Chapter 49 Army of One

Jin gave the sword back.

The woman drew it as the barge rolled toward the quay.

Black hide broke the water beneath the hull. Two hooked tendrils tightened around the bow, lifting timber high enough for the remaining crew to slide across the deck.

“Off the far side!” she shouted.

Lark was already on the plank.

He caught a boy by the collar and flung him toward Jin. Jin caught him under both arms, set him behind a stone bollard and went back for the next man.

The creature's broad mantle spread across the water like an overturned black sail.

Its tendrils pulled.

The mooring rope shrieked against the post.

The woman raised her free hand.

A white barrier opened beneath the falling barge.

Timber struck light instead of stone.

She kept it there, sword lifted in her other hand, while Lark shoved the last crewman down the plank.

Then the creature's head rose beside the barrier.

A mouth opened across its underside.

Jin saw teeth where the lips should have been.

“Gravefin!” somebody screamed.

The woman stepped toward it.

Her sword came down.

Black plates closed over the pale throat. The edge struck them with a sound that hurt Jin's teeth.

She landed on the quay with water bursting beneath her boots.

Gold light ran along the blade.

The black plates began to smoke.

The creature recoiled, wrenching the barge sideways.

One wounded passenger fell from the low bench onto the plank.

Jin went for him.

Three strides from the bollard to the plank's stone footing. Solid quay under each foot. He tested the landing as he crouched to catch the man's arm and set the trace.

A tendril swept toward them.

Lark cut it across its hooked tip.

The barge dropped a foot. The white barrier shuddered beneath it.

Jin hauled the wounded man back to the bollard, turned and walked the four steps around its other side to the mooring post.

A second route. Same start.

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The loose rope lay there, snapping across stone.

He recorded the arrival and went back.

Above the water, the woman held the barrier with one hand and drove her burning sword through a closing seam with the other.

White cracks spread across the gravefin's armor.

It screamed.

Its uncut tendril lashed around her sword arm.

She twisted with it, keeping the blade away from the barge. The barrier dipped.

“Leave the boat!” Jin shouted at the last sailor.

“My brother—”

“I've got him!”

The wounded man behind the bollard raised one shaking hand.

The sailor jumped.

Jin caught his wrist, pulled him over the lip of the quay and dragged him clear.

The barrier vanished.

The barge crashed down between the gravefin's tendrils.

Water struck the quay in a dirty wall.

Jin ducked behind the bollard with the two men. Something long and black slapped the stone on the other side.

The tendril around the woman's arm had come across the mooring line.

Jin looked at the rope.

At the hook caught inside its slack loop.

He chose the second trace.

Four strides carried him to the post. He seized the line, braced at the arrival and hauled its loose end around the post's lower iron cleat.

The gravefin pulled.

The loop closed over the hook.

Iron rang. The post held.

The tendril straightened between post and creature, dragging the sword arm with it.

“Lark!”

The swordsman struck the taut flesh.

His blade passed through.

The severed length fell across the quay, releasing the woman's wrist.

She stepped onto the trapped stump as it recoiled.

Her gold-lit sword went into the pale underside.

This time the plates couldn't meet over it.

She caught the hilt with both hands.

Light spread inside the creature.

For a heartbeat, Jin saw every rib through the black mantle.

Then the gravefin split in a burst of white fire and river water.

The black mantle dissolved. A severed hook slipped from the mooring rope and struck the quay.

Jin put five into Strength, six into Agility and four into Endurance.

He pushed himself upright. The wet rope slid through his stronger hands without dragging him forward this time.

The woman came back onto the quay.

Her cloak was gone. Beneath it she wore a plain coat with white stitching at the cuffs. One sleeve hung in strips.

She went straight to the wounded man behind Jin.

“Where does it hurt?”

“Everywhere.”

“All right. Start with the worst.”

He pointed. She knelt.

Lark went to help the sailors recover their wounded. Jin stayed beside the bollard until the woman finished.

Jin looked at Lark.

“How many jobs does she have?”

Lark breathed out through his teeth.

“All the ones people give her.”

An older ferryman hurried over with a folded blanket.

“Lady Selene, the others are at the shrine. They're asking—”

“Tell them I'm coming.”

Jin caught the blanket before the wind could take it. He draped it over the man she'd just healed.

Selene looked up at him.

“Jin,” Lark said. “He's called Jin.”

“Jin.” She tried the name once, then stood. “I leave for the capital at dawn. There's a convoy on the north road that needs another pair of hands.”

He looked at her sword.

Then at the broken barge.

“What sort of hands?”

“Ones that move before everyone finishes staring.”

She held his gaze.

“Will you come?”