The Sea Hag

by David Drake

  The trees to either side of the pavement closed overhead in a canopy gorgeous with flowers, fruits, and the lizards which darted to snatch up metal-glistening insects. The air was a steam-bath, even though the light that reached the ground was filtered yellow-green by the leaves through which it poured.

  Dennis' boots squelched at every step. Finally he stopped and took them and the socks off, wringing the latter dry and giving all the paraphernalia to Chester to carry in the embroidered shopping bag.

  "I thought I threw that away," the youth said suspiciously. Had the dream started—

  "You threw the bag away, Dennis," the little robot agreed. "And I retrieved it before I followed you."

  The warmth of the pink pavement felt good to Dennis' bare feet, but he needed to walk with some care. He had a habit of banging his heels down as he strode along. The road had no resilience at all. He'd bruise himself badly if he tramped that way here without wool and leather to cushion the shock.

  He was getting very hungry. That was probably a sign he'd recovered from the events of the night—both real and imagined.

  Dennis looked at an overhanging branch, heavy with fruit of an enticing scarlet—

  A color similar to that of the poisonous frogs of the night before. Or was that only dream, too?

  "Chester," he asked, pausing, "can we eat any of these?"

  "Eat freely, so long as food is available," Chester quoted. One of his limbs snaked up to remove a globular fruit and offer it to his companion.

  Dennis bit down. The pulp beneath the bright rind was mauve and succulent; juice dribbled off his chin as he resumed walking.

  It tasted delicious, but he didn't remember ever eating the type in Emath. Forty yards further on, as he was finishing the fruit, he realized why the lizardmen didn't bring this variety in to trade. Even in that short time after picking, the pulp had softened further and begun to sour. It was a delicacy for jungle-dwellers alone.

  Jungle-dwellers like Dennis, Prince of Emath.

  Chester continued to pluck fruits and berries for Dennis as they strode along. The youth noticed a cluster of thumb-sized translucent fruits and said, "These, Chester?"

  "Not these, Dennis," said the little robot, guiding Dennis' hand away with one of his tentacles. "For you would die, and your bones would rot before your flesh."

  Dennis lost all concern over the wholesomeness of what his companion offered him.

  The fruits were tasty and interesting in their variety, but they didn't satiate Dennis' appetite even after he'd eaten all his stomach could hold. "Ah, Chester?" he asked, embarrassed that he might sound ungrateful. "Is there a place we could get meat? Ah, or fish?"

  "There is a pond ahead of us, Dennis," the robot said. "It may be that there are fish in it that you can catch."

  That I can try to catch, Dennis thought; but he was looking forward to the chance.

  CHAPTER 20

  The road swept through the interior of the continent in a series of curves. The pattern had nothing obvious to do with the terrain. When one gently-radiused arc intersected a rare outcrop of hard stone in the jungle's general flatness, the roadway sheared through and left what remained of the outcrop as a gray wall to either side of the manufactured pinkness.

  The pond was curved also, a crescent moon of water so large that its horns vanished to either side in the fringing jungle. The road crossed three feet above the water, unsupported and without guard rails. As the companions approached, Dennis saw touches of pink beneath the mud and reeds of the water's edge. Whoever built the road had constructed the pond as well.

  There was bright, unobstructed sunlight at the center of the shallow arch that bridged the water: the pond was so wide that even the giant trees to either side could not close the sky with their branches. Dennis had spent his life in sunlight; but after less than a day in the jungle, the sharp purity of an open sky was as great a wonder as tangled greenery had been when he viewed it from a crystal tower.

  Dennis looked down into the water—black as shadows except where it reflected the orange ball of the sun. Insects skimmed the surface, tracing their figures with mechanical repetition.

  One circle broke suddenly in a splash and a silver glitter too unexpected to be visualized after the event.

  "There are fish indeed, Dennis," said Chester approvingly.

  "How did you know this pond was here, Chester?" the youth asked.

  "I know what I know," said the robot. "And the pond was here."

  Dennis attached his hook and cork float to the line. They'd been in the shopping bag when he flung it away, furious at the wet bread and missing sausages. If Chester hadn't retrieved the bag...

  "The wise man is praised because he remains calm, Dennis," said the robot—as if he were reading his master's thoughts.

  Dennis would have to hold the line by the small stick on which it was spooled unless he cut himself a pole, and to do that—

  "I should have brought a little knife, Chester," Dennis said doubtfully. "Or maybe a hatchet. I could use the sword, but it'd be pretty clumsy...?"

  He let his voice trail into a question. Chester ignored it.

  Well, that was what Dennis deserved. He was unsure of himself and hoping to be told that everything would work out fine. What he needed to do—what he knew he needed to do—was to act.

  He unbelted the sword and laid it beside him. He'd use the butt to club his catch when he'd landed it. Then he started to drop the line into the water—and froze. The large fish that rose and slapped the water only a few yards out did so in mockery.

  "Chester," Dennis said, "I forgot bait. We don't have any bait."

  "There is the ring on your finger, Dennis," replied his companion. "It may be that the ring will lure fish."

  The ring was a diamond in a thin band, placed on Dennis' thumb for luck in his infancy and now worn on the little finger of his left hand. Its facets sent the sunlight across the surface of the pond in fiery sparkles even as Dennis turned his hand to look at it.

  "Sure, that's a good idea," he said as he worried the ring over his knuckle. "Thank you, Chester."

  "Many are the small things that are worthy of respect," quoted the robot smugly.

  The line, with the ring attached to the tag end of the leader, plopped into the water at last. The pond was so rich in dyes leached from the surrounding jungle that the hook disappeared though it was only a hand's length beneath the bobber. The diamond remained a wink of brightness twisting in the dark.

  The strike was immediate. Dennis almost lost his grip—and the pull was so strong that he nearly pitched into the water when reflex clamped his hands against the spool.

  He staggered backward on the bridge crying, "We've got one, Chester!" as the line spun out.

  In the back of his mind Dennis was bitterly calling himself a fool for not cutting a pole after all, even if it would have been a hard job with the sword his only tool. A pole's springiness would have given the fish something to fight besides the tension fingers put on the spool... but Dennis' hands were strong and calloused from swordsmanship drills, and the thrill of the struggle quickly replaced desire for a meal as the force driving his actions.

  It was a big fish. It would have been big if it came from the hold of one of the Emath trawlers whose catches had all the salt ocean in which to grow.

  At first Dennis saw nothing but the cavorting line and the insects drawn by the bubbles in the line's swift wake. A spiny fin flicked the air, long and six feet back from where the line cut the water.

  The fish broke surface in a leap, tossing its head in a vain attempt to clear the hook fast in its jaw. It was huge, its head and back iridescent and its belly the white of fresh cream.

  Its eyes were black. They sparkled like the diamond flopping at the side of its mouth.

  Dennis let his catch run against the drag of his thumb until the line had wound almost to the end of the spool. Then he fought the fish back, loop by loop—wishing he had better equipment and proud beyond words
that he was succeeding with what he had.

  Dennis was doing this himself, with neither king nor courtier to ease the task.

  For a time, the fish struggled in the pond-edge reeds, but there were no trees growing beyond the pink margin to break the line on their roots. If the fish came toward him, though, and crossed beneath, the road's lower edge—an immaculate 90 degrees despite the untold ages the pink material had been exposed to the elements—would cut the line as surely as a pair of scissors.

  "Chester!" he shouted, already poising to jump into the pond if the water were knee-deep and its opaque surface had convinced him that it must be. "How deep is this?"

  "It is twice your height, Dennis," Chester replied calmly. "Or maybe more."

  The fish started its rush at the bridge, just as Dennis had feared.

  Instead of reeling the line, he gathered it in great loops by the handful. He could never pay it out again smoothly, but—first things first. It didn't matter whether or not the line were neatly coiled at the spindle end, if the hook and the catch that was invaluable for Dennis' self-respect were trailing their way unimpeded on the other side of the bridge, lost forever to him...

  "He who thrusts his chest at the spear will surely be slain!" Chester warned—

  But the robot didn't interfere, it wasn't his place to interfere, and Dennis with his blood up was in no mood to be warned about the sin of pride.

  Almost the fish beat him. Almost.

  Dennis bent with the spindle in his left hand as the fish tried to shoot beneath him, its fin cutting a flat S-curve of foam in the black surface. When he jerked upright again, the last yard of line was in his right palm, sword palm, and the great, glittering fish flashed up also—will it or no.

  They teetered there together, the fish's tail lashing the water to froth as Dennis tried to twist his torso back to balance and safety. The eyes winked at him and the ring winked; and Dennis dropped the tangled spindle to thrust the vee of his index and middle fingers into the flaring gill slits.

  For a moment it was an open question as to which of them was caught, the fish or Dennis. Then the youth curvetted, lifting with all the strength of both arms—nearly overbalancing but not quite, while the fish flopped and slapped and flopped back on the bridge.

  Dennis panted and groped for the sword with his right hand. The line had cut his palm, so he left chevrons of blood on the pink surface as he patted toward the hilt.

  "Be my lover, dear one," said the fish in a human voice, a woman's voice.

  Dennis squawked and jumped back, snatching away his left hand that had pinioned his catch while his right prepared to finish it. The sharp gill-rakers had cut his fingers.

  "I am the Cariad, dear one," said the fish, turning so that both its eyes watched the youth in a most unfishlike way. "Be my lover, will you not?"

  "By earth and heaven!" Dennis shouted in a mixture of wonder and horror. "You're a fish and no more than my dinner!"

  He snatched up the sword, and as he turned with it the fish—glimmered. He didn't see the change, but instead of its tailfins slapping him, bare human legs tangled with his legs and they both went back over the side of the bridge—the youth and what had been a fish and was now a girl who clasped him.

  Dennis hit the water with his mouth open to shout surprise. The pond was as cold as it was black, and no better to breathe than water of any other temperature or color. They sank in a gout of spray, Dennis and the girl. All he could think of as he went down was: It is twice as deep as you are tall, Dennis; or maybe more.

  When his body's buoyancy and air trapped in his clothing bobbed Dennis to the surface, the girl—Cariad—spouted a playful jet of water from her mouth and said, "Now, dear one—won't you give me the power of a wish over you?"

  "Let me go!" Dennis shouted.

  He knew an instant later that he should have saved his breath instead, because Cariad grinned and ducked him again with arms that were slim and white and very strong.

  She had a pixie face with high cheekbones and a wide mouth. Her eyes were round and the color of sun-struck amber, while the nipples of her breasts were the same bright coral as her lips.

  Dennis' lungs were burning before Cariad let him rise the second time. When his head broke surface, he began to cough and his eyes were blind with fear of suffocation.

  "Give me the power of a wish, beloved," the girl murmured in a voice as soft as her naked body pressing against him. "So that we may go up upon the firm ground again, you and I..."

  "Never will I—" Dennis sputtered, uncertain whether or not he was speaking aloud until the Cariad's hands gripped his chin and forced him down again backwards, as if she had her will to slay him or spare him—

  As indeed she did, slip of a girl though she looked... But Dennis' strength was nothing to hers in the water. White torture seethed in his lungs, and his eyes pulsed red with fire and death.

  When the pressure released for a moment, before Cariad could speak—or he could see the sun for what might be his last glimpse—Dennis gasped, "I give you your wish! Only let me up!"

  "But of course I will let you up, dear one, little heart," the girl crooned as she thrust them over to the bridge with two stokes of her slim, strong legs. "Of course I will do no harm to my lover."

  Dennis reached for the lip of the bridge—low above the water when he stood atop it, but a lifetime away now. When his arm rose out of the pond, his face sank under the surface.

  Help, Chester! his mind wailed. Frustrated exhaustion goaded him, but he'd learned at least not to open his mouth at such times.

  Cariad gripped the youth under one armpit and splayed her free hand onto the bridge. Against the pink stoniness, Dennis could see the translucent hint of webbing at the base of her fingers. She lifted him effortlessly into the tentacles of Chester, who caught the youth when Dennis' own arms would have let him flop down for want of strength.

  Girl-shaped and eel-fluid, the Cariad slipped onto the roadway beside them. Smiling, she curled her legs beneath her, knees together, and sat in a shimmer of pond water. When she tossed her head, droplets flew from the tight rings of her hair. Her tresses were of variable, brilliant colors, like the rainbow dazzle of a fish's scales or light breaking through one of the prisms of Emath Palace.

  Cariad's yellow eyes were ageless, but for the rest she seemed no more than a girl as young as Dennis. Her nudity was innocent and utterly unselfconscious.

  Dennis' hook was caught in her upper lip. The line trailed from it, back into the pond. As Dennis watched, she raised her hands to the injury and winced as she tried to worry the barbs free.

  "Ah..." said the youth. "Can I...?"

  "Oh, would you help me, my Dennis, my lover?" Cariad replied, giving him a sunbright smile that the barbed steel hook only quirked slightly.

  Dennis shifted on the pavement without standing up. His garments felt gluey and uncomfortable. He started to shrug out of his tunic but looked at Chester first. The robot was as impassive as motionless silver could be.

  Dennis blushed and left the garment on as he leaned toward the Cariad.

  The hook was set firmly. Dennis tried to keep his eyes focused on the steel, instead of letting them drift down as they wanted to the girlish breasts. The water that beaded on Cariad's flesh gleamed prismatically clear, with no hint of the black depths of the pond from which it came.

  He tugged tentatively. Cariad gasped and tears started from the corners of her eyes. Dennis flinched away.

  "No, beloved," she said, hugging the youth back against her. "No, you must hurt me to save me, is it not so? Go ahead, then, my lover."

  "I'm not your lover," Dennis muttered to her shimmering hair. The sharpness of his tone was meant as a reminder to his own body.

  "Even a wise man can be harmed by desire for a woman," quoted Chester. His voice was slightly too distant to be called tart.

  The Cariad lifted her face with another broad smile. "Come, my Dennis, you will love me forever, as I wish it," she said. "But first
the hook."

  Dennis felt the heat of his blush again. "There's no help for it but to push the hook through," he said firmly. "I'll cut the line and do that, though it will hurt for the time."

  One of her delicate hands played with the back of Dennis' neck as he turned to find his sword, the only cutting tool he had. He kept his eyes down so that he didn't have to look at Chester—though the robot's metal carapace could have no expression.

  The Cariad giggled.

  The Founder's Sword was an awkward device at best for cutting fishline, and Dennis' muscles still quivered from being starved for oxygen as the girlish arms held his head under water. Dennis pinched the leader between his left thumb and forefinger, while the other three fingers momentarily steadied the cross-guard of the weapon he held point-up in his right. Then he cut the stout line.

  The Cariad smiled and her hand shot out to snatch the ring Dennis had used as a lure. "Beloved..." she murmured as she slipped the little diamond onto her own fourth finger, the digit whose vein leads straight back to the heart with no branchings.

  The swordblade was filmed with rust, especially where the sheath rubbed the chines that gave it a diamond cross-section for strength. Dennis slid the weapon back into the scabbard, embarrassed at its condition.

  Embarrassed also at remembering that he'd drawn the sword to knock in the head of this luscious girl.

  "I'm ready, little heart," said the Cariad, lifting her face as he gingerly reached for the hook with both hands. When she arched her chest, her nipples brushed his forearms.

  With his face set in stony determination, Dennis' left index finger probed the inside of Cariad's lip. He could feel the point, but it hadn't penetrated the skin.

  Well, he'd have to push it the rest of the way.

  "This will hurt," he said forcefully as he spread the lip with one hand and twisted on the shank with the other. Her flesh resisted the barbed steel.

  "Push, beloved," she murmured in a voice blurred by his hands. "I don't—"

  The barbs poked clear. Dennis gripped them and pulled the shank the rest of the way out of the Cariad's lip.