"This jab is for depriving Minoh of her eldest daughter ... this one's for making Ahlegra an only child ... mustn't forget robbing Lasbow of his ticket to my throne..."
On the next poke Cerdic left the point under the skin of the flinching Landhopper's thigh, meanly twisting the enamelled stabber until his anguished ribbits tautened into insufferable trilling. “I'll make you pay horribly for what you wrenched from my heart,” he swore, sinking his needle teeth into the Dokran's shoulder. Biting down, egged on by Ryops’ writhing torment and the bitter taste of amphib blood filling his mouth, Cerdic tore out a measure of frog flesh. Spitting out his trophy, he had his cruel fun cut short by a three-headed spear slamming into the Landhopper's sunken chest.
Ryops shuddered once, twice, and went into shock. Trickling blood escaped from the sides of his slack mouth. His torment coming to an end, his useless eyes closed. Engulfed in calming blackness, the chieftain hoped for a moon tonight. The path to Dughenna would be a pleasanter journey illuminated by moonlight. Minutes later the Dokran Teh of the Piawro drifted off into the eternal bliss of death.
Lasbow extracted his trident, but not before Cerdic, in his disgust and ire, turned on him. “What's the meaning of your interference, Captain? This scum deserved endless torture for his crimes.” The Dokran's corpse wafted idly in the current, the boundless sea his graveyard.
"We are not animals, Sire. Never should we sink to their level, even in retribution. Nupterus will condemn us all to flight for this debauchery."
"Not only do you interrupt my play, you dare presume to know the will of the Sea God. How bold of you, Lasbow. Do you wish also to pre-empt my actions as Merking?"
"I am a faithful Seaguardian, Your Majesty."
"Who covets the kingship of Castle Rock. Do not deny this! I see the lust in your eyes."
Lasbow saw only madness flaming Cerdic's. “This is not the place for arguing the point."
"What better time then, Captain? Look about you. The Landhoppers are in complete disarray. We are victorious."
The commander did not doubt the mad king's assessment. The bulk of the frog army floated massacred in the sterile waters, their deadness colouring the oceans with failure. Already the Fishers started their mopping-up operations, mercilessly helping those few amphibs surrendering to join their slain comrades. Whereas Cerdic foolishly considered this engagement the defining battle, Lasbow viewed it for what it really was. A precursory skirmish to the impending clash when thousands more frogmen would storm the seas and deluge the Cetari with death.
"Certainly we've won this round, King Cerdic, but the next will prove our undoing."
"I find your attitude defeatist and cowardly.” The monarch's whistle had the ring of a sneer to it.
"I'm being realistic!"
"You need to be put back in your place, Captain Lasbow. Perhaps even relieved of your command."
"In the middle of a war we cannot hope to win? Without me, you'll lead us all to our ruin."
"Treasonous talk! That is cause enough to remove you from your post permanently. Hand me my sword.” Hesitating, the Seaguardian looking after the Merking's slasher was surprisingly unsure where his allegiance lay. Never had the dilemma cropped up to choose between king and captain. Cerdic shook his fist at the indecisive Fisher. “My sword!” he insisted. The merman nervously withheld it still.
"The Seaguard seem to be doubting your judgement, Sire."
"They have not the right. I command their obedience."
"But I've earned their loyalty."
Respect counted for much amongst the premier Fishers. None would lift a hand against their esteemed commander. But therein lay their quandary. Neither would they openly raise a trident in opposition to their sovereign ruler.
The deadlock binding him could, in Cerdic's assessment, be resolved in only one way. “So it's come down to a pissing contest between me and you, Lasbow.” Flashing the borrowed knife in the face of his wavering bodyguard, the Merking snatched back his sword. Discarding the tooth, he threw down the challenge. “Let us be at it then."
"Sire, no good can come from our duelling. Every able-bodied merman is needed if we are to survive this tribulation. The Cetari must remain unbroken, presenting a united front to the enemy."
"Quick are you to butt in, yet you fear to confront me out in the open.” Tapping Lasbow's reshaped trident with the point of his sword, Cerdic's muttered click rapped the captain with equal disdain. “Sneaking behind my back is your preferred style.” His provocation remaining unmet, the Merking laughed loud and scornfully. “You haven't it in you to commit regicide."
"Unlike yourself."
Before he could control his reaction, Cerdic stiffened. His body betrayed his guiltiness.
"So the rumours were true,” read Lasbow, solemnly nodding his disenchantment. “What dastardliness induces a merman to murder his own brother? As the forgotten second son, were you that desperate to become top dogfish?"
"Compulsion makes a merman do heinous things, Captain."
"Referring to your sick obsession with Lorea now?"
"I was only ever a doting stepfather."
"You display a perverted concept of love, Cerdic. She was your niece!"
"And personal advancement was not the impetus behind you wooing the elder Merprincess? Don't make me laugh again, Lasbow. You aren't that noble.” Comprehension placed a dry smile on the Merking's mug. “Fishtory is repeating itself. You're angling for Ahlegra, since she's the surviving, available, daughter."
"Are we jealous?"
The annoyed swish of the sword confirmed Lasbow had hit the mark. “At least I merwomanise under no pretence. I've only ever been in it for the sex. The Sea God knows I get no companionship from Minoh. To think the depths I sunk to, the energy I expended to make her mine. If not for the enjoyableness of gaining the crown, my efforts would have been absolutely wasted."
"You wanted the Merqueen all along?"
"Lust is the bane of all mermen. The desire for affluence or affection makes monsters of any one of us.” Intent on ramming his point home, the unhinged Merking hoisted his sword against Lasbow. He would never relinquish his kingship to his moralising guard captain. The equal of any Fisher, Cerdic vowed to hack Lasbow into titbits for the eels to snack on.
Coming on the defensive, Lasbow had an inkling some time ago that matters might well come to this, how he would be obliged to act treasonously. But to depose Cerdic he risked overthrowing the monarchy. He gripped his trident tightly in resolve. As always, whatever he did was for the betterment of the Cetari. Even if that meant killing a king.
Cerdic froze. Or rather his scowling countenance did. “I can't move my face,” he alarmingly whistled through numbing lips.
Lasbow floated firm. Was this real, or just some ploy to unbalance him?
"My eyes!” wailed Cerdic. “My sight blurs. I cannot see."
Lasbow lowered his guard. The deceitful Merking was incapable of subterfuge on such an elaborate level. Slaying his brother and claiming it an accident was the extent of Cerdic's duplicity. He simply was not that good an actor.
Cerdic started trembling, his steely blue skin darkening into a ghastly shade of purple. The sword dropping from his unclenched hand, he rolled onto his back, convulsing violently.
"The king has fallen!” Forgetting their differences, Lasbow rushed to his side, helpless to aid the afflicted regent. A number of Seaguard in earshot went with him, equally impotent. Cerdic's spasms doubled in concentration, his pain and fear broadcast in screeching whistles.
"What's wrong with him?” they simultaneously wondered.
"It's as if he's been stung by stonefish poison,” one of them compared.
"Bind him to still his thrashes,” ordered Lasbow, shouting to be heard over the shrilling. Snatching up the royal slasher before it sank beyond reach, he added, “We tow him back to the Rock. Ochar will know what therapy with which to treat him."
One Seaguardian did not bother to unwind his belt rope, and f
olded his arms. “The kingfish'll be dead before we've swum halfway."
The pessimistic merman was wrong. Cerdic expired then and there, right before their shocked eyes, his tremors silenced into limp finality.
Assailed by a flurry of condemnatory stares, Lasbow spread his arms wide in a non-threatening gesture of guiltlessness. “I never touched him. You all saw this. I could not have poisoned Cerdic."
"Nonetheless, the fact remains,” the cheerless Seaguardian proclaimed. “The Merking is dead! All hail Lasbow, Steward of the Three Seas."
Chapter Fifteen
"Put your backs into it, you maggoty tadpoles. Push I say!"
Twelve tons of war canoe trundled ponderously across log rollers, the pushers grunting and wheezing from the exertion of manhandling what many secretly called Eskaa's Folly through the logged rainforest. A continuous relay of toiling frogmen rotated the rollers from back to front while their grumbling workmates put their shoulders to the hull, ensuring the uninterrupted progress of the outsized dugout over the bumpy terrain down the wide jungle path.
The vine whip brandished by the burly overseer cracked frighteningly over the heads of the slogging Burrowers, persuading the work gang not to relax its effort. “Keep up the pace! The beach is within hopping distance and the Subos desires his flagship in the water before the tide turns again tonight,” he bellowed from his position riding in the massive vessel.
"We'd move a lot quicker without his extra weight,” griped one gasping labourer, pining for the shade that the defunct trees had provided to blot out the unceasing sun. It was hot, heavy work.
Below on the bleached sands, Eskaa's pride beamed through his stickiness as the war boat inched out of the treeless landscape and into the channel the Diggers were in the process of finishing excavating down to the water's edge. Manoeuvring the canoe sideways off the creaking timber rollers, the flagged pushers slumped gratefully onto the beach for a well-earned breather after the roughly hewn keel settled with a thump into the top end of the trough. Their short respite would be over the moment waiting Climbers attached thick drag ropes to the prow for the final haul to the lagoon.
Standing in his shadow, Chulib looked up at the cheerful Subos with glowering eyes. Having earlier ditched his weighty robe in the interest of coolness, Eskaa was unadorned except for his silly feathered torc and venerable staff of office. “You could at least display a modicum of grief,” suggested the Shurpeha. “A lot of good amphibs tragically died this morning."
Still smiling, Eskaa shrugged uncaringly. “They're replaceable.” He deigned to glance down at Chulib. “Missing Ryops are we?"
"The Dokran was my chum, as well as chief. Lunder ought to be mourning its loss."
"I'll organise a memorial service for our gallantly slain leader after this invasion is successfully concluded. He'll be fittingly martyred for his sacrifice and those that died with him eulogised too, despite today's debacle. I suppose even losers deserve remembrance, if only to learn a lesson. But for now we amphibs wage war, not weep like a beached sea turtle."
Chulib muzzled his sorrow, struggling to accept his changed circumstances. Mere hours ago he keenly awaited the Dokran's triumphal return, only the silent seas washed up not the army of victors as expected but a solitary warrior bleeding from defeat. Rescuing the stranded survivor salvaged his horror story of the Amphib Army suffering a mortifying pulverisation at the hands of the fingered fish. Lucky to have fled with his battered life, he reported there was no chance of others escaping the carnage; their annihilation calculated and complete. The Dokran Teh, the Shurpeha extras, the draftee lancers—all likely terminated. It was pointless to hope otherwise. The mute celebratory drums would stay unbeaten.
Temple acolytes promptly whisked the shaken and exhausted escapee up to the mountainside compound to dress his wounds. That was the last anyone heard from the hurt Leaper. Eskaa later announced, with apposite sadness, how the patient had croaked, succumbing to his injuries. A natural hatched cynic, Chulib quietly suspected foul play. In his estimation as a fighter, the frogman's wounds were survivable. What did the victim know, or perhaps damningly had seen, of the battle that made him such a threat to the priesthood to warrant his elimination? Did Ryops in fact meet his grisly end as imagined, or were those responsible more froggy than fishy in form?
Chulib might never find out. Today the governing power of the atoll had inalterably shifted in focus, and with it swung his allegiance.
Capitalising on Ryops’ presumed death with organisational swiftness, as if the contingency plan for such a dire happening had been laid out and put into motion even before the frog army embarked from Lunder's sandy shores, Eskaa claimed dominion over the island with his typically persuasive eloquence. To do so he hurdled 500 years of tradition with scarcely a blink of regret.
Hosting a hurriedly convened rally, the Subos, after making a suitably teary announcement bewailing the “noble death of the Dokran and those courageous souls he led,” put his proposal to the many thousands of Piawro gathered in stunned silence on the shoreline. “Change is thrust upon us,” he had said, “and the Elementals, in their infinite wisdom, have seen fit to put their wanton people to the test. We are to change or die. You are all witness to the dawning of a new era. Prosperity will return to Lunder Atoll and its inhabitants, when the island is brought under new management. Counselled spiritually by the Brother Gods during my prayer time, they unanimously commanded that I become sole superintendent."
Ripples of astonishment wrinkled the crowd's muteness.
"A Dokran has always ruled over us,” a malcontent Leaper bravely croaked from the front rows. “It has ever been that way."
Already Eskaa's acolytes, distributed slyly throughout the assemblage, marked the outspoken amphibiman for disposal afterwards. Opposition troubled nobody if it could be removed everlastingly.
Raising his hands to shush the mutterings, Eskaa rebuked the throng. “Your misgivings are groundless. Are your memories so short? Bellies growl empty, land is at an all-time premium, and sickly froglets drop like flies. Traditional methods of rule no longer work. Face the fact; generations of Dokranry have failed us."
"And the Suboship intends to bail us out?” The sneering detractor felt foolishly bold in his heckling.
"I will put right the maladies ailing the atoll and restore the flagging pride of the Piawro. But if you need convincing, if any doubt my ability or empowerment from the Elementals, let the Shurpeha decide my worthiness. What say you, Chulib? Is my legitimacy valid? Am I fit to be more than spiritual leader of the Piawro?"
Genuinely astounded by Eskaa gambling on his support, Chulib amazed the gathering and himself by giving the underhand magician-priest a ringing endorsement, a turnaround made all the more surprising by their longstanding mutual enmity. “I am oath-bound to uphold the will of Lunder's recognised ruler,” he straightforwardly said. “If the gods ascertain it is to be the Subos alone, then I freely follow Eskaa."
His justification was simple. Ryops had to be dead, leaving no heir to fill the void. Devious and dirty Eskaa stood out as the obvious candidate to become his replacement. Chulib did feel as if he was doing a disservice to Ryops’ memory, but there was method to his madness. The best way of continuing his watch over the blameworthy magician-priest was not from the sidelines, but as his sidekick. Who else on the isle was there to keep alive the moral principles that died with the Dokran?
The transition period was sensibly short. By midday word spread across the deforested isle of the Subos absorbing the general leadership duties of the Dokranry, upping the already substantial power the priesthood exercised. To many his rise in station came as no surprise, was indeed a mere formality. Unofficially, most amphibs already regarded Eskaa as their true leader. This morning's event only confirmed the promotion. As for Eskaa's investiture, the ceremony was informally succinct. There would be time aplenty for pomp and pageantry when the victory celebrations commenced. Fish-with-Hands on a spit would make a grand feast for all cele
brants.
"Was your secret meeting with the Climbers profitable, Chulib?"
The enquiry nearly floored the Shurpeha captain. Garmented still in his ropey battle-wear, Chulib put down the sword and shield to remove his helmet. “How did you find out?"
"The gods see all and tell me everything."
More likely your spying flunkies. The meeting took place on the far side of the atoll, presumably out of sight of prying eyes.
"It was only a matter of time before they approached you, now that you've risen from being the third to the second most influential amphib on the atoll. What did they promise you to withdraw support for me?"
"They offered me nothing I don't already have."
Eskaa's smile broadened. Chulib was firmly under his thumb. “Your constancy is appreciated."
"I didn't do it for you, Eskaa. Things are in turmoil enough around here without adding civil strife to the pot."
"I reward those who are loyal to me."
"I don't want your thanks. It's not like we're pals."
Eskaa laughed a mirthless chuckle. “I'm not expecting you to be fond of me, Chulib. You hate my guts and I yours. That won't ever change.” Theirs was a working relationship broadly akin to the strained pairing of he and Dokran Ryops, except for one fundamental difference; Chulib was infinitely stupider and easier to dupe. He ceased chuckling. “You just have to serve me unquestioningly."
Already having trouble complying, Chulib pointed a querying finger at the relocated war canoe. The elemental symbols for earth, wind, fire, and water adorned the hull in bas-relief, each patterned in the likeness of the Piawro gods to which they were attributed and painted correspondingly in green, white, red, and blue. “What insanity possessed you to commission the boat builders to chisel out that monstrosity?"
"You've been the Dokran's stooge far too long. Ryops always did think small. Working for me, you'll soon appreciate bigger is better."
Gazing at up at the taller frogman, Chulib doubted that. “It's awfully large to be a fishing kayak."
"Don't insult my intelligence, Shurpeha. Not even you are so dumb that you can't recognise the ultimate war canoe for what it is."
Three Times Chosen Page 24