Tink choked on seawater.Dark. Cold. Burning. Just like before.
This was it. The sea would get her after all.
The merfolk weren’t coming. Not this time. They’d left hours ago after pointing them to theKraken.
She stilled, giving in to the embrace of death.
But as she did, James’s face flashed before her eyes. Her captain. Her love. He was fighting, struggling for vengeance for all of them. How could she quit now?
Tink clawed through the water, kicking her legs, wiggling her body. Her lungs screamed in pain, ready to burst.
The water parted. She gasped for air, choking on the water in her lungs. Small hands grabbed at her, trying to pull her from the water.
“Got her!”
“Pull!”
Salt and panic seared her eyes. She choked and gasped, desperate for life-giving air. Her wings pinched against the boat as the boys hauled her—none too gently—back in.
“Are you all right?”
“Miss pixie—”
The boys crowded around her. Tink hacked up seawater, wheezing for air.
“Row left!” the one in charge commanded.
Tink looked up through the wet hair sticking to her face. Lily was wrong. Tink wasn’t better at everything. Lily could swim—a skill she’d never learned.
Lily adjusted her form in the water and fluttered her wings until she began to rise. The boys jumped back as Tink sent her own into motion, flinging seawater all over the little dinghy.
“Go back, Lily!”
“Lily?” the boys echoed.
Water dripped from her cousin as she floated in the air above the churning sea. Her hands balled into fists. “Not yet!”
Tink pursed her lips. She couldn’t let Lily damage the little boat. The boys rowed furiously across the water, giving it their all. Peter, still unconscious, leaned against the side. If it spranga leak—or worse, if Lily tipped it over—these boys could die. She couldn’t let that happen.
Tink stepped up to the edge of the boat and vaulted into the sky.
“Wait!” the boys screamed, but she ignored them.
Sorry, kids.
“You got what you wanted,” Tink yelled. “Leave us alone. Let us go!”
“No.” Lily pushed wet hair from her face. “I can’t let you get the scale. You can’t go home!”
The two pixies hovered a few feet apart in the dark night. Tink bared her teeth. It was too late for that anyway. “Why? Too worried people will learn the truth?”
Lily reared back.
She’d struck her target right on. “Using my name now too, huh?” The boys had given her away. “Too afraid to commit your crimes in your own name? Truth always outs in the end. They’ll know. They probably already know! I’m the good one after all, remember?”
Lily squealed with fury, just as Tink predicted, and hurtled toward her. At the last moment, Tink folded her wings and dropped, dodging her cousin’s bared claws. The other pixie hurtled into the water, unable to stop herself in time.
No sooner had she gone under than her blonde head emerged, coughing and scrambling to regain her senses. The sea wouldn’t keep her down, not long. Nearby, men ran across the deck of theKraken. Her heart lurched as she caught sight of James, locked in combat with Blackbeard.
