Page 118 of Seaborn and the Seven Seas

He pressed his palm flat against the wall and closed his eyes. A long, still moment passed, then the section of the brick wall opened to a courtyard.

Rowhan curled his fingers into his palms, jaws clenched.

The roots pushed up through the stone floor, cracking through the surface, coiling around ankles before the guards could register what was happening. One shout, cut short. The thuds of ten bodies hitting stone. Then silence.

“Come,” Rowhan said.

We moved passed the guards pressed flat against the walls by roots that held them with implacable strength. One of the soldiers was still trying to shout through a root coiled across his mouth. His eyes went wide when he saw us emerge from the brick wall like something the earth had grown.

Three more soldiers poured through the far gate before we’d crossed half the courtyard.

Fraya reached the first one before he’d drawn his sword, driving her elbow into his jaw with a crack that dropped him, and stepped over him without breaking stride. The second came at her from the left and she caught his sword arm, twisted, and put him into the wall with enough force to crack the stone behind his head.

Minha moved like water finding the fastest path downhill. Quick and silent, her shell dagger finding the gap in armor that she always seemed to see. The third soldier lasted four seconds.

Jina took the fourth.

The soldier came from behind a pillar, blade already swinging, and Jina—not the hesitant sidestep of someone afraid, but certain, ducking under the arc of his sword and driving her palm into his chin with a force that snapped his head back. He crumpled.

She looked at her hand like she’d surprised herself.

“The sea in your blood,” I reminded her.

She blinked, then straightened. “Right.”

Rowhan was already sprinting toward the far corridor, one hand still pressed against the wall, reading the stone. We followed him down two flights of stairs and into the lower level, the air growing colder with each step, the torches burning farther apart until the darkness between them swallowed whole sections of the passage.

The cells were ahead. The same cold damp and old straw smell of every place people were kept against their will. My stomach tightened.

Rowhan stopped at the first gate.

Empty.

The next. Empty.

Every cell on the corridor was empty. Just the dirty hay and no sign of life.

My throat tightened at the last empty cell.

“She moved them.” Calroy’s voice came from behind me.

“This feels like a trap.” Fraya gripped the bars.

“I agree.” Minha tightened her dagger.

“Is there more than one dungeon?” Jina asked.

Rowhan was about to speak when Palto came around the corner dragging a guard by the collar, roots still coiled around the man’s arms and legs, eyes wide and white with terror.

“I found him conscious at the end of the corridor,” Palto said, releasing him at Calroy’s feet.

Calroy crouched in front of him, the air crackling like lightning from his power. The guard’s breath caught, his whole body going rigid, unable to look away.

“The prisoners.” Calroy gritted the words through his teeth. “Where are they?”

“I—the queen—” The man swallowed, struggling against the roots coiled around his arms. “She took them with her to the shore.”

“How many soldiers are with the queen?”