The wind was like nothing Bram had ever felt ashore, and the shore winds could be strong. Still, the sea winds over the Thalassic were like a fist to the face. He struggled to keep his footing on the deck. He struggled to keep his curls out of his face. He struggled to keep his eyes open.
“If you blink a lot,” Kori said, “it’s easier.”
Bram blinked hard and looked at his brother. Even through tears, Bram could see he was smiling.
“And, either get your hair cut or wear a band to keep it out of your eyes.”
Bram laughed. So that’s why sailors were always wearing headbands.
Kori reached up and tapped his shoulder.
“Here, tie off the seine like this.” Rope wrapped and tucked so fast that Bram couldn’t follow it.
“Wait,” he said, “go slower.”
Kori laughed. “I’ll go slower next time. Now, we just let it out.”
The men set to the seine with a passion. Bram was impressed by their discipline. They all moved in unison, dumping the net into the rolling sea, and he struggled to keep up. His fingers kept catching in the knots. He ventured a glance to his father by the tiller. The man was grinning and nodding at him.
After the seine was overboard to port, secured fore and aft, Bram’s father set the boat on a heavy tack to drag the seine through the waters.
“Now we wait for it to fill with fish,” Kori said. “Look!”
Bram followed his brother’s finger behind him to starboard. Across the waters was a huge pillar of gray and black stone spangled with green, brilliant in the light of the noon sun. Waves clawed at its base, spray bursting like fireworks.
“What is that?”
“That’s the Tyrant’s Tooth.”
“Tyrant?” Bram said. “The nearest tyrants are on the mainland. In the mountains.”
Kori laughed. “It looks like a tyrant’s tooth, though.”
“Sure, but.” Bram felt his face scrunching. “Wouldn’t it make more sense if it were the tooth of a—”
“Sea dragon!” a man shouted.
All eyes were suddenly staring to port. The top of the seine was a rippling arc in the sea, the waters inside sparkling with captured fish. Beyond the seine, the dark Thalassic rolled like shambling hills. A white wake broke through the waves. Bram’s mouth fell open. The dragon looked ten meters long.
“Man the guns!” Bram’s father yelled.
Sailors rushed to the cannons and swivel guns. Men were shouting and pointing. Kori grabbed Bram’s arm and dragged him to a swivel.
“I’ll load, you aim.”
Bram nodded, his face cold despite the heat of the air. He felt his head nodding long beyond it made sense, his eyes fixed on the gray back of the dragon tearing through the water toward the seine.
Stuffing gunpowder into the swivel, Kori said: “What are they called?”
The dragon’s snout broke the water. It tore into the seine with teeth like daggers.
Bram scanned the deck. The sailors were no longer watching the monster in the waters. They were focused on their guns.
“What?” he said.
Kori shoved a ball into the swivel with a loading rod.
“What’s the old name for the sea dragon?”
Bram winced as cannon roared across the deck. Men cheered. He glanced into the sea. The dragon was sliding its fish-like body over the seine into the storm of fish. Bram could see at least four more monsters swimming toward the break in the seine.
“Plotos,” Bram choked. “Those are plotosaurs.”
“Plotos,” Kori said, waving Bram toward the gun.
Bram wrapped his hands on the iron grips. They were hot from the sun. Kori was holding a fuse stick. Bram hadn’t seen him light it. He aimed the swivel down at the dragon in the seine, but the sea around it was already torn by shot. Guns were thundering to either side. He looked up and saw what looked like a dozen creatures closing on the boat. He lifted the swivel to the dragon nearest the break in the seine.
“I got one,” he said.
Kori dropped the fuse to the breech. The gun bucked in Bram’s hands. A red spray of blood burst from the back of the dragon he was targeting.
The boat lurched to starboard. Bram felt his arms go tight, his fingers tearing against the grips of the swivel. Then, he fell free. He slid across the deck on his back. His shoulder slammed against the starboard gunnel and the boat rose under him.
“Chami! Geyri! Falken!” Bram’s father roared. “Go below! Bail, bail!”
“That’s a lot of ’em,” a sailor near Bram said.
The boat rocked in the sea as Bram and Kori crawled back to the swivel. The seine’s fore stay snapped with a loud crack.
Bram grabbed the swivel and dragged himself standing. He noticed his left hand was bleeding. Kori was shoving powder into the gun. Spray hit Bram’s face, and he ducked away from it. A sweep of gray blocked the sunlight. The boat shook under his feet. He shook the wet hair from his face.
The gunnel was missing a shattered chunk. Kori was gone. The sea was a swirl of foam and blood and fish and plotos.
Water sloshed around Bram’s feet. He glanced back. The deck was sinking under the sea.
“Swim for the Tooth!” a man shouted. Sailors abandoned guns, splashing across the deck toward the starboard gunnel.
Bram’s eyes flashed fore and aft. He couldn’t see his father. His feet were moving under him. His shins were pushing against the rising water. He launched his body into the sea.
He couldn’t keep his eyes open. It wasn’t the salt. It wasn’t the wind, which was from behind. It was the horror of men screaming like infants as dragon teeth sank into their bodies. It was the rush of water against his body as a dragon swam past him. It was the blood and gore in the water. He kept his lips clamped shut, lest the nastiness get into his mouth.
He only opened his eyes now and then, to keep his body aimed at the Tyrant’s Tooth.
Waves thrust him up the rocks. His chest slammed against stone and his fingers clawed for purchase. The water sucked at his body as it withdrew into the sea. He dragged himself up, shoving his feet and knees into ledges. The next wave threw water in his face but only rose to his waist.
He climbed up and up. His throat eventually reminded him to cough. He opened his lips and the water came out in a burst.
His body fell on its side. His skin was hot, even wet and in the wind. There was green in the corner of his vision. Little plants, well above the surf pounding the Tooth. He sat up.
There was a smudge of pink in the rolling waves of the Thalassic, but nothing else. No boat. No fish. No plotosaurs. No sailors’ bodies. It was almost as if nothing had happened. The splash of the fish, the thunder of the guns, the shouts of the men. All were silenced. All he heard was wind and surf.
Bram glanced up toward the tip of the Tooth. Just above him were ikti birds gathered on ledges, black and white feathers sharp against the gray of the rock. Above them were a trio of sky dragons peering out over the sea, their red crests jerking this way and that as they scanned the horizon. Beyond that, the sharp black pinnacle of the Tooth bit into the bare blue of the sky.
His legs dangled over the ledge. He looked down at his left hand. It was still bleeding a bit, draining pink down his wrist.
How was he going to get home to Safran? If he did get home, how was he going to live without his father and his brother? What was he going to say to his mother?