James scrubbed his hands through his hair. “There has to be a better way. A smarter way. A way in which I don’t have to watch while you—”
He broke off and Ahnna felt a pang in her chest, because she’dbeen in this position when she’d left him to fight Carlo on the beach in Riomar. She considered pointing out that she’d done what he’d asked then, despite the risks, but instead she said, “I wouldn’t do this if I didn’t think it would work. Please trust me.”
The muscles of his jaw stood out even with the thickness of his beard, his teeth surely on the verge of cracking beneath the strain of his frustration, but then James said, “Fine. How do I bait them?”
“Blood.” She winced. “Ideally, yours.”
60
James
“This isn’t going to work,”he growled, flinging droplets of blood into the water. “This is madness. It’s bullshit. It’s the worst plan ever conceived.”
But there was nothing he could do to stop it.
Ahnna would already be in the water, and if he ceased his baiting, the sharks would return to the ship while she was still within reach of their teeth. Pressing his knife against the cut on his arm, he flung more droplets into the waves. It seemed the purest form of stupidity to think that the sharks would notice, much less be lured, by literal drops in the ocean.
On the heels of the thought, a large gray fin cut through the waves toward the little ship. James instinctively tensed, especially when others appeared and began to circle him, because every instinct in his body screamed danger. But better him than her, so James reopened the cut and flung more droplets of blood into the water.
Something thudded heavily into the bottom of the boat.
“Fuck,” he hissed, because at least two of the creatures were twice as long as he was tall. And they were watching. There was no mistaking how they turned sideways, black eyes taking in their potential meal even as their fishy brains considered how far they’d go to get it.He threw more droplets and his heart thundered in his chest as they swam faster, their motions gaining a frenzied rhythm.
But then one of the big ones veered away.
Ahnna had said that it wasn’t just the blood that would lure them in. It was certain sounds. Most especially splashing.
Throwing caution to the wind, he leaned over the edge and slapped the water. Again and again, only jerking back as one shark rose right beneath his hand.
But the big one had returned.
“That’s right,” he snarled at it. “You keep your focus on me.”
He flung more blood into the water, counting dozens and dozens of gray shapes circling beneath him.
There was no way to know what step Ahnna was at in her strategy. No way to know whether things were even going according to plan other than the relative silence coming from the direction of the ships.
Sheathing his knife, James grabbed the covered bucket next to him, which was full of snakes that Ahnna had caught. They had been thumping around inside, and not wishing to risk a bite, he hurled the bucket itself into the water.
As if sensing the danger, the snakes immediately began swimming toward the rocks. The sharks were faster. They tore the snakes apart, and then went after the pieces floating between the shards of the bucket.
Hurry.He watched them until the frenzy began to ease, then flung more droplets of his own blood into the mix and hit the water with a stick. The sharks slammed into his ship, setting it to rocking, but he kept up the noise. Doing everything and anything to keep them close, but it felt like only a few minutes passed before the sharks began losing interest. As though they understood he was only baiting them, they circled away, none of his splashing or splatters of blood regaining their interest.
Fuck!He leapt off the ship onto the karst, and then scampered up the slope with no care for snakes that might be hidden in the foliageas he followed the path Ahnna showed him. He threw up prayers to God, fate, and the stars that Ahnna was out of the water, because there was no doubt in his mind that at least some of the sharks would return to the ships in search of a meal.
James crouched on the tower of rock that faced the entrance to the cove. The Amaridians were still working to unload sacks of grain, the Ithicanians ferrying them back and forth between the ship and the bridge.
But there was no sign of Ahnna.
The sharks were circling the ships, and terror threatened to strangle James as he hunted for any sign of her.
Then motion on the edge of the beach that was more rock than sand caught his attention. Behind a set of boulders, Ahnna climbed out of the water, wearing only her undergarments. James stared, those long legs blasting all reason from his skull, but then she looked up. As their eyes locked, she lifted her hands to signal that all was set. Then she lifted three fingers.
Three minutes until the explosion.
Counting down, James dragged his gaze back to the ship. Ahnna had taken several jars from the supplies hidden in the bridge, but there was no time to explain how they worked beyond that it would blow a large hole in the hull. He searched for signs of the bottles, but she must have placed them below the waterline. The ship would go down fast, and Ahnna said that while the explosion would first scare the sharks off, they’d swiftly come back, drawn from miles around by the sound.
Like a cursed dinner bell.
