I ran before anyone could stop me.

  It was a crazy plan, but unless we could get it up where we could fight it, we were all going to die anyway. I made it halfway to the railing before the monster hit the side again.

  I’d run to my right, over the patch of ice that was mostly slush now. I pointed at my feet as the ship threatened to send me back to where I’d just been.

  “Bind.”

  A vine shot out of the deck and wrapped itself around me. That was only half of what I needed, though, because I’d still slide backwards unless I anchored the other end somewhere closer to where I wanted to be. I pointed at the hole in the railing and mentally chose that as my other anchor point. A second vine reached out from the edge of the ship and connected with the one around my waist. My backwards momentum halted as I mentally instructed the longer portion of vine to tighten, while the one at my feet to take the slack.

  I swayed from side to side, but I didn’t slide backwards, which was a plus. As soon as the ship stopped rocking violently, I scrambled back to my feet and ran as fast as I could towards the edge of the ship. I thought about activating Dash but decided against it. I didn’t know if the monster could remember what skills and spells we’d used, but I didn’t want to show it what I could do just in case.

  As soon as I was at the edge of the ship, I scanned the water for a shadow. It was difficult to see with all the rain. If it had been daytime, then the cloud cover wouldn’t have been so bad, but right now, everything was dark. I pointed my pistol at the water.

  “Spark Barrage.”

  Changing the wording changed my Spark Shot to continuously fire a large amount of Spark Shots at once. The downside to this was it was a very expensive spell, but each streak of electricity lit up the area, allowing me to see much better.

  I was expecting to see a shadow swim under the ship, or even the blue scales if it was close enough to the surface. I wasn’t expecting to see a pair of yellow eyes and an open maw surge out of the water up at me.

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  The moment the monster’s head broke the water, I released the vine connected to the railing. The vine behind me pulled tight, shrinking as it yanked me away from the edge back towards the middle of the ship.

  “SPARK SHOTS!”

  It was only one at a time, but I didn’t want to run out of mana without my footing. I kept firing as my binding pulled me farther away from those hungry jaws.

  The giant serpent rose up out of the water, its jaw clipping the side of the ship as its head rose above the ship. Its yellow eyes tracked my retreat, then its open maw began to fall.

  “LOOK AT ME!!!”

  Ether flared as she pointed her sword at the giant creature. The binding pulled me past her. She looked like a mouse daring a giant snake to fight.

  I released the binding so I could slow down. I had to stop shooting as well so I could use both hands to stop my backwards momentum. It felt like time froze as I came to a stop, with the Sea Dragon and my wife locked in a staring contest.

  “COME ON!” Ether banged her sword against her shield. “YOU WANT A GOD, COME GET ME!”

  The hair on the back of my neck stood on end at her declaration. It was the first time that I could remember her acknowledging what she was. And she was using it as bait to take this giant monster’s attention away from me.

  I flashed back to our first fight against the Bone Snake. My heart sped up as the vehicle of a mouth fell from the sky towards my wife. I didn’t want to see her get swallowed again, but I was too far away to reach her even with Dash. I used the only spell I could.

  “BIND!”

  I anchored both ends on either side of me and targeted her waist as the midpoint. The vines pulled her back as golden light from her shield wrapped around her. The barrier might have protected her, but its mouth was big enough to swallow the whole area that the dome forming around her would have protected.

  The serpent’s lower jaw bounced off the deck, snapping the jaws shut. The whole ship tipped towards the giant monster as more of its body slithered onto the deck so its head could chase the retreating meal.

  “GET IT!” I pulled a mana potion out of my CB and downed it, then aimed at the creature’s eye.

  Aelin unleashed her pink arrows at the same eye I was shooting at, while Nakten landed on the right eye to try to blind the other one. Ether cut the binding that had pulled her back, then ran to meet the creature, jumping into the air and slamming her shield on the Sea Dragon’s nose.

  I was sliding towards the monster already, but once its head thrashed into the air, the ship tipped even more towards the giant creature. Everyone was sliding and without some way to stop it, we were all about to go over the side of the ship.

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