The Stormbringer Saga - Daughters of Flood and Fury E-Book

Gabriella Buba

• Herausgeber: Titan Books
• Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025

Beschreibung

This powerful sequel to Saints of Storm and Sorrow brims with unruly magic and pirates, moon-eating dragons and sizzling Sapphic romance. Enthralling Filipino-inspired fantasy for fans of The Hurricane Wars, R.F. Kuang and Tasha Suri. Five years after the fall of the Palisade in Aynila, the Codicíans are closing in with a vast armada. Lunurin and Alon have been working desperately to solidify their alliances across the archipelago, but petty rivalries, suspicion, and conflicted loyalties threaten to undermine their efforts. To stand any chance, they must unify the disparate factions of their forces at the festival of the eclipse, when the laho will swallow the moon, and the islands' magic will be at its strongest. Inez has been training as a tide-touched healer, but the gentle side of her goddess's gift does not come naturally to her. When she hears rumors that her sister, Catalina, has returned to the archipelago, Inez embarks on a dangerous journey over the sea. Aboard a pirate ship, she meets the fierce firetender Umali, who has no fear of her own power, and burns brighter than anyone Inez has ever known. Yet Inez worries her untamed, hungry magic may prove too much even for a pirate captain, and the threat of the Codicíans' return hangs heavy over both their heads. Three goddesses stand ready to fight. But without human allies, even their power may not be enough to keep Aynila and the archipelago free.

Leseprobe

Contents

Cover

Praise for the Stormbringer Saga

Title Page

Leave us a Review

Copyright

Dedication

Prologue Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

1Inez ng Dakila

2Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

3Alon Dakila

4Inez ng Dakila

5Alon Dakila

6Inez ng Dakila

7Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

8Inez ng Dakila

9Alon Dakila

10Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

11Alon Dakila

12Inez ng Dakila

13Inez ng Dakila

14Alon Dakila

15Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

16Inez ng Dakila

17Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

18Inez ng Dakila

19Alon Dakila

20Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

21Inez Domingo

22Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

23Inez Domingo

24Alon Dakila

25Inez Domingo

26Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

27Alon Dakila

28Inez Domingo

29Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

30Inez Domingo

31Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

32Inez Domingo

33Alon Dakila

34Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

35Alon Dakila

36Inez Domingo

37Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

38Inez Domingo

39Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

40Inez Domingo

41Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

42Alon Dakila

43Inez Domingo

44Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

45Alon Dakila

46Inez Domingo

47Alon Dakila

48Inez Domingo

49Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

50Inez

51Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

52Inez

53Alon Dakila

54Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

55Inez

56Alon Dakila

57Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

58Inez

59Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

60Alon Dakila

61Inez

62Lunurin Calilan ng Dakila

63Inez Buwaya

Acknowledgments

About the Author

PRAISE FOR

THE STORMBRINGER SAGA

“Gabriella Buba writes the way the ocean moves: rhythmic and rolling, with dark currents and a powerful grace… elegantly weaves the rich tapestry of Filipino folklore into a poignant, harrowing tale of magic and rebellion and sacrifice. Every page is drenched in the pain and hope that characterized our centuries-long struggle. This is fantasy at its finest, but it's also a story about us, and about how my love for you is one with our love for the motherland.”

Thea Guanzon, New York Times, USA Today and Sunday Times bestselling author of The Hurricane Wars

“A vicious examination of the struggles a colonized culture must endure to survive, bundled in a devastating storm of rage, grief, and lost love. Love, betrayal, incredible worldbuilding, and righteous female rage… hell yeah!”

Rebecca Thorne, USA Today, Sunday Times and Indie bestselling author of Can't Spell Treason Without Tea

“A story of secret identity and concealed powers through a magical mixed kid’s double life—the narrative architecture of Filipino folklore crashing against the rise of colonial power—I’m obsessed and so glad there’s more of Buba’s story to come.”

Maya Gittelman, Reactor, “Reviewer's Choice: The Best Books of 2024”

“Action, magic, romance... An unforgettable story filled with inspiration from myths across the Philippine islands. Crafted with exquisite detail that will resonate with fantasy fans—from those seeking new adventures to those like me, aching for the familiar.”

K. S. Villoso, author of The Wolf of Oren-Yaro

“I am feral for this book. Buba has written a sublime, devastating tale that crackles with romance, dazzles with political intrigue, and snarls with the pent-up fury of those who suffer under colonization. And that fury must be released… will hook you from its tumultuous beginning, draw you into a richly realized Filipino world, and crush you with emotion.”

Mia Tsai, author of Bitter Medicine

“With prose as immersive and bracing as a sea storm… Readers will be swept away by Lunurin’s struggles as she is torn between the life she’s building under the bonds of colonial rule and a vengeful goddess pounding at her mind’s door. This aching, rage-soaked novel is a must-read.”

Nicole Jarvis, author of A Spell for Change

“Weaves an unforgettable journey into a world where gods walk among mortals and even the quietest whispers can spark a revolution. The thrilling action and complex characters provide a springboard from which Buba masterfully delves into the nuanced relationship between the colonizers and the colonized. Lush, vibrant, and spellbinding—this folklore-inspired fantasy gripped my imagination (and my heart) from the beginning and never let it go.”

Kyla Zhao, author of Valley Verified and The Fraud Squad

“An absorbing, compelling story of resistance and determination, offering fantasy readers a richly detailed world full of characters with exceptional emotional depth. Buba is a powerhouse, providing an unflinching examination of colonialism and the full range of tenderness, loyalty, and pain in the complex relationships between her characters, all with equal skill.”

Faye Delacour, author of The Lady He Lost

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Daughters of Flood and Fury

Print edition ISBN: 9781803367828

E-book edition ISBN: 9781803367835

Published by Titan Books

A division of Titan Publishing Group Ltd

144 Southwark Street, London SE1 0UP

www.titanbooks.com

First edition: July 2025

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead (except for satirical purposes), is entirely coincidental.

© Gabriella Buba 2025

Gabriella Buba asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

EU RP (for authorities only)

eucomply OÜ, Pärnu mnt. 139b-14, 11317 Tallinn, Estonia

[email protected], [phone]

To all the ones who survived but healed wrong.They broke our halos so we grew teeth.

Also by Gabriella Bubaand available from Titan Books

SAINTS OF STORM AND SORROW

PROLOGUE

LUNURIN CALILAN NG DAKILA

FOUR AND A HALF YEARS AFTER THEFALL OF THE PALISADE IN AYNILA

The flash pan’s spark glittered deadly bright as the pistol rose toward her. Lunurin’s throat burned, her goddess’s words ringing in her ears.

“Even you, in your battened fortress, are not greater than the typhoon. Leave in peace or be shattered. My storm will wipe the scourge of your greed from land and sea.”

Alon threw himself between her and the raised weapon, her husband once more using his body as a shield.

Not again. She’d not risk losing him to Codicían treachery again.

Anitun Tabu’s promise burned within her, singing lightning quickness into her blood. Lunurin moved just before the eardrum-shattering bang. She counted the space between powder flash and thunder, like lightning under an oncoming storm, as she hurled herself and Alon down. Heat and pain streaked across the back of her neck as the bullet and sound caught up, reverberating in Lunurin’s lungs.

The Stormfleet delegate that Calilan had sent collapsed beside them, heart’s blood staining her malong’s red and yellow folds to black. Lunurin saw the moment Alon gave up trying to hold back the tide. Blood gushed across the floor, warm on Lunurin’s skin. A stopped heart could be restarted, but not one that had been shot through. Not now, in the middle of a fight, and so far from the sea.

Lunurin released her grip on the lightning in her own blood. It exploded outward, Anitun Tabu’s fury writ large, burning the air and stopping hearts. The Codicían governor crumpled, as dead as the woman he’d shot.

The echo of divinity was still in Lunurin’s voice, raising the hairs on the back of her neck with static charge. “No peace, then.”

It had all been going so well. Diplomats from across the archipelago had gathered in a show of unity to negotiate the release of Talaan’s tide-touched captives in exchange for a few of the “missionary” spies the Codicíans kept smuggling into Aynila. Lunurin had been sure they were making progress with Talaan’s Codicían governor—until through the window, they had all seen a contingent of the Aynilan navy sailing into the bay alongside Stormfleet ships and opening fire on Talaan’s shipyard.

The culmination of years of Aynila’s alliance building, their efforts to prove the archipelago could negotiate peacefully with the remaining Codicían territories on equal terms, shattered as cannon fire exploded around them.

Blood ran down her neck, splattering across Alon’s full lips, still parted in shock or the last-ditch effort at diplomacy she’d interrupted when the governor drew his gun.

“Jeian,” Alon muttered his brother’s name, half-curse and half-explanation of how months of negotiations had ended in a puddle of heart’s blood. His arms came around Lunurin, his power flowing over the wound, cool with salt healing. He met her burning gaze, steady as ballast. His strength was a storm surge. Divine fury roared through her, turning the clear skies overhead dark, thunderheads spiraling together like schooling mobula rays.

Despite their best efforts, today would not end in peace. But it would not end in defeat. She would not allow it. They would not falter.

Alon’s determination met hers, and they both surged to their feet. “Together,” Lunurin promised.

“I’ll cover you.”

Bamboo flasks and gourds hidden among their delegation burst open as Alon dragged every drop of saltwater in the room toward him. They moved as one, pressed back-to-back, Alon facing the soldiers leaping to the governor’s defense, Lunurin the open capiz shell windows and the fire fight upon the bay.

“What are they thinking, attacking like this, in the middle of the negotiations?” one of the delegates cried.

“Get down!” Lunurin urged.

But Alon’s rising wave brought all bullets to a standstill. They should never have agreed to meet so far from the sea.

Lunurin uncoiled her hair and dragged down the storm. Rain slashed through the air, shattering the surface of the sea into a white haze, hiding their ships. Let them try to pick out targets without sightlines.

She returned her attention to escaping the death trap she and Alon had led their allies into.

Lightning danced like cloth-of-gold over her hands. She coiled and struck as Codicían soldiers swarmed into the room like termites. Men in polished metal armor fell smoking, burnt flesh acrid in her nose. Rainwater sloshed across the floor, and Alon upended a pouch of salt at his hip, extending his power over the water. He sent a rolling wave across the floor and down the stairs, sweeping soldiers away before the flood.

“Out! Before they rally and we’re trapped away from the sea,” Alon ordered.

Alon’s bodyguard Litao herded their party before him as Alon and Lunurin cleared the way.

They fought down toward the docks, tearing the last Codicían shipyard in Lusong asunder around them, exposing its soft innards to the might of Lunurin’s storm.

At last, they made it to the jetty where their ship—still flying a white flag—lay half-sunk under enemy fire. Alon no longer had to struggle to salt rainwater with the whole bay at his back. He sang up massive waves that battered the docked Codicían ships to pieces, crumbling sea walls and fortifications like sand.

Lunurin curled her fingers through her streaming hair. Twisters touched down within the shipyard, shredding guard towers and flaring lightning-struck fires. She destroyed the final set of wall-mounted cannons, black powder igniting with a savage roar. Survivors fled toward the settlement beyond the fort walls before her ravaging cyclones and Alon’s waves. At last, the only reverberations overhead were true thunder.

The salt-soaked decks of Aynila’s and their allies’ ships burned eerily, sheets of green and blue fire mirroring the bruised underside of Lunurin’s storm. Caustic fumes and heat warped the air around the burning Stormfleet as the gods-blessed aboard struggled to quench the flames. Red-hot lead shot still glowed within the timbers, and Talaan’s lightning-struck fortifications sent their own choking black smoke into the sky. The drought here had been long, and the fortifications caught like kindling.

Lunurin wished she could turn from the terrible sight. So much unnecessary death, and for what? What had Aynila’s navy and their Stormfleet allies been thinking, putting their negotiating party and the hostages in danger? They’d gotten their own delegate killed. No doubt all Calilan would soon blame Lunurin for failing to save her—failing to save all the Stormfleet ships now perfuming the air with their smoke.

They’d been lucky to escape. No, not lucky—gods-blessed. Unlike the delegate from Calilan.

But there might still be lives to save in all this ruin.

“The hostages.” Lunurin voiced her fear in a rasp, the air thick with stinging smoke.

Alon’s knuckles and the cool bands of his brace brushed her nape. He lifted her drenched black curls out of his way to inspect the graze he’d hastily healed, then pressed his lips to her temple, his relief palpable. “There’s still a chance. The Codicíans might not have had time to retaliate.”

Lunurin’s eyes burned. Their ally’s blood still stained her skirts, unmoved by the drenching rain. “We were making progress. The Codicíans were going to release the tide-touched. Why—?” Her head throbbed. She still couldn’t grasp how it had all gone so wrong so quickly.

“Jeian…” Alon said again in weary resignation. He pointed with his lips at a sailed guilalo headed toward the jetty.

“I will burn him to the waterline myself!” Lunurin spat.

“I won’t stop you,” Alon promised.

It was so unlike him that despite herself, Lunurin laughed, then coughed as the caustic air hit her throat. No matter what, through it all, she had Alon beside her. Together, they could face anything.

She caught his bad hand on the back of her neck, tracing her fingers up his arm, brushing salt and ash from his deep brown skin. She ran her fingertips down the side of his face, pushing back the strands clinging rain-wet to his brow and cheeks, escaping the gold and pearl cuff at the nape of his neck. Black stubble stood out on his upper lip and there were dark circles under his eyes. Tense hours over the negotiating table had made his cheekbones sharper, his features hollowed. She cradled his jaw, seeking his warmth and the reassuring thrum of his pulse. They both needed a long bath and sleep—not a battle they’d faced unarmed, with no warning. What if she’d been a breath slower?

“You frightened me. What would I do if you were shot?”

Alon turned his face into her touch and kissed her palm. “You forget you bleed as well as any mortal, even with your goddess burning in your eyes.”

His hot breath and faint stubble tickled her fingers. She wanted to drag him closer—

“Is this a honeymoon for you two?” There on the deck, his ship miraculously unharmed, stood Jeian Dakila, leader of Aynila’s navy and Alon’s eldest brother, interrupting as usual.

Jeian shared Alon’s height and bearing, but he’d picked up the southern archipelago’s affinity for ink. Geometric blue patterns stood out on his bare chest, ringing his arms and legs like the spotted banding of a maral leopard cat. He leaped easily to the jetty, his tide-touched wife Aizza guiding their ship smoothly into a berth.

“We never signaled any need for support.” Lunurin swept a hand behind her toward the ruined fort.

“I assumed the lightning was a signal.” Jeian was far too pleased with himself, and not nearly bloodied enough. Some of Aynila’s ships were sinking too, but the fort had fallen, and that was all he cared about.

“Liar! I didn’t call the storm until you attacked,” Lunurin cried, furious that he was trying to shift the blame for this to her.

“What if the San Vincente had still been here? Or Lunurin had not been? We would have died, all of us and our allies, and for what? A garrison of a hundred soldiers?” Alon demanded.

“But she was. And now we’ve secured the nearest rally point for any future attack on Aynila, and ensured Lusong’s gold will not finance her reconquest. With this shipyard, and the recent rebellion in Masbad, the richest regions of the archipelago have thrown off the yolk of Codicían control. This is a triumph.”

“They tried to kill us all,” Lunurin reiterated.

“Don’t fret. Aizza will have you all good as new before we’re in sight of Aynila. And Alon’s spies let me know the San Vincente had already left for Sugbu,” Jeian assured her.

So that was why he’d attacked. Lunurin wanted to leap for his throat, snapping like a feral dog. People were dead. Alliances that had taken years to build, shattered. And this would be a personal blow to her relationship with Calilan and her family there. Their bond had remained difficult and distant, despite years, countless letters, intermediaries, and entreaties. Lunurin was beginning to believe she would never see her family in person unless she returned to Calilan herself. She’d been trying and failing to make time for the journey in between the crises raining down on their heads. Now, with more of Calilan’s dead to blame on her… they might never forgive her.

She shook her head, leaving him to Alon. No one else had any chance of talking sense to Jeian. Instead, she urged several of the other members of the negotiating party who’d been injured in their desperate fight aboard Jeian’s ship into Aizza’s care.

“What about the priests?” Alon asked wearily. “We should leave them at the mission.”

Jeian’s smug expression didn’t waver. “I’m afraid I no longer have them in my keeping.”

Finally, Alon lost his temper. “How am I supposed to negotiate to get the tide-touched back if you keep killing off any leverage I acquire?”

Jeian spread a hand to indicate the ruined shipyard. “I hardly think we need them now. I don’t know why you keep showing them mercy when it’s clear all they’re going to do with it is rile another assassination attempt against your wife, or our mother.”

Another ship rowed up alongside the jetty. Jeian tipped his head and introduced Captain Tomás, one of the sons of Talaan’s Datu, their chief.

“My father?” Soot streaked Tomás’s face.

“He went to the mission to speak to the priests. Let us retrieve him together,” Lunurin offered.

Tomás flinched from her. “You can’t mean—the friars are holy men!”

“They won’t be harmed. We’ve come for the tide-touched. That’s all.” Lunurin reassessed her bloodied appearance, trying to appear less like a madwoman bent on killing anyone and anything that stood in her way. Not everyone dealt with her as well as Alon when she had divine rage burning in her eyes.

“The witches will be locked in the munitions building. It’s the only place far enough from the water. The holy fathers would not contaminate the sanctity of the church.” Tomás crossed himself instinctually. It reminded Lunurin of Catalina. It was her turn to flinch, if only from memory.

“Quickly,” she ordered.

Litao gestured, sending three of his men back up toward the munitions building before flames engulfed the garrison entirely.

Tomás’s voice trembled. “You’ll need to take them all and go.”

“And leave you without healers after this?” Alon frowned. “We’ll deal with the mission, if you’re worried about them.”

“The friars may have riled the situation, but the drought here has been long. When the crops withered, they said it was due to our faithlessness…” His voice died in his throat as Lunurin’s gaze landed on him.

“When the groundwater went to salt and poisoned the farm animals, they said it was witchcraft. A mob rounded up the suspects for them. My father couldn’t stop them.” He looked away, ashamed.

Along with the local healers, Talaan’s garrison had snatched up Stormfleet crewmembers who’d slipped quietly into the area to determine the number of ships the Codicíans could outfit here for a direct attack on Aynila. A day or two more in either direction and this would’ve remained a local issue. Without the Stormfleet ships desperate to retrieve their own alongside Aynila’s navy, she doubted Jeian would’ve been so quick to launch a surprise attack.

But Jeian was right about one thing. An attack on Aynila was coming. The Codicíans’ tactics had changed this year. There’d been no more outright demands for surrender and threats of the coming Reconquista, or posturing patrols from galleons that knew better than to attack Aynila alone. Somewhere, they’d learned a dangerous subtlety. Now they sent missionaries, both Codicíans and converts, trickling into Aynila like an insidious leak in their hull. Spies stirred unrest among Aynila’s converts, and orchestrated assassination attempts on both Lunurin and the Lakan. Thanks to Alon’s efforts, only once had such plans made it into—quickly thwarted—action. Still, an attack on Aynila was imminent. It was only a matter of time.

So many dead. She wasn’t ready for a return to war. Lunurin had no more fury left in her. She smiled, her face stiff and aching. “I see. Aynila will welcome them, even if Talaan does not.” She stepped aboard Jeian’s ship, turning her face upward toward the drenching rain. It felt blissful on her blistering skin. “I will leave you the rains.”

1

INEZ NG DAKILA

FIVE YEARS AFTER THE FALL OFTHE PALISADE IN AYNILA

Seawater dripped down her spine from earlier dives, making the scars on her back itch. She scanned the expectant crowd gathered on the shore and along the floating diving platform that had been built out over the oyster beds for the wet season festival.

Lunurin had finally agreed that Inez could dive last year, at seventeen. Inez had been desperate to prove it hadn’t been a mistake ever since she’d come out of the water and Lunurin had refused to take the oyster she’d chosen or fashion her mutya.

The snub had stung, even when Sina filled the space of Lunurin’s rejection, pulling the round pearl from the shell and announcing Inez as tide-touched. She’d crafted her mutya, a magnificent necklace of mother-of-pearl scales—and in a personal touch of craftsmanship only a firetender would think of, Sina had concealed a small balisong-style folded knife within the two scales cradling the round pearl pendant at the center.

A full year later, Inez couldn’t shake the feeling that Lunurin regretted her dive. What else explained the way she’d stepped back? The way she held Inez at arm’s length, even now?

If Inez could only make her see she’d been ready for the responsibility… Today she’d prove it. She knew the oyster beds better than anyone besides Lunurin. She’d prove it hadn’t been a mistake to trust her, that the old gods hadn’t been mistaken in her naming.

She’d already made one save after a child fell from the volcanic stone wave-breaker that was all that remained of the Codicían shipyard, preventing an accidental naming. Anitun Tabu’s statue had been moored upon the stones, just below the tide line, where offerings of pounded green rice, pinipig, and sampaguita garlands had been heaped by hopeful divers.

Inez waved to the three others from the healing school now stationed along the shore with the crowd. Her friend, Bernila, caught her eye and waved back.

It was the biggest change the Lakan had made when the wet season festival was revived. No one would be named until they were old enough to understand the risk and responsibility that came with being gods-blessed, and were ready to enter training in the healing school or with the metalworking conclave.

Sina was certain that this year, all the gods-blessed would be chosen firetenders. The Amihan Moon was just a week away, all the archipelago’s wild magic burning fever bright. Aynila had been preparing for months.

According to Lunurin, an Amihan Moon graced each active volcano in the archipelago just once in a generation. When the full moon, ripe with power, rested on the peak of the caldera, it became such a tempting prize that the laho would be unable to resist. She claimed to have seen the laho swallow the moon herself on Calilan as a child, and she’d taken part in the all-important rituals ensuring the hungry sea dragon spat it back out. The whole city was in a frenzy of preparations, and dignitaries from across the archipelago were expected to observe the event.

But first, the wet season namings. A shiver ran over her as Lunurin let down her hair and, together with the other katalonan, sang in the ambon. The healing school gleamed in the dappled sunlight under Lunurin’s clouds, blue-tiled roofs and multiple tiers of golden stilted-bamboo buildings making a far kinder backdrop than the Palisade ever had.

Sometimes, Inez still felt the shadow of it looming. When she stood in certain parts of the central delta and the sunlight angled just so, the raised scars on her back felt less like skin and more like so many shards of shattered glass painstakingly pieced back together, fragile, barely holding back the blood. Days like that made her feel she was about to fly apart at the seams, a deep-sea creature brought into the air.

She shoved the thought away. The Palisade was gone. Even if the Codicíans’ threats to return were growing more and more real, Inez wasn’t a helpless girl trapped within their walls. Not anymore.

As one, the katalonan cried the diver’s name to the wind. “Rosa Capili!”

The past came roaring back. Rosa? From the church kitchens? It was hard to recognize her with her long dark hair unbound and uncovered. She was still small in stature, but had shed the cling of childhood’s rounded features for a stubborn chin.

A fine rain fell across the water in a misty veil, glittering in the sun that peeked through the clouds. Inez tried to catch Lunurin’s eye, but failed. Why hadn’t she mentioned that Rosa would dive today? Lunurin’s attention was skyward, and she’d taken on that particular electric intensity she always had when Anitun Tabu was with her.

Rosa looked tense and determined, almost worried. Inez felt the shadow. The lines across her back prickled and ached, the old edges sharp, threatening to—

She did not like to dwell on her life before.

The hollow thump of running feet snapped her attention back to the water as Rosa disappeared with a splash. The pockets of shadow under the ambon played tricks across the waves, making it difficult to track her progress. Inez dropped a few rungs lower on the floating diving platform till she was up to her knees, reaching out with her other senses through the salt.

A riot of sensations rushed over her, a rogue wave breaking over her head. Inez gasped. It was overwhelming, threatening to unbalance her. A low rumble went through her bones, and she focused in on the sensation, a shield from the riot of tide and current and wave, too much sensation on her sensitive skin.

The Saliwain’s passage into the sea was a dizzying rush. Aizza and Alon had diverted it carefully around the oyster beds to keep the area calm for less experienced swimmers. Inez hoped to be so trusted one day, but Alon insisted that learning big tidal workings and the directing of currents could wait until after she’d gotten a handle on healing. Given how overwhelming just the bay felt to her, she hadn’t pushed for more. It was hard enough to control a single bangka over shallow water. How did Jeian’s wife, Aizza, handle a whole ship at sea?

The rumble came from several large saltwater crocodiles. They were circling the area, eyeing a pair of dugong with young calves grazing the seagrass nearby. But where was Rosa?

The deep-water thrum of crocodile hunting calls felt closer. The buwaya were anito themselves, little gods of the sea. They were growing fat on the offerings of the local fishermen and veneration as more and more Aynilans returned to the old ways of thanking sea and sky, and all the lesser spirits of the land and water too. But they shouldn’t be so loud. Alon insisted she shouldn’t hear them at all.

Inez tried to focus again on Rosa, on picking her quiet presence from the dozens of currents, the tide, and the noisy anito. But the bay was so alive. An overwhelming riot of feedback and sensation that pulled her in a dozen directions, making her head and her skin ache. It was too much. Alon said it should feel calming, that she only had to give into the salt and let herself be cradled, but to Inez the shallow stretches of Aynila Bay were anything but gentle.

She dropped farther into the water, up to her waist, hooking her feet in the rungs for stability. She spread her fingertips in the water, sending her awareness out across the oyster beds. Where?

She struggled to focus through all the noise, the way the waves crested over the surface, the way the currents shaped themselves over sharp edges and crannies, the myriad creatures that moved and swam and filtered and—

She felt the moment it went wrong, when blood colored the water and the crocodiles’ attention turned, directing Inez’s scattered awareness with a single-minded precision.

Salamat po, buwaya, she thanked them, and dove. Alon would say it was unwise to acknowledge them, but Lunurin would say being impolite to them was even less advisable. The sea twisted together around her body without being asked, without her direction, an almost comforting embrace that dragged her down to where Rosa had gotten her foot lodged in the razor-edged oyster reef. Inez had to resist the urge to fight against being pulled so deep so fast, her ears popping. But she couldn’t panic; Rosa was doing more than enough of that for both of them. Her frantic yanking only turned the water red faster as precious breath streamed between her lips. Inez reached her just as she stopped struggling.

Balisong knife in hand, Inez broke loose the dense aggregate of shell clasped like a set of jaws around Rosa’s calf and pulled her free, towing her to the surface.

The way up was harder. It was ridiculous that a tide-touched should feel uncomfortable in the water, but Inez couldn’t bring herself to relax with the bay’s overwhelming presence all around her, flush to her skin. It was far too much.

She found the predator-sharp attention of the crocodiles on the blood streaming into the water, a clear, unmuddied focus point. There was something about that reptilian single-mindedness that cut through the churn of the bay. She swam faster for the dive platform, reaching out for Lunurin’s hand, already extended to haul them from the water.

Her back hit the bamboo planks, yanking the bay’s turmoil from her with the familiar tender ache of her own flesh. Inez gladly would’ve stayed down, but Rosa was so still beside her.

“Inez, the water in her lungs,” Alon instructed.

He couldn’t be serious. A lesson, now? Inez’s hands began to shake.

“Inez!” Alon had his hands full with the laceration on Rosa’s leg.

No time to panic. Inez tried to push down her nerves and pressed her hands to Rosa’s chest, fingertips tracing circular motions as she’d been taught. She reached for the sea where it should not be, water in lungs. Nothing. She closed her eyes, reached harder toward the bay. But her tender skin shied away from another overwhelming deluge of sensation. Instead, her mouth filled with the richness of blood in the water as the crocodiles circled closer, ever so interested. And for a moment, the spiky thoughts and painful edges of her old wounds morphed. She was not shattered glass, but the armored scales and direct bloody-minded surety of a crocodile.

Dropping with a wrenching gasp back into her own skin, she let her hands fall. “I can’t, I tried!”

“Focus, Inez. You can do this.” Alon’s voice was steady. As if this were any other training session in the healing school. “It’s not healing. Just seawater where it shouldn’t be.”

Inez looked to Lunurin, desperate for her to intervene. She knew how much Inez struggled with healing.

But Lunurin only pointed her attention back toward Alon with her lips. “Focus.”

Inez wanted to scream. Easy for Lunurin to say. No one expected a stormcaller to heal. But everyone expected it of a tide-touched. Even the newest who came to the school could heal faster and more easily than Inez. They were quickly promoted to infirmary assistants and given more important responsibilities. Inez only failed, again and again and again, unable to feel the saltwater of blood and overwhelmed by the sea.

“Just focus on the salt,” Alon coached.

But the salt was the whole bay. A roar of sounds, sensations, and lives, the tiny spec of it in Rosa’s lungs impossible to differentiate.

She wanted to do this. But she could find crocodiles more easily than a struggling swimmer. She could feel the way their scales fit together so much better than skin. Hungry. Like she was hungry, for attention, for blood, for—

She backed away from Rosa’s still form, tearing her mind from the bay, away from the golden eyes in the water. Shut up! she wanted to scream. At Alon, at the sea, at those taunting crocodilian eyes watching her, worse even than the stares of the crowd. “Please! You know I can’t.”

The moment stretched slow as pine-pitch under the hot sun, before Lunurin stepped in, applying pressure on Rosa’s leg and freeing Alon up to clear her lungs.

Inez had failed. She’d been so sure she was ready. No one was a better diver or a stronger swimmer. But Lunurin was right. Inez couldn’t be trusted, not when it mattered.

She scrambled back, guilt pressing at the cracks in her skin, feeling fragile and furious. With herself, for failing such a basic task; with Alon, for insisting she heal under pressure; and with Lunurin, for having these impossible expectations Inez never seemed to meet. Why wasn’t it enough she’d saved Rosa from drowning? Why couldn’t Inez be enough?

Inez backed farther out of the way as the proper healers moved in. Aizza took over healing Rosa’s leg, Lunurin helping her secure the bandage. In one smooth movement, Alon pulled and turned Rosa as she coughed up sea foam and gushes of water. So much water. Inez hadn’t been able to grasp a drop.

Rosa opened her eyes, then her fisted hands. A gnarled, palm-sized shell the color of sand gleamed wetly between her fingers, more precious than gold. The dive hadn’t failed after all.

Alon helped her sit up. “Can you talk? Breathe deep for me.”

“Yes, Gat Alon.” Her voice was hoarse from near drowning, but strong.

“Good. Then choose the katalonan you wish to name you.” He indicated to her to choose between Aizza and Sina, since she’d arrived with no matriarch of her family to sponsor her dive.

Aizza was the most popular pick among divers who came alone. It was especially fortuitous to be named by a bayok katalonan, raised a boy until she’d been named tide-touched and received the Sea Lady’s calling.

After a long moment inspecting the circle of women surrounding her, Rosa held the oyster out to Lunurin.

Inez winced, waiting for the inevitable rejection, hurt on Rosa’s behalf. But Lunurin reached forward, her hands open in acceptance. Rosa beamed, placing the oyster in her hands.

Inez watched, stricken. Something ugly inside her convulsed. She dropped her head, the sharp ends of her mutya digging into her collarbone. She felt horribly exposed, all her desperation laid bare. She wanted to dive deep, deep, deep and never come up. She wanted the sea to swallow her whole. How could Lunurin do this? How could she accept Rosa, where she’d rejected Inez?

2

LUNURIN CALILAN NG DAKILA

Blood stained the golden bamboo of the dive platform red as gumamela blossoms, just as it had the deck of Jeian’s guilalo years before. Lunurin’s vision wavered briefly between past and present, between the boy Alon had been and the young woman before her now. Both half-drowned and bleeding, both so full of hope she still did not think herself capable of answering.

Anitun Tabu’s gaze was a physical weight, dense as the air before a storm broke. The agony of indecision gripped her.

“By what right can you sing down the ambon if you would reject a diver’s choice, my Katalonan?” asked the goddess of storms in the wind. But Lunurin, drowning in memory, still hesitated.

Alon’s hand closed on her shoulder, steady, always steady. “It should be you,” he murmured.

“I’m not—” She bit down, catching her frustrations and doubts between her teeth. She was not fit, not ready. No more ready than Inez was for emergency healings.

Alon’s breath was warm in her ear, his confidence in her as reliable as the tides. “You are Lady Stormbringer. Who better to cry her name to the gods’ ears?”

How could he be wrong?

In all the years since she had taken her place at Alon’s side, since she had decided to stand for Aynila, why did she waver now, when all her goddess and Alon asked of her was a blessing?

She was a tempest. But had she not also named Alon? Her rains ended droughts as well as washed fortresses into the sea. If she could not balance between, could she truly call herself a stormcaller?

She held out her hands in acceptance, trying not to notice how Rosa’s blood already painted her palms. It was not an omen. She would not let it be.

Lunurin accepted Rosa’s oyster, and Sina slid a ceremonial knife into her palm. The silver and bronze hilt fit perfectly in her hand. She gave a firm twist, and the craggy shell split to reveal gleaming mother-of-pearl, like the golden full moon cradled in her hands. The weight of her goddess’s expectation beat down like the noonday sun.

Let it be empty, Lunurin prayed fervently. Goddess mine, let this one go. This is not the year to claim another daughter. Not now, not here, not Rosa. Let her go with the tides, let her tend to fire. Let it be empty. Give her peace. A life free of the decisions a gods-blessed must make. Hear me, hear me, goddess, please.

Apprehension welled up, filling her throat as she plunged her fingers into the pale body of the oyster. Hard and slick, impossible to miss. Rosa’s pearl was golden and irregularly jagged, like lightning stretching between sea and sky. It marked her as a stormcaller.

“Rosa Capili, stormcaller they will call you, and typhoons you will face.” The traditional blessing felt far too heavy to lay on another. Especially now, at what felt like the cusp of the Codicíans’ inevitable return, a black storm gathering on the horizon whose path not even Lunurin could shift. She tried to mirror back the elation on Rosa’s face as she lifted the half-shell to her lips, eating the sacred oyster and completing the ritual. A bounty from the sea, salty as tears, sweet with regret.

Thunder boomed loud as laughter, and the sun sparkled through the rain. The goddess of storms rejoiced. All Aynila reveled in their newest gods-blessed. It was a good omen, a sign the goddess of storms blessed them still. Rosa was the first stormcaller named in Aynila in over fifty years.

But Lunurin’s dread only grew. Why now? For a whole generation there had been no stormcallers in Aynila until she washed ashore from Calilan. For that delicate balance to be in flux again did not bode well. Anitun Tabu moved quickest when the need for her vengeance was at hand.

As if to amplify all her misgivings, Lunurin locked eyes with Inez. The shock and hurt in her large dark eyes seared itself into Lunurin’s heart.

Alon leaned close, crushing her into a joyful embrace. She turned her face into his neck, afraid of what might be on her face. She didn’t want to ruin this moment for Rosa. She resisted the urge to stay hidden there forever. Why couldn’t he understand her apprehension? It was more than that she was afraid to train someone else. Even if she didn’t have a goddess burning within her, training a stormcaller in Aynila would spell disaster, just as surely as the debacle in Talaan had torn holes in the careful tapestry of alliances the Lakan had been weaving together since the fall of the Palisade. Stormcallers were always trained on the barrier islands like Calilan, so that their presence did not drag typhoons in toward the main islands. This tradition had long helped maintain the storm paths around the archipelago that the Stormfleets worked so hard to maintain.

The Stormfleet was already nursing all the distrust they could want toward Aynila, without an untrained stormcaller worsening the situation. Especially now, with an Amihan Moon so near. The power and magic of the world were hurtling toward the fevered peak of Hilaga, when the full moon would rest cradled in her caldera. With all that power at the center of the archipelago, the delicate balance that the scattered Stormfleet was already struggling to hold could easily be undone, and completely by accident.

Lunurin could not afford to fail Rosa, not even once. Not when all Lunurin’s greatest fears were coming to fruition. Just a few months after the debacle at Talaan, an envoy from the governor of Simsiman had arrived to demand the Lakan surrender Aynila and pay reparations for the Palisade and the shipyard in Talaan. Upon her refusal, they’d been informed that the Codicían Empire’s persistent funding issues for their planned Reconquista of Aynila had been resolved by a generous donation from the illustrious de Palma family.

Her father, Mateo de Palma, Archbishop of all the Codicían holdings on the Great South Sea, was in Canazco assembling an armada of galleons, by which to retake his rightful place.

Aynila needed her allies now more than ever.

*   *   *

Lunurin tried to get Alon to pull Inez aside, wanting to relieve her after two rescues, but Inez refused to leave her post. Thankfully the rest of the dives were uneventful, though almost one in five were chosen gods-blessed, an unusually high rate. That was to be expected on an Amihan Moon year. What wasn’t was that Lakan Dalisay had claimed a handful more tide-touched than Hiraya had firetenders for her metalworkers’ conclave.

Sometime between the last diver offering their family matriarch their oyster, and the Lakan announcing that the celebratory feast in honor of all those who had dived would be held in the courtyard of the healing school, Inez vanished into the crowds before Lunurin could pull her aside. Lunurin felt terrible. Inez was struggling enough to learn healing without being forced to try and fail so publicly.

She wove among the gathered festivalgoers streaming from the shore toward the healing school, trying to find Inez or any of the cohort of students she usually ran with, but with what seemed like all of Aynila spilling across onto the central delta, she couldn’t get two steps without being pulled aside.

The Lakan wanted her to offer up one last blessing for Aynila and all the divers before they began serving food in the courtyard.

Biti, who was still one of the younger firetenders in Aynila, egged several newer, if older, firetenders to try coal walking under the roasting lechon. Lunurin happily shoved Sina toward that particular disaster in the making, and walked on.

“Inez!” she called out, thinking she’d caught sight of her long black braid, but it was one of the dyers who worked at Aynila Indigo, newly named as tide-touched. Her nails were stained indigo for good luck.

“Oh yes, congratulations,” Lunurin said again. “You must find Casama, she’ll be so pleased.” Lunurin pointed the woman toward Alon’s head dye mistress and tried to hurry on—but was waylaid by Aizza, worried about the size of the crowds.

“There are just so many people out for the festival. What if you brought the rain down a bit harder? It might thin the crowds.”

The noise of the festivities was a lot, but things seemed orderly enough in the courtyard. “Alon has guards handling security, and I’d hate to dampen the atmosphere beyond the traditional ambon.”

“But—”

Alon pulled her away from his sister-in-law. “I’ll be back with you, Aizza. I need Lunurin a moment.”

“We shouldn’t…” Lunurin protested none too loudly as Alon whisked her out of the cheerful mayhem of the courtyard into the privacy of a kalesa, woven anahaw curtains drawn to keep out the rain.

She put her hands over her face and breathed, her head spinning from all the noise and being pulled in so many different directions. What she needed was to find Inez!

Alon’s hands were cool, gathering the long curtain of her hair off her back, twisting it up in that perfectly deft and gentle way he had and securing it with her pearl hair prong. Lunurin reached for him, pulling him close, thankful he’d seen without her saying a word that she needed a breather. She drew her hands down his back, reveling in his solidity and strength, breathing in the salt breeze and fresh indigo dye of his silk barong.

“Were you able to find Inez?” Lunurin asked into his shoulder.

“Isko saw her headed home. She was up as early as you preparing the oyster beds. You both deserve to call it an early night. No one will notice,” Alon promised, signaling to the driver.

Relief crested over her, and she let herself relax fully into Alon’s side. They’d find Inez together, and somehow make it alright.

Things had been going well with Inez’s training—or so she’d thought until a few months ago, as more and more of the tide-touched who’d dived at the same time as Inez had been promoted to junior healers in the infirmary, leaving Inez ever more desperate to prove she wasn’t falling behind.

“You shouldn’t have pushed her to heal Rosa. She didn’t deserve to fail so publicly.”

“She’s ready. She needs a push.”

“Alon—” Lunurin cut herself off. She’d been trying so hard not to undermine Alon’s efforts. Inez had been chosen tide-touched. Her path would be different, and Lunurin wanted that for her. Alon knew better what a young tide-touched needed than she ever could. Lunurin stared out of the kalesa, which had slowed to a crawl as they began crossing the bridge over the Saliwain River. It seemed all of Aynila was out in their festival finest, some crossing, some browsing the stalls decked in flowers and brightly colored canopies that lined both sides of the bridge.

Alon squeezed her hand, tracing a fingertip over the face of her wedding ring. “I’ll talk to Inez. She does so well with everything else. She’s able to tune in to the sea in a way I’m envious of at times. But…”

Lunurin turned back to him as he lifted her hand in his and kissed her knuckles, then her ring. As if she hadn’t worn it every day for the last five years. It was hard to imagine it’d been so long, when he still looked at her like she was the sun at the center of his universe.

She tightened her grip, using the tension of their joined hands to pull him in for a kiss, his lips so soft and full, the heat of his mouth a revelation she never tired of.

The kalesa came to a complete stop and Lunurin pulled back reluctantly, for the sake of propriety.

“But?” she prompted, smiling with quiet promise into the heated focus of Alon’s gaze on her mouth.

Alon shook himself, returning to the conversation. “But she’s been stalled with healing for months. Aizza thinks it’s normal and she’ll work through it in her own time. But it’s been so long. I thought if I gave her a real application instead of just a class or demonstration… but you’re right. An emergency wasn’t the right push.”

“Not everyone does better under pressure.”

“You do.”

Lunurin groaned. “Only you would think so.” It seemed a cruel joke that she should feel surer of herself and her tie to her goddess when Codicían cannon fire mingled with the thunder than during a peaceful wet season naming festival. Would she ever feel meant for peacetime?

But that wasn’t what this time was, and the goddess in her heart knew it. This had been a long dry season between hostilities, while everyone prepared for the bloody deluge that was coming. With the fall of Talaan, Lunurin had ensured the Codicíans would not ignore the embarrassment of Aynila any longer. They were coming. It was only a matter of when they would attempt the dangerous south sea crossing.

“And we will be ready,” Anitun Tabu promised. “I will not let my people forget me so easily.”

“Rosa wants to be a stormcaller. That will make it easier,” Alon soothed.

Lunurin pressed her palms over her eyes. “That’s worse. You do understand why that’s worse, right? An overeager stormcaller is twice as dangerous as a timid one.”

“It will be a good thing. So many stormcallers have wanted to come to the rebuilt temple school. If things go well with Rosa, we could invite them, start repairing our ties with the Stormfleet, your family—”

Lunurin groaned aloud at the mention of her family who might, or might not, come to celebrate the Amihan Moon. Four previous meetings had been thwarted by bad timing or her family sending delegates in their place. Stormfleet politics or her mother’s responsibilities to her husband and her proper heirs had always taken precedence over Lunurin. She refused to be hopeful after so many disappointments.

“That would be the worst thing we could do. My mother and tiya have all but said in their letters they think the Lakan is poaching their best and that the only proper place for a stormcaller is the barrier islands or the fleet. I know they’re avoiding any meeting that isn’t on Calilan to try to force my hand. If they found out I was training a stormcaller, here in Aynila… Hay nako! I’m having a hard time thinking of a worse insult I could pay them. They might just disown me entirely.”

“Why would—”

Lunurin shook her head. “You don’t know them like I do. Especially after Talaan—most of Calilan and the Stormfleet blame me, not Jeian, for what happened. Their dead delegate, and five ships allied to Calilan sank. They think I should’ve been able to work a miracle.”

“We’ll convince them you did everything you could in Talaan. Jeian is the one who sailed them into a death trap,” Alon assured her.

She wanted to believe him. “It’s more than just Talaan. More than what my family thinks. Many of the more traditional factions don’t think I should be in Aynila, that my proper place is Calilan. After all, there hasn’t been a stormcaller here since the Lakan was a girl. They blame me for every ship lost in a storm headed toward Lusong, whether or not I’ve summoned it. They will think I’m training more young fools without a shred of control, intentionally upsetting the Stormfleet’s efforts to protect the archipelago from typhoons, like a misplaced weight in their casting nets. That won’t help mend the alliances Aynila needs, and soon.”

Suddenly, the carriage juddered sideways. The pony balked, jerking against its traces, as the crowd surged and pushed with the force of too many bodies, desperate not to get pushed into the water. What was happening? Had another kalesa’s pony bolted? Something hit the back of Lunurin’s neck, and pain arched, just as it had in Talaan. She moved without thinking, ducking and turning, lightning sparking from her fingertips. But there was no pistol, just a frightened Aynilan woman clambering free of the crush.

Alon threw himself between them and pushed Lunurin’s hand skyward, sending the skein of lightning up through the kalesa’s canopy, away from the crowd and into the roiling clouds overhead.

Screams and another rush of bodies sent the kalesa toppling back onto both wheels as people scrambled to escape the delayed crash of the lightning’s passage.

The woman fell back with a cry. She was empty-handed. There was no stink of gunpowder or the burn of the bullet across the back of Lunurin’s neck. Her instincts were screaming, but this wasn’t an attack. No assassins lay in wait, just frightened people.

More panic, as someone was forced over the edge of the bridge into the water. Alon surged to his feet, seizing the churning river current before they could be sucked under, guiding them out toward the calmer water of the bay.

Litao urged his horse into the gap alongside the kalesa, opened by the crowd’s mad scramble to escape her lightning. Shame threatened to choke Lunurin.

Alon grabbed her by the waist, lifting her over the side rail. “Go. Get clear. Bring more tide-touched. We have to get people off the bridge.”

Lunurin didn’t protest. The pure terror in the woman’s face as lightning traced deadly lines in the air between them, was seared into the back of her eyelids. In a crush of innocents like this, her power was more liability than asset. She braced her feet, grabbed Litao’s extended arm and swung herself across the gap. His compact black mare reared and pivoted neatly, breaking back toward the temple delta, where the crowds had not yet reached such a dangerous density.

3

ALON DAKILA

The kalesa rocked as another surge crushed people against its sides. Alon stepped up onto the driver’s seat, trying to see above the press. He clenched and unclenched his bad hand, shaking out the pins and needles ache from the charge of Lunurin’s lightning passing so close. He hoped Inez had not also been caught in the crush. There were just too many people. The slow wending festival gathering on the bridge had turned into a dangerous panicked tide as crowds on the Aynilan side of the river rushed toward the water and packed onto the busy bridge. A fall meant going into the water or being trampled. People were packed too tight to breathe.

He could not breathe until Lunurin was back on solid ground, clear of the crowds pushing from both directions onto the bridge. He saw her drop off the mare and begin redirecting people, off and away. Her voice carried even to him, in the loud katalonan pitch that could reach the heavens.

Litao cantered on toward the temple school complex for more help. Another surge in the crowd and a cry as more people pressed to the railing lost their footing and plummeted over the edge into the water. The wet season rains had been heavy all night. The Saliwain was running high and turbulent. With so much fresh water, it would be difficult for him alone to keep people safe if a large number went in.

Alon studied the water, tracking the swimmers, trying to determine the best place to guide them ashore. More cries rose as the crowd grew increasingly desperate. Across the dangerous mass of bodies, Alon saw his brother, Jeian, approaching the Aynilan side of the bridge. The salted indigo tattoos Aizza had given him glowed bright with power, as if he were entering battle, not causing a stampede. Alon saw a line of his warriors, recognizable by the round taming shields they’d adopted from their time sailing in the southern archipelago near Ísuga. Jeian and his men were using shield and spear to force the crowds down toward the water and onto the bridge.

Fury boiled through his veins, and Alon made a split-second decision. Lunurin would make sure the bridge was cleared. He could rely on her. Someone had to stop Jeian.

Another surge of the crowd pushed the kalesa against the railing. Alon shifted with the momentum, and dove into the water.

The turbulence where the Saliwain met the bay calmed and cradled him, the Sea Lady’s mercy a balm even now. Alon took a moment to urge the currents to slow even further, to carry every beating heart to shore. His power formed an invisible net in the water, gentling the journey to the bay.

A wave deposited him, dripping and a great deal more levelheaded, on the far shore. The crowd on the other side was still pressing onto the narrow bridge, making the situation over the water more dangerous. Alon did not let his wave falter. He dragged it with him, up and across the plaza that funneled toward the bridge. It didn’t have to be deep, ankle height would be enough. He held everyone’s feet in place but his own.

He’d thought that after the fall of the Palisade, he’d lose the ability Aynila’s drowned ghosts had to hold the living so tightly. But though those souls had passed on, Alon had been left with an ability to move and grip with the sea that went beyond what most tide-touched could achieve alone. And right now, it was a boon. But through his wave, Alon could feel Aizza’s power channeled into his brother’s tattoos, granting him the strength to tear free of Alon’s hold.

“Jeian!” Alon raised his voice, stalking toward the battle-high glow of his brother.

Another push of seawater up into the plaza, grasping his brother about the knees. But the lines and whorls of Aizza’s tattoos across his chest and arms glowed brighter yet, blue and blinding as deep water on a clear day, sending Alon’s wave cascading away from Jeian’s legs.

“Traitors! Spies! The lot of them!” Jeian declared.

Alon caught the runoff, pushing it up into a surge that forced Jeian’s men back from the crowd a few more steps. How did he expect to tell a convert from a wet season festival goer in this mayhem, much less an actual Codicían spy?

“Stand down,” Alon ordered. These weren’t his men, but with their captain clearly in a battle frenzy, maybe…

But no. Jeian’s men were sailors. They would not be cowed by a low wave. Locking shields together, they pressed forward toward their captain.

“Jeian, what is the meaning of this?” Alon cried, desperate to talk sense into his brother.

“I won’t have your peace talks now. Not after this!” Jeian snapped.

Fine. If Jeian was done talking, he’d fling his brother into the bay. Aman Sinaya could soak the battle rage out of him.

With all the grace of a tsunami dragging the tide out, Alon pulled his brother and any of his men unlucky enough to be in contact with his wave down the slope toward the Saliwain.

Except Jeian caught himself on the sturdy bamboo stilt of a building built out over the riverbank and launched himself at Alon. They went down hard, Alon’s head cracking into his brother’s skull with light-flashing force, before the water caught them both.

They were swept in a tangle of limbs out to the bay.

*   *   *

Alon was dripping on his inay’s festival silks as she bent over him, hissing in displeasure as she tended the knot on his head. Lakan Dalisay Inanialon heaved one last put-upon sigh. She looked to Isko, Alon’s foster brother and right-hand man, for a tally of the day’s disaster.

“How bad?” she signed.