The Drowning Eyes Read Online Free Page A

shook her head. “Oh, no—oh—what?”
    “You were screaming again,” the Captain said. “You kept telling us, ‘They’re coming, they’re coming,’ and I been trying to wake you up for damn near a minute.”
    Shina realized her chest was heaving. “I was having a nightmare,” she said.
    “I’ll say.” The Captain stood up and looked at her with the corners of her mouth turned down. “Take some rum—it’ll quiet you down some.”
    “I—I don’t drink,” said Shina.
    The Captain clicked her tongue. “Well, I don’t know your life,” she said, “but that might be part of your greater overall problem.”
    While she went back to her patrol of the deck, Shina wrapped the blanket around her shoulder and sat on a fish crate to watch the stars go by. It was almost dawn, and unless she was mistaken, she could see some of the lights of Jepjep on the horizon.
    Now and then, the Captain would look Shina over with her eyes narrowed. A few times, she tilted her head and opened her mouth as if to say something, but she stayed silent.
    It wasn’t until they passed the first jetty that the Captain rubbed the back of her neck and let out a long, acid hiss. The sun was coming up, and the clouds blushed coral violet.
    “Well,” the Captain said, “we’re here.” She waved her arm in a broad sweep against the crescent of wooden buildings that lined the docks. “Is it everything you imagined?”
    Truth be told, Shina hadn’t put much thought into imagining what Jepjep would be like. In her mind, all ports were built on a pile of rocks, just down the beach from a sleepy little straw-roofed village. Humma, with its rows of wooden houses and storehouses and shops all in together with each other, had surprised her with its hustle and bustle. Jepjep, as she had expected, did the same.
    Jepjep was built on the southern tip of Moliki, which was first in a little string of eastern-ish islands that boasted snow-capped peaks. The hills started to rear up almost at the water’s edge—the city was built on one that was shallower than most. Brightly painted wooden houses grew fancier and fancier as they got higher off the water, and then there was a band of green around a small hut that had to be the storm temple.
    “Better put those silks back on,” said the Captain, snorting at Shina’s openmouthed silence. “You’ll find a cleaner bed at an inn if you look nicer.”
    “Are we staying overnight, then?” Shina raised her brows.
    The Captain looked at her with wide eyes and a flat mouth. “You wanna get gone in a hurry, don’t you?”
    Shina looked at the ground.
    “Well, what do you want here?” She clicked her tongue. “New clothes, I bet—get your hair changed.”
    “I just need to visit my sister,” Shina blurted. “She—she won’t be able to help me, but I need to
see
her, all right?”
    “Fine.” The Captain put her hands up and backed away. “As long as you keep the money coming, my ship is yours.”
    They didn’t speak to each other as the Captain moored the ship to the dock at its east end; when the first mate came up to help her, he communicated only in grunts. They were one of only a few boats tying up in Jepjep that morning. The threat of the Dragon Ships had been keeping boats away from ports like this one, where there was no Prefect rich enough to keep a private navy. Storm temples all around the islands had learned a cruel lesson in how powerless they were against the raiders. Once their natural eyes were replaced with windstones, they lost the ability to create the kind of freakish weather that could destroy ships and ruin towns. They could only aid the Prefects’ warriors—and the Prefects didn’t have enough swords to guard ports
and
temples.
    “I won’t be long,” Shina said to the Captain as she put her shass set back on. You could tell she’d stowed it, but it wasn’t too much the worse for being hung up down below.
    “Good,” said the Captain. “You can help us get the