Bone Crier's Moon (Bone Grace #1)(4)

She struggles to kick. I grab her arm and kick for her. Her eyes close just before we break the surface. She coughs up a mouthful of water, and I hit her back, pounding out the rest.

“Sabine . . .” She gasps and blinks salty drops from her lashes. “I almost had her. But she’s so strong. I wasn’t prepared for how strong.” Ailesse looks below. I don’t need her keen vision to see what she does—the shark circling and drawing closer. She’s playing with us. She knows she can kill us any moment she wishes.

I kick madly toward the shore. “Come on, Ailesse. We have to go.” I drag her behind me. “We’ll find a better kill another day.”

She coughs again. “What’s better than a shark?”

“How about a bear? We’ll travel north like we did last year.” I’m rambling, trying to urge her to swim. She’s still dead weight in my arms, and the shark’s circle is tightening.

“My mother killed a bear,” she says, like it’s the most ordinary animal in Galle, even though Odiva’s bear was a rare albino.

“We’ll think of something else, then. But for now I need your help.” My breaths fall heavier. “I can’t swim for you the whole way.”

I feel Ailesse’s muscles gather strength. She starts paddling, but then her eyes narrow, her jaw goes stiff. She rotates around. No, no, no. “I remember where the spear tip sank,” she murmurs.

“Wait!”

She dives underwater again.

Dread seizes me. I plunge in after her.

Sometimes I really hate my friend.

My eyes burn before they focus. Ailesse zips forward in a sharp line. The shark stops circling and faces her squarely. Ailesse is probably smiling, but she’ll never fetch her spear quickly enough. Tiger sharks are brutes. This one will attack first. She needs a distraction.

I swim faster than I thought possible. My one grace bone proves helpful; salamanders move through the water with more ease than falcons, ibexes, or even humans. That’s my only advantage.

I pass Ailesse and briefly meet her gaze. I pray sixteen years of friendship will help her understand my intentions.

She nods. We separate. I dive for the coral reef, and she dives for the spear.

The shark stalks her, not me. Ailesse is the one who started this fight.

I reach the coral and scrape my palms against it, then both my arms for good measure. My skin stings like fire. My blood swirls like smoke. I struggle to free my dagger, but its blade is still stuck in my sheath. I spy a large rock in the coral. It’s sharp and jagged, freshly fallen from the cliffs. I pull it loose.

Three feet from Ailesse, the shark turns, her dead eyes fixing on me through the blood-veined water. For a moment, all I fathom is the terrifying beast and the twenty feet between us. I barely notice Ailesse swimming toward the seafloor.

The shark comes for me. Lashes through the water like lightning.

I brace for impact. I’m fierce. Strong. Fearless.

I’m like Ailesse.

An instant later, the shark’s hideous face is before me. I bash my rock against her snout with a muted whimper. I’m nothing like Ailesse.

My strike barely cuts her face. She jerks sideways and hits my hand with her head. The rock fumbles out of my grip. She doesn’t dart away this time. She circles me twice. So near her fin grazes my shoulder. So fast her head and tail blur together. She tries to bite. I drop below her with salamander speed and grope for the rock. It’s out of reach.

I look up and startle. Right above me, I stare at the shark’s open jaws and countless blades of teeth. I punch her blunt nose. She doesn’t back off. I don’t frighten her.

Her jaws snap. I don’t roll away fast enough. Her teeth snag on my dress. She hauls me closer, chomping up more cloth. I twist and kick as her mouth yawns open again. I see into the cavernous tunnel of her belly. I’m out of air, out of options. Desperately, I wrestle with the hilt of my dagger. At last, the blade pries free.

I swing it up and stab the shark’s snout, then one of her eyes. She thrashes madly, half-blind. My sleeve rips away, and one of her serrated teeth along with it. I wish to the gods it could be the bone Ailesse needs, but an animal must die to impart its graces.

As the shark pitches and reels, I zoom to the surface and gasp for air. Three breaths later, I’m underwater again.

Save Ailesse, save Ailesse, save—

I stop kicking as a cloud of red blooms beneath me. My throat tightens. Just when I fear the worst, Ailesse swims up through the blood, her spear shaft in her teeth. I hurry after her to the surface.

I push wet black curls from my face and search my friend’s eyes. “Did you kill her?”

She pulls the shaft from her mouth. Her hand is bleeding. She hurt herself during the fight. “I couldn’t reach far enough to stab her brain, so I cut off her dorsal fin.”

Nausea pools inside me. The red in the water fans wider. The shark is down there, horribly injured, but still alive. She could rush up any moment and end us both. “Ailesse, we’re done. Give me the spear.”

She hesitates and looks below with longing. I wait for it, that stubborn set of her jaw. But it never comes. “She’s yours if you want,” she finally says.

I recoil. “No, that isn’t what I meant.”

“I’ve given her a fatal wound, Sabine. She’s weak and partially blind. Take her.” When I say nothing, only continue to stare at her, Ailesse swims closer to me. “I’m giving her to you—another grace bone. Surely killing that monster won’t break your heart.”