by Lynn Abbey
"I…" He hesitated, and I could see how he hated acknowledging that, landlubber that he was, he didn't know what to do next. "What do you recommend?"
"I see only one way to deal with them as long as they're on the bottom of the boat. Some of us will to have to dive down and dislodge them."
He nodded. "See to it."
I picked three men to accompany me and gave instructions to the rest, then it was time to pull off my boots and slip over the side.
The frigid water shocked my flesh, and the salt stung my eyes. Clutching my harpoon, kicking, I impelled myself beneath the barnacle-studded hull, and my comrades trailed after me.
It was little easier to peer through the cloudy water now that I was immersed in it, but I eventually made out the crabmen dangling from the keel, ripping and prying at the caulked timbers. Grateful there were only two, I swam to the nearest and thrust with the harpoon.
The water stole some of the force from my attack, but I still pierced a joint in the crabman's natural armor. Caught by surprise, the creature twisted toward me, just in time for one of my companions to spear it in the mouth, whereupon it relinquished its grip on the hull.
Jabbing, relying on the length of our weapons to keep us clear of its claws, we drove the crab from beneath the ship, while the other militiamen did the same to its fellow. As soon as the beasts were in the open, harpoons showered down into the water, several finding their mark.
By now my chest ached with the need to breathe, but I didn't care to venture out into the rain of lances, so I turned to swim back under the boat. Just in time to behold our true quarry streaking upward from, the depths.
It was like a jellyfish with a soft, white, undulating body half the size of our vessel. Scores of thin, translucent tentacles swirled around it. Even startled as I was, I wondered that such a creature could be so cunning. How had it known to attack precisely when every single member of the crew had his eyes turned in the opposite direction? Then I noticed the crabman swimming along at the larger monster's side, and surmised that it was directing the creature's efforts.
No sane man would care to swim closer to this duo, but with my lungs ready to burst, I had no choice. I kicked upward, and luck was with me. None of the jellyfish's arms flailed into me.
As I broke the surface, glistening tentacles did the same. Shooting up into the air, they lashed back and forth across the deck above me. From my vantage point, I couldn't tell precisely what they were doing up there, but I could tell from the screams that they were wreaking havoc.
The next instant, a figure of shining steel and gaudy scarlet tumbled over the rail, his glimmering sword flying from his grasp when he struck the water. Weighted by his armor, Hylas sank like an anvil.
If I balked, it was only for a second, then I dropped the harpoon, drew a deep breath, and dived after him.
By rights Hylas should have plummeted all the way to the bottom, but he managed to grab hold of a section of one of the jellyfish's tentacles. Bubbles boiling from his mouth, he clung with one arm and tore at his armor with the other.
My ears aching from the pressure, I hovered at his side, helping him, fumbling with the clasps and buckles. The ornate regalia of Term's Fury fell into the depths, one piece at a time. When it seemed we'd disposed of enough-and in any case, our air was all but gone-I half dragged him to the surface, then to the side of the boat. A line dangled in the water, and I put it in his hand.
To my relief, men were still fighting on deck. The jellyfish had wrapped some of its tentacles around the cog itself, and appeared well on its way to capsizing her or tearing her asunder.
"Hang on to the rope," I said.
Hylas tried to answer but could only cough. I drew my knife and swam away from the boat, weaving my way through a mesh of writhing tentacles.
As before, the jellyfish didn't molest me. Even the crabman didn't notice me at first. Perhaps the monsters were too intent on the destruction of the ship, or perhaps the cloudiness of the water, and the effort I made to come in on their flank, helped conceal my approach.
As I prepared to attack, the crab sensed my presence and turned, grabbing for me with its pincers. Somehow I twisted out of the way, then raked my knife across the soft orb at the end of one of its eyestalks.
The crab recoiled and fled into the depths, and the jellyfish broke off its assault on the cog. Realizing that the colossal beast would be all but indestructible, I'd Tioped to deter it by disposing of its handler, and my tactic had paid off. Still, I'd accomplished very little. No doubt the jellyfish would resume its depredations soon enough.
When I paddled back to the cog, I learned that three militiamen had perished in the battle. Under the circumstances, that was fewer than we had any right to expect. The ship itself was crippled but capable of limping back to port. On the way in, Hylas's face was bleak. I wondered bitterly if he was grieving for our fallen comrades or his lost gear.
That night, when we were still exhausted and dispirited, the crabmen attacked the settlement. Four more warriors died, along with sixteen of the townsfolk.
I knew more or less what the men were going to say. It was clear from their conspiratorial air, to say nothing of the lookout posted at the barracks door, but I judged it wiser not to let on.
"Very well," I said, "what did you want to talk about?"
"Captain Hylas," Vallam said. Some trick of the wavering candlelight made the old scars on his face look raw and new. "You told us to give him a chance, and we did, but he isn't working out. These… schemes of his are killing us like flies."
"We lost a few men before he arrived, and we've lost a few since. Considering what we're up against, we could expect nothing better."
Dandrios shook his square-jawed head. "It's different now. That high-born lunatic doesn't care about lowly militiamen. He'd sacrifice us all to rejoin his precious Fury. Well, Talona wither me if I'll die for that. We want you to lead us, Sergeant. Hylas can disappear."
Vallam smirked. "We'll tell everyone the crabmen got him."
"No," I said. I'd seen mutiny before, and no matter how wretched the deposed officers had been, it was always a disaster. Once a company of warriors decided they had the option of pulling down their commander, discipline decayed until they were no longer an army but a rabble.
Vallam scowled. "Sergeant-"
"No!" I repeated. "Whatever mistakes the First Captain has made, he's our leader, and we'll follow him in accordance with our oath."
"I won't," Dandrios said. "If we cant get rid of Hylas, I'm leaving." He turned away, presumably to gather his belongings.
Wishing he weren't so much bigger than I, I yanked him back around. "No one's deserting, either. The town needs us."
"Bugger the town," he said.
"All right. If you've no backbone, it comes down to this. Run, and 111 hunt you down and make you wish the crabs had gotten you."
He snarled and swung at me, a haymaker fit to break my skull. Happily, a man has to wind up for a punch like that. I saw it coming and sidestepped. In any common brawl, I would then have kicked my opponent in the knee, but Dandrios wouldn't be able to serve if I lamed him. I hooked a blow into his belly, then a second into his kidney.
The punches didn't faze him. Spinning, he clipped my jaw with his elbow. My teeth clacked together, and I stumbled back into one of the bunks. He scrambled after me and grappled, immobilizing my arms. I butted him twice in the face, and his grip loosened. I twisted free, then kneed him in the stones.
He gasped and doubled over. I kicked him, laying him out on the floor, then, careful not to damage him too severely, went on kicking for a while. I didn't like playing the bully, but matters had reached such a pass that the only way to maintain order was to make the garrison more afraid of me than they were of the crabs.
When I finally stepped back from my victim, I judged from the militiamen's wide eyes and white faces that I'd made my point. But it was only a temporary remedy. Ere long they'd be talking of making me disappear, or simp
ly start slipping away in the dark.
They might have been surprised to learn that afterward, as I wandered the benighted streets, trying to calm down, I flirted with the notion of desertion myself. I didn't want to die for a lost cause, either.
Musty-smelling books and scrolls littered the First Captain's desk, and Aquinder perched on a stool beside it. A gray-bearded old man with a nose like a sickle, clad in a ratty scholar's gown, he was Port Llast's closest approximation to a sage, and in truth, had considerable skill as a herbalist and chirurgeon.
He gave me his usual curt nod as I stepped through the door. Hylas greeted me with the constraint that had entered his manner since the battle on the water. I didn't know what the change portended, but I preferred it to the cocksure posturing of yore.
"Please, take a chair," the young knight said. "I've asked Master Aquinder to come and ponder with me, and it occurred to me that it would be worthwhile to hear your thoughts as well."
"If I can help," I said, "I will."
"As serious a problem as the jellyfish is," said Hylas, pacing restlessly about, "the crabmen are the greater threat. Unfortunately, as you warned me, they're too numerous to exterminate, but if we could figure out why they've allied themselves with the sahuagin, perhaps we could somehow sever the bond."
I cocked my head. "I confess, that tack never occurred to me."
"Sadly," said Aquinder, "those sages who've studied the crabmen agree that they're insular creatures, with no ties to any other race. None of the available texts provides the slightest insight into the local colony's anomalous behavior."
"So I hoped you might have an idea," Hylas said. He gazed at me with a hint of desperation in his eyes.
Wonderful, I thought. He finally wants my opinion, and I haven't got one. Then, however, a notion struck me. I suspected it was a stupid one, but I offered it anyway. "We have fresh carcasses from last night's skirmish. We could cut one up."
Aquinder's gray eyes narrowed. "You mean, dissect it?"
"If that's what you call it," I said. "I've heard that's what sages do when they want to learn about a creature."
Hylas and Aquinder exchanged glances. The scholar shrugged and said, "Why not?"
We dissected the carcass where it had fallen. Stripped to the waist, I used an axe, mallet, and chisel to break open the dead crabman's shell. His sleeves rolled to the elbow, Aquinder probed the creature's stringy gray flesh with a lancet and tongs. It wasn't long before both of us were spattered with reeking slime. Meanwhile Hylas looked on anxiously.
None of us knew what we were searching for, nor did we actually expect to find anything. Yet when it appeared, it was unmistakable. A coin-like disk of pol ished red coral, wedged between two of the chitinous plates that armored the crabman's head.
Aquinder wiped it clean with a linen kerchief, then inspected it with a magnifying lens. He grunted, and Hylas asked what he'd found. Ignoring him, the old man extracted a pink quartz crystal from his pouch and touched it to the disk. The crystal glowed Uke a hot coal.
Having seen Aquinder perform the same test before, I knew what the light meant. "Magic," I said.
The scholar nodded. The faces of the medallion are graven with glyphs of subjugation devised to turn a creature into some magic-wielding entity's willing thrall. I daresay all the crabmen have been enslaved in the same way."
"But how could a handful of sahuagin force scores, perhaps hundreds, of such powerful beasts to submit to such a thing?" I wondered aloud.
"If the brutes have a chieftain," Hylas said, "perhaps the sea devils captured and enslaved it, then bade it command the other crabmen to accept the talismans. At any rate, they managed somehow. I trust you see the implications."
"Yes," I said, though I didn't like them much.
I assembled the men on the training field, and Hylas explained the plan. "It would be impossible to invade the caves and slaughter all the crabmen," he said, "but Sergeant Kendrack and I believe that, if someone else created a diversion, a small force might be able to slip inside, locate the magic-wielding creature controlling the crabs, and kill it."
Not that we actually knew for certain that the slave driver in question was even in the tunnels, but it seemed likely.
"Here's what we'll do," Hylas continued. "The majority of you will march to the headland and entice the crabmen out. Once they appear, you'll make a fighting withdrawal, endangering yourselves no more than necessary, but luring the creatures after you. Meanwhile, the rest of you, Kendrack, and I will slip into the caves from the other side.
"Both tasks will be perilous, but infiltrating the tunnels, particularly so, and I won't compel anyone to go. Instead I ask for volunteers."
The men stood still and silent. My heart sinking, I stepped forward to harangue them, but Hylas lifted his hand to forestall me.
"I don't blame you for declining," he said to the men. "Since I arrived, I've blundered repeatedly. I led you recklessly, stupidly, and good men died as a result. I regret that more than I can say. Though I've finally learned the error of my ways, I don't ask you to follow me on that account. I've forfeited any claim on your loyalty, but Port Llast hasn't. Many of you were born here. You all have kin or friends here. I beg you, don't let your home perish when we still have one final chance to save it."
For several seconds, none of them responded, then Dandrios, of all people, his face bruised from the beating I'd given him, stepped from the ranks. "I'll come," he rumbled. "What the hells."
Vallam and six others followed his example.
Giving the crabmen's promontory a wide berth, we circled around to the other side of it, hid in some brush, and settled down to wait. After a quarter of an hour, we heard our comrades shouting and generally raising a commotion on the other side of the rock. Then came the long, wavering bleat of a trumpet to tell us the enemy had taken the bait.
On our side of the headland, the largest and thus most promising entrance to the caves opened offshore in the foaming surf. On Hylas's command, we ran toward the shadowy archway, our dash becoming a laborious floundering once we entered the waves.
Finally we made it into the cavern. The first granite vault seemed empty. If a lookout had ever been stationed here, it had evidently forsaken its post to join the battle our diversionary force had started.
I looked at the walls, hoping to find a ledge we could use as a path, but in this chamber at least, the wet rock surfaces were too steep, jagged, and generally treacherous for a human being to negotiate, though I suspected the crabs could manage nicely.
"Well have to keep wading," said Hylas, echoing my thought.
Vallam nodded. "At least-" he began, then something snatched him down into the water. His hand flailed above the surface for an instant, then disappeared again.
I hurried toward him and the others did the same. Suddenly, I too plunged downward. For one panicky instant, I imagined that something had pulled me under, then realized I'd stepped in a hole. Fortunately, none of us was wearing armor this time, and, despite the encumbrance of my pickax and lantern, I clambered out without too much difficulty.
I was virtually on top of Vallam before I finally made out what was attacking him. When I did, I cursed in shock, for he was squirming amid a tangle of writhing dark green seaweed. I'd heard traveler's tales of man-eating plants, but never dreamed I'd be unlucky enough to encounter such myself.
Beneath the water, slimy fronds sought to slip around my limbs and torso. I dropped the objects in my hands, drew my short sword, and began hacking and sawing at them.
The fronds could draw as tight as a strangler's noose, and it seemed that for every one I severed, two more slithered forth to take its place. Finally the weed yanked my legs from under me, and, as I splashed down into the water, slapped another length of itself around my neck. I groped behind my back, but couldn't find the member that was crushing my throat.
The plant let me go. When I found my feet and — looked at the panting warriors around me, it was plain that it had
released everyone. Evidently, working together, we'd finally done enough damage to persuade it to abandon the fight.
But alas, we hadn't done so quickly enough to save everyone. Somehow, Vallam himself had survived, but the weed had broken another lad's back.
When it was clear that nothing could be done for him, Hylas murmured a terse prayer to Torm, then turned to Vallam. The scarred little man was a mass of scrapes and bruises, and his eyes were wild. Hylas gripped his shoulder. "Are you fit to go on?" he asked, holding the militiaman's gaze. "I hope so, for we need every hand."
Vallam grimaced and gave a jerky nod. "Yes, Captain," he croaked, "I'll stick."
"Good man," Hylas said. He pivoted toward the others. "Is everyone else all right?" The militiamen indicated they were. "Then let's keep moving."
Those of us who had dropped pieces of gear recovered what we could, and we slogged on.
I won't recount every moment of our trek through the caves. Suffice it to say, it was hellish. We felt we had to use the hooded lanterns sparingly, lest they give our presence away. A bit of light leaked in through chinks in the rock, but we still crept through gloom at the best of times and near absolute darkness at the worst. Moreover, only occasionally did we find a dry track to walk on. Often we waded in cold, murky water, while currents and uneven places on the bottom strove to dunk us. The crash of the surf outside echoed ceaselessly, deafening us to the stirrings of hostile creatures.
And such menaces abounded. Evidently the diversion had worked, and most of the crabmen were busy fighting on the beach, but they hadn't all departed, and sometimes one would pounce out of the darkness. So would other threats, like gray lizards that blended with the rock, leeches the length of a man's forearm, and sea urchins that hurled their venomous spines like darts.
We slew or evaded the beasts as best we could, but the most demoralizing thing was the mazelike nature of the passages. We kept running into dead ends, or realizing we'd inadvertently returned to some spot we'd visited before. The men began to whisper that we'd never find the puppeteer before the crabs returned. Some even worried that we were so completely lost we wouldn't even be able to find our way out.