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dyrewrites · 9 months ago

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Before Deluca -- deep blue nothing

Terrible plan, as it turned out.

All that wide, wet water and in the minutes, that too quickly became hours—leaning against that railing, ever-wary of splinters—I spied not a single fin or flash of scale.

Quiet as I could manage, I asked the ship, “che diavalo did that beast woman use for bait?”

My thigh answered, with a scratch against the railing drawing just enough blood to drip. And I eyed the spear in my hand, scanned the ocean before me, and realized what the Hunter must have when she sought a meal fit to fill her.

I was pulsing with bait.

Sharp, that spearhead, slicing so smoothly into my arm that I shivered with the chill of air on the wound before the pain of it registered. Pulling on more tales shared over ale, and whispered across pillows, I slipped my arm through the railing and dunked it in the sea. Sucking salt-sweet air with the sting of it, I kept alert for fins and moving shadows beneath the surface…while thrashing my arm as best I could.

My shoulder ached before I caught any shadows and teeth almost caught me, snapping a bite out of the railing as I fell back onto the deck with a foul word yelled too loudly—that luckily didn’t wake Lucient.

The shark sunk slowly back into the sea, beady black eyes watching me. And I waited for a fin, for a sign of it circling, as I retook my position at the railing—spear in hand. But no fin breached the surface. Railing to railing I checked, finding only flashes of thick shadow—wide, long, viscerally terrifying in shape and motion—and it made itself known before I braved a toss of the spear.

With a solid slam against the hull, port-side—knocking me to the deck and my spear clear to the aft—it informed me, in no uncertain terms, that I was not the predator in that situation. It peeked after, poking its nose out of the water to watch, to taunt.

Sun bright and hot on my skin, veins aching, starving—pleasant as Lucient’s blood, we were meager meals to one another—all that damned beast’s posturing managed to do was infuriate me. Keeping low on all fours I crawled for the spear, wrapped the end of its rope tight around my arm, and held the mast to wait.

It slammed again, starboard, and I spun and rushed for the railing, throwing the spear the second I saw its wide nose. When the spearhead broke through the thick hide of that overgrown fish’s back, a few things happened far too quickly to adequately describe...but I will try.

The shark dove, the loose rope chased, its end clenched tighter on my arm and I flew over the railing and took in lungfuls of icy saltwater—burning me inside and out, yet still I breathed, painful, agonizing breaths, but breaths.

Then all became shadows, deep blue shadows with something, something I knew had to be the shark swimming towards me. That name failed to capture the size of that mouth, those teeth.

Had I been a living man and not the undead abomination my mother surely would have classified me as...well, I doubt I would have escaped that first bite.

As it was, I didn’t escape the second.

I kicked and kicked and swam toward the darkening surface too far above me, but it had me by the rope, by the spear, and as I broke into open air it had my arm. It sought next to drag me back down, to thrash until it tore me open.

But, once again, I must remind that I was no man.

And I was starving.

Allowing it to hold my arm, I swung up and around to straddle its back, squeezing my fingers between those massive teeth to grip its jaw. It thrashed and flipped over and over—destroying my concept of sea and air to a nauseating degree—while gnawing on my arm. But the closer it came to the surface, the easier it became to manage its spin and I locked my legs against its gills, aiming my own teeth at the slender edge of its nose. With my bite, it jerked and dove deeper, flicking its tail fins to turn and angle straight up.

Up and up it swam, faster and faster, while I drained what raked down my throat. That blood stole the pain from my lungs as it pounded against my ears, sour and chill on my tongue yet warm as a hungry heartbeat in my veins. With it thrummed a desire to hunt, to bite and eat, to take and take and take.

And as the shark breached the water—likely looking to throw me—I’d taken all it had. It crashed back into the sea, stiff and lifeless, sinking into what had become black and endless in the setting of the sun—a fact I noticed only then.

While I, I went hunting.

There were other sharks by then, circling, lured by the glut of blood the first rent from me—wounds closed in the feeding. But they cared little for me, what with the carcass I’d sent them. Easy to pick off, had I wished it, and I did. I ached to sink my teeth into each and every one, to eat until I could fit nothing more in my maw.

But sense broke through, or rather Lucient did.

Treasure, did you go for a swim? He asked my thoughts, too far to see, to hear, I’ve been up here yelling for you for an hour…

I didn’t answer, wouldn’t yet, as his voice had interrupted the ravenous hunger but not the desire to hunt. It also reminded my blood-addled mind that he, too, would need to eat. And with all of those sharks so close—all much smaller than the beast I felled—and so thoroughly distracted…I couldn’t help myself.

Swimming to mirror their circle, somehow certain none would attack me, I singled out the smallest among them—easiest to grapple, I hoped. Its teeth were not as the last, not so easy to slip fingers between—they were a mangled mess of razor-sharp pain. So I took it by the nose, again snapping my legs tight against its gills and it immediately jerked and thrashed and made for the surface. I bit into that nose as we cleared the others, and all that blood in me begged to thrash, to swim...to leap.

I blame the peculiar strength of that blood for the absurdity that followed, as I held that shark—roughly twice my size—with naught but my teeth and leapt from the sea and onto the deck of the schooner.

Lucient was crawling, backwards, toward the cabin when I released the shark and he shouted while I held the beast still, “Qu’est-ce que c’est que ce diable!”

Smiling, painfully so, I motioned him over, “Isn't it something?”

“I thought you were fishing?” He asked, voice high, not moving to join me.

“I was,” I told him, proudly gesturing at the shark, “It is a kind of fish…”

“That is a shark, treasure,” His voice kept uneasy as he stepped closer, accepting my free hand and sidling the shark—thrashing still. “How did you even get it?”

“You didn’t see me?” Disappointment rang too clear in my voice.

And Lucient smirked as he leaned to replace my hand on the shark, eyes scanning for where I bit it, “I saw something fly out of the ocean like a crazed fish and flop onto the deck. Was that you?”

“You know it was,” I snipped, “and it was incredible.”

Finding the bite, he smiled at me, “You had an incredible moment with a fish?”

Throwing my hands up, I gestured to the fresh night sky and back to the shark, “This took me all day to catch, for you, and you're mocking me?”

“Pardon, treasure, but you're asking me to be excited there is a big ugly fish on deck,” He said as his eyes stuck on the bite, blood pouring too freely from it, “bleeding…all…over…”

Hungry, ravenous even, Lucient licked up what poured before sinking his teeth into the marks I left. Slow as the shark’s movements had become, they stopped with that bite, and I stared—likely grinning—as Lucient moaned into his meal.

“This is a new look for you, love,” I told those moans, and he stopped, not moving from the veins he suckled, “No, no, don't stop. It’s a good look. I like it.”

Turning to glare at me, he wiped off his chin and snipped, “You would.”

“But it’s incredible, isn't it?” He ignored me, but returned for more, and I laughed, “Come on, love, admit you enjoy it. That shark is in you, pulsing cold as seawater yet hot as a heartbeat…whispering its bloodlust into your own. Urging you to dive, to swim, to leap and bite.”

Pushing away from the bloodless feast, he stood, licking his lips before addressing me, “I am not diving into that pitch black water to hunt fish with you, treasure, I don't care how big those eyes get.”

Laughing again, I hefted the dead shark up and over the railing, before yanking Lucient into a hug, “Well, amore mio, we don't need to hunt to bite…”

“You’re very cute, mon amour, and while I’m overjoyed that you’re back on deck and terribly grateful for the meal,” He told my seeking lips as he met them too briefly before patting my chest, “I must figure out where we are.”

I wouldn’t let him leave my arms, warmed as he was he was cooler than me—even through his shirt—and I wanted him closer. His mind fogged when I reached for it, but I didn’t need to look to know the reason for his rush. Targets yet to find, vengeance yet to enact, and I couldn’t help but want to keep him from it. To hold him in whatever peace we could scratch together on that ship, and the laugh left my voice as I angled for that peace, “Is it really so bad to be lost?”

He narrowed his eyes at me, studying, but as he’d learned to fog his thoughts I’d learned to fill mine with pleasant images to keep him out. Lips twitching with the sight of his own face, his own naked skin, he accused as he spoke, “Teasing with those thoughts, treasure. While again you are too calm, why are you so calm? We are stranded in the middle of the ocean.”

“Mm, but we're together,” I whispered, kissing his neck.

“How saccharine of you,” he said, breathy and quiet as my lips traced down to his collar. He shoved me back, forcing my eyes to his, “but did you not wish to see the world, venture to new lands, taste new…people?”

“I want to travel with you, to visit places because you wish to show them,” I sighed, unable to soothe the bubbling joy from my blood or smooth the smile from my face, “My love, I am happy wherever I am, so long as you’re with me.”

Unfair those eyes, glittering so bright despite the furrowed brows, and he watched me for a moment before laying his head against my chest, breath puffing sweetly cool, “Perfect, you are, my treasure.”

Fighting a giggle, I asked, “Even though I fed you a fish?”

He lost his fight, giggling into the drying hair of my chest before digging his fingers into it and speaking to my warmth, “It was a very big fish.”

We wouldn’t stay lost forever—obviously, or you wouldn’t be reading this now—and he would have his vengeance, but that evening we chose to enjoy the peace and quiet of a starry night and a steady sea.

#writeblr #snippet #writing #novel #before deluca #vampire vs shark #vampire #it could probably be more tense and scary #i will work on that in revision #but this is what i got for now

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