Leviathans swim away from Arcs. Krakens are nocturnal, and it’s still daylight.
Sunset was approaching, though.
“Big sonuvabitch,” Felixion remarked, standing beside me as he also peered at it. He may have been a man of few words, but a poet, Felixion was not.
“Yeah.” A whisper of anxiety rose in my gut. The Arc was currently headed away from Mesmoria to try to avoid this thing. The wind was against us. At the speed we were currently traveling, the creature would catch up to us in under half an hour.
We wouldn’t outpace it.
Whatever it was, we were going to have to fight it if it kept stalking us.
I hoped it was a Riftfloat, harmless since it was traveling by itself. Maybe it was just curious about our ship.
“Too dark to see shit,” Felixion groused, setting down his spyglass. The miasma was even darker out here, bordering on pure black. It made it even more difficult to distinguish miasmic life forms from the normal spray. “When the storm breaks, it’ll lose us.”
“I can’t tell what it is, either. But it’s going to catch up if the storm doesn’t give us some cover soon. We need to alert the captain to prepare for combat,” I said. Felixion grunted hisagreement, scurrying down the ladder back to the main deck to relay the message.
A distant rumbling of thunder and lightning temporarily lit up the miasma.
About time.
The breeze kicked up, the first few raindrops sliding down my cheeks. The miasma puckered under the diamond droplets, murky vapor slowly rising above it like a funeral veil.
The miasma’s turbidity would obscure the vision of whatever was following us, and the rising strength of the wind would fill the sails to carry us farther. The sails ballooned out, my sense of reassurance rising as they pulled us away from the danger.
The miasma pebbled and roiled as the weather turned, waves curving higher. A strong gust caught me, pushing me back to the other end of the crow’s nest. I braced against it, keeping my gaze on the dark shape moving in the distance.
Was it moving faster?
A sudden buzzing caught my attention. I turned toward it, just in time to instinctively blink against being blinded. Lightning struck the foremast with a thundering boom.
When my vision returned, the foremast sail was in shards, and on fire. Several people were shouting down below, in pain and panic. A persistent ringing filled my ears. I shook my head, trying to clear it. Rain was spewing out like a solid wall now, dousing the blaze. Specks of glowing and charred wood dotted the mast, and great gaping holes split the fabric of the sail.
It wasn’t safe to stay in the crows nest, but I needed to identify what had been chasing us before I climbed back down. Turning back toward the miasma, I put my spyglass back up, shielding it against the downpour with my other hand.
It was still chasing us. The shape was even closer than before. The storm hadn’t impaired its ability to track us. Instead, it appeared to have agitated the creature.
A tendril of something sinuous distended from the main body.
My stomach dropped.
No.
My mind denied reality. I was just tired, and my eyes were under a lot of stress from miasmic vapor that had risen from the squall.
I strained against the burning in my eyes, concentrating on Perception with as much focus as I could muster. Past the rain impeding my vision, past the wind jostling my hold on the spyglass.
It was a tentacle.
Sweat broke out across my forehead, my heart racing up to a gallup.
It can’t be.
Dread began to roll around like a bramble in my chest.
Rubbing my eyes to alleviate the burning hint of tears, I pressed them tightly closed. I reached for inner calm and managed a shaky inhale.
I had to be sure.
