Total pages in book: 76
Estimated words: 71403 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 357(@200wpm)___ 286(@250wpm)___ 238(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 71403 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 357(@200wpm)___ 286(@250wpm)___ 238(@300wpm)
The foundation beneath my feet vanished. Water, water, all around. In my eyes, my nose, my mouth. Vision? Impaired by the murk. Breathing? Impossible. I tasted dirt and brine.
Waves continued to slam against me. Expecting the mers to attack at any second, I flailed for purchase but found none. Panic rose, stomping through me… but my dragon rose faster, ashing the mental pandemonium.
Cold serenity settled over my thoughts, my body, while my blood turned molten, leaking from my pores and hardening over my skin in a pattern resembling scales.
The added weight sank me, but I pushed back, treading as my line of sight crystallized. And what a spectacle I beheld.
Sebastian had doubled in size, becoming a giant who eclipsed even Jon. Hundreds of thin, shadowy, whip-like tentacles lashed from him, as sharp as swords, slashing mers in half at the same time he worked through the masses, wielding a pair of daggers.
His eyes glowed ice-blue, and he moved with such speed, such grace, he and the water seemed to be one. No mercy, just instinct. But it was his methodical precision that truly amazed. He never missed a target. Never hesitated to deliver a fatal blow, no matter how brutal.
One word echoed inside my head. Berserkerage. A trance in which bloodlust overcame a berserker’s reason, the need to kill as essential as breathing. Anyone foolish enough to enter his vicinity would die screaming. Including me, if I wasn’t his firebrand.
Would those glowing eyes recognize me?
The mers fired beams of light from their spears and tridents, aiming for us. But Sebastian allowed no one and nothing to bypass him, catching and shredding all who tried while his tentacles intercepted and devoured the light. One after the other, sometimes dozens at once. But I knew better than to consider him a true shield. He could turn on me at any moment.
Time to go. Now. My lungs screamed for oxygen until even my dragon felt the lack.
A plan formed. Swim to the surface, killing any mer that tried to stop me along the way. Sebastian would find me when he finished here. Ja, ja. But as I kicked my legs, I remained stuck.
Panic clawed back, sharper now and far more desperate. I looked down, and my stomach dropped. A trident anchored to the sea floor pulsed beneath me, a ribbon of light coiling from it while wrapped around my ankle like a living thing. That ribbon tethered me.
This was no accident. Someone had meant to end me.
I fought for freedom, kicking and slashing at the beam with my claws to no avail. My vision began to dim. Weakness invaded my limbs.
Desperate, my dragon attempted to release my smokewings. The flesh between my shoulder blades blistered but never split. No release, no lift.
My fire needed air to catch, and I had none. The sea had drowned the ember before it could spark. And now, for the first time in my immortal life, my dragon was as helpless as I was.
Nein, nein, nein. Not helpless. This couldn’t be my end. I fought as though my life depended on my success. Because it did.
Suddenly Sebastian was there, chaos bending to his will. One heartbeat, I was drowning. The next, I was free from the coil with his arms locked around my waist, iron and heat and unyielding force, his berserkerage banked. He hauled me against him and claimed my mouth with brutal precision, sealing his lips over mine as if he meant to steal something back that belonged to him.
I opened for him, greedy for oxygen. Air surged into my lungs in a violent rush, hot, sharp, and unmistakably his.
My chest burned as breath after breath was dragged into me. He didn’t let go. Around us, his tentacles lashed and tore, slaughtering mers with ruthless efficiency, even as he held me suspended between life and death, his mouth still locked to mine. The contrast was terrifying. Devastation and salvation bound together in one being.
Strength slammed back into me. My dragon roared. Agony ripped between my shoulder blades as the skin finally split, and my smokewings burst free. This was no release of tendrils but a violent unfurling of ash and fire.
The water hissed and boiled around us, unable to snuff out my wings as they swept outward, disintegrating everything they touched. The force of them hurled us upward. Up, up, through darkness, pressure, and chaos. But the higher we went, the more the wings faded until they were no more.
Sebastian’s grip never loosened as the sea screamed past us and the surface rushed closer. Finally, we breached the waterline. I inhaled, gobbling air as if it were my last meal. Fading sunlight bathed my face, warm and welcome.
He maintained his tight hold and swam us toward a shore that loomed in the distance. Glittering blue liquid leaked from his wounds. I frowned. Blue blood? That wasn’t a kraken thing. Not even an immortal thing.