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  “Yes, I suppose one would have to either be quite, ah, swift or have some sort of device for breathing underwater. One could take tanks of compressed air down. There are prototypes in the empire for diving suits like that, though they’re terribly awkward and heavy.” Rias dropped his chin into his hand and tapped his jaw with one finger. “As I said earlier, they’re meant for salvaging wrecks, but I imagine one could come up with a much lighter suit and system for recreational diving.”

  Tikaya tapped him on the shoulder.

  Rias blinked and looked up. “Yes?”

  “Did you truly just go from a discussion of sexual positions to designing some new diving prototype in your mind?”

  “Er, maybe?”

  “You must have mystified your wife,” Tikaya said before she thought better of it. He never seemed that distressed when he mentioned how incompatible they’d been, but she would never wish to remind him of painful moments.

  “Yes,” was all he said. “I’ve mystified a lot of people with my interests. Fortunately, you seem unfazed.” Rias offered his arm and nodded toward the navigation cabin.

  “Fortunately,” she agreed amiably, taking his arm. The Nurians had even less mundane technology than the Kyattese, so poor Mee Nar was probably being mystified up there himself.

  “Just so we’re clear,” Rias murmured as they headed back up front. “No biting?”

  “We’ll see.”

  “We have a problem,” Mee Nar called before Rias could respond to her comment.

  Mee Nar was pointing at the front porthole when they came in. Sweat gleamed on his brow and his loose shirt stuck to his back. A red sphere floated in the water inches above the Freedom’s nose.

  “Is that one of the explosives?” Tikaya asked.

  Rias had already lunged into the primary navigation seat.

  “Yes,” Mee Nar whispered, his voice strained. “They threw a bunch out as soon as we detached. Most of them didn’t come close, but...” He licked his lips.

  “I guess they didn’t like your mine gift.” Tikaya gave Rias a grimace that she hoped portrayed an apology for distracting him with that silly conversation. He gave her a quick headshake, as if to say he was to blame.

  “I’m keeping it from dropping farther,” Mee Nar continued, “but I can’t disarm it, not when it’s this close. I don’t know if it explodes on impact or on a timer.”

  “Does this thing go in reverse?” Tikaya asked, trying to remember if Rias had mentioned a control for that. She was fairly certain he’d just driven it forward and used the rudder to turn in a circle when they needed to change directions. With that sphere hovering so close to their nose, there was no way they could go forward. It’d smack right into the porthole and blow up.

  Rias flipped the switches that controlled the water-to-air ratio in the ballast tanks. “This thing goes down.”

  “Sorry,” Tikaya murmured. Apparently calling an engineer’s latest invention a thing wasn’t the way to his heart.

  The sphere rose out of sight as the submarine descended. Rias nudged the propeller lever, and the vessel glided forward.

  “You can release it now,” Rias told Mee Nar. “We’re not—emperor’s balls!” He turned hard to avoid a second sphere, this one dropping into view ahead of them rapidly.

  The submarine changed headings faster than a sailing ship, but not nearly as fast as Tikaya would have liked at that moment. Standing behind Rias, she caught herself sinking her fingernails into the back of his chair. Slowly the sphere drifted off to the left of the viewing area, or, rather, they drifted away from it. Only when it dropped out of sight did Tikaya let out a relieved breath.

  “That was—”

  A boom thundered below them and to the port side. The craft lurched, the deck tilting so hard it almost threw Tikaya off her feet, even with her grip on the chair. Mee Nar tumbled into the bulkhead. Rias’s hands never faltered—he rode out the bucking wave and brought the craft back to a horizontal position. His gaze skimmed over the gauges and displays.

  “Did that do any damage?” Tikaya asked.

  “Nothing that’s showing up.”

  “That wasn’t really a no was it?”

  “No,” Rias said. “Any deficiencies will become clear when we descend to lower depths.”

  “Because the hull will implode and we’ll die?” Tikaya asked.

  Mee Nar threw her a wild-eyed look.

  “Something like that,” Rias said. “Mee Nar, are there any more of those out there? I can’t pick up objects that small with my echo ranging device.”

  “You should come up with a catchier name for it,” Tikaya said. It was a stupid thing to say, but somehow it was better than standing there imagining more of those mines dropping onto their heads. Wasn’t that the whole reason they’d sneaked in to disable the ship? To avoid this situation?

  “Mee Nar,” Rias repeated, turning in his chair.

  The Nurian was still staring at them, his face pale, his breathing rapid. Maybe the morbid exchange hadn’t been wise.

  Rias was tall enough to grip the other man’s shoulder without standing up. “Mee Nar, you said you could detect the charges around us.” His voice was penetrating, and he stared straight into the Nurian’s eyes. “We’re depending on you here. All of us. And your wife and child will be waiting for you to come home safely.”

  Mee Nar’s stare shifted to Rias’s grip. For a moment, he looked like he might pull away and dart off into some hole to hide, but he held out his hands and drew in a big gulp of air. “Yes. Yes, I know. I understand.”

  “Guide me.” There was definitely a tone of command in Rias’s voice. He gave Mee Nar a nod and turned back to the controls.

  Mee Nar took a few more deep breaths. Tikaya was tempted to offer him a shoulder to lean on, but after Rias’s words, he seemed to regain some of his composure. She remembered her own moment, trapped on a Nurian warship, and how she’d almost fallen apart after shooting—killing—people and how he’d calmed her down. Strange to think that a veteran warrior would need similar treatment, but she supposed the submarine—and the tons and tons of water above them—presented a unique experience.

  “There are none above us dropping.” Mee Nar’s eyes were closed, and his hands gripped the console as he concentrated. “One is approximately fifteen meters to the starboard.”

  “Understood.” Rias guided them toward the port. “Are there any below us? I want to descend now.”

  “Not close enough for me to detect. There don’t seem to be many left. I think they threw a bunch over the side, hoping to hit us before sailing off to make repairs.”

  “I’m taking us down then. It won’t take them long to recuperate up there.”

  Mee Nar’s gulp was audible, but he nodded. “I’ll keep my senses open.”

  “Thank you,” Rias said.

  Since Mee Nar seemed content to stand, with a death grip on the console, Tikaya slipped into the seat beside Rias. “How far down are we now?”

  Rias glanced at a gauge. “Only thirty meters.”

  “And we’re going down to two hundred?” Tikaya might be sharing some of Mee Nar’s claustrophobia in a moment. “It occurs to me that the landmarks in the letter won’t be very helpful down here. Are you going to be able to find the wreck?”

  “We’ll see. I’d say something cocky like I have the map in my head, but I ran into the coral reef on our last excursion, so I better not talk too soon.”

  “Well, you were distracted by a giant octopus hurling us about.”

  “My commanding officers never would have accepted such an excuse,” Rias said.

  “Over the eons, women have learned to be accepting of men’s flaws.”

  Rias gave her a sidelong look. “That must be a Kyattese-only philosophy. I never noticed it amongst imperial women.”

  Tikaya alternately watched a depth meter and the viewport as they descended. Thanks to nightfall, the water outside had been dark all along, but there was an oppressive, absoluteness
to it now. And a stillness. The only sounds came from the soft hum of the engines and from creaks and groans that Tikaya tried not to find alarming. Rias’s face gave away nothing.

  “How much pressure are we under?” Tikaya asked softly, not wanting to disturb Mee Nar.

  Eyes still closed, the Nurian seemed to be taking his task seriously. Maybe he needed the work for a distraction.

  “Atmospheric pressure is approximately fourteen point seven pounds per square inch at sea level,” Rias said, “and it increases by fourteen point seven psi every thirty-three feet.” Rias glanced at the depth meter. “We’re nearing two hundred meters, so approximately 291.994 psi.”

  “Approximately,” Tikaya said and smiled.

  Rias didn’t return the gesture. Maybe he was thinking about all those pounds of pressure on the hull of his craft. Tikaya studied his profile. He wasn’t paying attention to the viewport at all; his gaze swung back and forth from the depth meter to the readings on the echo ranging device. Hoping to see a promise of the ocean bottom before they reached the submarine’s maximum operating depth? What was their maximum operating depth? Rias hadn’t told her.

  “The last two spheres have blown up,” Mee Nar said. “I was tracking their descent.”

  “It’s random then?” Tikaya asked. “When they blow up? Or were they adjusted to a shallower depth to target us?”

  “I don’t know,” Mee Nar said.

  Rias didn’t acknowledge the Nurian’s announcement. As Tikaya watched him, a question floated into her mind. Maybe distracting him wasn’t a good idea.

  “Have we reached two hundred?” Tikaya asked.

  “Yes.”

  “And no sign of the wreck?”

  “No sign of the bottom.”

  “Oh. I checked the letter twice to make sure of my translation. I’m sure it said two hundred meters.”

  “I believe you. Their measurements weren’t likely accurate.” Rias glanced at his gauges. “Two hundred twenty meters.”

  Tikaya swallowed. She wanted to let him know that it was all right to give up. As much as she desired to know what was down here, she desired to live more. Quiet filled the cabin, creating an eerie sense of solitude, or maybe isolation. If they disappeared down there, never to return to the surface, nobody would ever know what had happened to them. She wished she’d left a note for Mother, instead of simply disappearing into the night.

  She could hear Rias’s breathing. It remained steady and regular; he’d appear calm to someone who didn’t know him well, but she could read the tension in his rigid posture. It warned her of danger in a way his words did not.

  “What are you thinking?” Tikaya murmured.

  “Among other things? That I regret bringing you down here.”

  “I would have been annoyed if you’d gone without me.”

  “There are worse things to be,” Rias said.

  Like dead. Tikaya didn’t say it out loud. Another groan emanated from the hull. The ominous noise was louder than before, she was sure of it. “We can turn back,” she said. “Curiosity is only an admirable trait until it gets you killed.”

  “We can go deeper,” Rias said.

  Tikaya stood for a better look outside the porthole. The life in the waters outside had dwindled. The sharks had disappeared along with the schools of fish that had flitted through their light earlier. What did swim through the beam of illumination were strange creatures with rows of uneven, bristly teeth and misshapen bodies, nothing she’d seen fishermen selling in the market. In their own ways, the fish were as strange and alien as anything they’d seen in those ancient tunnels in the empire. Like something from another world, a bizarre world that had few commonalities with the one she knew. A bioluminescent squid—at least Tikaya thought it was a squid—jetted away at their approach.

  She pressed a hand against the hull to lean in for a better look. The icy temperature of the metal numbed her fingers and she pulled them back. It was only then that she noticed the puffs of air in front of her face with each exhalation. She wrapped her arms around her body. Who would have thought she’d need a jacket and mittens off the coast of the Kyatt Islands? She almost made the joke to Rias, but his face was grimmer than ever.

  “Mee Nar,” Tikaya said, “do you want to watch the porthole in the science station and see if there’s anything coming up—or down, as it’d be—in that direction? We must be getting close to the bottom.”

  “All right,” Mee Nar whispered.

  Tikaya never would have guessed a Nurian warrior and practitioner could sound so meek. And afraid.

  Rias’s gaze shifted away from the instruments just long enough to regard Tikaya with knowing eyes. Yes, she wanted to ask her question and she didn’t want Mee Nar to know the answer, not when he’d grown so alarmed at the mention of the submarine failing.

  “What’s the maximum depth the Freedom is designed to handle?” Tikaya whispered when they were alone. “I know you have an exact number in mind.” According to the depth gauge, they’d just dipped below two hundred and fifty meters.

  Rias blew out a long breath. “I rate it at a maximum operating depth of two hundred and eighty meters.”

  A surge of alarm charged through Tikaya’s limbs. Dear Akahe, they were almost there already. She struggled to keep her breaths slow and calm, not wanting to fall apart the way Mee Nar had—or worse. “And there’s still no sign of the bottom? We have to go back. This isn’t worth dying over.”

  “If the captain’s letter said they pulled up something, it couldn’t have been much deeper. Their estimates couldn’t have been that far off.”

  “How sure are you that we’re in the right spot?” Tikaya asked.

  “We’re in that basin; we would have hit the ocean floor by now if we weren’t.”

  “How deep is the basin?”

  Rias didn’t answer.

  “I know you know. You studied the old maps closely enough to know when the basin turned up missing. You must know its depth.”

  “Four hundred meters at its deepest, but there’s a ridge coming up.”

  Tikaya glanced at the depth meter and a fresh wave of alarm washed over her. “We’re almost to two-seventy-five.”

  “The ridge is—”

  “You said two-eighty was the maximum, right?” Tikaya interrupted, her heart in her throat. “This is insane. Take us back up.”

  “The maximum operating depth is the depth at which I deem it’s safe to operate. The crush depth should be closer to three-twenty-five to three-fifty.”

  “Should be?”

  “It won’t be before three-twenty-five,” Rias said. “We crafted the strongest Turgonian steel alloy that’s ever been invented for the hull.”

  How he could have melted that wreck into any semblance of a strong alloy, she couldn’t guess, but she wouldn’t doubt him when it came to metallurgy.

  “So... we should be fine as long as we stay above that point?” Tikaya asked.

  He was speaking calmly, but that tension was still in his shoulders. He wasn’t telling her something. “On paper, yes, but I haven’t tested it anywhere near this deep. If one of the tanks ruptures or there’s a mechanical failure or... Emperor’s teeth, a thousand different things could go wrong, and if one of them does, and I can’t fix it quickly, we can easily drop below crush depth, and the Freedom ends up as another wreck on the bottom of the ocean.”

  Tikaya wished she hadn’t goaded the reason for his concern from him. It was obvious as soon as he said it, but she hadn’t been thinking of the possibility that they might not be able to return to the surface. She’d imagined them as a balloon being held underwater, just waiting to be released to shoot back up. But they weren’t a balloon; they were a couple of frail human beings encased in a steel cylinder. And steel sank. Tikaya found herself imagining what it’d be like to die down here. Would it be like drowning? With water rupturing the hull and rushing in to smother them? Or would their bodies, without the protection of the vessel, implode under such pres
sure?

  She shook her head and banished the unhelpful thoughts. She slid out of her chair, stood behind Rias, and put her hands on his shoulders. “We’ll be fine. None of those things will happen.”

  Rias snorted. “What makes you so sure?”

  “You built it.”

  “Tikaya... I’m not infallible. Trust me.”

  “Would you be this worried if I weren’t here?” she asked, thinking of his comment about regretting bringing her down.

  Rias hesitated before admitting, “No.”

  “And if I were safe on the beach, would you be excited and thrilled to be down here testing it and searching for the wreck and probably going deeper than any human being has ever gone before? Even if it meant risking your life?”

  “Maybe.”

  “I’d be devastated if you died down here while I was sitting up there, braiding my hair, so let’s pretend I’m one of your marines right now and nothing else.”

  “Hm.” Rias checked a different gauge—had his range finder finally found the bottom? “I never discussed biting with my marines.”

  “Yes, I understand some of them found that regrettable.” Tikaya thought of the letter she’d written to Corporal Agarik’s family; she wished she’d posted it and Rias’s letter already, in case... Well, the letters were in her room. If she proved incorrect about Rias’s infallibility, her mother would find them and take care of the task.

  “Tikaya?” Rias asked softly.

  “Yes?”

  He tugged his gaze away from the instruments and met her eyes. “If we make it out of this, will you marry me?”

  “Erp?” It wasn’t the most eloquent thing she could have said, but he’d startled her.

  “I was going to wait until... to see if there was any chance we could make things work with your family and your people, and to wait until I had established some sort of stability, financially and otherwise, in my life, but plummeting into the ocean depths to unknown dangers makes a man rethink his priorities, and I... I’m talking rather rapidly, aren’t I?”

  “Yes,” Tikaya whispered. “And you should probably be monitoring our descent.” What a stupid thing to say. But her heart was thundering against her ribs, and she needed a moment.