Читать «Rising Tide (зксм-1)» онлайн - страница 53

He looked up instinctively, his attention drawn to whatever she saw.

At first, it was only a dim shape lost in the horizonless vast of the sea, then it came closer with astonishing speed. He realized it was a shark when it was still a distance away, recognizing the dorsal fins. He'd dreamed of sahuagin and sharks a lot since the recent attack on Butterfly. Reaching down to where he normally carried his shin knife, he found only bare skin. He had no weapons.

He reached for the girl. "Come, lady," he said, "while there is yet time."

She resisted, pulling against him, and said, "No, Jherek. This is not a thing that can be fled from. This is something that you must face."

He grabbed her wrist, desperately wanting to pull her to the sea bed below. The great shark was bigger than he'd thought, swelling into sight. Fear took him then when he saw that it was thirty, forty, or more feet in length.

Its skin was a stained gray, like ivory that had been rubbed with charcoal, the black coloring worked into the veins and scratches. When it came closer, he saw that the veins and scratches were tattooed runes and old scars. One eye was liquid black, malignant, magnetic. The other was only a puckered hole, dark with the hollow and the scarring around it.

Without warning, the girl slipped through Jherek's fingers. The clam closed over her again, a fort protecting her from the approaching dreadnought.

Before Jherek could move, the shark was on him. It opened its fanged mouth and swallowed him whole. Trapped in the shark's teeth, he discovered whatever ability had let him breathe underwater was now gone.

Death came for him.

*****

Jherek fingered the scabbed and itching cut along his throat, remembering the Amman sellsword's blade from three days ago. Nightmares had continued to plague him the previous nights, and he knew there'd be no relief tonight either. They'd put in at Athkatla two nights before, then made the journey on into Velen.

He sat at a back table in the Figureheadless Tavern and looked out the dirty window at the eastern dock walk over the waves lapping up onto the beaches of Velen. His stomach knotted and clenched repeatedly as he considered all his ill luck of the past few days.

It would have been better, he thought dismally, if Captain Finaren had let the sellsword slit his throat that day. Butterfly's captain had talked with the Amnian merchants, explaining that Jherek had never been a true part of Falkane's crew aboard Bunyip, only a captured youth pressed into service on the pirate vessel who'd managed to escape with his life.

Lelayn had reluctantly accepted the story. There was no proof to the reports that Captain Falkane was in league with the sahuagin, but the Amnian merchant had demanded that Jherek be held in the ship's brig. Though Finaren hadn't been happy about complying with the order, the brig was where the young sailor had found himself.

Jherek had lain on the hard bed with no light to read his books and no company. The ship's crew had been busy with repairs, and probably no one wanted to speak with him now anyway. With nothing to occupy his hands or mind, the darkness that always waited to consume his soul had riven him, tearing at him with the gale fury of a summer squall and as persistent as the seasonal rains. His grip on the world around him had come loose, freeing many of the old demons that he'd walled away with Madame litaar's and Malorrie's help and guidance. He hadn't forgotten the old fears that lived with him, but he had been surprised at how fierce they seemed now. Where the nightmares had come from was no mystery, but the one with the shark continued to gnaw at him.