Windburn (The Elemental Series #4)(30)

Forgive me.

I don’t know if it was his thought or mine. I drove the spear further in, pushing the blade hard and twisting it. Blood flowed into the water and his tentacles slowly released me. The creature convulsed and its questing tentacles drooped. His body slid down into the inky black water, his body shifting one last time as he breathed out his last gulp of water.

Keeping my hands tightly on the haft of my spear, I swam to the surface. I broke through to the sounds of fighting, and Peta snarling. Grabbing the edge of the dock, I pulled myself up but kept my body low to the wooden surface. In front of me, Cactus and Peta barely dodged the first Undine, keeping free of him but only just.

I stood and arched my hand back, took two running strides and loosed my spear. There was a slight wobble in it—it wasn’t meant for throwing like that—but it still slammed into the left center of his back. He threw his arms wide with a roar and fell to the ground. Scrabbling at his back, he tried to reach the spear, but failed and dropped forward onto his face.

“I am done,” he said, but his back still rose and fell. I approached him cautiously before crouching by his head. His eyes lifted to mine but not much else. Dark, so dark they were, like the night sky.

“You fought Requiem?”

“I did. He was a bastard.”

Snarling, he took a swing at me. I pressed his head to the ground and knelt on his hand closest to me. “Peta, can we call on Finley?”

He shivered under my hand. “The child cannot help me. No one can. End it now. You are an Ender. I demand you END ME!” he screeched and lurched toward me, but he had no strength in his body.

With my free hand I pulled the knife tucked into the top of my boot.

“Are you sure, Lark?” Cactus asked. I knew what the real question was. Could I live with killing the Undine in essentially cold blood? But what Cactus didn’t understand was that it wasn’t going to be in cold blood. Mercy was an act of love, an act of understanding. I could do for this Undine what he needed.

“Last words, if the madness is not so far eaten into you?” I asked.

Below me, the Undine shuddered. “Requiem is dead?”

“Yes.”

“Then I am at peace and need no last words. I go to the mother goddess’s embrace.”

I didn’t wait for him to say anything else. As hard as I could, I drove the blade into the back of his neck, angling it upward for a clean kill. His body jerked once, all his muscles contracting at the same time before he relaxed into his death.

Pulling both blades, I wiped them one at a time on his back. The salt water would rust the blades if I was not careful.

I put the blade back into my boot and the spear I reattached to my belt, my movements automatic. Without a word, I took the dark Undine’s arms and dragged him to the water’s edge. I laid him on his back and folded his arms over his chest. Peta moved to my side and pressed herself against me. “There was no other choice.”

“I know. But banishment from the Deep for fighting Requiem . . . I thought Finley would have made these things right.” I pressed my hands over the unnamed Undine. The queen of the Undines should have been bringing home those Requiem had banished. Why wasn’t she? A question I did not have time for.

I rolled the Undine into the water. “Go to her embrace then, and find your peace.”

The water splashed up, engulfing him with a single wave that settled within seconds as if he had never been. Being banished, perhaps that was the truth. Those banished were considered anathema, as if they had never existed.

Peta must have picked up on my thoughts. “Their names are wiped from any record. Finley likely doesn’t even realize they are missing.”

A hand brushed along the side of my face and I leaned into Cactus. He was softer than Ash in many ways . . . but right in that moment he knew what I needed. A touch, and the knowledge that he was there with me, with no pressure beyond what we could see in front of us.

I stood and let out a long breath. “Let’s take the boat.”

Cactus gave me a sideways grin. “Theft?”

“I think it’s the least of my sins tonight.” I meant it as a joke, but it fell flat and killed whatever levity he’d been attempting. “Sorry, my timing sucks.”

“You’re telling me,” he grumbled, but again the mood lightened. In a matter of minutes we had a boat untied, a small one with a sail attached to it. Peta paced the dock. “It’s small, are you sure this is a good idea?”

“No, but you want to get to Greece. How else would you like to do it?”

“I would rather drag my belly the whole way than get into that boat. I don’t like water, Lark.” She blinked her large green eyes up at me. Yet she’d dived into the water to save me before she’d ever been my familiar. Peta had the heart of a dragon beating inside her chest.

“Not overly fond of it myself, but we all do things we don’t like. Come on, you can sleep the whole way.” I pointed at a small orange padded material with a hole in the middle. A perfect cat bed if I ever saw one.

Sighing, she shifted into her housecat form, then jumped into the boat and settled down. “This is not very comfortable.”

“Stop complaining, bad luck cat,” Cactus said.

She hissed at him but said nothing more. I stepped into the boat last and pushed off the dock with my boot.