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“You let her go?”
One of the tall, shadowy creatures in the corner of the room shifted as the Darkling yelled. She didn’t yell often. A lack of outward emotion was important in her position. That alone expanded Aleksander’s fear tenfold. He should have waited to tell her when she was in a better mood. When she wasn’t grieving the loss of a battle and the loss of a life. In hindsight, he thought, this was a lot like rubbing salt into a wound.
“Did you even try to keep her here?”
“Yes.”
He wasn’t sure whether he was lying. He had pointed a gun at Nadia. But he had also known he would never be able to pull the trigger. He cared for her too much for that, and she had been the only thing standing between him and dying painfully like Mal.
“Don’t lie to me.” The Darkling snapped.
“I’m not.”
He was shocked by how confident he sounded. It was a far cry from how he felt. She ran a hand down her face, winced as she touched her still-healing scars, and pulled her hand away.
“I trusted you.”
He felt like he’d been stabbed.
She had?
She’d never once questioned any of the information he’d given her about the royal family. She’d let him poison the king himself.
Of course she had.
“We lost ten people out there.”
It was war, ten people wasn’t a lot. But it was different now. These were people Aleksander had talked to. People he worked with. People he knew.
“Alya, Dasha, Emil, Irina, Kirill, Lev, Mark, Nataliya, Radmir,” The Darkling continued, “Mal–” her voice snagged on something. She cleared her throat, “For nothing.”
Alya - the ship’s head Healer, hardly trained for combat. Dasha - one of the Squallers who had helped to move the ship. Emil - Alya’s younger brother, a Heartrender barely old enough to be a soldier. Irina - the Durast who had delivered Aleksander’s red and blue kefta. Kirill - a quiet Alkemi, always experimenting. Lev - Dasha’s best friend, another Squaller, more wind in the ship’s sails. Mark - a loud Inferni, always good with people, always laughing. Nataliya - one of the many Tidemakers on the ship, keeping the ship afloat even through the worst of storms. Radmir - a Healer, Kirill’s spouse, he had a brother on this ship somewhere. Mal - the Darkling’s right hand, the man who had treated Aleksander like he was normal. The man Aleksander had watched die. Gone.
A spark of anger ignited somewhere in the pit of Aleksander’s stomach. She was blaming him for this? Her creatures could have saved them all. If she wasn’t so fixated on the Sun Summoner, none of them would have been out here at all. The people lost were sacrifices she made, not him.
“You brought us onto a stranger’s ship.”
Now wasn’t the time to be angry. The Darkling wasn’t somebody he should be lashing out at. But he was tired, shaken, still recovering from a battle. He was too exhausted to press it down.
“What are you implying, Mister Morozova?”
A nichevo’ya stirred in the corner, attention turning to him. It should have been enough to blanket his anger with fear, but instead his anger exploded from a spark to a bonfire, burning his fear to ash.
“They wouldn’t be dead if you hadn’t dragged us into the middle of nowhere, on a ship owned by a pirate, to chase a fairytale!”
“My plan worked until–”
“Until it didn’t! Until ten people – soldiers – your soldiers – died! Soldiers you should have saved! Soldiers who trusted you.”
The Darkling’s fists clenched, and the forms of nichevo’ya hovering in the shadowy corners of the room shifted, baring their vague ideas of teeth.
“They’re dead because of you, not me.” He shot anyway.
Her nails dug into her palms and her jaw clenched, “Watch your tone.”
“That’s all? You don’t have anything else to say? Nothing to argue? You’re not even going to try?”
She opened her mouth to speak, but instead she turned away, taking two long strides to the door.
Good. He should let her walk out. Let her face the friends – family – of the people she let die. No. He should stop her – yell at her like she’d yelled at him, be angry on behalf of all those people, he was the only one brave enough to be. He was already moving to catch up with her. Stop it. She whipped around, her red locks nearly hitting him in the face.
Her eyes met his and, as he had expected, they were clouded with anger. The nichevo’ya hissed, and then screeched and dove forward. He had just enough time to see the anger in her eyes shift to fear before the creatures pulled him away from her. His nails scratched against her sleeve, catching on the golden embroidery and tearing threads.
Claws dug into his shoulders and dragged him back, off of his feet and into the air, and then they let go. A scream tore from his throat. He didn’t hit the ground. Huge teeth dug into his middle, tearing through layers of muscle and flesh. He could barely hear over the hissing and screeching of the nichevo’ya, but he thought somebody yelled “stop”. He wasn’t sure if it had been him, the Darkling, or somebody else entirely, he was too focused on the teeth gnawing on him, the claws tearing at his skin.
The creature holding him up opened its jaw, letting him fall. He hit the ground hard on his back, knocking the air from his lungs. He wheezed, trying to catch his breath. Claws pierced through his arm, pinning him to the floor. He tried to scream, but all the air left in his lungs could only call a squeak. Teeth caught his legs and pulled him upward again, upside down. Blood rushed to his head. More claws dug into him, raked through his skin. His arms, his legs, his face. One talon dug into his eye. Mercifully, before it pulled away and yanked his eye with it, the world went black.
The last thing he heard was a firm but desperate order from the Darkling to her nichevo’ya.
“Off!”