The Abyss Surrounds Us (The Abyss Surrounds Us #1)(64)

I push off the ground and scramble onto Bao’s head, cursing pirate girls under my breath as he bucks underneath my weight and pulls back out of the rear port. I check the respirator around my neck and slip my goggles up over my eyes.

The piece in my ear crackles on. “So now that that’s over with … ”

Varma.

“You, uh … you heard that, then,” I say just before setting the respirator in my teeth.

“Funny thing about these comms—they pick up anything that shakes your bones. You’re lucky the captain put me in charge of your line,” he says, and I can feel the laughter he’s suppressing. I clench my jaw. As we slide away from the ship, Bao rears, lifting his head until we’re level with the main deck.

Santa Elena stands there, dressed to the nines in her own elegant, bulletproof armor. Her chin lifts, a vicious grin spreading across her face as she watches her handiwork rise up to meet her. The sunset blazes at her back, casting her long shadow out to touch us, as if marking us as inevitably, unquestionably hers.

And though part of me is certain that after tonight, we’ll be free of the Minnow at last, another part knows that this boat will last with me to the end of my days.

“Inbound is ten minutes out. Splinters away at my mark,” the all-call announces, and here atop Bao’s back, I finally have the vantage point I need, the one that lets me see right into the navigation tower where Lemon bends over a microphone.

The white hulls snap off the sides of the Minnow, and a swell of nostalgia sings through me. Bao’s upper body plunges back down toward the water; my stomach swoops as I crouch, winding my fingertips in his plates. His blowholes heave beneath me, drawing a quick breath before he submerges. The waters churn around us, and I fight to keep my hands rooted when they crash over me.

“Cas, you there?” Varma’s voice mutters in my ear. “Captain wants you to keep him submerged until she says otherwise. We’ll draw them in, then you do the rest.” He says it as if it’ll be easy.

“Got it,” I reply around the respirator. The comm’s smart enough to fill in the consonants where the piece in my mouth has stolen them. I unspool a line-hook from my belt and drive it into Bao’s plating, praying that the barbs will hold fast when the time comes. Once I’m secured to his back, I turn the Otachi to the dive command and blaze them out.

Bao sinks lower. Shadows close in around us, the dark of the night settling into the sea long before it touches the world above us. I can barely make out the sleek curve of the Minnow’s hull in the murk. We drop lower still. I pinch my nose and blow to pop my ears.

It’s so quiet, so calm down here. There’s nothing but the rush of water from the churn of Bao’s forelegs and the rock-solid sureness of his skull underneath me. I find myself wishing I could stay, wishing we could wait until Bao’s breath runs out or until the respirator sputters and quits. But somewhere up there on the Minnow’s deck, Santa Elena has Swift in her sights, and that thought keeps me rooted, waiting for the next instruction that comes through the comm.

Light spools through the deep as the Minnow’s engines flare, and I know it’s almost time. I don’t need to direct Bao with the Otachi. His bond with the ship is enough to set him after her as she runs, the Splinters’ hulls skimming in her wake.

There are six shadows trailing her, and three of them are swimming.

“Drop back, Cas,” Varma hisses in my ear. “They’ll be expecting signals to be coming from our ship. The farther Bao is from us, the more confident they’ll be. Wait for our signal to strike.”

I snap on the Otachi and cast Bao’s homing signal back toward his tail, my eyes fixed on the hulking forms of the three Reckoners overhead. Every homing signal is unique, coded to make sure that the beasts can only be controlled by their masters. But sometimes they forget themselves. Sometimes when they’re too amped up, they’ll go after any flashing light and any siren. But Bao is the only one who heeds my call, and the tightness in my chest unclenches as the pursuit boats and Reckoners pull ahead, still chasing after the Minnow’s shadow.

The biggest of the beasts is a cetoid. Its jointed flippers are tipped with vestigial claws that carve through the water as it leads the pack, plunging ahead with powerful strokes of its flukes. A cephalopoid follows close in its wake, tentacles rippling through the darkening waves, and a serpentoid brings up the rear. Its sinuous body dips underneath its companion ship, coiling against it before pushing off again. There’s a part of me that cries out at the sight of the other beasts, of the animals that I’ve spent my whole life raising.

There’s another part of me that reaches out to crush it.

Like Varma said, they’re focused on the Minnow. They’re expecting any signal to come from its decks. They won’t see me coming. Trainers have conducted battles from decks, from shattered hulls, and in their most desperate moments, from the sea. No one’s ever dared to fight from the back of the beast they’re directing.

No one has ever needed to.

Heavy pulses ring through the water, and flashes of light up above mark where the opening shells have struck. Santa Elena’s drawing them on, triggering the Reckoners’ responses. The three beasts lunge ahead, leaving their companion vessels defenseless in their wake.

“Cas,” Varma says in my ear. “Now.”