Normally it was us three who made landfall on an expedition, maybe backed by an extra sword arm or four. This time, though, we carried nine passengers, which meant we were brimming. Six were bearded men-at-arms, swarthy Tregellans complete with black lacquered cuirasses and matched helmets, a querulous lot I’d been at pains to keep my men from tossing overboard. Their leader was similarly equipped and just as large, but there was silver in his beard and steel in his gaze. That was Count Trovis, a man so used to commanding I’d been at pains to keep from heaving him into the deep blue myself.
With him was a slip of a boy, with only a little chin beard, his nephew Desron, the only good-humoured one of the lot, and Myria, a bronze-skinned, dark-haired vision. She was quiet and mysterious, as suits a sorceress, for so she was reputed to be. It was she who’d convinced the Count that there were treasures on the Isle of the Silver Mists, and that she alone could guide him there.
We weren’t along out of the goodness of our hearts – Trovis had already paid out a handful of sapphires, and he had pledged us another on his safe return, plus a fair cut of all the treasure.
Me, I wasn’t sure that we’d find any treasure. We’d profit enough from the sapphires. But even a rich man doesn’t turn down the offer of more money, and none of us sailors were rich. I had a crew to feed, debts to pay, and maybe some wine and revelry and women to get acquainted with.
With Lilandra’s help we were making grand time. I studied the shore while the Tregellan soldiers mumbled to themselves about what they’d do with their cut.
And then the closer reef started moving. I blinked. Unless you’re inebriated or in the midst of a quake, reefs don’t move, so I doubted my senses until I heard one of the soldiers shout. His hand rose and pointed towards the reef, asking Lilandra what that was.
It wasn’t just the gliding reef that was problematic. Much as that was a mystery worth ruminating over, I was more worried that the gap between the reefs was shrinking. What had been an easy manoeuvre was growing more challenging by the second. There are certain understandings between you and the landscape, a gentleman’s agreement like, that you’re the one supposed to do the moving.
This island apparently hadn’t heard that. A war galley’s length of reef seventy-five feet high was inching north to south, straight into our path. As I shouted to Lilandra for more wind, a massive spear-shaped reptilian head climbed from the waves, dripping water. For a brief moment, I assumed this was a new problem. Then I realised it lay at the forefront of that reef. To make things abundantly clear, as the head rose a massive length of neck lifted behind it, connecting to the body of what we’d heretofore assumed for a reef.
‘Sea monster!’ the Count shouted. I hadn’t before noticed his great gift for stating the obvious. He clambered towards me, his voice booming as though I was seated at the far end of a banquet table. ‘We’re heading straight for it! Turn or something!’
He was a lubber. You don’t just turn a skiff like you would a horse. To our port was a string of little reefs and sandbars – no safety there. And there was no way to avoid the beast if we swung further to starboard. We’d just run smack dab into its aft quarters, rising now as a lengthy strand of tail.
‘Orders, cap’n?’ Heln shouted.
‘Steady as she goes!’
Count Trovis gabbled at me about my stubbornness and stupidity, but I ignored him. Lilandra called to the winds, gesturing frantically with one hand while her other held to the mast.
She was good. That wind kicked in pretty as strawberry pie and sent us zooming past the monster. We passed only half a cable length out and I got a real good look at its head. A dripping mass of green seaweed hung out of one side of its mouth, and it chewed on this with no particular speed as it watched us dully. Above the huge green eyes was a rounded forehead and then a big flat skull. Apart from the reef-like back frill it looked about as dangerous as a turtle.
Well, a turtle long as the king’s war galley. What I mean is that it didn’t look like those drawings of beasties on map edges that are cracking ships open to snatch screaming sailors. It was just a giant grazer, as interested in us as a sheep is when a squirrel wanders past.
But as we drew even with the monster, three of the sailors whipped up their bows and started firing.
The thing kept chewing as the first arrows rebounded from its massive scales. I shouted at them to stop and Myria joined in.
‘Fools!’ she cried. ‘You’ll anger it!’
Their arrows didn’t have any effect, or leave much impression, until the last shot struck its eye.
Its jaw opened wide and it let out a sky-rumbling roar. The sail rattled in its spars and the ship rocked. An arrow through a man’s socket would surely have slain, but this hadn’t even ruined the beast’s eye – we saw the black shaft sticking out from the orb like a splinter in your hand.
The soldiers gabbled amongst themselves and the Count and his nephew shouted at them, belatedly, to stop.
In the stunned silence after the beast’s second roar I heard Heln’s low pronouncement. ‘That’s bad.’ My cousin had a way with words. He put all his weight into the tiller, swinging us as close as he could to the real reef on our port side.
The beast started after us, each massive footfall conjuring a wave. Lilandra was singing up a mighty wind now, and it belled the sail and ballooned my sleeves.
We slipped past that second reef just before the head of a second beast began its rise. I saw a monstrous eye as the head soared up. A huge glob of masticated seaweed dropped right onto the deck. If it had decided to surface just a little sooner, we would have run straight into the thing. Yes, the other reef was another of the sea beasts.
I don’t know what we’d have done if the second monster hadn’t roared in answer to the first. The one that had started after us swung to regard the second and they both snorted at one another.
I kept my eyes on them both and they had quite a bellowing match as we rolled closer and closer to the shore. Fortunately, they didn’t decide to join forces to smash us to paste and kindling. They were still grunting at each other as our prow drove into the beach.
I jumped to the sand and urged the men out to help drag up the boat. The Count was on me in an instant.
His voice was tight, and his yellowed teeth were bared in a dangerous smile. ‘Captain Varn, you do not give orders to my men.’
I was having none of that. ‘Your men just about got us killed, Count.’
‘That is my affair.’
I shook my head. ‘My boat. My crew, my rules. You hired me. That’s how it rolls. That’s the last time anyone attacks before I give the order, clear?’
‘You know better than a soldier?’
‘I know the Isles better than you.’
‘You do not know them better than Myria.’
At mention of her name, the bronze-skinned beauty glided up, her ebon shoulder-length hair swaying with each step.
‘Maybe not. But she was telling you to belay the attack as well. You’d do well to listen to your counsellors, Count. It’s a long swim back.’
He growled something but turned sharply away, truculently commanding his men to help Heln and Lilandra drag in the skiff.
Myria gauged me with an unreadable look, then followed him.
The nephew drew close to me as I studied the jungle.
‘You must forgive my uncle, Captain,’ he told me with a head bob. ‘He is old nobility, descended, on a lateral branch, from a line of kings. He is a good man, but he has trouble taking orders from those in… other classes.’
I nodded acknowledgement. His speech didn’t do anything to endear the older man to me, but I liked the nephew a little better for it.
We left the skiff well up the beach so high tide wouldn’t send it off on its own, stowed the sail, grabbed our gear, and headed into the deep green.
That temple had looked close from out in the bay, but there were a couple of miles of jungle between the beach and the ruins, and we didn’t spot
any trails. That meant hacking our own. Heln and I alternated taking point, hewing our way through the foliage with our machetes. The Count said he wanted to keep his men fresh for the fight, and there was no budging him. Lilandra kept her senses stretched taut. Sure, she was a Wind Warden, but she was sensitive to disturbances in the air, and if she concentrated she might be able to sense things that were interested in laying fang or claw into us. That was our hope, at least.
If you’ve never been to the tropics, you might have the idea that they’re hot and you’re always surrounded by weird birds and plants. It’s true enough. There’s constantly something off in the distance hooting or shouting. You spend enough time in these places and you get to recognise the difference between sorts of monkeys and birds, and know that one of the most threatening roars actually comes out of the maw of a hand-sized toad.
But there are new sounds on every single one of the islands of the Ghost Archipelago. You never know if that strange, spine-tingling ululation is from some bird or a lizard thing that’s creeping up to kill you. Then there are the endless insects, and the sweat constantly dripping off of you, to which the insects are naturally drawn.
On the plus side, there are pretty flowers. If you take time to smell them, plenty are fragrant, which is nice, because when you’re slicing through the jungle for a few hours it’s a change to catch a whiff of a pleasant scent.
We were about two hours in when Heln stilled, crouching, his bald, tattooed head swivelling to take in the foliage ahead. One muscular arm motioned us down while the other was poised with machete ready.
Naturally we lowered, Lilandra’s lean face screwing up in concentration. I did a quick scan over my shoulder to make sure the others obeyed.
Something heavy crushed through the underbrush, the ground shaking with each footfall. The thunder lizards in the Ghost Isles don’t quite feel like an earthquake when they move, but you do feel like you’re standing on the surface of a beaten drum when they near you. I’d been close to thunder lizards twice – one time a lot closer than I wanted – and I recognised the feel of their passage well enough.
The Count was demanding as usual when he rustled through the brush to whisper to me. ‘What is that?’
I pressed fingers to my lips. The rest of the jungle had stilled, which should have been a big clue to stay silent.
I crept up to Heln, who had his hand up against a thick palm. I stepped around a fern and looked north-west.
The thunder lizard was damnably close. It could have peered right up into a second story and snapped you in two if you were dumping your slops. Fortunately, the thing was a couple of yards off and was moving diagonally away. I felt my heart thrum at sight of the thing, all different shades of green scale with occasional red patches, with huge clawed back feet and spindly clawed limbs thrust forward below the immense head, which towered over the trees it stomped past.
Suddenly it burst into speed and went rushing into the jungle depths. It let out an ear-shattering roar that rivalled a thunderclap and lowered its head. There was the crackling sound and thud of a tree falling, and then, over the silent forest, some light trilling vocalisations that set the beast roaring once more.
We stayed right where we were, thanks. I expected shortly to hear lots of crunching sounds as the thunder lizard closed on its prey, and was a little surprised when the trilling continued, moving east. We heard the beast following, letting out shorter roars, as if in frustration.
Finally, the sounds receded, along with the earth-rattling thud of the monster’s steps. I felt it was safe to breathe when the creatures around us bucked up the courage to resume their own shouting matches.
‘What was that all about?’ the Count asked.
‘A thunder lizard on the hunt,’ I said. I might have explained further, but I didn’t feel especially disposed towards it. I took the lead from Heln, and there was no missing the path the thunder lizard had made through the foliage. Its passage had crushed shrubs and grasses, so we followed. You can get worn down cutting your way through the jungle.
Pretty soon we saw what the crash had been about. The monster had bumped into and brought down one of those odd, scaly trees that grow in the Ghost Isles. They look a little like palms, but they’re straighter, taller, and bigger around besides, about the size of a sturdy oak. They also have fruit that dangles down from their top leaves but it’s not worth seeking out unless you’re starving, because consuming one’s about as much fun as eating a turnip-flavoured pinecone.
The tree was lying on its side, its shallow roots drooping and covered with big red ants. Two thirds of the way down it had pinned a man in green pants, who was struggling to free himself.
I let out a low oath, told Heln to keep watch, and hurried to help the poor fellow. Instantly I guessed what had happened – somehow, he and a group had been surprised and his friends had bravely lured the thunder lizard off so he could get free.
It wasn’t until I drew close that I realised he wasn’t wearing green pants. He was wearing a tunic down to his thighs, but after that were green, scaly legs, with clawed, scaly feet, and there was a green scaly tale to boot. I stopped short.
This was one of the serpent folk. I’d only seen them from afar, but I’d heard a lot of dark things about their practices. I’d seen enough about the world at that point to know half the stuff you hear is complete nonsense – the Tregellan claim that the Vilgani are cannibals and the Vilgani claim the Tregellan sell their own babies, while in truth both countries aren’t guilty of anything more heinous than usual, apart from the Vilgani preference for ludicrous moustaches.
So I didn’t necessarily believe that the serpent folk craved human flesh or that they could curse you just by looking at you. But I was a lot more cautious. I stepped all the way around the tree and looked down at the front end of the serpent man.
There was no mistaking him for a human from this side. Sure, there were human-like arms attached to the shoulders, and a torso, but the neck that sprouted up out of there might as well have been the top half of a snake, complete with a snake’s head, albeit with a higher forehead.
It had been struggling until it heard me draw close, and now that head stared at me with its unreadable eyes in its alien, expressionless face, likely wondering what I planned to do. It was trapped, and I realised I still held a machete in one hand.
I’ll be honest. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do, either. We stared at each other for a moment that felt like a couple of hours, and we might have stared a little longer except that we heard the thunder lizard roar. It sounded a little closer.
I guess that’s what made up my mind. I drove the machete upright into the dirt and advanced on the tree.
I reached down for the tree bole further away from him and grabbed hold of the tree bark. It was slicker than I expected.
I’m not a small man, but I’m no weightlifter. I can’t say the trunk moved much despite my straining. I looked over at the serpent guy and he was still staring. ‘Well,’ I said at the same time the thunder lizard let off another roar. ‘I can’t lift it by myself.’
I wasn’t sure he understood the words, but he must have understood my aim, because a moment after I bent to get to work, he pressed up against the tree with his back.
But one spindly serpent guy and one able sailor wasn’t enough to move the tree. I glanced back and didn’t see my people, and didn’t want to call them out to the open anyway because damned if I didn’t hear the pad of that thunder lizard. I heard the trilling, too, but the beast must have decided it wanted to come back for a sure meal and stop following the promise of one.
I had two choices. I could either abandon this serpent man to his fate, or I could let loose with a blood burn. There’s some Heritors who just love using blood burn. I’m not one of them. Sure, it comes in handy, but there’s a reason ‘burn’ is in the descriptor. It hurts.
I’m still not sure why I helped him. Maybe it’s because I’d gotten myself involved and that I don’t like doi
ng things halfway. It certainly wasn’t because I overflowed with warm feelings for snakes. But I reached down into my core, sucked in a breath, and swore in Vilgani. Their oaths have a lot of poetry to them, you know?
And I knew a flush of strength at the same time it felt like a thousand fire ants suddenly chomped down on my skin. I actually shouted aloud at the pain.
But that tree came up, level with my shoulder, and then, as I braced my legs, higher than my head.
The serpent man scrambled away, stared at me, then jabbed over my shoulder with urgency.
I looked. Yeah, the thunder lizard was only a couple of cable lengths off, and his beady eyes were looking straight at us.
My new friend hightailed it into the jungle – and I mean this literally. I cursed again and dropped the tree, then ran west. I had the presence of mind not to run towards my crew.
The beast could have gone after the serpent man, but he came after me. The ground rattled with every stride, and when he roared it was a thunderclap.
I tore through the jungle, legs pumping, oblivious to the cut and scrape of spiny leaves and a sharp branch that sliced my cheek. I searched the ground ahead, desperate for something. Anything. Maybe a hole to dive into or a really big rock to hide behind – I didn’t know, really, what could save me until I raced right up to the edge of a crevice.
A little stream twisted along the bottom of it. On either side, a whole slew of red and yellow flowers bloomed cheerily. The far side was a long ways off. Maybe ten metres.
Close as that thing was, I didn’t have time for worry. I was already running at full speed, so I kept on straight for the edge, then leapt for it.
I heard the snap of great teeth just behind me, smelled the stink of that terrible maw. And then I was airborne and the far side rushed at me. I stretched out for it, aiming straight for a spiny green fern.
Frostgrave: Ghost Archipelago: Tales of the Lost Isles Page 21
