Aren and the rest were climbing into the small ships, but her brother immediately began to panic. “Ahnna! Ahnna!”
“Here!”
She and James swam hard, fighting over the surf to reach the bobbing ships. Hands caught hold of them, pulling them inside, but they hadn’t reached safety. Not even close.
“Sails!” Aren shouted. “Go! Go!”
No one hesitated, and the sails unfurled, catching the wind. But on the docks, other ships were making ready, and signals were being sent to those anchored on the water.
It wouldn’t be long until the large vessels were on the hunt, and on the open sea, they’d be much faster.
Strong hands caught hold of her shoulders, and James pulled her against him. “They won’t find us in the dark.” Then he caught hold of her hand and lifted it to the sky, using her index finger to point at the gathering of stars. “South,” he murmured, his heat chasing away the cold of the river. “Follow them, and we’ll make it home.”
95
Aren
There was no respite onthe seas.
James identified the ships pursuing them as clippers, and the fastest the Harendellians had at their disposal. Aren couldn’t argue that as the three ships flew over the waves, endless white canvas sheets stretched open to catch every bit of wind. His two ships were outmatched in every possible way.
Except for the crew sailing them.
“These are the nimblest ships in Harendell’s fleet,” James said, his hand held over his eyes to shade them. “But it’s like watching three lumbering bears trying to catch two rabbits.”
It was true that the larger vessels were unable to match them now that they were among the obstacles of the endless islands and outcroppings of Ithicana, the small ships backtracking and weaving, sailing over shoals and sandbars to evade pursuit. But it was not lost on Aren that if they hadn’t escaped during the night, they’d never have survived this long.
It was not sustainable.
Everyone was exhausted, as were their supplies, and to beach on any of the islands would allow the ships to capture them with ease.
They needed rest. They needed food, but above all else, they neededwater.
Aren tilted his face to the cloudless sky, squinting in the brilliant light, his tongue dry as sand. What he wouldn’t give for rain.
“It would be timely for one of Ithicana’s tempests to rear its head,” James muttered, also looking at the sky.
“Every other nation calls this seasonthe calm,” Ahnna said as she scampered along the length of the vessel to retie a line, sensing what Aren needed without him giving an order. “But we have another name for it.”
“What do you call it?” James had shifted and was now staring back over his shoulder at the ship gaining ground. Aren didn’t need to look over his shoulder to know that archers lined the decks, ready to loose arrows the moment they came into range, and there was nowhere to hide.
“War Tides,” Aren muttered, then shouted, “Lean!”
Ahnna and James joined those catching hold of lines, throwing their weight, the vessel heeling over at a dangerous angle. But as the wind caught the sail from a different angle, it flung them sharply between two islands, the passage between them narrow enough that the clippers couldn’t follow. Their other vessel tracked the opposite direction, forcing the clippers once again to choose which ship to hunt.
“We can lose them when the sun sets,” Ahnna called to him, one hand locked on a rope and the other trailing in the waves. She still wore the remains of the dress she’d nearly been executed in, her legs bare from the knees down, her naked toes gripping the wood of the ship. Painfully thin, she was marked with bruises and injuries, and—though she put on a fighting face—exhausted beyond measure. “Get onto one of the smaller islands and stock up. They’ll never find us.”
“We can’t.” Aren shifted his weight, adjusting the rudder. “Ornak is the obvious place for us to be headed, and if they manage to encircle the island, we’ll never get through. Lara’s there.”
His queen was there ruling in his absence, and readying for the war that was about to come down upon their heads.
“Can it be defended?” James asked.
Ornak was an island on the outskirts of the archipelago. It was the largest on the eastern half of Ithicana, so it was where many of the Ithicanian warriors were gathered because of its proximity to the threat of the north. Unfortunately, it was also a location known to the Harendellians because of its size and visible defenses, which meant they’d suspect that was where her people were hiding. Eranahl as well, but that was much farther south.
James’s words garnered worried looks from the others aboard, but he wasn’t wrong, and they all knew it.
“Harendell is ready for war,” James continued. “On the assumption Alexandra is still in control, she’ll be out for revenge. She and her supporters will surely have the people convinced that Ahnna poisoned William. Though in truth, she may hardly need the justification given that Ithicana is going to seem like easy pickings. They’ll smell the profit. We have a day’s lead at most. Maybe less, given we’ve hardly taken the straight shot south.”
