The Rogue Queen (The Hundredth Queen #3)(85)

The airships fly nearer, intensifying their winds. The Lestarian Navy pushes Kur with waves, adding to the impetus. The onslaught impels him farther into the choppy water.

Deven’s hand slips. I catch his wrist before he flies away. I hang on to the sword, but his wet grip slides from mine. He spins off into the lake.

“No!”

I lose sight of him, foam and dirt in my eyes. He reappears swimming helplessly against the powerful currents and crosswinds.

“Someone help him!”

Indah and Pons’s mahati dives, claws outstretched to pluck Deven up, but the gales knock them back, and they pinwheel out of range.

Kur sinks up to his breast. Deafening winds howl at me. My tunic rips free from the sword, but my hand holds me in place. Behind me, the lakeshore has been cleared for this attack. Even the Aquifiers conduct the waves from afar. I am the closest person to Deven.

I inhale a deep breath and let go.

Gusts pitch me across the water. I land among the chunks of ice, up to my neck in freezing waves. The cold bites, the water like teeth dragging me to Kur. Deven is caught in a tide pool near him, dipping in and out of sight.

A surge pushes me under. Another heaves me up and whirls me about. Kur’s claws rake at the air. Our forces are sending all they have at him, but his head remains above water.

He needs a reason to go under.

I ride an incoming swell to him and latch on to his scaly side. With one hand, I reach inside him and pull, parching him. His venom powers flow into my burning palm. My fingers blister and boil. My skin melts, but I hold fast. I can stand his cold-fire. I can embrace the night.

Kur tries shaking me free. I hold on and bring the evernight into my bones. Agony screams up my arm, begging for me to stop. The pain spreads everywhere, excruciating to the point of near blindness.

Unable to draw in anymore, I let go, and a whitecap drags me from him. My fingers continue to shrivel, eaten by the cold venom I welcomed inside me.

“Kur!” I bellow.

He lowers his head to me, and I throw the cold-fire I parched back at him. The sapphire flames burn across his snout and ignite his whiskers. He tosses his head to extinguish them, but the venomous fire blazes across scales, indiscriminate in its destruction.

A wave pushes me under and up again. Kur is eye level. He lowers his snout to the water to put out the flames. I reach for the last of the cold-fire within me and send the blue-white flames at his eye. He roars and thrashes as it burns and burns.

“Kali!” Deven calls.

He is trapped in Kur’s wake. Our gazes connect, both rife with terror. Kur is still on fire. Unable to withstand the pain, the demon god submerges to extinguish the flames.

The strength of his descent whips up a massive tow of crosscurrents. A maelstrom spins me around its outer radius. Closer to the center of the violent whirlpool, Deven is sucked under.

“No!”

I dive for him. Shadows writhe below, grasping and pulling like hooks. I push my powers into my uninjured hand, but the muted glow does not reveal Deven or Kur. The blackness is all-consuming. My lungs pang for air. But the darkness tugs at me, tying itself to my ankles like millstones.

I descend into the cold nothing, closer to the gate.

A sudden upsurge drills into my side. The current launches me into the air. I gasp, sputtering, as I am wrenched on a wave across the surface to shore. I land on the wet rocks, wilted and panting.

Cold chatters my teeth. My leg bleeds freely, lying limp and frozen before me. My injured hand—my drawing hand—is so mangled it is unrecognizable. Its flesh has been nearly eaten away, the remnants of the fiery venom still burning. I cradle my hand close and scan the waves between the chunks of ice for Deven.

Ashwin races up to me in the dying winds. “Kali, where’s Deven?”

I concentrate, pushing against my draining consciousness. “Kur took him.” Ashwin considers the roiling lake, his jaw hard-set. “He went under—”

“I’ll find him, Kalinda.” Ashwin tears off his jacket, splashes in, and dives underwater.

Just as he goes, Natesa and Yatin reach my side. She blanches at my disfigured hand and bloody thigh, and calls for Indah. The quivers within me rise to uncontrollable quakes.

“Where did the prince go, Kalinda?” Yatin says.

“Kur grabbed Deven. Ashwin dove in to find him.”

Yatin pales and shouts to the troops behind us, “The prince is in the lake! Find him! Get him out before he’s dragged through the gate!”

Aquifiers splash into the water up to their knees. The rest of the troops crowd along the shore and call their god by name.

“Anu, God of Storms . . . Ki, Mother of the Mountains . . . Enlil, Keeper of the Flame . . . Enki, Bearer of the Seas . . .”

Why are they praying? They should be jumping into the lake. They should be looking for Deven!

The stars blink into brightness, and the moon reveals its haunting eye. But their reappearance brings no joy. How dare the stars shine without him! How can they return when he is gone? How can the world be saved when my heart is destroyed?

The mournful praying continues, and so does my raging at the heavens. Anu, you cannot! Deven is good. Kur cannot have him!

A wave crashes nearby.

“I have him!” Admiral Rimba shouts.

Which one?

I compel my eyes to open. A man lies on the ground, soldiers crowded around him. I try to sit up, but the abrupt movement rips my strength away. Numbness steals over me.