Sea Dweller (Birthstone Series) (32 page)

Orin cocked his head at me,
curiously. “Perhaps you would like to stay with her.” He lifted his eyes to
meet mine, his expression exultant. I realized that while the other stones had
been screaming through my blood, I’d lost my connection to the Protection Gem.
Before I could correct my mistake, Orin grabbed my wrist. I stormed inside but
fought against the crushing onslaught of power threatening to overwhelm me.

“Remove your hand,” I said
slowly, trembling.

“I think we should remove
this
,”
Orin said, reaching for the necklace, “before it takes control of you.” I
twisted my body around and Orin screamed out to his men, “Restrain her!”

It was too much.

Like a pot over burning
coals, the anger, fear, and rage bubbled over and filled my entire body with
heat and ice. A tiny remnant of logic inside of me tried desperately to grasp
onto an image of Sai in hopes of tapping into the Protection Gem once more. As
soon as I attempted it, fire consumed the image. In its place, I tasted
destruction. Hatred.  Revenge. The kind Aluce had spoken of.

The ship and the sea spun in
a whirl of shadow and night as the stones took control. I felt my skin sear
Orin’s hand where his fingers dug into my arm. As he cried out, snapping his
hand away, the ship groaned and rocked. Underneath our feet, floor boards
shuddered. Somewhere inside the belly of the ship, the chorus of splintering
wood added to the cacophony.

Orin stared at me, terror
filling his eyes. I glared back, my hatred for him nearly blinding me. Looking
away from him, I glanced upward. Overhead, ominous black clouds curled and
snaked in the sky, extinguishing the stars. They seemed to form from nothing
but continued to move through the air, covering the earth with an oppressive
blanket. In that moment, the stones spoke to me.

Those were my clouds.

This was my boat.

These were my enemies.

I would destroy them all.

Chapter 27

I focused on the closed hatch
my mother had just been taken through. As I blew past Orin, he reached out to
grab my arm once more. He lurched back when my skin sizzled against his. I
gripped the latch with both hands and flung the door open. As I descended into
the dark Orin clambered after me.

“We’ll lock you in!” he
screamed.

I turned to him, warning him
with a look. As I did so, I involuntarily sent the door we’d just gone through
flying off the hinges. It crashed into several screaming soldiers before
flipping over the deck and into the water. The soldiers’ cries brought a smile
to my lips. Somewhere inside of me, I begged to stop. A distant glimmer of my
former self whispered that this wasn’t what I wanted.

But the gems wanted it and
they were in control now.

“Your father will die too!
You’ll kill your entire family.” Orin tried to keep up as I continued on,
ignoring him.

Above deck, the clouds burst
and an angry, frigid rain began to pelt the ground with sharp watery pebbles.
The main mast exploded into a fiery blaze of splinters and ash.

“At my command, the guards
can kill your mother. I’ll have her destroyed!”

I turned back to him. Heat swelled
behind my eyes and throbbed inside my ears. The stones rippled with power
through my blood. Every emotion and desire felt from their discoverers pulsed
inside of me. This was power I was born to wield.

I raised my arms, absorbing
the memories of the deranged soul who had called forth the Destruction Gem. I
bathed myself in its strength. The walls of the ship split and cracked around
me, sending wood flying in every direction.

This time, Orin didn’t
flinch. “The king predicted this, Aylen. It’s too much for any person to
handle. We were protecting you from yourself.”

“You’re the one who needs
protection,” the gems said, through my lips.

Another wall shattered and
Orin turned away, fleeing to the deck.  Anger washed over me in waves of heat
as I screamed out my wrath. Power bled from my cries and hurtled into the air.
The ladder and the portion of the deck over Orin’s head fractured into a
million pieces. Mutilated wood and sagging chunks of upper deck crashed on top
of the mainlander. Throwing his arms over his head, he fell to his knees and
curled into a protective ball while wreckage rained down upon him. When the
downpour finally ceased, he didn’t move.

  The ship groaned and rocked
as water flowed into its belly. Waves battered the deck, sending a rush of
foamy sea down the ladder, to my feet. I spun back around and stormed through
the tight quarters, climbing over wooden beams and debris. There was little
time. The ship had begun its final death plunge into the ocean.

My mother’s guards rushed
past me, making their escape. The floor split beneath them, entangling their
feet in the mangled wood. They toppled over. Another beam fell across them,
pinning them as water swelled and spilled over their bodies.

“Help us!” one of them called
to me.

“The way you helped my
mother?” the stones asked for me.

I turned my back to them,
letting the fear in their eyes slide off me. It grew darker as I made my way to
my mother’s cell. I found it easily when I realized it was the only door that
was closed and locked in spite of the giant crack down its middle. A moment
later, it lay in pieces at my feet. I sloshed my way in, falling once in my
hurry to reach her.

She lay in a crumpled heap,
battered and bruised. The dried blood on her body wet now as her wounds reopened.
She didn’t stir while the world raged around her. Ocean salt drenched my skin
and hung in the dank air of the cell but I tasted nothing other than my own
tears. Something inside of me broke and I fell to my knees. Whatever fury I’d
hugged inside of me had been replaced with grief so great I could hardly
breathe.

Crawling toward her, I shoved
pieces of destroyed ship from my path. Water rushed into the door, drenching me
and pushing me toward her. My arms reached out and I grasped her body to mine.
With every ounce of physical strength the stones hadn’t sapped, I lifted her
head above water and held it there, fighting to provide air for her the way
she’d provided love and protection throughout my life. I didn’t know if she
lived. Her heart seemed still in comparison to the violence of the storm.

I struggled to move us
through the door but the flow of water pushed me back. Closing my eyes, I
concentrated on the gems, searching for a way to control them. There had to be
something I could do to get us out of the ship. Some way this power could help
me move her.

They only mocked me now. The
wind wailed louder and the water pushed harder. I was too weak to stop it. I
had used the stone’s power to call in a storm and destroy a ship. I was able to
breathe underwater and battle a soldier and win. But as I tried to move my
mother through the debris and water to safety, no stone came to my aid.

“I’m so sorry,” I said, again
and again, shaking as I held on to her limp body. The ship teetered and we slid
with it, crashing into an intact wall. Cries from outside were distant and
otherworldly. If I couldn’t save my parents, nothing mattered anymore.

Gritting my teeth, I pulled
her, moving a hand’s width at a time until we were out of the cell. More beams
and broken walls blocked our path. There was no way I would be strong enough to
move her over them. I called to her, crying her name. I shook her, but she
stirred only slightly. Finally, I curled myself around her and propped her head
on my shoulder as though our roles had reversed. Wrapping my arms around her, I
whispered to her.

“I’ll keep you safe,” I
promised again and again. But I knew I was as helpless as a lone gull in a
tempest.

Outside, the storm unleashed
its wrath. The screams of soldiers were silent now and the creaking of the
abandoned ship was our lullaby. My misery poured into the gems and siphoned
back out again, sending torrents of rain, wind, and lightning strikes above.
But it didn’t matter. It was a place I was no longer a part of. It was nothing
I could control. If I couldn’t save my mother, I wouldn’t save myself. I closed
my eyes, waiting to drown in my grief.

Moments or eternities later,
amidst the darkness, I thought I heard a voice, urgent but familiar. It called
from somewhere across the black gulf in which I’d sunk, tender and light.

I opened my eyes and saw him.
Sai. He struggled through the debris, stumbling and reaching out to me. Behind
him was my father.

I almost didn’t feel Sai lift
me from the bottom of the boat. I was barely conscious enough to see my father
pick up my mother while Nethrans moved the beams and cleared a path of escape.
Water rushed in from beneath and behind us as we forged our way up to what
remained of the deck. I hardly noticed. The boat tipped, sighing one last time
as it dropped its side into the sea. I was still lost inside the stones as we
jumped off the side and into the water before the ship could take us with it.

In the distance, Nethrans,
kelpies, and sea serpents fought the last of the soldiers, sinking their
remaining ship, capturing as many as possible before they found a means of
escape.

“We’re almost there. Hang
on,” Sai said, piercing the gale inside of me. Then his hand touched my face,
warm and real. A feeling I remembered. Safety. Friendship.

“Aylen, you have to wake up
now. Come back.” His fingers lifted my neck and unclasped the necklace. He
grabbed at the gems and yanked them from my skin where they burned with
all-consuming power. But I still felt them.

 “Stop the storm, Aylen. You
need to stop the storm!” Sai said, over and over.

The storm. I had created the
storm. And some of the Vairdans were still in the sea. 

“Everyone is safe now! Stop
the storm!” His voice was desperate as he shook me.

I didn’t know if I could stop
it or if it had ever been in my control. I reached out for the necklace with
shaking hands and felt Sai place it on my palm. Closing my fist around it, I
pictured Sai. I sketched a mental image of him, laughing with me while we tied
Haran’s fishing nets together, a typical island prank. I thought of small,
child-sized fingers reaching toward me for the first time. I remembered my
mother after I’d come home, dripping and terrified. I envisioned how she’d
hugged me, first crying from relief before her expression had firmed and she’d given
me a maternal reprimand. I remembered my father, his white lipped concern plain
on his features until he kissed me and told me never to leave them without
permission.

The Protection Gem flickered
in my mind, fighting to break through the tumult. I grasped at it, pushing my
thoughts toward my happiest moments, embracing the light that came with them.
Warmth washed over me and the storm inside of me abated. Waves of power that
had consumed me moments before dissipated as the Protection Gem glowed brighter
than the others.

I opened my eyes.

“Sai,” I said. I focused on
his face, afraid of what I’d see if I looked at what surrounded me. Finally, I
pulled my gaze away from him and glanced around. Determined stars fought to
break through the clouds hovering over the island. On the beach where I lay, my
father held my unconscious mother. And there was death. It was scattered
through the island and into the ocean. It plagued the beach. It called from the
cliffs above. I shuddered.

I turned back to Sai, tears leaking
from the corners of my eyes. The warmth in his expression seeped into my soul
and the last bit of control the gems had over me fizzled. In the same moment,
the rain abated and the wind died to a flutter. The sea smoothed into an easy,
moaning surf and overhead, black clouds began to disperse. Nethrans were
already helping Vairdans to shore and rushing about, trying to save those who
had been injured.

Aluce stood at the edge of
the water with Perin, caring for as many islanders as they could find. In the
water, the mainlanders’ ships were gone, leaving behind only broken wreckage.
The air was thick with the sound of lamenting from those who had lost family.
One voice pierced my heart as I recognized its cries. Faema?  I shook my head
against the sound as I gasped for breath I wasn’t sure I wanted.

“I’m so sorry. About the
storm. The island. The mainlanders. Everything.” I closed my eyes, afraid to
meet Sai’s. Images of destruction branded my mind. I had nearly destroyed
Vairda and the people who lived there. The thought brought another wave of
regret as I realized how deeply I loved my home.

“Aylen, the king owes us an
apology. Not you,” Sai said, brushing wet strands of hair from my face.

I didn’t answer. Instead, I
wept, exhaustion taking over all reason.

“Aylen,” my father said, his
tone sharp. “You can blame yourself all you want. If you’re going to do that,
then also blame your parents for hiding here, knowing we were putting Vairda at
risk. Blame the people who hid the necklace here. Blame Aluce and Perin for
wanting you to fight their battles for them.”

I slowly turned my head to
look at him.

“Blame your mother,” he
whispered. “She wanted nothing more than to have you, even when she knew our
child would be the one forced to accept this responsibility.” He paused,
fitting his face with a sad smile. “Even with all that has happened, she would
have never wanted anything different.”

I nodded as the last of my
tears leaked from eyes, carrying with them my regret. My life would never be
the same and an obligation I wasn’t sure I could carry weighed heavy on my
shoulders. But I would find a way to bear it. I had to. For my parents, for
Sai, for the island. For myself.

“Sai?” I asked, drawing a
shaky breath. 

“Anything,” he said.

“Will you help me home?”

Sai took my hands and pulled
me to my feet. Before they gave out from beneath me, he wrapped an arm around
my waist and supported my body with his strength. Nearby, my father lifted my
mother in his arms, motioning to Aluce to follow when she glanced in our direction.
Then, we made our way through the dazed and battered trees, toward what was
left of my home.