “I didn’t speak to it or command it as you do your dragons.”
“You did something,” I sputter. “You never told me you speak fish.”
He stops his paddling to glare at me. “Don’t start.”
“I’ve already begun and will not cease.”
His sigh echoes against the water as he begins swimming again. “All it did was look at me.”
“Maybe it thought you were pretty.” He groans in response like he’s debating leaving me behind to fend for myself in the sea, but he tightens his hold, smiling in spite of himself. “Do you know what monster that is?”
His eyes ping to Thirwen’s sails, many of them burning in the aftermath of Zale’s efforts. “I think…it’s the kraken.”
“I’m never swimming in the gods-forsaken ocean ever again.”
Cayden manages to get us back to our ship and shoves me onto the ladder.
The dragons sink their claws into the ships of the final line, sinking them as we enter open ocean again.
I pull myself up and tumble onto the deck in a heap, and Cayden isn’t too far behind.
I’m too exhausted to even care that the wood is covered in blood, or that it vibrates as people surround us.
I crack my eyes open, and Saskia, Finnian, Ryder, Zale, and Zarius are all staring down at us.
“This is my own personal hell,” Cayden states as he sits up to avoid their gazes, but I remain reclined.
Zale shakes his head and is the first to break the silence. “You crazy bitch.”
I’d be offended if his words weren’t drenched in a mixture of astonishment and respect, and instead, I laugh.