The sunlight reflected blindingly off the seawaters sapphire surface, scattering rays of white gold across the small boats sail and creating beautiful intricate geometric patterns that swayed in time with the rocking of the dancing waters beneath. The waves lapped lazily, almost playfully, against the side of the small ship, the breeze billowing in the sail sending the boats less than pleased occupants flying across the vast expanse of blue that stretched for miles in all directions.
"One reason," Celeste hissed, pressing Gandriel against the side of the dinghy, the sweat gleaming on her brow as the heat beat down on her from overhead, the temperature near stifling in the midmorning sun, "One reason why I shouldn't throw you overboard."
Their temporary peace had come to a resounding halt once they'd cleared the wreckage of the slave ship, known as the Queens Dame if Gandriel was to be believed, and they were now here, battle lines clearly drawn.
Gandriel had refused to take her back to Vanica to find Anelisse. Had demanded that she help him find some obscure object that was only rumored to exist and that she owed to him. Had told her she belonged to him now and would do as she was told.
He was rapidly learning that Celeste didn't take well to demands of any nature.
Especially egotistical men.
"Now, now," he said swallowing nervously, backtracking from his previous demands, his golden-green eyes glancing to and fro. His long brown jacket had long since been abandoned in the heat revealing a sweat drenched white shirt and a chiseled form beneath- "There's no need to be unreasonable like this. I did save you after all-"
"Saved me?!" Celeste roared, digging her nails into Gandriel's shirt and skin harder, willing blood to pool beneath her fingers from the infuriating jackass who was pinned underneath her, "Saved? YOU literally helped a group of slave traders steal me from my home and SISTER and then have the audacity to call yourself my savior?"
Taking advantage of Celeste's rage Gandriel slipped a foot behind Celeste's ankle and shoved backwards, effectively unpinning himself. He, however, had not accounted for Celeste's fingers still clinging tightly to his shirt as she pulled him backwards with her, dangerously rocking the boat, sending it off kilter and water splashing over into its base, soaking its occupants.
"Oh I don't think so," Celeste murmured rolling and she drug Gandriel under her, pinning him with her knees. Pulling a fist back she threw her arm forward and smashed her fist painfully into the blonde males face, blood spurting as his lip split in two.
That was now two injuries she had bestowed upon the fae male.
Throwing his face to the side, blood gushing from his lip, Gandriel looped his knees around the back of Celeste's legs before rolling her over onto her back with an umpf as he pinned her, blood trickling down his chin.
"That's enough," he demanded, feline eyes narrowing as he snarled, pinning Celeste's arms above her head, his grip somehow loose enough that it didn't dig into her still sore limbs but still kept her securely pinned, "Why are you such a stubborn ass?!"
Did he think her so weak that her his limp grasp could hold her?
"I'll show you stubborn ass," She ground out, pushing her forearms up, shoving against his pinning position. Realizing she couldn't get loose she slipped her knee between his legs before thrusting it upwards, with excessive force.
A moan of pain escaped his lips as he immediately let go of Celeste's wrists, giving her the opportunity to wriggle loose and scuttle across the boat towards the sail, fulling intending on guiding the boat herself and sailing herself south, back to Vanica and her sister, not west towards some uninhabited island that supposedly held some lost treasure and fortune.
Something that only she could find, he'd claimed so confidently, that her power would be able to reach out and find.
What lies had those slave traders fed him?
"Not a chance," Gandriel barked before tackling Celeste from behind, her body slamming painfully into the wooden seat below, his much larger mass laying on top of her pinning her while her arm remained outstretched, reaching for the ropes to the sail only lying inches away, "You're going to help me and you're going to like it."
To hell with it, Celeste conceded in her mind, she could drown him then take the boat on her own to go get Anelisse-and if she drowned with him, well that was one less miserable person the world had to deal with.
With strength that even surprised herself Celeste jerked herself upwards, tilting the boat and sloshing water, and out of his grasps. With lithe motions she turned and dove forward hands aimed for Gandriel's throat. Gandriel easily dodged and scrambled to the side Celeste following close after.
Throwing themselves violently they felt the boat rock one last hazardous time before tipping just a little too far and inevitably flipping, sending both occupants into the lapping waves beneath them.
Celeste surfaced first, eyes narrowed into angry slits and she pulled herself up on the side of the capsized boat, nails digging into the wooden surface, "I'm going to kill you, slowly."
"Ah, ah, ah," Gandriel replied sending Celeste a warning look, his hands lying flat on the bottom of the capsized boat his position across from her on the side, safety out of distance of her fists, his wet hair clinging to his face and neck, "who's going to benefit if you do that?"
They glared at one another, silence permeating the air except for the gentle lapping of waves.
"You help me," Gandriel replied, swallowing hard as he watched her like she was a wild beast needing coaxing, looking like a male who had clearly bitten off way more than he could chew, "and I will help you get your sister back, I swear it."
"Why should I trust you?" She hissed, her fingers digging divots into the bottom of the boat, curling strips of wood as she drug her nails down. Her grip was strong enough that she had enough leverage to launch herself over the capsized vessel and effectively land on the pretentious ass before her, before dragging him beneath the surface and drowning him.
"You don't really have any other options, do you?" He gestured to the endless sea around them his blonde hair clinging to his face and neck, "we're in the middle of the ocean and last I checked I was the only one who had any magic that could even get this boat moving quickly enough to avoid starvation or succumbing to the elements."
"You don't own me," She stated, the wood screeching beneath her nails as she dug out more rivets, "You don't give me orders. I help you find this damned item you so desperately need and then YOU take me back to Vanica and help me find my sister. Understood?"
"One thing," Gandriel drew, his lips puckering in that way that Celeste knew he was about spout something entirely aimed at pissing her off, sliding conveniently down the length of the boat out of Celeste's reach, "your chest looks fantastic in that wet fabric."
Celeste bellowed like a hell hound.
A day later Gandriel sat in the boat, sporting a new black eye in addition to his split lip and bloodied nose as he watched Celeste pull the sails to and fro, navigating the boat with an expertise he likely hadn't suspected of her.
"I wasn't aware you could sail." He chimed, pulling his crossed legs closer to him, his boots abandoned at the end of the boat to dry, making another failed attempt to strike up conversation with Celeste.
The same attempts he had made for the last day that they'd spent on the water together after they'd struck up another temporary truce. She had silently ignored most of his attempts but deigned to reply.
"I can do many things," She explained, effectively ignoring the male as she pulled the ropes to the left, steering the boat along the path of the wind that Gandriel was steadily feeding the sail, raven tendrils whipping free from the braid she had pulled her hair into, "seeking out magical objects is not one of those talents."
"We'll see about that," he replied, unconcerned, his eyes glancing skyward then out towards the darkening horizon as the sun began to dip below it, "the Captain of that ship was fairly certain you had the gift to find lost objects based on the report of that human male in Vanica so I'm willing to take my chances."
"Your loss when it doesn't work." She replied smoothly, trying to prevent her mind from focusing on her sister, on the fact that she had been left to the hands of Lukas Pennington.
Her skin crawled in response.
She loosed a tight breath from her chest, it had been two weeks since her capture, two weeks since Anidre's blood had soaked through her blankets on the floor.
She gritted her teeth, the image of her adopted mother haunting in her mind. Anidre had been many things but Celeste wasn't certain she would have wished such a damnable death on the woman. Not that it mattered any longer.
She felt the familiar tug of hunger in her stomach, more satiated that it was accustom to, but still annoying as she burned her reserves of energy piloting the boat.
Gandriel had not bothered to pack any supplies prior to their escape so they had been left with nothing but the clothes on their backs and a small canteen of water which they had finished hours before as they raced towards this mysterious island that Gandriel claimed held an object of immense power.
An object that supposedly would sell very well if they could claim it.
If.
The cry of gulls suddenly sounded above, and Celeste glanced up, watching as the seabirds circled to and fro. A sign that they were finally approaching land.
Gandriel whistled, pushing himself upward out of his seated position, "We're almost there."
Sure enough on the horizon a thin line of green had appeared, it's surface covered in mist and the sky above the island a muted grey color where clouds hung overhead, seeming to absorb the fading light as the sun began to kiss them goodnight.
A chill raced down Celeste's spine as she took in the island, a sinking feeling of dread raising up to meet her as she watched the stone structures begin to pop up as they approached, like grave stones shoved up from the ground, an eerie silence permeating as they grew closer. The gull's cries muted above them, the birds having flown in the opposite direction, fleeing.
Whatever was on that island was not keen on outsiders.
"What," Gandriel inquired, having risen from his seated position and leaning against the small mast next to Celeste, his eyes alight with amusement as the last of the sun's rays flared the gold in his eyes to life, "getting a little spooked by some mist and storm clouds?"
Celeste shook her head.
"Those aren't natural," she replied matter of factly, releasing her grip on the rope opening the sail and tying it through the loop on the base of the boat. Her skin beginning to prickle as the temperature dropped, something she was certain, wasn't just the effect of the fading sun, "whatever's on that island doesn't want visitors."
"Well that's most unfortunate," Gandriel said with a devilish grin, the island rising up before them as they cleared the last few miles of ocean between them and the green land, ancient ruins finally coming into focus as the lone calls of ravens echoed in the distance, "the item is supposed to be in the base of the largest ruin, guarded by wards written by the ancient fae thousands of millennia ago."
His finger came up and pointed towards the largest looming structure, centered on the tallest hill, "and my bet is that that's the one."
The looming stone structure made Celeste's throat go dry, it's cracked surface littered with green moss, it's infrastructure beginning to fail it. The energy from it seeming to warn, commanding that no one approach or touch it. It felt like a living, breathing tomb.
"You're going to have to reach out, poke around it," Gandriel continued his eyes narrowing as he focused on the island, "see if you can find any power emanating from it. The island itself should be abandoned, it's rumored that only ruins and the bodies of those who last inhabited it remain."
Celeste was certain that wasn't the case, voices beginning to call to her in the back of her mind, the way they had the night under the water when she'd dove off the cliff to rescue Marrien. Whatever dwelled here was ancient and powerful.
"Then what?" Celeste asked, the urge to whip the boat in the opposite direction and flee becoming stronger as they approached, her instincts screaming at her to run. She could make out seven dark blotches on the tower of the largest ruin, the raven's she assumed, "and what are we do to? Knock on the door?"
"We'll just have to walk up and say hello." He replied with a purr, his hand patting Celeste on the shoulder as they cleared the last hundred feet to the island, the waters becoming dead beneath them, no movement and no sign of life.
Celeste cut him a dry look, her brow rising to meet her hairline and she tried to suppress the shudder than coursed through her body at the thought of having to even step foot on the island.
The boat came to a slow stop as Gandriel's wind pushed the dinghy the last few feet to the shore and stopped as the boat stuck in the sand, it's halt a sickening groan.
The beach was simple enough, fine sand intertwined with large round pebbles that peppered the length of it, bits of shell protruding out. It was what sat above the grass overreaching the beach that left Celeste's body quaking, the mist.
It was denser than what she had detected on their approach from the ocean, darker than she had ever seen before, more like smoke, murky.
It was entirely conscious.
A chill raced down Celeste's spine as she watched the mist dance on the island's edge, moving as though it had a mind of its own, beckoning. The song and cries beginning to crescendo in the back of her mind.
Something was very much alive and aware here, as if calling it she felt it's attention snap to her, the mist beginning to move down the beach, searching.
The alarm bells screaming her mind.
Whatever it was knew they were there.
"Gandriel we really sh-"
He hopped off the boat, a resounding squish echoing from his boots, having replaced them on his feet, and began walking up the length of the beach towards the encroaching mist, completely oblivious to the wrongness of it all. Every step his took left Celeste's body screaming wrong, wrong, wrong, trespasser, outsider, leave, wrong.
Gandriel stopped and turned to face her, his insufferable grin still painted across his now shadowed face, the last tendrils of the sun having vanished beneath the horizon. No breeze even danced as though the wind died the second it touched this cursed place, "Well?" He inquired dipping his head towards the ruins, less than half a mile's hike away, "shall we?"
For Anelisse.
And, against her better judgement, Celeste stepped off the boat.