All the Stars and Teeth(59)

But I do see the source of the noise. Directly below, a whirlpool eats away at Keel Haul, hungrily chomping into the wood and attempting to devour it whole. It rattles the entire ship as Keel Haul tries to fight its way free, knocking Vataea further off balance. Water splashes onto the deck and her fingers glisten with dampness, more slippery by the second.

A door slams behind me and I look to see Ferrick hurrying out, wide-eyed and searching. When he spots me at the bow, he rushes forward, likely ready to drag me away until he spots Vataea struggling to hang on.

“Get back!” He nudges me aside and leans his longer body over the ledge, but it’s no use. Vataea’s hold slips as Keel Haul teeters and thrashes in the water. I lunge for her again, but her fingers brush through mine as her head smacks against the figurehead. I feel her phantom touch on my skin as her body hits the waves with a splash that sounds as terrible as the screeching behind us.

I stumble back, shaking, to find Bastian frozen behind me. There’s another screech—more like a garbled wail—and I follow his terrified stare.

I will my heart to stop. If it stops now, then I won’t have to know what happens next.

I thought Zudoh would be the scariest part of my travels, but I was wrong.

The Lusca is far, far worse.





CHAPTER TWENTY


The beast that bursts from the water is the color of ink and moonlight. The stars catch its scales, turning them silver as it roars. I double over, covering my ears from the shriek of what sounds like metal grating against metal. Even in the worst of my nightmares, I’d never be able to imagine such a wretched sound.

The Lusca. The legends of this beast have traveled through word of mouth, told to scare disobedient children. But no one has ever been able to prove its existence.

Probably because no one has survived to tell the tale.

The creature has eight inky tentacles with sharp, jagged hooks. Its body is that of a leech, giant and round, with a permanently open mouth it whines from. Several rows of bloodstained teeth fill that mouth, with bits of fish and squid dangling from them. I imagine our bodies will be the ones dangling there, soon.

“Where are the others?” Bastian gasps. The question hitches in his throat.

“Vataea fell into the water.” My voice shakes as I remember the horrible crack of her head hitting the figurehead. But given her gills, it’s not her drowning that I’m worried about. “We need to get her out of there before the Lusca sees her! Ferrick and I tried to—” I make a motion toward Ferrick, but he’s no longer in my periphery. My heartbeat triples as I spin around, but he’s gone. Only when I lean over the bow do I spot his red hair in the sea below as he struggles to break out of the shrinking whirlpool.

“You idiot,” I hiss at the water.

Bastian presses a hand to his chest as he watches the beast. He’s shaky, body swaying as Keel Haul makes a final push to break from the water imprisoning her. Only when she steadies does Bastian suck in a relieved breath and draw his sword. It looks useless against this giant beast. Laughable.

“You want to fight it?”

“What else are we supposed to do?” he rasps. “Keel Haul’s fast, but there’s no way we’re going to outrun this … thing.”

“The Lusca,” I say. I know in my bones this is the creature of the legends.

Bastian’s face hardens, but he doesn’t disagree. Everyone knows the stories.

“Ferrick jumped in?” he asks.

I nod, chest tightening when I hear the words aloud. Ferrick’s a selfless fool for jumping after Vataea, and he’s a selfish fool if he thinks he can die when our last words to each other were so cruel.

But I won’t let him die. Not tonight.

“If we can’t run, we need to drop anchor so they can get back up.” The ship rocks too fiercely, jerking as though it’s stuck in the eye of a storm. We need to steady it.

“Drop it, then,” Bastian says. “I’ll keep the beast busy.”

Without a second glance, I dash to the cathead. There’s no time to drop the two bower anchors, and they’ll take too long to haul up if we need to make a quick escape. Instead, I unfasten the stopper and let the main anchor drop. I toss the ladder for them to climb, but neither Ferrick nor Vataea is in sight.

The Lusca screeches until every hair on my body stands. Ten red, spider-like eyes stare at us from around its oversize mouth. It could easily swallow ten dinghies at once, but Keel Haul is thankfully barely too large to swallow whole.

The monster spots Bastian as the pirate’s sword catches the glow of the moon. He holds it in front of him, as though the thin blade will be able to do anything against a sea monster.

The Lusca lashes out with one of its hooked tentacles. Bastian dives out of the way, raising his sword just in time to counter. He gets in one solid gash before the monster snarls and withdraws its massive tentacle. The sound rattles the ship and forces me to cover my ears again. They burn as though they’re about to bleed.

As the Lusca draws back, its tentacle knocks into Keel Haul’s helm and scrapes against the wood. It must hit Bastian too, because he stumbles back as if struck. He tucks his left hand around his stomach and struggles for breath.

I rush to his side and put my arms on his shoulders to steady him. “Are you all right?” His chest rises and falls as he regains his breath.