Plague of Spells Page 14

  Nowhere could he perceive what he most feared to discover: great, sinuous bulges in the water hinting at tentacles hundreds or more feet in length, or a great bulblike central body with a brain more ancient than the founding of Impiltur. Japheth had seen pictures of kraken in the Candlekeep stacks.

  He found no evidence of such a shape, but something else was fast approaching.

  A handful of ballista-like shapes arrowed through the water. They left V-shaped wakes behind each one’s single high fin that pierced the boundary into air. Sharks, and big ones. Worryisomely, the contours of reflected sound revealed each bore a rider, but the swirling seawater foiled him from teasing out real shape from fancy.

  The swarm veered closer, darting down to intersect the line of the onrushing fins.

  Japheth saw a warty arm rise from the water and point. He had just a heartbeat to study it, to recognize that its oozing, sound-absorbing flesh wasn’t the scaled arm of a kuo-toa, before pain cut his connection to the swarm.

  He opened his eyes, his mouth dry.

  “What?” said Captain Thoster.

  “Kuo-toa, maybe twenty. Well, maybe they’re not exactly kuo-toa; they looked warped somehow. And, I think … a covey of water witches.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  The Year of the Secret (1396 DR)

  Green Siren on the Sea of Fallen Stars

  The slushy, damp patter of kuo-toa feet on the stairs knifed terror through Anusha. She instinctively tried to get away—

  The girl woke in her flesh body as if from a nightmare, breathing hard and struggling to sit up.

  Pain smote her forehead. Dazed, she fell back, blinking in darkness broken only by a ruler-straight thread of light that ran from near her left temple down past her left foot. It was the seam of the travel chest’s lid, in which her body slept away her dream travels. Not for the first time, she imagined it was like this inside a sarcophagus. Unlike most sarcophagus residents, though, she could leave whenever she wanted.

  She slid open the custom-installed bolt that unlatched the lid from inside. With only a little effort, she pushed away the covering. Brightness brought tears to her eyes. Even though the light from the cabin’s porthole was dimmed by mist, she had to squint.

  The roiling fog beyond the porthole was the same mist she’d seen rushing across the water to blockade Hegruth Island. The same mist that cloaked the scaled, fishy kuo-toa as they converged on the tower.

  Her cheeks warmed. They couldn’t have hurt her, or probably even seen her. Yet she had done the equivalent of scream and run. Had Japheth seen her depart in fear? She hoped not. He probably had.

  “Am I such an infant, to flee at the first hint of danger?” she wondered aloud. “You can do better.”

  A gurgle of hunger diverted her self-rebuke.

  With one hand, she grabbed a piece of unwrapped hardtack from the clutter on the adjoining cot. Her other hand sought the wineskin Japheth had also provided. She bit and chewed the stale, unsalted biscuitlike texture, moistening it with the watered-down wine. She had incorrectly supposed that spending most of her time lying still and dreaming would cut her appetite by half or more. Instead, the yawning chasm in her stomach told her she must eat, if she was going to launch yet another dream walk. The activity seemed to suck far more out of her than a natural dream. Already her clothing was becoming loose and baggy. If she didn’t increase her food intake, she would waste away to a dream in truth.

  Anusha choked down the last of the biscuit, took another pull on the skin, then pulled the lid closed as she reclined back into the travel chest.

  After several rafts of empty moments floated past, she recognized the hard truth her body already knew.

  She wasn’t the least bit sleepy.

  “Oh, please!” she whispered fiercely, frustration making her voice shrill.

  She spent a few more moments attempting to control her breathing and calm her thoughts. It simply wasn’t working. Her heart still pounded with the memory of kuo-toa on the tower stairs.

  Her hand moved almost of its own accord, feeling through the things she kept with her in the chest. She found the cold silver vial Japheth had provided two days earlier. The “elixir of somnolence,” he’d called it.

  A drug, she knew it to be in truth. One she was on the cusp of taking, despite her disdain for Japheth’s habit.

  “No time for prissiness,” she remonstrated. She twisted off the lid and brought the cold vial to her lips. The taste of blackberries bloomed across her tongue, and her lips tingled as if she’d bitten into a mint leaf. Recalling Japheth’s words about counting down from ten, Anusha quickly restoppered the vial.

  She didn’t feel any different. Had he given her colored water? Perhaps the warlock—

  Everything blurred away.

  She stood outside the travel chest, intangible as a hallucination.

  Japheth’s potion wasn’t colored water, that was certain.

  Anusha rushed from the cabin, slap through the door without pausing. The guard dog, Lucky, still standing vigil in the narrow hallway, yipped and wagged his tail. She took a moment to pat his head, saying, “I’ll bring you a treat later, I promise!”

  She emerged from below the stern deck onto the main deck. The crew stood in disorderly groups, weapons in hand, glancing nervously into the impenetrable vapor that pressed in on all sides. The high masts poked up into a ceiling of white, fluffy film. It was as if the entire ship was cocooned in a great down pillow.

  Now what? Could she swim in her condition? Walk along the bottom? Her dream form didn’t need to breathe. She supposed she could pass through water as easily as solid walls.

  A crewman at the starboard railing suddenly gasped out a surprised oath. He pointed over the deck. He yelled, “Something’s coming out’a the soup!”

  Anusha and several pirates joined the man at the railing.

  A woman emerged from the fog. She balanced on some sort of low raft, narrow and long, adorned with a protruding fin like a shark’s. A shape stroked alongside the woman on her strange raft, just beneath the surface, but lingering fog made the swimming thing impossible to identify.

  The woman was old! Her flesh was sickly and yellow, covered with warts and oozing sores. Her hair was filthy and appeared to be composed of rotting seaweed.

  The woman’s gruesome appearance pulled a groan of horror from the crew. Several crumpled, as if all the strength fled their limbs, like water pouring from a cup.

  The newcomer gurgled like a creature on the edge of drowning; it was a titter of delight. The crone locked her gaze on the pirate who’d first identified the old woman’s approach. A red pulse lit her eyes from within, flashing so brightly the scarlet glow illuminated the fog a dozen paces in all directions.

  The crewman gasped, then fell to the deck, his limbs and head suddenly as loose as a rag doll. He was dead.

  The remaining crew screamed and bellowed in a decidedly non-pirate fashion. They scrambled away from the railing, knocking into their fellows and, in some cases, trampling them. Anusha was right in among the retreating crew, voicing her own shock and fear, though her voice was lost among the others’ cries. Those who couldn’t run pulled themselves from the ship’s edge. In moments, the only one still by the railing was the one whose heart had been silenced with an evil look. All eyes stared at the railing, silhouetted against the roiling mist, dread thundering in their chests.

  Anusha listened for more gurgling laughter, or worse, the sound of something attempting to climb the ship’s side, but she discerned only harsh breathing, mumbled prayers, and water lapping against the side of the Green Siren.

  “Damn me for looking, I told the captain we’d signed scairt children instead of freebooters at our last stop. Looks to me I was right!” came a mocking voice.

  Anusha turned and saw the hulking first mate, Nyrotha. He stood by the great cavity that connected the lower decks, hands on his hips.

  “Nyrotha,” pleaded a woman to Anusha’s left. “A … a water witch i
s in the fog! She snuffed Roger with nothing but a look!”

  The first mate roared, “Damn Roger, he was a fool anyhow! Now, pay attention, I’m saying this just once: you ain’t paid to whimper and squeal when the Green Siren’s attacked! Get off your butts and repel boarders, you bastard children of diseased mudflats! Draw your weapons and defend this ship, or by Bane’s black nails, I’ll see all of you dance the hempen jig!”

  Several of the crew, apparently as frightened of Nyrotha as of the creature in the mist, drew their weapons. A few even took a few tentative steps toward the railing.

  A crunch sounded from below the water line, and the entire ship canted slightly. Pirates shrieked. Nyrotha cursed and strode forward, a great black scimitar clutched in his corded hands.

  Hands three times as large as the first mate’s appeared on the railing, followed by a hulking body of dark green scales and ropy hair. An overpowering odor emanated from the creature, like a barrel of unpreserved fish left rotting in the dark for three days. It roared, revealing a swath of blackened teeth in which the half-masticated remains of previous meals lingered.

  The crone Anusha had seen below rode the beast’s shoulders, clutching its ropy hair for balance.

  “To me!” shouted Nyrotha. The mate engaged the creature. Nyrotha no longer seemed hulking compared to that awful aquatic humanoid menacing the Green Siren. Half the pirates stumbled to help the first mate. Another quarter stood rooted in place, numb with fear. The remainder fled the deck, nearly weeping in their terror.

  And what shall I do? Anusha wondered. She glanced down on her unreal body, saw she was clad in the noble’s gown she unconsciously seemed to prefer while in a dream. Hardly the outfit of a warrior.

  She recalled then the panoply of Imphras Heltharn. Imphras was the great war captain who had rid the Easting Reach of hobgoblin marauders three centuries ago, ending the Kingless Years. The old king’s fantastic, golden armor was on display in New Sarshel in the Atrium of the Grand Council. She had looked on it many times. The armor’s significance was one of the bits of historical knowledge that had taken up residence in her memory. Her tutor would be proud.

  Could she effect a change in wardrobe merely by wishing for it, after the manner of regular dreams? Anusha concentrated. Her gown shimmered and flowed.

  A tall helm enfolded her head, a slender gorget spread across her throat, wide pauldrons defended and magnified her shoulders, cunningly articulated couters grew from her elbows, fluted vambraces enshrouded her forearms, and a golden cuirass of breathtaking strength and beauty hugged her torso.

  She flexed her gauntleted hands, articulated with flawless dream joints, and realized she required a weapon.

  Into her upraised hand flashed a long sword on whose slender blade burned the Marhana family crest. It was the same blade that hung over the fireplace in the great room of the family estate. In life, it was too heavy for her to wield. In dream, it was as light as a switch of hazelwood.

  She breathed deeply, exulting in the vision in which she’d clothed herself.

  Enough, she scolded herself. You changed your clothes, that’s all.

  Accoutered for a fight instead of a noble ball, Anusha advanced on the already raging skirmish.

  The smelly monster towered over the press of pirates, though several lay broken on the deck. Nyrotha still stood, wielding his scimitar with precision, managing to keep the great beast at bay with defensive slashes and sidesteps. The creature’s scaled arms streamed red from a dozen wounds.

  The sea hag had dismounted and remained with her back to the railing. The hag gestured with her water-wrinkled hands, chanting in her gurgling voice. The fog above her head stirred. Neither Nyrotha nor the crew noticed; their attention remained riveted on the monstrous, troll-like thing trying to eat them.

  Anusha traced the fight’s periphery until she reached the railing. Neither pirate nor attackers noticed her new dream form. She halfway wished they could see her fabulous new likeness. Her fear of discovery was vanquished by the elation of her successful transformation.

  The witch still chanted, and the writhing fog above her head was fast becoming a rotating whirlpool, growing wider and wider. At its center, a red light glimmered. The light reminded Anusha of the illumination that had twinkled in the hag’s eye, only to leap out and steal Roger’s life. This scarlet whirlpool looked big enough to encompass all the ship …

  Fear found Anusha again despite her armor. The urge to race away or wake up returned.

  What a mistake waking up would be, she thought. If the ship is holed and sunk, I’ll drown in my own body! Anusha strode forward and raised her dream sword high.

  Doubt ambushed her, blade still in the air, even as the alarming aerial vortex swirled wider and quicker. The “sword” she held wasn’t even real.

  She’d pushed things and touched things with her unreal hands. Why not her unreal blade? Why not do more than move them; why not cut them? She had to try to use her sword to affect the waking world. Should she try to imagine the dream blade steel hard and capable of cutting more than phantasms? Would that even work? She didn’t know.

  No, she decided, I’ll imagine the sword as ethereal as my hand and body, an extension of it. Her dream form could pass through anything, including living creatures, but as she’d learned down in the hold, she also adversely affected anything living through which she passed. Dream flesh and real obviously did not get on too well.

  Anusha advanced a final few steps and brought the sword down in an awkward slash. At the last instant, the sea witch’s eyes flickered, somehow sensing Anusha’s presence. The hag jerked to the side, but not enough to completely avoid the blow.

  Anusha’s dream blade grazed the hag’s forehead. A burst of dark blue flame briefly illuminated both witch and armored girl. The hag loosed a surprised howl of agony. The red swirl growing overhead instantly collapsed into so much disturbed cloud-stuff.

  When Anusha had touched the pirate down in the hold, he immediately collapsed into a quivering, unconscious heap.

  The witch quivered, yes, and was obviously hurt, but she did not fall. Instead she screeched, “Protect your mother!”

  The hulking sea monster glanced back, the gnawed boot of an unlucky privateer protruding from its mouth, the battered body of the coxswain in one hand. The monster had been using the screaming coxswain as an improvised club.

  Nyrotha took instant advantage of the creature’s distraction, making a deep cut across the creature’s stomach. The monster staggered and ichor spurted. It dropped the coxswain. It returned its full attention to the first mate, forgetting its “mother’s” command. For the first time, Anusha thought the pirates might just defeat the creature from the sea. If the sea witch was dealt with, anyhow.

  The water witch continued to back away from Anusha, her haggard eyes darting this way and that, squinting. She held her hands out in a warding gesture. She screamed out into the fog, “Sisters, I am assailed by a ghost! Gather near, that we may banish it to the Shadowfell from which it strays!”

  It wasn’t the first time Anusha had been mistaken for an empty spirit. Too bad the witch couldn’t see her new armored splendor. Then she’d know she faced more than a wandering apparition. Then again, when the hag looked at Roger, he’d flopped dead.

  “Sisters! Return! I am beset!”

  Anusha followed the retreating witch step for step. Yet she continued to hold her swing. She just couldn’t bring herself to strike down the hag. Anusha intellectually knew the woman was a monster, something that would kill and eat her … but now that she was at the cusp, she couldn’t follow through. If she struck down the hag, would it be an assassination? Would the hag scream and die, kicking? She lowered her sword, indecision growing into anguish.

  Instead of striking, Anusha said, “If you promise to leave the ship and depart forever, I won’t hurt you?” Irresolution made her ultimatum a question.

  The wandering eye of the water witch tracked Anusha’s words. The witch muttered, “G
ethshemeth can do worse than kill me. Look into my eyes, and I’ll show you!”

  Anusha’s gaze unthinkingly darted to the witch’s.

  The hag’s red eyes flashed the color of fresh-spilled blood. Anusha recognized death itself in that bloody gaze. It grasped her.

  A wave of nausea visually distorted her dream form, sending cracks and shivers through her. Hopes, memories, and hates dropped from her like dead leaves from a tree in winter.

  Wake! she commanded herself. Wake up, wake up!

  She did not wake up. The sea hag’s blazing eye held her rooted in place … or was it Japheth’s drug? He’d told her only to use it when she had a long time to sleep. She wouldn’t escape this peril so easily. Her choice was to kill or die.

  With dream armor unraveling like funerary linens, Anusha raised her shivering, splintering dream blade and plunged it into the sea hag’s stomach. Real blood spurted from the wound.

  The witch’s scream possessed a keening, yearning quality that nearly made Anusha pull back. But she persevered. She held her wavering sword so it transfixed the creature from the sea, willing it real and as sharp as a razor for this moment. She plunged the blade deeper, concentrating on its keen solidity.

  The witch’s final, sorrowful plea for her sisters’ aid trilled out into the fog. Then the hag collapsed and lay without movement or breath. In death she had the guise of a sleeping grandmother, placid and hardly a threat to anyone. Blood trickled from her wound, red as any human’s.

  The only response the sea hag’s entreaty elicited was the appearance of a swarm of darting bats, which rotated and swirled across the Green Siren from stem to stern. Even as the mist around the ship began to break up, the investigating bats twirled back out over the sea, toward the tower island.

  “The Green Siren weathered the fog,” reported Japheth, his breath still coming in gasps between his sentences in the fight’s aftermath. “I knew I saw three hags! The one that didn’t attack us tried to scuttle the ship.”