Uirbrig Crake.
He was still in his heavy armor. As I watched, he roared like a bear, spitting foam, yelling hoarsely to his soldiers, “To me! To me!” His legs were stuck fast, sinking rapidly—and then the next wave plowed into him, unforgiving.
The water level was rising fast. Suddenly, as the next wave lifted and dragged me, I realized I could no longer touch the causeway with my toes. A moment passed, but Crake didn’t reappear. And soon, bodies began to float past me, face down.
“Llir!”
My voice was hoarse, torn ragged. It took all my strength to hold on to the blade. My legs were on fire, my muscles rebelling, but I pumped my elbows to stay afloat. I dipped down briefly, felt my head go under, then reared up, forcing my body to obey.
And then: a hand, two hands, on my shoulder.
I turned. Llir was behind me, bone pale.
Relief flooded through me. “I have a blade,” I gasped. “Quick. I can’t hold it up for very long.”
We rose with the bulge of another huge wave. We were like dolls, utterly at the sea’s mercy. Llir sawed his bindings against the sharpedge until, after what felt like an age, they frayed apart. Then, wrists free, he grabbed onto the sword, and I cut my own ropes. He let the blade sink, panting.
“I have to get back,” he gulped, turning in the water. “Emment…” He took up an exhausted-looking front crawl.
It was all I could do not to sink down like the sword. “Wait,” I croaked, “we shouldn’t use all our energy.Llir.We need a float—” But he couldn’t hear me through the tide’s roaring.
I struggled after him, searing pain in my limbs. Pieces of leather floated past me, shards of wood.
In sheer desperation, I spoke to the water, pleading with it in a whisper as I swam. But I knew it was hopeless. I was too overwrought. And the tide wasn’t listening; it was bent on its assault. I needed to stay put, save some of my energy. Find something to hang on to, some timber, a raft…
Ahead, Llir began to dip lower in the water, his legs now sinking, his strokes more frantic. His head went right under, then emerged, sea slick. I heard him coughing. I fought to keep up.
Just as I came within arm’s length of him, he gulped some water and went down, choking. I dived, grabbed him and yanked him upward, adrenaline granting me one final burst of strength.
He came up gasping, shaking water from his eyes. His hair was dark, plastered to his head, and his shirt was billowing around us, cloudlike. I didn’t let go, afraid he would go under again, and we floated, gripping each other’s arms tightly, legs kicking beneath us. He looked wild, half crazed.
“Speak to it!” he yelled. “Speak to it now! Tame it!” His gaze flashed in the direction of the island, of his siblings.
Had Iovawn Crake excavated the ruins by now? Was he back at the castle? I pictured that stone block.
A wave broke near us, showering us in surf, and a jagged wooden board tumbled past, barely missing us.
“Do it!” he shouted, face inches from mine, as we soared together on the next great swell.
“I can’t,” I yelled over the crashing of the water, the rumble of the wave as it carried us with it. “I can’t—can’t concentrate in this—”
“You have to!” His grip on my arms was like iron. “Do you understand? Ihaveto get to them!”
I could see it in his face: that same look from the inner ward, from the causeway after.Cuckoo. Betrayer.I closed my eyes, tried to summon my red ball, but his anger, his anguish, was leaching into me.
“I don’t think I can,” I choked out. “I’m sorry. I’msorry.”
“Then what in hells use are you?”he cried, his voice cracking open, his face soaked by spray.
Something in me broke in two.
I knew it was the desperate outburst of a boy whose family might be dying—or already dead. But that didn’t stop the bitter indignation, and then the black hopelessness, rolling over me.
He was right. What usewasI if I couldn’t even do the one thing I’d been born to do?
My arms were lead weights; my legs kicked feebly. Only Llir, now, was stopping me sinking, and I wanted to tell him to just let me go.
Seeing me crumple, feeling me sag, he tugged me upward, his sharp features tensing. “Corith,” he grated, dipping his head. “Listen to me. I know you can do this.”
