Anton grinned. “I’m sure you’ve devoted some thought to the question of how to hurt him worse.”
The tattooed wizard nodded. “I have one or two ideas. They involve other spellcasters wearing him down as much as they do some cunning masterstroke on my part, so let’s hope the druids have been fighting fiercely. What about you?”
“When we fought before, I sliced him up a little, but I never cut his hand off his wrist, a leg out from under him, or the head off his shoulders. This time, I’m going to work on the assumption that dismemberment will stop pretty much anything, even an undead Chosen.”
“When I was a mage in training, I had to accompany a band of troll hunters into a swamp. The creature killed two of them after it had already lost an arm and a leg. Then it grew the arm back.”
Anton laughed. “Thank you. What a perfect thing to say to bolster my morale. Remind me, why are we doing this?”
Umara smiled. “I thought you knew.”
Peering through the rain, Anton studied the galleon. As far as he could tell, no one aboard the larger ship was alarmed at the Octopus’s approach. If Evendur’s men had even noticed, they must believe that Mourmyd Jacerryl and his cutthroats were coming to lend them a hand.
In time, Umara said, “They’re in range for a blast of fire if you want one.”
“Tempting,” Anton replied, “but it wouldn’t be like my incendiaries all detonating at once in the bowels of the Jest. It’s unlikely that one attack would sink her. So let’s creep at least a little …” Squinting, he leaned forward.
“What’s wrong?” Umara asked.
“I know you can’t see much of what’s happening aboard the galleon from here, but try.”
Gripping the rail, she leaned out over it like he had. “I see … scurrying.”
“That’s one word for it. We knew Evendur was chasing another ship. He caught her. Now his men—or most of them—are boarding her.”
“Then we can’t set the galleon on fire lest the blaze spread to the Turmishan ship as well.”
Anton nodded. “Exactly. What we are going to do is lead a boarding party of our own.”
The galleon held the captured Turmishan warship on its starboard side, so the Octopus steered for the port side. As Anton and his comrades made their approach, his nerves felt taut as the string of any cocked crossbow or ballista, and he studied the larger vessel for a sign that he was sailing into a trap.
But there was none. There was only the rattle of the rain and shouts, screams, and the clanking of blade on blade, the latter sounds muffled by the galleon’s bulk.
When the Octopus reached the proper position, Thayan marines lifted grappling hooks, but Umara raised a hand to tell them not to throw. She then murmured a spell, and the end of a coiled rope on deck reared like a serpent. It rose up and up until it was as high as the galleon’s railing, then looped around it and tied itself off, without the telltale thud a grapnel would have made.
“I’m first,” Anton said. He took hold of the coarse hemp line and climbed hand over hand.
When his head reached the level of the deck above, the clamor of the battle washed over him. As he’d expected, the enemy had left half a dozen men on the starboard side to shoot crossbows bolts and fling javelins into the melee below as targets presented themselves, and, more importantly, to keep any Turmishans from clambering aboard the galleon and causing trouble.
But, Anton thought, that effort had failed. Because he was a Turmishan, and he was about to make a lot of trouble.
He drew his saber and cutlass and skulked closer to the third man in line. Meanwhile, Umara clambered up the rope and over the rail. He winced when her foot bumped audibly against the gunwale, but none of the Umberlant warriors noticed.
A moment later, though, the first man in line, the one in the galleon’s forecastle, turned his head, perhaps to call something to his comrades. When he did, he must have glimpsed Anton or Umara at the periphery of his vision, because he jerked around to goggle at them.
The man bellowed, “ ’Ware—” then collapsed as Umara rattled off a spell of slumber.
Unfortunately, even an unfinished warning sufficed to make the other crewmen turn around. Anton rushed the nearest, beat the javelin in his hand out of line, and sliced him across the belly. The Umberlant warrior fell.
At the same moment, something, pure instinct, perhaps, told Anton to duck. He did, and a quarrel whizzed over his head. The next man forward had shot a crossbow at him.
Anton looked around, found a crate of javelins, grabbed one, and threw it. It caught the crossbowman in the chest, and he toppled backward.
Anton spun back around to see how Umara was faring. She gestured to indicate the men who’d made up the aft portion of the line. All three lay motionless, slain or rendered helpless by her wizardry. He flashed her a grin and pivoted to starboard to look out over the battle below.
As best he could tell, nobody had noticed the skirmish aboard the galleon, and small wonder. Locked in the jostling press of a shipboard melee, the combatants below were far too busy with their own killing and dying.
Evendur was easy to spot. Hulking and hideous, he was fighting on a less crowded patch of deck—less crowded, perhaps, because he’d experienced so little difficulty slaughtering most of those who dared to face him. A white-haired woman with a scimitar in one hand and a bronze sickle in the other fought him with a nimbleness that put many a youthful man-at-arms to shame, but even so, the relentless sweeps of his glowing axe were pushing back into shrouds, halyards, and sheets that threatened to entangle her like a net. The moment they did, the wavelord would chop her to pieces.
Anton couldn’t allow that, because the old woman was Shinthala. His final conversation with the Elder Circle had led him to assume none of them would sail with the Turmishan fleet. But plainly, one had, and she might well be its best hope for victory if she could escape the present onslaught and get back to casting spells.
An attack of some sort had littered the galleon’s deck with stones and lengths of snapped cordage that had previously secured and controlled the yards on the mizzenmast. Anton ran, leaped, and caught a dangling rope.
His weight rotated the yard to which it was attached, and even when the spar jerked to a halt, he kept swinging out over the deck of the Turmishan caravel like a pendulum on a string. When he judged the moment was right, he released his grip.
He thumped down hard, but that was all right. He hadn’t broken or sprained anything, and he’d come down more or less where he’d intended.
Evendur jerked around to face him. If possible, the dead man’s features were even mushier and seemingly incapable of human expression than during their previous encounter, but the way he faltered conveyed surprise even so.
Anton grinned and drew his saber and cutlass. “Well,” he said, “here we are again.”
Stedd didn’t mind that someone had carried him to the circle of stones in the center of the House of Silvanus. He’d been too hot, and the cold rain felt good on his upturned face.
But he did mind the chanting. It made it hard to doze. And the force that throbbed in the ground in time with the words was even more disturbing. It struck echoes in the core of him and reminded him that he too could channel power.
He flinched from thinking about such things because the last time had hurt him so badly. He shifted on the wet grass, trying to squirm his way into sleep, and then a radiant figure appeared, more vivid than any sight had ever been before, even though Stedd’s eyes were shut.
He opened them in surprise and the newcomer remained as before, a smiling, handsome, youthful-looking man, with blond hair, golden skin, and the trim, long-legged build of a runner clad in princely robes of crimson and blue. Strangely, none of the druids, not even Ashenford and Shadowmoon, seemed to notice the interloper standing the middle of their ritual.
Trembling with a joy so keen it almost felt like terror, Stedd took a long breath. “You never showed yourself to me before.”
&nb
sp; Lathander smiled, and somehow, that simple change of expression communicated his message as clearly as words: You weren’t ready to see me before. Now, you are.
The Morninglord then waved his hand, and a golden shimmer trailed from his fingers. Stedd gasped as strength and well-being surged through him. Suddenly feeling too exhilarated to keep lying down, he scrambled up, and none of the druids noticed that, either.
For a moment, grinning, he imagined Lathander had accelerated his recovery purely out of kindness. Then visions poured into his head, first a panorama of battling warships and sea creatures seen from high above, and then a closer view of three particular vessels locked together. Anton, Umara, and Shinthala were in that fight. So was Evendur Highcastle.
Stedd sighed. “I was supposed to beat Umberlee by ending the famine. But the fight’s not over, is it? Because she and her Chosen haven’t quit.”
Lathander inclined his head.
“All right.” Stedd swallowed. “I want to help. But how can I?”
Lathander proffered a golden mace. Stedd was certain the god hadn’t been holding anything a moment before. But he was now, and surely, it was Dawnbringer, the weapon he’d wielded in all his great battles against the lords of darkness.
Stedd hesitated. Chosen or not, he felt unworthy to touch such a holy thing. He was also afraid it would be too heavy for him, and he’d drop it in the mud.
But since Lathander wanted him to take it, that was what he did, and without any fumbling. Dawnbringer was light as a stick in his hands.
“All right,” Stedd said, “I’ve got it. What am I supposed to do with it?”
Another image of Anton flowered before his inner eye.
Though his face was slime and tatters, Evendur somehow managed a recognizable sneer. “You’re nothing,” he growled. He flicked the boarding axe, its edge glowing a poisonous green as it had aboard the Iron Jest, like he was brushing away a fly.
The gesture made water explode from empty air. The stinging blast splashed Anton and knocked him backward onto his rump. A warrior of Umberlee’s temple rushed him to spear him with a boarding pike.
Anton blocked with the saber, hamstrung his attacker with the cutlass, and leaped to his feet as the other man went down. It only took a moment, but, left unhindered, Evendur might have only needed a moment to dispose of Shinthala.
Fortunately, Umara had seen fit to hinder him. She’d cast her spell of the five colored orbs at him, and the discharges of fire, acid, and other destructive forces made him recoil.
That gave Shinthala the chance to take note of her surroundings. Instead of blundering back into the running rigging, she slipped nimbly through and put the lines between Evendur and herself.
Anton charged before the spheres of light even finished flashing out of existence. As a result, a screech stabbed pain into his ears and made his teeth clench, but he reached the Chosen of Umberlee in time to slash at his knee from behind.
The saber cut deep enough to shear through muscles and tendons and cripple any living man. But it didn’t cut through bone to take the swollen, oozing limb completely off, and Evendur didn’t fall. Rather, he whirled and cut. Anton jumped back barely in time to keep the boarding axe from smashing in his ribs.
The dead man pursued him with the luminous axe poised for a strike to the head. For three steps, Anton retreated on a straight line, then pivoted on the diagonal. The shift caught Evendur by surprise, and he failed to defend as the saber bit into his extended arm.
Once again, the blade sliced deeply. Anton felt it scrape bone, but it didn’t cut through. Evendur didn’t even fumble his grip on the axe, just snapped it out in a short, vicious cut of his own.
Anton parried with the cutlass. The clanging impact tossed him backward, and his back foot came down in water or blood. He slipped and floundered off balance.
Evendur stepped in, then stiffened as darts of blue light pierced him from overhead. He glanced up at Umara, who still stood at the railing of the galleon, and growled, “Drown.” The wizard reeled backward out of sight.
Hoping to take advantage of the undead pirate’s distraction, Anton lunged and tried a head cut. But Evendur hadn’t lost track of him, and his axe blocked the saber. Anton shoved closer and stabbed with the cutlass for the other corsair’s glazed, sunken eye.
Evendur jerked his head down, and instead of catching him in the orbit, the cutlass sliced a flap of slimy flesh from his brow. The injury intensified the putrid stench that emanated from him even in the rain, but it didn’t make him falter. He pushed with the axe even though it was still hooked on the saber blade, trying to shove through Anton’s guard and bring the glowing edge to his face through pure brute force.
Reflex made Anton push back. It only took an instant to feel it was the wrong choice. He couldn’t match Evendur’s strength. But before he could spring backward or twist aside, the axe pressed into the side of his face from jaw to temple, then hitched upward to split the skin.
The gash itself was a superficial wound. Anton had suffered worse in the midst of battle and kept on fighting. But the luminous poison in the axe head filled his lungs with what felt like frigid brine. He fell down retching.
Evendur raised the axe, and a small man in armor that looked like a coat of leaves shouted words that made thorny vines grow from the deck and try to coil around the living corpse. Evendur spat black sludge, the briars vanished, and a huge hand made of water rose from the sea, snatched the little druid, and yanked him over the side.
Meanwhile, Anton struggled to stand. He made it to his knees, but he still couldn’t breathe, and another spasm of coughing wracked him. The convulsions spattered the deck with blood from the gash on his face.
“Fight me!” Shinthala called. Evendur pivoted to face her, then stiffened.
The druidess’s eyes shone like lightning. Phantom serpents crawled through the ghostly holly that surrounded her, and streaks of a different grayness shot through Evendur’s body.
Anton just had time to realize the undead pirate was turning to stone before he wasn’t anymore. His inherent mystical strength had resisted the petrification. He snarled and brandished his axe, and a ball of silvery phosphorescence flew from the head of the weapon.
It missed Shinthala by a hair but discharged its magic when it was right next to her. The blast of pale light froze puddles on the deck and plummeting raindrops, and painted the left side of her body with frost. The holly and snakes vanished, and she toppled. The newly-made hailstones clattered around her.
Black spots dancing at the edges of his vision, Anton struggled again to rise. But something went wrong and he flopped back down on his belly instead.
As he did, Evendur stumbled slightly and gripped a tack. He only held on for an instant, though. Then his unsteadiness, if that was what it had been, passed, and he appeared as formidable as ever.
Certainly, he must seem so to the Thayan mariners. As Anton had intended, they’d followed him and Umara onto the galleon and then started jumping and sliding down onto the Turmishan warship in an onslaught that, in any normal battle, would quickly have turned the tide against the enemy. But now, with no spellcasters left to oppose the Chosen of Umberlee and Anton likewise helpless if not dying, the men still peering down from Evendur’s magnificent ship hesitated.
Then someone rasped, “Keep going! Kill the scum!” The voice was so hoarse that it took Anton an instant to recognize it as Umara’s. She’d somehow managed to free herself of the drowning curse, but not before coughing her throat raw.
Evendur looked up at her. “Your men have better sense than you,” he said.
Umara sneered back at him. “They’ll follow where a Red Wizard leads.” She stepped back, spoke a word of power, ran at the rail, and leaped.
Magic made her jump like a grasshopper; she cleared the obstruction and landed forward of Evendur in the caravel’s forecastle. Encouraged by her example, her countrymen resumed their attack.
But Evendur laughed. He ripped the dangling
flap of flesh loose from his forehead, exposing a patch of bare skull, and started toward her.
Stedd now understood what Lathander wanted him to do—or at least he hoped so—but not how to do it. The fight was out to sea, and he was here.
Then the god gestured to draw his attention to the chanting celebrants inside their circle of stones. A column of hazy green light rose into the air above them. When it was taller than the tallest tree, it started turning west and ultimately became a verdant thread winding across the slate-gray vault of the sky. Thanks to the Morninglord’s unspoken guidance, Stedd realized it was like a river of power the druids here were sending to their counterparts in the battle. And a person could swim down a river.
Stedd squared his shoulders. It was something he’d seen Anton and the Thayan fighting men do when they were about to start some hard or dangerous task. Then he moved to the center of the circle, still without any of the druids noticing him. He settled himself, stared up at green phosphorescence, and wished himself to the middle of what he imagined to be a tangled mass of dozens of warships attacking one another on the Sea of Fallen Stars.
Nothing happened.
So then he pictured Anton and Umara. They were his friends, and he wanted to be with them.
That made something happen. The emerald luminescence suddenly felt different, almost as if Stedd were above it instead of the other way around. It was like the pond back on the farm, daring him to jump from the high overhanging willow branch, or like a steep, snowy hillside challenging him to make a running start with his toboggan pressed to his chest.
Shadowmoon turned in his direction, and the slanted eyes in her delicate face widened in surprise. “Stedd!” she said.
He thought about pausing to explain what was happening. But now that he could feel the green current, he felt an urgency, too, as if he were running out of time to do whatever it was he needed to. Hoping the elf would understand, he gave himself over to the power.
The Reaver Page 32
