Water, dark and icy cold, surrounded Seth. He groped for the surface, his lungs hot and ready to explode. His head stung, his vision clouded. Pain and darkness sought to overcome him. Then just when he thought his lungs would explode, he broke the surface and gasped for air.
Despair filled his mind as turbulent waters pulled him under again. Wildly, he grabbed at the surface, both arms flailing frantically. His hand found something wet and rough. He latched onto it. Coughing and choking, he held on.
The night above the water, nearly as dark as the world beneath the water, offered him little relief. Seth cursed his foolhardiness. He hadn’t expected an ambush so soon after departing Kapital and somehow Seth knew he should have. He remembered little of how he had come to be in the water. One minute he had been standing on the deck of the Lady L, Sailmaster Cagan at his side, preparing to make one last desperate stand. The next, a sharp sudden pain in his legs and then the long plunge into cold deep water.
Seth suddenly realized had no idea if anyone else had survived. He lashed out with his mind, Sailmaster Cagan? Galan?
Seth felt something pass underneath him, and then touch his legs. Fatigue, disorientation and panic overwhelmed him. Sailmaster Cagan had told him about dark beasts beneath the waters. Creatures called krens that fed on all manner of beast alike. His left arm had caught a blade and his leg—his right leg—was gouged from thigh to calf.