“The last coven I know of, that of the Lady Noor, is on the southern continent. Noor told me her own coven was to be a last resort,” Alexander said.
“We’re going to Noor’s coven?” Fia almost spat out her apple.
“You know how I feel about the witches, Alexander.” Altair tore at a piece of grey meat with his teeth. His great fur cloak seemed to fold around him in layers where he sat, and Fia realised she hadn’t seen him without it. “We know they have mixed allegiances.”
“The same can be said of any race. We’ve known Oren since the day he was born, and yet he betrayed us still,” Alexander replied.
Runa’s eyes glistened as they had before above deck, but she said nothing.
Altair shook his head, and Fia caught a glimpse of sadness in his old eyes. “Very well. But one of the smaller ships has requested to break away from the fleet. I have given them permission. Anyone who does not want to continue south should go with them. They will head west to Ashar,” he said, starting on an apple.
“I cannot speak for the others, only for the Nords. We will stay with you. We are greater in numbers,” Maab added. His voice was deep and heavily accented, and he didn’t look up as he spoke. He reminded Fia of a lion, but she didn’t know why. His hands seemed impossibly big, and he had wild, wavy silver hair reaching down to his shoulders.
Enne had a wildness about him, too, but was restrained and demure at the same time. Fia focused her attention back on the conversation, picking at her fruit.
Maps were brought out, with lands indicated at and deliberated over.
Fia studied the parchment stretched out before them. Iraluxia, the continent they’d left behind, to its east, Himera, and to its west, Ashar. Islands dotted around them, and to the north and south stretched great masses of white.
Iraluxia was covered with markers, areas the Makya had destroyed, and it was a sizeable amount of the continent.
“The coven is here, in the south.” Alexander tapped the white at the bottom of the map. “Altair has business in this area, too, unless anyone can provide any information about why the remainder of the fleet shouldn’t travel in this direction.”
“We have no objections,” Maab said.
Altair rubbed his chin. “Good. What word from the angels, Alexander?”
“Runa returned to Alythia earlier to speak with my General. We have a network of angels I believe we can trust to keep us updated.”
“Trust, indeed,” Altair said. “These witches make me uncomfortable, Alexander. I recall one coven back in Iraluxia who were a nasty bunch back when I was a boy.”
“I imagine that was some time ago,” Enne said, a smile tugging at his lips.
Altair laughed. “Yes, yes it was.”
“Noor’s intention was to take Fia to a coven, and then infiltrate the Makya,” Alexander added. “After what happened at the council meeting in Nadar, I couldn’t let another angel take such a mission. Noor is adept with her illusions, resourceful. She’s our best chance of finding out what the Makya are up to.”
“And what has she discovered?” Altair asked.
Alexander shifted his weight. “We’ve had no word from her.”
Please be okay.
“We’ll also need a greater defence weapon,” Alexander continued, “like the water jets in Ikothea. Unfortunately, they don’t harm the Makya, but for most, they remove their ability to ignite. For the stronger ones, that’s another matter.”
Altair held his chin as he thought for a moment. “Ah, yes. Our friends in the south can help us with that.” He rose to his feet. “Now, I am an old man, and I need my rest.” He smiled at Fia as he wrapped his cloak around him, the layers of fur swinging behind him as he left.
“What of our dying sun, Alexander?” Maab asked.
“All I know for certain is that we’re running out of time,” he said, glancing at Fia.
Fia counted her breaths. All the talk of attacks and tactics, the severity of the situation pressed down on her. There was nothing she could do to help, and she was no closer to getting back to London.
They’d found the wrong girl, surely.
Chapter Sixteen
Fia
The next morning, Fia and Alexander found Maab and Enne together beneath a grey sky. As they approached, Maab’s armour dropped away from him, and he transformed into an enormous black and white tiger, growling as he paced up and down the deck.
Navarii children ran screaming as Maab whipped his tail and leapt up onto a stack of wooden boxes. He let out a solitary, rumbling roar, before sitting down on top of the crates. Within moments, Enne had joined him, no longer a man, but a beautiful, white snow leopard.
Alexander approached. “Dear friends, I do hope you are going to behave. A storm approaches.” He touched Maab gently on one of his enormous white paws, and Enne let out a low rumble in response.
Fia blinked at Maab, speechless. “They just…shapeshifted?”
“Yes, all Nords can.” Alexander chuckled.
Fia let out a low whistle. “Into whatever form they choose?”
“Only one,” Alexander said, before taking a few graceful steps into the air.
Shapeshifters. Fia leaned against the gunwale. Beside her, two women shifted into birds and dived into the water below. She watched them disappear beneath the surface, blurring in and out of focus as a tear rolled down her nose. You’d have loved all of this, Soph. The birds whistled and chirped as they dived, and Fia strained to listen.
“Fish, there!” one cried out. And then there was nothing more than bird sounds again.
She wiped away her tears and pressed closer to the railing, but the birds had already flown out of ear shot, up high onto one of the masts where they shifted back into women, naked and laughing as they talked.
A low purr pulled her attention back to the deck and to Maab, licking behind Enne’s ear.
Fia cleared her throat as she approached.
“Hi. I, um, I hear things sometimes…animals. And I wondered if you could…help me practice?”
Maab stopped licking Enne’s ear and raised his head to blink at Fia. His eyes were pale, with a touch of pastel green, the unusual shade she’d noticed the night before at the meeting. He opened his mouth to pant, great white teeth pressing against a pink tongue. He made no sound other than the huffing of his breath. It clouded in the cool air in front of Fia’s face, and he flicked an ear.
“If I’ve interrupted you, then I apologise,” she said, stepping away.
Enne’s head shot up, and he made a peculiar chuffing sound at Maab, his teeth exposed. “Maab is not one for words,” he began, but the rest of the sentence became nothing more than a throaty rumble.
Fia shook her head. “I…I see. This isn’t going to be very straight forward, is it?”
Another sound huffed in Enne’s throat, but his mouth was closed, and only the tip of his pink tongue remained exposed, in just the way her neighbour’s cat used to do. He licked at his whiskers and opened his mouth again. “Practice, Fia. We’ll help you. The Nords are restless. There will be plenty of conversations for you to listen in on.”
Maab began licking behind Enne’s ear again, and Fia knew the conversation was over. Still, that was the most she’d ever understood at once and it was something. Had the witches been right about her? But what could be achieved by talking? If Erebus could reach across all of Ohinyan with his whispers, nothing could stand against him.
Fia looked to the skies for any sign of Alexander, although she knew he wouldn’t be back for a while. He’d flown on ahead of the ship, looking out for other angels, for signs of the Makya, or for any dangers that might be ahead of them. He’d mentioned a storm. Was it safe to fly?
A familiar knot of anxiety twisted in her stomach. Training, that’s what calmed her most. Anything to take her mind off her thoughts of getting back to Earth…and of Alexander.
The familiar jab, hook, jab, hook soothed her as she practiced against one of the huge masts, taking
care not to make contact with the wood.
“Perhaps you might prefer a real target?” It was Enne, human again, smiling as he approached. His accent rested heavily on the T’s at the ends of words, and he unclipped his chest armour and placed it on the deck beside the mast as he spoke. “A fairer fight,” he said with a quiet, playful laugh. He pulled two wooden quarterstaffs from his back and threw one to Fia.
“Sure,” Fia replied, feeling the weight of the staff before readying her stance. She’d practiced enough times with Jo to know she wouldn’t make a fool of herself.
Don’t mess this up. She circled Enne. He was a few heads taller than she was—not as tall as Maab, but she knew at once this would be to her advantage.
Maab leapt up on all fours onto a pile of crates nearby, his oval eyes narrowing as he watched. Enne glanced over for a moment, and Fia didn’t miss the opening. Her first strike caught him softly behind the knees, but Enne countered quickly with a light blow to her shoulder.
She swung around, feigning a swing at chest height to catch Enne off guard. He reached out with his own quarterstaff to counter, but Fia was too fast. She swung her legs low this time, tipping him off his feet. Maab let out a long, low rumble that sounded unmistakeably like laughter. Fia laughed, too, and before she could hold her hand out to Enne, he was bounding towards Maab, already a snow leopard. He rolled him over playfully on top of the crates, licking at the fur around his mouth and purring.
Fia watched them for a moment, play fighting across the deck, much to the distress of the Navarii. She laughed again, envious of how free they were in their animal form.
Runa sat down beside her, brilliant, even in this light.
“Fia, a bad storm is coming,” Runa said quietly.
Fia looked above the sails; the sky was dark, and dense clouds hung over the ship. “I know, Alexander mentioned it earlier.”
“Did he tell you how bad?” Runa took Fia’s hand in hers, and Fia turned away from the wildcats. She could have been mistaken, but something like fear shone in Runa’s eyes.
A bad storm is coming. A sickening feeling rose in Fia’s stomach.
“You think he’s flying through it now?” It was as if the decking was slipping out from under her. She ran to the edge of the deck, looking out into the darkening horizon. It wasn’t even noon, and the sky was heavy with a black mass of thickening clouds.
“I thought he would be back by now,” Runa added, joining Fia as she leant over the railing and gazed down at the murky ocean below them.
Maab and Enne stopped playing, and turned back into men, reaching for their armour on the deck.
“He will be back,” Maab said. “And we will see the storm through. Come, let’s not stand here and worry, but help to ensure everything is prepared. Perhaps you could clear all those with young children from the deck?”
Fia nodded. She and Runa did as he said. Across the deck, Altair looked at maps and called instructions. All masts were to be lowered and all unnecessary items cleared away.
She glanced across at the smaller ships, their decks a scurry of movement as their masts were brought down, too. She whispered a quiet wish to herself that the fourth ship had missed the storm entirely as it made its way west. The ship began to sway in the waves. He’s going to be fine, Fia told herself, over and over.
The air around them gradually became thicker, and the sky turned an intense black. The wind had picked up, and great waves began to crash against the sides of the ship as it rocked.
Fia ran from port to starboard, her eyes darting across the sky for Alexander’s silhouette. Nausea washed over her as the ship lurched, but she ignored it. One, two, three.
“Fia, you must get below deck,” Altair called out over the wind.
“No, not until Alexander’s back,” she replied.
“I’ll stay with her,” Runa said.
With the masts down, most of the crew went below to join their families, and the deck seemed vast with only the few remaining occupants. The ship hadn’t looked this big since Fia first saw it back in the dockyard. Maab and Enne remained above deck on two feet rather than four, helping wherever possible.
When the rain began, the waves were already breaking over the sides of the ship. It came down in heavy drops the size of fists, followed quickly by a crash of thunder that resonated throughout the ship.
“Fia, time to go below!” Runa shouted, gripping her arm. Beads of rain ran down Runa’s dark hair, flattening it against her face.
But Fia clung to a railing and stood on the top step that led below deck, away from any direct contact with the breaking waves. Thunder cracked around them. “I’m staying here until he comes back,” she said, her voice barely audible through the rain. Runa shook her head, tying a sodden rope around Fia’s waist.
“I was worried you might say that.” She secured the other end of the rope to the staircase. “The crew will do this, too.” She pointed to the crew, and as they moved, Fia could see a trail of rope behind them, securing them to the ship.
More thunder rumbled, followed by a brilliant flash of lightning. The ship rocked wildly, as the waves climbed higher and higher. In the half-light, the shadows of enormous waves hanging over the ship were unmistakable.
The next crash of thunder was followed by a flash of lightning so great they were blinded for a moment, but then Fia could make out Alexander’s silhouette, tumbling onto the ship in a ball of arms and feathers. At the same moment, a Navarii child ran out into the rain, his mother calling after him from a staircase to the lower decks.
“Look!” Fia shouted. She wriggled out of the rope and ran towards the boy. She reached out for him just as an enormous wave tipped the world sideways, and Fia threw her arms around him as the water and the wind and the angle of the ship carried them overboard.
The water was cold and dark. Even beneath the surface, Fia could see the churning undercurrent below the great hull of the ship as she kicked and thrashed, trying to find her way back to the surface. The boy’s eyes were wide, and she held him to her as tightly as she could with one arm.
Fia held her mouth shut tight, fighting the urge to breathe out. Wings dove into the water not far from her. She could make out Runa’s face and she reached out a hand. She didn’t know how much longer she could hold her breath, but she held onto the boy, his fingers still clamped around her arm.
Runa’s hand was almost touching her own when from the darkness, hundreds of creatures appeared, their long hair floating about them, all reaching out for Runa. Their upper half was like a woman’s, but their skin had a silvery-greenish hue even in the darkness, and their eyes were black and empty. Where there should have been legs, there were long, deformed tails and tentacles, some with two tails and exposed flesh revealing rotting bone below.
As soon as the first one touched Runa, she screamed, a piercing, gurgling wail beneath the water, as the decaying creature began yanking at her arms and wings. Fia could hear them whispering to each other. She thrashed and kicked in the water to try and reach Runa while keeping her hold on the little boy. She reached towards the angel again, but then the ghastly things were around her, too, grasping at her hair and her arms, and one had its hands around her face. She could hear their words now that they’d surrounded her, pulling at her from every direction.
“I want this one,” one said.
“But she’s mine!” cried another.
“Fia…” a familiar dark voice whispered. A fresh wave of panic shivered through her, and she thrashed and thrashed with her legs to get away. He can’t hurt you. He isn’t really here. But it was too late.
Fia’s grip on the little boy was loosening, as she struggled to hold her breath. She could barely see Runa through the mass of swirling hair and the silvery flesh of the creatures. There was another glimpse of white, and then she saw a beautiful white leopard. It dived beside Runa, swiping at the scaly flesh of the attackers. They screamed as its claws cut through their skin and their twisted tails.
Somet
hing hit Fia, hard, and then Alexander’s mouth was around hers, breathing air into her lungs. As quickly as he’d reached her, they were soaring upwards, out of the water, high above the waves, and the last of the creatures fell away from them, screaming and shouting as they plunged into the water.
Their landing onto the ship was hard, but Alexander protected Fia and the little boy with his wings as they rolled onto the deck. Another wave crashed over them, but supported by Alexander, they held fast. Pairs of hands reached towards her and carried the little boy away as he coughed and spluttered water.
“We should not be above deck,” Alexander said, as he helped her towards the stairs.
They joined the others in one of the smaller rooms on the first level. Enne, naked except for the blankets the Navarii people piled around him, sat beside Maab, who was still dressed in full armour. Maab said nothing and merely shook his head as he looked from Enne to Runa.
Runa was soaked but refused a blanket. Fia supposed she didn’t need one. Malachai inspected every millimetre of his wife, checking for wounds. Alexander rested Fia beside them, and the Navarii draped her in blankets, too. The great ship swayed, and Maab put his foot out to stop a stool sliding into the wall.
“Runa, I’m so sorry,” Fia whispered, the warmth tingling at her numb lips.
“It’s all right Fia. It’s not your fault,” Runa said softly. “We could not have known they were going to be there.”
“The Sorren have never been seen this far south,” Enne added.
“Sorren?” Fia said, her teeth chattering together. “They were bickering over us. I could hear them.”
“What were they saying?” Alexander asked, his wings flickering behind him.
“They um…they were fighting over who was keeping who,” Fia continued, her cheeks flushing. You heard Erebus again…tell them you heard him.
The room was silent. The thunder and lightning had quietened, and the waves were no longer crashing against the ship.
The Third Sun (Daughter of the Phoenix Book One) Page 14
