She swung the slimy plant out away from her body and released it, leaving it suspended in the water between them.
With surprising swiftness, the two fish dove toward it. They quickly chomped it down.
When she didn’t produce another strand of seaweed, the other fish lost interest and swam away, but Mola resumed swimming in circles around her. She reached out to scratch the thick scales above his eyes as she had often done before. He stopped swimming to give her a better angle for scratching.
When he was quite still, she propelled herself upward, slowly swinging a leg over the top of his body as though he were a horse. He remained still, not seeming to mind her presence.
When she had run into the Mola two years prior, he had been a playful young fry and often sought her out from among the divers. She’d had no idea then, of course, that she would eventually attempt to swim across the sea with him, but she was incredibly thankful for the trust they had developed.
Leaning back so that her spine was pressed against his tall fin, she reached down and scratched the top of his head. Sitting still in the buoyant water, her body gently tried to rise back up to the surface, but she squeezed Mola lightly with her knees to keep herself in place. He sat still for a few moments longer, gently swaying in the water. Eventually, he must have realized the comfortable scratches he was receiving were not going anywhere. He started to swim forward.
Aizel kept up the comfortable rhythm. As the fish moved, the water naturally pushed her back against his tall, firm fin and she was able to relax her knees, held in place simply by the constant pressure.
However, Aizel quickly realized Mola was traveling along the shoreline rather than away from it.
She lowered her left hand down his side and scratched harder, stopping all motion with her right hand.
As hoped, Mola leaned into her scratches, which redirected him to head in the proper direction.
“Ha!” Aizel nearly choked herself with a triumphant underwater yell as Mola gathered momentum and she settled herself in for a long underwater ride.
Chapter 5
Erich was not ready.
Standing on the deck of a rolling ship, he watched in horror as the water below him came alive. It tossed the ship and then disappeared, leaving the massive warship to fall through the air as though it were lighter than a child’s plaything.
Seasoned sailors screamed in fear, grabbing onto anything in sight to avoid falling overboard.
Erich had not even seen their enemy yet, but the effects of their capricious magic were already devastating.
Upon arriving at the monastery, he had boarded the final remaining vessel to fend off the vicious attack of raining fire-spheres that came from an unrecognized ship at sea.
That ship had quickly disappeared when they set out after it and the water itself had turned on them instead. It was clearly being controlled as no normal sea storm played games like these.
“Turn back!” Erich yelled in an effort to make his voice audible above the crash of the waves, the screams of the sailors, and the groaning of the wood.
Clutching at a piece of fallen rigging, he attempted to cross the deck of the ship.
As he made his way, the water calmed. Seizing the unexpected moment, Erich dashed across the ship toward the captain, who had tied himself to the ship’s wheel.
“Turn back!” Erich yelled again. “Our men’s lives are not worth it. They have the advantage at sea. We will have to find a way to fight them from land.”
The captain merely nodded in response as he threw the weight of his body against the wheel to turn the rudder.
Erich grabbed the railing to brace himself for the next attack.
The water remained calm.
Peering out into the rising sun, Erich tried to locate the ship they’d been chasing, but the horizon was clear.
His stomach tumbled. It felt as though the ship was still sinking even though the water line remained the same.
“Are we... still falling?” he asked, looking down at his feet. He immediately wished he could take his words back. Of course they weren’t falling; he was just experiencing a twinge of seasickness.
“Look to starboard!” The captain’s gruff voice carried above the high screeching of the frightened men.
Erich glanced back up, his eyes following the rising line of the horizon.
