Read Online The Wizard Hunters by Martha Wells - Free Book Online

lurched and a rush of cool air struck her, passing through her without impact, as if her body were made of gauze. There was nothing under her feet and her hair streamed up and she just had time to realize that this bizarre sensation was vertigo from falling when she hit something.
    The first lungful of salt water clarified the situation completely. Tremaine surfaced, thrashing and gasping for air. It was day, bright blue sky laced with white clouds arched above and this was the ocean. Choppy blue water lay in every direction. In the distance was a rocky cliff-lined coast. Closer there was an island that seemed to be nothing but several peaks of graduated heights, all wreathed in dense mist. “Gerard!” Tremaine yelled, and went under again. She fought her way back up and remembered to tread water. Shrugging out of her jacket helped. She took a deep breath, went under, and wrestled off one boot; that helped too. She surfaced, her throat burning from inhaled salt water. “Gerard!” she shouted again.
    “Here!”
    She saw him swimming toward her and thrashed awkwardly to him. “What the hell happened?”
    “I... I don’t know.” He had lost his spectacles and his dark hair was plastered to his head. “Do you have the sphere?”
    The sphere . . . Oh, God . Tremaine looked around as if it would be floating nearby. “I must have let go of it!”
    “All right. It’s all right.” He sounded as if he was reassuring himself as well as her. “Give me your hand, we can call it.”
    Tremaine nodded and reached for him, lacing their fingers together as Gerard whispered the words of the brief charm. They bobbed in the water, Tremaine turning her face away as the low waves crashed into her. “Did it work?”
    “I’m not—” The sphere surfaced a few feet away with a splash. “Thank God!” Gerard let go of Tremaine and grabbed for it before it could go under again.
    Watching him, Tremaine asked, “There’s an island that way, should we swim?” It seemed the thing to do, though she had never swum that far in her life.
    Gerard twisted to look. “Island? It could be a promontory.”
    “Whatever. Shouldn’t we start—”
    He shook his head. “No, now that we have the sphere, we need to give the spell a chance to reverse. I timed it precisely—”
    “Precisely? Gerard, what happened? This was supposed to be a weapon, not a transportation—thing!” Tremaine demanded, keeping her head above water with difficulty. “Hold on.” She went under again to get rid of the other boot.
    As she surfaced, Gerard asked anxiously, “Are you all right?”
    “Boots,” she explained succinctly. “What happened to the spell?”
    “Ah, yes. Well, something ... something unexpected has happened.”
    “You think?”
    “Yes, sarcasm always helps a situation like—” His face went deathly still. “Tremaine, look.”
    Her head whipped around, following his gaze. “The Gardier.”
    The airship hadn’t been there a moment ago. It hung low, heading away from them, its black mass silhouetted sharply against the blue sky. The ridge and fins made jagged outlines and the long square cabin hung low underneath the swollen belly of the hull. “Where did it come from?” Tremaine realized she had whispered. It wasn’t likely to spot two heads bobbing in the waves, as high as it was and pointed away from them, but she had instinctively tried to sink as low as she could in the water and still keep breathing. The thing moved slowly but something made her think of a wasp, heavy with venom and searching for prey.
    “It just appeared. I saw it.” Gerard stared after it. “There was a flash of light and it popped into existence. . . . Just like we did.”
    “Like we did?”
    Gerard was muttering, “Gardier attacking the coast always come out of the west and return that way. If that’s west— Wait!” He floundered, splashing her, frantically digging something out of a pants pocket. He produced a compass, shook it to get the water out,