But then he wades over to her and takes her hand.
“We could have been really great,” she says, unable to stop her tears.
“I know.” He draws her hand to his lips. “I know.”
Mercy’s heart cracks and breaks. None of this is right. How can he know how amazing what they have between them is, yet let her get away like this? He could have tried harder in the tests. He could have been a Seeker.
He chose not to be.
Dropping her hand, Luca pushes the boat deeper into the water. Diesel has already returned to shore. The acid must be stinging Luca by now, but he’s not showing it.
“Bye, Luca!” calls Sam.
He gives Sam a long, hard stare, his expression impossible to read. Anguish? Worry? Regret?
Mercy shuffles over to Sam and holds her hand. “We’re going to be okay,” she says, repeating Hawk’s words.
With one final shove, Luca launches the boat forward.
And…leaps aboard.
He grins at Mercy and Sam. “You didn’t really think I was going to let you leave without me, did you?”
LUCA
“Luca!” Sam gasps in astonishment. “You’re not a Seeker!”
Luca picks up an oar. “I didn’t see a sign on the boat that says Seekers Only.”
“But…but…” Sam splutters, her rule-driven brain trying to process her brother coming along, anyway. She glances over his shoulder at the disappearing shoreline of Askala then snaps her mouth shut.
Luca’s made his decision. Passing or no passing, he’s coming anyway.
Hawk nods at Luca solemnly. “Good call.”
Luca hides his surprise. He wasn’t expecting any sort of welcome from Hawk, but he’s obviously realized that having Luca around could be useful…despite their differences of opinion.
His gaze falls on Mercy. Her eyes are alight in a way that has his heart jack-knifing.
“You came,” she murmurs.
Luca swallows. It was a split-second decision. Sam was in the boat, leaving.
Mercy was in the boat, making the impossible seem possible.
As he leaped in, he’d told himself he was doing it to keep them safe. Now, as his eyes dip to Mercy’s lips, he’s not so sure that was his only motivation.
Her tongue flicks out, moistening them. His gaze darts up, locking with hers. Luca wonders how everyone else can’t see the awareness crackling between them.
Sweet Terra, what has he done?
“Hey,” Gust calls from the adjacent boat. “The boats are uneven now!”
Four in the boat Luca just jumped in, with only Gust, Siena and Nikita in the other. Luca sighs.
Now he’s really wondering what he’s done…
“We’ll stay close together this time. It’ll be a slower trip because we have the supplies, so we’ll need to take turns rowing.”
Luca studies the stacks of urns and packages wrapped in hemp. The water laps only a few inches below the lip of the boat. The leaders obviously wanted them to have everything they needed.
Gust turns to Siena and Nikita. “Let’s share the load of rowing,” he suggests. “Siena and I can start.”
Sam frowns. “Why is he repeating you, Luca?”
Gust’s face takes on a pleasing shade of tomato. Luca’s lips twitch as he suppresses a smile. Some days, Sam says just the right things without intending to.
Luca shuffles to the middle of the boat, clambering around the piles of supplies. He picks up an oar, surprised to find Mercy settling beside him with an oar of her own. Silently, they start paddling, Askala fading behind them as the afternoon sun invites them to sail into their new future.
This isn’t the first time Luca’s left Askala, but this time, it feels…big. Life changing.
Life threatening.
He glances at the three others in the boat with him. They’re all a little pale, all avoiding looking at everything they’re leaving behind.
Yep. The trajectory of their destinies have taken a new turn. And have just become undeniably entwined.
Just as Luca predicted, it’s slow going. Mercy watches Luca’s paddling technique, her brow crinkling as she works on replicating it. It’s not long before they’ve established a rhythm. Dip. Stroke. Pull. Mercy smiles at him triumphantly and Luca’s returning grin leaps up before he can stop it. It’s like their bodies intuitively follow the other’s cadence.
Twice, Hawk offers to take over, but Mercy shakes her head. Even Sam tries once. But when they see the determined set of Mercy’s chin, they face forward, shoulder touching shoulder as they talk quietly between themselves. Well, Sam talks, Hawk nods.
Mercy glances at Luca. “You don’t like to be predictable, do you?”
Luca snorts. “I don’t know what I’m about to do most of the time.”
“What changed?”
The Falcon is dead.
Luca’s hands tighten around the oar. Those four words changed everything.
He shrugs. “The Outlands no longer had the same hold on me.”
Mercy’s voice drops. “Is it because you realized we’ll be…free?”
“Free?”
Mercy turns to him, her gaze intense. “We can make our own rules in the Newlands. No parents. No one thinks we’re cousins…”
Luca’s eyes widen. It never crossed his mind, but then again, he doesn't tend to think that far ahead. It seems Mercy has.
“But…”
His words face away. Is there a but?
Mercy arches a brow, challenging him to find one.
Luca realizes he’s stopped rowing, and he quickly resumes, matching his strokes to Mercy’s. He stares straight ahead, conscious his heart is leaping like a frog in his chest. “What are you suggesting, Mercy?”
She shrugs, her shoulder brushing his. “Maybe it’s time you planned for a future, Luca.”
The two of them. Starting a new life in the Newlands. No longer defined by their families. Luca freezes.
Surely, they couldn’t…
He turns back to Mercy. She has ‘we totally can’ written all over her beautiful face.
“Luca.” Hawk’s quiet voice intrudes on their hopeful bubble. “What’s that?”
Luca squints in the direction Hawk’s pointing, wondering what he’s seen. It’s too soon for them to be approaching the Newlands. The ocean around them is calm, sparkling as the rays of the afternoon sun glint and glimmer on the surface. At first, he doesn’t see anything.
Then, he sees it.
An unmistakable mottled fin.
“Hawk! Take over the other oar!”
Gust shoots to his feet on the other boat. “What? What is it?”
It’s Siena who answers the question for him, her voice little more than a horrified mutter. “Leatherskin.”
Hawk’s already clambering over to Luca. Without needing to be asked, Mercy quickly swaps. She moves to sit beside Sam, both their gazes focused on the approaching shark.
The leatherskin has seen them. And it probably had long before they realized it was there. Its fin slices through the water, carving a razor sharp line toward them.
Luca turns to Gust and the others, waving his hand frantically. “Bring your boat closer!”