Part 20 (1/2)

All around him were shadows made of silt and kicked-up leaves. He saw the forest, dark, like ma.s.sive prison bars-and between them, darts of silver. Fish, carried in by the wave. Slender, glittering in the muddy half-light. He did not have much time before the water would recede and carry them away-though a second wave might crash soon enough.

Perrin hummed a low, sonorous, Krackeni melody, warm and soft.

The fish drew near, attracted by his voice. Close, closer, until their movements turned sluggish. When they were directly in front of Perrin, he reached up-grabbed their thick bodies, and tossed them to land. A blind throw, over his shoulder. His hand was the only part of him that broke the surface. He imagined a yelp, m.u.f.fled through the water.

Perrin captured five more fish, throwing them to dry land. He would have followed, except for the sudden wavering squeals he heard in the water. The distant sounds chilled him.

Dolphins. Signal cries of recognition, and alarm.

Some pod had just sighted something that did not belong.

Shark, he told himself, but he didn't believe it. Sharks didn't rouse that kind of agitation, but only because they were so easy for dolphins to drive away, or kill.

No. This was something else. Him, maybe. Didn't matter that he was here on land, and those dolphins were some distance away. He'd learned to appreciate the benefits of a little paranoia. Perhaps the sea witch had told where to find him-though his instincts said no. She had sent Jenny and him away from her island, when she most certainly could have kept them. And he knew this was not her island. No tsunami would have touched her sh.o.r.es.

Perrin dragged himself from the water. Jenny crouched at the edge of it, her toes digging into the rocks. Her mouth tightened when she saw him.

”You're funny,” she said, her tone implying that he was anything but. ”I survive kidnapping, drowning, earthquake, a crazy witch-woman, and a tsunami, only to get bashed in the brains by flying fish.”

Perrin frowned. ”Little fish. Where are they?”

Jenny jerked her head sideways. ”I didn't throw them back if that's what you're worried about.”

”I'm worried about hunger,” he muttered. ”I'm sorry if I . . .”

Hit you, he almost said. But that sounded more awful than he could bear, given the darkening bruises on her pale arms.

”Like you said, little fish.” Jenny grabbed his wrist and pulled. She had a strong, sure grip, and his stomach did a dizzy flip at the contact. He let her help him out of the water-pretending he needed help, even though he was a good foot taller and more than twice as broad. Her touch was nothing he took for granted.

The fish still flopped, gasping. Perrin picked up a rock and smashed their heads, one good blow each to kill them. No remorse. No hesitation. He searched for it but felt nothing. Like that part of him was dead.

They broke you. Rik's voice, echoing in his head.

You would kill again. The sea witch, this time. You are stained with blood.

Perrin rolled his shoulders, ignoring the ache in the base of his skull. Broken. Yes. His soul, stained.

But still alive. Alive, and look what had happened. He had found something good. A reason to have kept breathing all these years.

A miracle, set to break his heart all over again. Jenny stared at that rock in his hands like it was a gun. ”That's not what I expected to see.”

”Because I'm from the sea?” Perrin couldn't look at her. ”Humans eat cows. My kind eat fish. Some call it inhumane, but hunger usually trumps ideals.”

She sat down beside him. ”I didn't mean to offend you.”

”You didn't.” He flung the rock away. ”I used to avoid eating meat. I couldn't stand the idea of hurting something for food.”

Jenny didn't say anything. Perrin glanced sideways and found her eyeing the dead fish.

”Really,” he said.

”I believe you,” she replied. ”But something changed.”

Perrin hesitated, feeling naked and lost. Her gaze slid over his scars, then away.

”I'm hungry,” she said. ”I have waterproof matches in the pack.”

Jenny began to stand. He caught her wrist.

”I'm not the boy you knew on the beach,” Perrin said quietly, staring at her hand, those bruises, and not her face. ”I'm not . . . good . . . like he was.”

She stood very still. Silent. Watching him with those eyes he was afraid to look at. Those eyes that Perrin had spent a lifetime dreaming desperately to see.

He let her go and turned his back-skin crawling with shame and soul-searing loneliness. He could still feel things, all right.

And there would be more blood-on land, this time-if he did nothing to stop the events unfolding on the seafloor, amongst his kind. If he even could. What had the witch meant? Where was the kra'a? Was it truly so close?

If you leave Jenny and you fail, she will die.

You could protect her, though. If you manage to live long enough, evade your kind, you could keep her alive when the beast wakes and the waves destroy land.

You could save her life, if no one else's.

One woman, against millions.

We're all f.u.c.ked, he thought.

Chapter Eleven.

I cannot fix on the hour, Jenny recited silently, clinging to lines from Pride and Prejudice, which steadied her, brought her down into the world in ways that the rocks beneath her did not.

I cannot fix on the hour, or the look, or the words, which laid the foundation. It is too long ago.

Too long ago, when she had laid the foundation of what was happening now. And yet she could fix on the hour. She could fix on the look.

Twelve years old. A morning on a beach.

Jenny lay curled on her side, in leaves and dirt, her knees drawn up to her chest. She wanted to sleep, but was afraid to. Not that she was going to have much choice soon. Everything hurt, and her eyelids were heavy.

”How is your fever?” Perrin asked. His voice was low, rough enough to be unfriendly, even menacing. Jenny wasn't intimidated. Nor was she bothered by the bruises on her arms. Not anymore.

”Fine,” she replied, which was a lie. She was not fine. She was exhausted, heartsick-and there was a parasite attached to the base of her skull, drinking her blood, burying itself to the bone.

Kra'a, she named it. The very thing Perrin was searching for. She was absolutely certain of that.

And every time she tried to tell him, some mysterious compulsion kept her mouth shut tight. The impulse frightened her more than the parasite. It made her angry, too.