Jiang fell out of an ocean with the stolen tether wrapped around his beak.
Water hammered his back and spun him breast-up. Skykeel turned beneath him: towers, bridges, wing-sails, then towers again. The hanging catch basin crossed his vision on every roll, close enough to promise survival and far enough to miss.
Kesta fell above him.
Her damaged sail had opened into a wet knot behind one shoulder. One clasp remained. The other trailed broken cloth, and the weight of the falling water kept both wings pinned to her spine.
She reached for the brass catch at her collar.
Cold water stripped her fingers away.
Jiang spread both flippers inside the fall.
Water descended with him. The swinging basin below was already receiving the same stream. Every condition that had been absent in the flooded throat and ceiling sea now held his body at once.
At last, `Stormdive` answered him.
The water gripped his new feathers without softening the fall. It offered direction, not mercy.
