The Underground Witch (Incenaga Trilogy) (16 page)

A pirate charged toward Emmeline from her right, his dagger held above his shoulder as if he were going to swing it like an axe. His arm thrust forward and the dagger flew toward her, spinning around and around with blinding speed. Emmeline jerked her hand up and the dagger froze in the air, its tip pointed at her neck. The pirate’s eyes widened and then he took a step back.

Without touching the dagger, Emmeline brought her
hand near its hilt and turned her wrist. The dagger rotated in the air until pointed at the pirate. She held it there, her gaze boring into his. If he took one step closer, she’d hurl it into his chest. The pirate’s eyes widened further and then he dove over the rail.

Emmeline dashed
to the rail, but the pirate had already hefted himself partway up a rope hanging off the pirate ship. Emmeline stretched her arm forward and directed just enough heat toward him to flip him over. He screamed as he fell, but before the sea could claim him, she whipped her arm in a tight circle and the rope spun around his ankles. He dangled like a spider caught in its own web.

Emmeline spun around
to face the battle just as a pirate twice her size barreled toward her, his bloodied hands gripping a cutlass. Emmeline thrust her palms down and the deck between them caved in, creating a gaping hole large enough for four grown men to fall into. With his momentum propelling him forward, the pirate couldn’t stop himself before he disappeared into the hole. At the last second, he threw his hands out and caught hold of her ankle.

Emmeline gasped
. Her foot jerked forward and her heart stopped as she plummeted into the dark hold. With only a fraction of a second before she hit the bottom, Emmeline flung a wall of heat below her to catch her fall, but she misjudged the distance between herself and the floor, and the bottom of the ship exploded into the sea, pulling the pirate toward its depths. He clawed at the floor, but the pressure proved too strong and his scream silenced as the gaping hole swallowed him like a giant fish. Emmeline had just enough time to duck to the side before the pirate swept away and a gush of water pushed through the hole.

Pressing
herself against the far wall, Emmeline cringed as the sea spread toward her like fingers made of ink. If the water reached her, it would smother the heat within her and she would be left powerless. Now that she had tasted the thrill of a flame again, she wasn’t sure she wanted to feel the cold emptiness when it was gone. Or the helplessness.

Wood began breaking away from the hole and the
sea surged with renewed strength. Hoping she could push it back, she sent heat toward the water only for it to bubble and steam. The room filled with a heavy heat she didn’t like, a heat that filled her lungs with wet uselessness.

With water
reaching the soles of her boots, Emmeline knew she had seconds before it seeped in and stole her power. She turned around and drove a fistful of heat into the wall until the wood buckled and shot into the next room. She climbed through and turned a full circle, but saw nothing more than dark walls and dark corners.

The crack of splintering wood pierced her ears and she knew the sea had eaten away at the hole. The ship groaned as it took on more water and before Emmeline could find a way out of
the room, water began spilling through the opening in the wall, splashing onto her dress.

Emmeline swayed,
her mind swirling. How much heat did she have left? She closed her eyes and felt for the fire she hoped was still burning on the ship. She felt nothing.

Desperate to get away from the water, Emmeline punched another hole into the opposite wall and leapt through. Without breaking stride, she threw both hands
forward and broke through the next wall in front of her, and the next. She tore from room to room, breaking through wall after wall as she searched for an exit, her power draining until she could not longer think straight.

After blasting through six or seven rooms,
Emmeline fell to her knees. She needed fire. She needed strength. Closing her eyes, she searched again for the fire that would sustain her. Her heart caught a spark of heat and she sucked it in greedily, sensing the direction from which it came.

Punching through one last wall, she came face to face
with a set of stairs caught up in a blaze. She breathed it in like a drowning victim finding air just before death. The flames danced toward her, seeming to surround her in a warm embrace. She smiled and stepped forward. The fire engulfed her, filling her with power and asking for nothing in return.

With her strength renewed, Emmeline dashed up the stairs and emerged
with her arms swinging. Pirates fell away from her, smashing into walls and against the rails. She sent barrels rolling down the deck, knocking them down before they realized what was coming. But there were too many of them to fight off one by one. Slicing her arm in a wide arch from left to right, every soldier, pirate and sailor fell to the ground. A heartbeat of silence passed before they realized what had happened and all eyes turned to her.

Narrowing
her focus to the pirates, Emmeline raised her hands high above her head. A steady stream of heat left her palms, coursing in the direction of her choosing and lifting the pirates one by one. At first they yelped in surprise and then they flailed about like fish on hooks, cursing and shouting obscenities as they rose higher than the sails.

“Drop your weapons!” she shouted.

A chorus of curses rained down upon her.

“Drop them or I’ll burn them from your hands.”

A few cutlasses dropped, but the majority remained in the hands of the pirates, their glares less sure.

Emmeline pointed
at each of their weapons and the pirates gasped in pain. Dozens of swords and pistols fell to the deck, their grips glowing red. Only one pirate remained armed - a pirate with gloves and a pistol. He pointed the barrel and pulled the trigger, but Emmeline had already melted the muzzle closed. The pistol erupted in his hand and he shot backward in the air, out of Emmeline’s reach and into the sea.

Emmeline turned her attention
to the remaining pirates, their bodies drenched in sweat from her heat, or from their own fear, she could not tell. Supposing a group would be easier to handle, she gathered them in the air like fish in a net. They flapped their arms and pushed against one another, but it was a silent struggle as none of them seemed to want to elicit any more attention from her.

The soldiers
stared at her with wide eyes and open mouths. Emmeline smiled. The fighting had ceased and if she could hold the pirates long enough, she figured they could come to some form of an agreement. Tiergan was a convincing man; surely he could talk his way out total annihilation.

Smoke billowed out from the stair opening and Emmeline knew that if
the peace talks took too long, she could gather more heat from the fire raging below. She lifted the pirates higher, readying herself for Tiergan’s approach.

“Are you in control
?” Mahlon whispered in her ear.

Emmeline jumped and the pirates shrieked as
she let them slip a little. Refocusing her efforts, she lifted them higher.

“Go away, Mahlon,” Emmeline said with a clenched jaw. Her eyes never left the pirate jumble
but her insides ached to run away. “Or I’ll send you up there in the middle of the pirates. I doubt they’ll let you live for long.”

“Look at me, Emmeline,” he said.

The fire surged behind him and she felt herself pull on the heat in response. Her heart beat against her chest. This was the moment Mahlon had been waiting for, the moment he hoped would come when he saw the pirate ship. A chance to take her for himself.

O’fin scurried out from underneath the crate and Emmeline’s breath caught in her throat. He would get killed if she lost control. Before she could shout for him to go back, Mahlon snatched her wrists together and clutched them in a grip so tight his fingers turned white. The motion sent the pirates hurtling through the air and into the sea below. Emmeline gasped. How
could she have let him take her wrists? Within seconds he had her wrists tied together with a thick leather strap.

T
he urge to take on more heat overwhelmed her senses. Mahlon wanted her and the fire beckoned her to obey. As she pulled at the fire, the smoke from below seemed to blow toward her like a hot oven. More. More. She needed more.

Mahlon laughed
as his gaze bore into hers.

The fire swelled within her, b
urning her from the inside out. With her hands bound, she had no way to release it, no way to ease the pressure building inside her. At any moment her eyes would explode with light and he would claim her. She tried to squeeze them shut, but for whatever reason, her eyelids would not obey. She was powerless to stop him.

Out of the corner of her eye, Emmeline
thought she saw Demyan rushing toward them, followed by a bulky figure she could only guess was Tiergan. Mahlon glanced at the two men, breaking his gaze for half a second. Emmeline blinked and did the only thing she could think of. Throwing her shoulders back, she pulled Mahlon and herself overboard.

Emmeline sunk into the ocean’s depths, both relishing and missing the release of power from her body. Mahlon could have no hold on her now, not while she was sopping wet. Never did she think she would be so grateful for the one anomaly in the Incenaga’s power. It had left her feeling powerless when Mahlon had escaped all those months before, but now, it had saved her.

She
looked up through the clear water to see Mahlon’s legs treading at the surface. Her blood boiled with hate. She loathed the man and all he stood for. He would stop at nothing to control her. With only a few strokes between her and Mahlon, Emmeline braced herself for a struggle. But a long, lean body plummeted between them, dragging Mahlon under with him.

Emmeline
kicked to the surface, stole a quick breath and dove back under. She recognized the other fighter at once. Demyan. He twisted and moved as if the water held no restraint, while Mahlon thrashed and kicked, his blows weakened by the ocean’s weight.

Within a matter of seconds, Demyan had his
and arm twisted around Mahlon’s torso and the other wrapped around his neck. Mahlon squirmed and a stream of bubbles left his mouth as he shouted garbled words. Demyan noticed Emmeline watching and caught her gaze. He grinned and Emmeline flinched. Something about Demyan’s expression spoke of a darkness she’d never seen before. He jerked his chin up and pulled Mahlon to the surface.

Keeping
her distance, Emmeline followed.

“Do you want the honors?” Demyan said
when she resurfaced. He pulled Mahlon’s head back to expose his neck.

Mahlon squirmed and spat in her direction.

“Not like this,” Emmeline said. As much as she hated Mahlon, she didn’t want to murder him. She’d much rather he rotted in prison. It seemed a more appropriate sentencing, especially after he had forced her father to endure the cruelties of prison.

“Very well.” Demyan said.

Emmeline turned toward the ship, but a loud snap brought her attention back to Demyan. With a wicked glint in his eyes, he released Mahlon’s body to the sea.

“What did you do?”

“His worth decreased the moment we extracted you from Dolmerti,” Demyan said. He jerked his chin toward the lowering ladder.

“So
, you broke his neck?”

Within a blink of an eye, Demyan was inches
from her. “I did you a favor,” he said as he yanked the leather strap off her wrists.

“
I could have handled him myself.”

Demyan’s eyes turned black.
“Get up the ladder. There are pirates in these waters.”

Emmeline
glanced around her and grimaced. She had forgotten about the pirates she’d dropped into the water. While six or seven of them remained content to search for something to float on, the rest had begun swimming toward her. Emmeline didn’t need another excuse to get away from Demyan. She swam toward the ship, grabbed the ladder and hauled herself up.

As she climbed, the sound of Mahlon’s neck snapping echoed in her mind over and over.
She couldn’t believe he was dead. After all this time, after all the struggle she’d endured because of him, Demyan had ended it with a quick twist. She felt cheated somehow, and yet still relieved, satisfied even. He was gone.

S
crambling over the railing, she caught sight of what looked like the captain of the pirates emerging from the stairway, his arms full of loot. He coughed and then stood dumbstruck as he took in the scene. All his men had disappeared in a battle he must have believed would be a certain victory.

“Where be yer
Capt’n’! I’ll slit his throat!” he shouted, dropping everything but his sword.

Demyan pulled himself over the railing and
strode toward the pirate.