The Blunt Reaper

The ferryman’s warning vanished the instant the water closed above Mara.

Cold surrounded her, seeping through her clothes, her hair, and every wound left by the journey. For one panicked moment, she held her breath before remembering that she no longer needed to breathe. Her body disagreed. Her chest tightened, and every instinct demanded that she return to the surface.

Mara ignored it and forced herself downward.

The lantern swung beside her as she descended. Its blue flame continued burning beneath the water, untouched by the current. Pale light spread around Mara, revealing the underside of the boat moving above her and the grave-rope steadily uncoiling behind it.

Then she looked down and saw what the surface had concealed.

The Silent Sea opened beneath her.

Bodies moved at every depth. Some appeared as little more than shadows passing beneath the fleet, while others were so large that their shapes extended beyond the reach of the lantern. Worm-sharks twisted through clouds of blood. Pale fish gathered beneath falling souls, their mouths opening before their victims even struck the water. Long serpentine Abominations rose toward the boats in coiling paths while mermaids climbed between them.

Farther away, the Fourth Rank still held the armored vessel. Its body extended deep into the darkness, far larger than Mara had understood from above. The mouths covering its ridged back fed upon wreckage while its divided limbs pulled the ship apart. Souls tumbled from the broken decks and fell directly into the mass of creatures waiting below.

The sea beneath the battle had become a grave without a bottom.

Mara forced herself to look away.

The luminous chain of her contract descended behind her, cutting through the darkness at a steep angle. Rook was being dragged beneath the fleet, away from the boat and deeper into the water.

Mara gripped the grave-rope and followed.

At first, she pulled herself along it. Once the current strengthened, she used the rope only to prevent the moving boat from leaving her behind. The water fought every movement. Her coat dragged around her legs, her hair spread across her face, and the lantern repeatedly struck her wrist as she descended.

Something passed through its light.

A pale fish turned toward Mara. Its mouth opened across the top of its head, exposing a cluster of human teeth growing from several mismatched jaws.

It looked directly through her.

For one strange moment, Mara felt as though the creature could not see her at all. The lantern’s light remained visible beneath the water, but she did not. The fish drifted closer, following the disturbance of her movements rather than the glow, then snapped at the empty space behind her.

Mara pulled herself farther down the rope, but the creature’s teeth caught a fold of her coat. Fabric tore from her shoulder and spun through the lantern’s glow as the current carried it away. The fish followed the drifting cloth for several moments before realizing that it had caught nothing.

Mara continued downward.

The grave-rope stretched diagonally above her, connecting her to the boat as it traveled along the current. It pulled constantly against her grip, forcing her to descend while being dragged eastward. Every few moments, the rope tightened enough to wrench her arm upward and nearly turn her body around.

The chain of her contract led in the opposite direction. Its pale light passed through the darkness beneath her, descending farther than the lantern could reveal.

Rook remained alive somewhere at its end.

Mara followed it.

The cold gradually seeped deeper into her body. At first, she assumed the numbness came from the water. Then she tried to remember what she had eaten at the inn and found nothing.

She remembered sitting across from Rook. She remembered the crowded tables, the open kitchen, and the cook forming onions beneath his hands. She even remembered tasting something warm and scattering salt across it.

The meal itself had vanished.

Mara could not remember whether she had eaten meat, bread, or something else entirely. No matter how hard she searched, she found only the memory of having eaten, with the food itself stripped from it.

Her grip tightened around the rope.

The Silent Sea pressed in around her, and something tugged within her thoughts.

The sensation was subtle, almost gentle. It felt like fingers passing through the contents of her mind, testing each memory before deciding whether it could be pulled free. The color of the innkeeper’s clothes disappeared next, followed by the shape of the room where she had slept.

Mara remembered breaking the lock.

No. Rook had broken it.

She remembered the blue lantern resting upon the sill and the memory fragment held in her hand, but the walls surrounding them had become indistinct. When she tried forcing the room back into focus, the water seemed to tighten around her skull.

Mara stopped trying.

The chain continued downward.

A dark shape passed between her and the distant battle. It possessed too many limbs to be one of the mermaids and moved with slow, deliberate strokes that carried it through the water without disturbing the surface above. Several smaller creatures fled before it.

Mara drew the lantern close to her chest and remained motionless. Even without breath to hold, her body became rigid until the creature passed beyond the light and disappeared.

The grave-rope suddenly tightened, jerking her body upward. The boat was pulling her away from Rook.

Mara wrapped the rope once around her forearm, then kicked deeper with both legs. The current dragged at her clothes and hair, but the contract’s chain grew brighter as she descended.

Something moved at its end.

Rook emerged from the darkness below.

The mermaid had wrapped her divided tail around his body. Two of the long limbs crossed his chest while another coiled around his legs. Her human arms remained locked beneath his throat, pulling him deeper with violent strokes of the transparent fins lining her twisted frame.

The scythe he had driven into her face still protruded through one ruined eye, but the wound did not appear to slow her at all.

Rook fought with a dagger he had drawn from somewhere inside his coat. He drove it repeatedly into the arm around his throat, cutting through pale flesh without forcing the creature to release him. Each wound closed almost as quickly as he made it.

Blood surrounded them.

The mermaid’s wounds released dark clouds filled with brief flashes of faces and grasping hands. Rook’s blood spread more slowly from several cuts across his chest and neck, but both scents were drawing attention.

Mara saw pale shapes beginning to circle beyond the lantern’s reach.

Then Rook noticed her.

He stopped struggling for a fraction of a second and stared at Mara as though finding her beneath the Silent Sea offended him more deeply than the creature dragging him toward its bottom.

His lips moved, shaping a single word through the dark water.

Fool.

Mara would have insulted him back if opening her mouth underwater had accomplished anything.

She descended the last few body lengths and caught his ankle.

Rook kicked instinctively. His heel struck her shoulder and nearly knocked the lantern from her wrist before he realized what had grabbed him.

Mara pulled the grave-rope from around her arm and pushed it into his hand.

His fingers closed around it.

The rope immediately tightened between him and the moving boat. The pull slowed their descent, stretched the mermaid’s body and forced one of her coiled limbs to slip from around his legs.

Rook seized the rope with both hands.

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