A Pirate for the Dead Goddess (Legends of Rahasia Book 2)

Chapter Sixteen

Ode. The goddess of death. She kneels with her head bowed. Wrinkles. Looking like a middle-aged woman, despite having eternal youth.

Kane. The god of life. A shriveled husk on the ground. His thousand-thousand years catching up with him at last.

"Lucky, my Champion, I'm sorry..." Ode whispers, pushing her husband's brittle silver hair back behind his ear. He makes a rattling noise in his chest. She stares at him with tenderness, a love that knows neither time nor mercy. "I couldn't keep her back."

***

I bolt awake from the vision, where I'm curled up and bandaged in one of the hammocks. I get to my feet, shaky and feeling stiff, like my body's been prepared for a burial instead of healing. Ali's on my other side, helping me limp to starboard.

"Sea serpent!" Jun screams, sliding down the ropes.

"No," I gaze blearily at the giant, scaled beast swimming towards us, possessing a thousand legs and a shell like spiked armor. Ears like a dog, flattened near a pointed snout. "That's Kaliya."

So much for our being alive long enough to take on the Godkiller.

"What do we do, Captain?" Ali even shudders nervously, her usual wit replaced by fear. "We used up all our fire boats to take down the Lunes."

I look, sore and aching from my brush with death, at the oncoming serpent.

And I roll the dice.

Skulls.

But Kaliya is unaffected. Keeps charging.

Figures a child of gods, even monstrous as she is, wouldn't even flinch.

"Nothing," I struggle to stand alone, to face death with acceptance. "I'm sorry. All of you should abandon ship." I look down to my feet, wondering what's real and what's a dream. "I'll go down with the Kona."

Familiar arms, the faint scent of coffee beans, wrap around me. Chains around the wrists. Her whisper tickles my ear.

"It's time these chains came off, don't you think, Lucky? It's better I die, not all of you."

"No, Farzaneh. I can't lose you."

She laughs at me. "How selfish!" Making me feel even smaller than I do now. Making me feel silly for my grandiose statement of going down with my ship. "And it's fair that you go out with a bang? I saved your ass from the water, Lucky, from when you heroically tried to save the Kona with those fire boats." She holds the manacle out to me. "Now it's my turn to go out in a blaze of glory." She leans in close, whispers, "all you have to say is the Rahasian word, 'آزادی 'Freedom. Azadi.' And channel it through the power of your dice, focus on the Diviner's magic."

"You better come back to me, Farzaneh."

She grins at me mischievously. "You kept your promise. What makes you think I won't keep mine?"

We lean our foreheads against one another. Exchanging breath for breath, a tradition I kept from Akua. A tradition that means home to me."Azadi..."

The manacles fall like they were made of string.

And Farzaneh's eyes go entirely green. No whites, no pupil. Just glowing bright green.

Red cloak fluttering behind her, though the breeze doesn't stir half so much, she steps in front of me. When she opens her mouth, bright light flows from every available crevice. It's as though she possesses light inside her. Power, trapped in her body for all those years.

Power and a sick little girl, dying to be set free.

The serpent rears its head like a viper, ready and hissing to strike. It opens its giant, scaly maw. I see endless rows of razor teeth, a tongue flat against the roof of a rotten-flesh mouth.

Farzaneh opens her mouth again, speaking in a tongue I can't recognize. A language no mortal should possess. A language that was born from the fabric of the universe, before time began. She utters a curse of her own.

As Kaliya hurtles forwards to strike, her body the size of all an entire kingdom stretched thin, Farzaneh calmly holds out one hand.

A wave of energy and emerald fire. My crew's bodies are scattered on the deck, some living, others I'm unsure about. I lift myself to my feet, staggering to the broken mast of the Kona. My already sore body screams with pain.

The sea is quiet as it can be.

The serpent's gone, replaced by the shivering body of a ten-year old girl hidden beneath sail-cloth. Farzaneh's manacles are on her wrists now. Binding the little girl to her real body.

But there's no Farzaneh.

"Kali," I hold out one hand, struggling to keep the pangs of loss from my voice. Struggling to wipe away the tears streaking down my face. "It's time we brought you home."

"Mommy and daddy are really ill." The child looks up with those unnerving eyes, one eye red as the blood moon, and the other shining grey. Ali hurriedly wraps her in a spare blanket before she can find more suitable clothing.

Kali has earth-toned skin from Ode, silvery hair from Kane. And her wisdom, her tenacity, from the both of them. "The palace of the Emperor is home now."

I realize then that her silver eye is focused on nothing at all. The blood moon is in the present, staring up at me. "I see them through this eye," she taps on the lazy one, "they wait for you in the big city behind Lioness Gate." She shudders, hugging me tight. "But grandma's waiting for us all too. Grandma's so angry for being put to sleep so long. I woke her up, and she turned me into a monster."

Kaliya... did she start all this without even knowing?

Some family drama, when all their squabbles end in a world war.

I hush her tears, stroking her hair. "We'll stop this, Kali." She shuts both eyes tight and weeps. I avoid looking at the manacles on her arms, imagining I smell coffee beans. My throat's sore from screaming. And I'm tired everywhere. Bone-tired. "We can't lose any more."

***

Hey Pirates,

Thank you for voting and commenting!

Also, poor Farzaneh and the crew for losing her.

-Sophia