The Dark Between Dreams | ✔️

Chapter 21 🔻 Song and Dance

I fussed with the corsage on my wrist, minding the dyed roses that complimented my floor-length emerald green dress. I didn't want to look anywhere else—not at the people moving in rhythm on the dance floor, not at the groups of friends laughing together clustered around cocktail tables covered in black table cloths and gaudy floral arrangements. It was too loud here. And too dark. But it was senior prom, after all; one of the most important events of someone's life.

Dominic laughed with his buddies next to me. He was too distracted by the flask they all passed around to notice that his matching boutonniere was crooked. I stood there, chewing my lip and staring down at the sparkling heels I couldn't walk in. I wondered when he'd finally ask me to dance.

But I also wished to be anywhere but here.

"Damn it!" Webb shouted, his voice way too loud for the tiny room we were trapped in. "He's supposed to be our prisoner, not the other way around! We should've stabbed him through the heart when we had the chance."

By we, he meant me, of course.

I peeled off my other boot and tipped it upside down to let all the sand spill out, making two matching piles on the floor. The storm still buffeted our hide-out. But there was no place for us to go. We'd tried forcing open the door Crow had slammed, to no avail. And there was no chance in heck that we'd climb the ladder back out of the sub and brave the storm. I leaned my head against a pipe and shut my eyes, listening to the ship creak and moan like a haunted house.

But then something tapped on the other side of the door. "Shhh!" I raised a hand to calm the pacing ghost. Vale shut her sketchbook and tucked her piece of charcoal behind an ear. "There's someone coming!" I said.

We all stood in formation with blades drawn when the bulkhead door slowly creaked open, just a crack. A single crow strutted into our chamber. It hacked a curt greeting at us. Then, with a flap of its wings, it hopped up onto the hatch's threshold and cawed again, waiting.

"I think..." I began, knowing that what I was about to say was going to sound very stupid. "It wants us to follow it?"

Another caw was my answer. The bird fluttered off through the doorway.

"Come on, guys," I said to my equally dumbfounded friends. Spear in hand like a wizard's staff, I led the way through the submarine. We followed the sauntering bird toward the bow of the submarine. There wasn't any room to fan out, so in single file we filtered through what appeared to be the ship's galley, stopping just outside another hatch to the next chamber. In the dim luxlight, I could make out the white sheets and the rails of bunk beds. That was the crew's quarters. I held my palm up to my friends to stop them. Just beyond the open doorway, someone hummed a quiet, melancholic tune.

Crow was in there.

The bird ruffled its plumage at our hesitation and strutted right past us into the next chamber before we could stop it. It announced itself with a throaty call.

The humming stopped.

Swallowing the lump in my throat, I prodded the hatch open the rest of the way. It was dark in the crew's quarters. But a stream of red light spilled in from the hatchway, illuminating the cloaked figure sitting cross-legged on an upper bunk. Crow turned an ear in our direction. His wrists were still bound. He had his hands cupped, as if he held something too small for us to see.

I saw his lip curl beneath his hood. "Damn bird let you free, did she?"

Sword, spear, and machete lit up the quarters.

The man huffed through bared teeth. "The wind is still crying outside. Our truce still stands."

"C-Crow," I said. Why was it so hard to not stutter before him? "We just want to talk."