The Sea Devils Eye (34 page)

The journey that had taken only days before had extended to two restless months. A sahuagin attack had cost them their rudder. Replacing the rudder had taken tendays after Steadfast had finally made a friendly port. Despite the time, the pull in his chest had brought him to Sabyna without fail, never once wavering.

As he got to his feet, the young sailor noticed the lightning bolt fading in the high sheen of the bracer on his left arm. The bracer had somehow protected him from the magical assault.

Black spots whirled in his vision as he gazed around the main cavern. Two of Tarnar’s sailors-the two he’d been thrown into-were down, alive but unconscious. Jherek looked for his cutlass but didn’t see it. The sounds of battle and the screams of dying men continued above.

He started to take one of the sailors’ cutlasses, but impulse drew his eyes to the chasm in the center of the cavern. Looking down over the edge, he spotted a man-made entrance cut in the left side six feet below him. Before he knew quite what he was doing, feeling pulled to get back to Sabyna’s side, he hung over the ledge, staring down into a pit that looked fathoms deep. Thankfully, the chasm walls provided finger and toeholds.

When he looked into the opening, he saw the sword hanging on the wall at the other end of what looked like a man-sized pink pearl box. Glancing at the other side of the chasm, he noticed what appeared to be the other side to the pink pearl room. The sword’s steel glistened with a lambent pink light.

Ignoring the reluctance that filled him, Jherek clambered into the room. It stood to reason that if a sword had been hidden as cleverly as this one, it had to be a powerful weapon. The question of whether the sword was good or evil only touched his mind fleetingly. As powerful as the mage in the other room was, Jherek needed a powerful weapon.

Wrapping his hand around the sword hilt, Jherek felt a small tingle run through his arm. He almost released they sword, but the tingle was gone before he did. He thrust his blade through his sash and climbed the chasm wall again, then he jumped up the ledge and ran back to the second cave.

Tarnar looked at him with a surprised smile and said, “I thought you were dead.”

Iridea’s Tear saved me.” Jherek drew the sword from his waist, surprised that the blade was a curved cutlass and not the long sword he’d thought it was. The blade still held the pink glow.

Two of Steadfast’s crew lay dead inside the second cavern.

Peering into the shadows, Jherek saw Sabyna and Glawinn battling koalinths rising from the pool. Vurgrom’s men took advantage of the situation and rushed forward.

Azla stepped from behind a column, batted aside the pirate’s clumsy attack, then slid her scimitar across the man’s stomach, spilling his guts. Still on the move, the pirate queen engaged her next attacker. Steel gleamed as it moved, then she sank the dirk in her left hand between the man’s ribs, stiffening him up at once.

Lifting his arm, Jherek willed the bracer into a shield, then stepped into the cavern. One of the pirates rushed at him. The young sailor stepped sideways at the last moment, letting the pirate’s overhead swing go past him, then he slammed the shield into his attacker with all his weight behind it.

The pirate hit the wall and sagged, dazed by the impact. Before he recovered, Jherek knocked the man’s blade from his hand.

Tarnar stepped up and grabbed the pirate by the shirt, yanking him into a stumbling run and passing him back to one of his men.

“I’ve got him,” the captain growled.

“Don’t kill him if you don’t have to,” Jherek said.

“In that, my friend,” Tarnar said, “we are in agreement.”

Vurgrom bellowed orders from hiding but didn’t make a move to engage Jherek as the young sailor moved forward.

Iakhovas stood his ground, glancing at Jherek with real curiosity. “Who are you, boy?”

Jherek shook his head, peering over the shield and hoping it would hold against any further magic. “I’m no one,” he said.

“What are you doing here?”

Jherek thought he detected suspicion in the dark male’s tattooed face and mismatched eyes. “Let my friends go,” Jherek demanded.

“I don’t know you, do I?” Iakhovas asked.

“I’m only going to ask you once.”

The man’s eyes narrowed and he said, “Boy, I’ve eaten creatures bigger than you.”

Without warning, Jherek stepped forward. It bothered him that the mage didn’t draw the sword at his side, but if he didn’t have to kill the man he wouldn’t. He swung the sword, surprised at how balanced it felt, like it was a weightless extension of his body.

Incredibly, Iakhovas grabbed the sword with his hand, stopping the swing, but from the pained expression on the mage’s face, it was a surprise for both of them. He lifted his hand, gazing with ill-concealed astonishment at the blood that spilled from around his closed hand.

“Who are you?” the mage demanded.

Before Jherek had time to answer, Vurgrom bellowed and rushed from hiding. He barreled across the short distance and slammed into the young sailor with his considerable bulk.

Already sore from his earlier fall, Jherek couldn’t keep his feet, but he did keep his grip on the cutlass. It felt as if his arm was being torn from its socket before the blade slid free of the mage’s hand.

“Going to kill you now, boy!” Vurgrom roared as he came down on top of Jherek. “I remember you from Baldur’s Gate. I should have killed you then.”

Willing Iridea’s Tear from shield to dagger, a handle forming in his hand, Jherek shoved it toward Vurgrom’s face. The fat pirate captain’s eyes rounded as he stared at the multi-colored blade. Taking advantage of the man’s shifting weight, the young sailor levered his forearm under his opponent’s jaw hard enough to make his teeth clack, then rolled out from under him.

Jherek willed the bracer into a hook, the handle fitting easily between his fingers. Vurgrom got to his feet at the same time as the young sailor, taking up his battle-axe in both hands. Iakhovas was still visible over the pirate captain’s shoulder, his attention torn between his bleeding hand and Jherek.

Reversing the battle-axe so the hammer end of it was forward. Vurgrora swung at the young sailor. Jherek dodged, barely escaping the speeding weapon. The blunt head smashed against the wall, cracking rock loose and driving stone splinters into Jherek’s face and left shoulder.

Lining up behind his blade. Jherek gave himself over to it, relishing the feel and movement. He whipped it forward, forcing Vurgrora into a defensive posture. The bigger man managed to block the sword strikes, but only just.

Another pirate stepped from hiding at Jherek’s side, coming too quickly for the young sailor to bring the cutlass around. Jherek dropped, falling backward, watching the pirate’s sword flash by only inches from his face. The young sailor kicked upward, rolling on his back and right shoulder to get the necessary height, aware that Vurgrom was renewing his attack.

Jherek’s foot connected with the pirate’s sword arm elbow hard enough to crack bone. He continued the roll to escape Vurgrom’s battle-axe. More stone splinters sprayed against his back, then he was on his feet in a squatting position, ready to spring upward.

Vurgrom already had the battle-axe back and was swinging the blade at him, intending to cleave him between wind and water. Staying low, Jherek drove forward, firing off his bent legs and planting his left shoulder and neck at knee level.

Vurgrom squalled in surprise and toppled.

As the big man fell, Jherek rose to his knees and struck again, snaring the battle-axe’s haft with the hook. He brought the cutlass down hard and sheared the head from the haft. A small blue light flared as the weapon came apart.

Vurgrom raised the haft in defense as Jherek stood and swung again. The cutlass blade sliced through the thick axe haft as if it were made of paper. With uncanny precision, somehow knowing he could trust the sword, the young sailor brought it to a stop less than two inches from Vurgrom’s face.

“Surrender,” Jherek told him, “and I’ll not kill you.”

“You broke my axe,” Vurgrom said in disbelief. That axe was enchanted. It’s never been broken before-never failed me.

Jherek twisted the tip of the cutlass, emphasizing his point.

“Fight me hand-to-hand,” Vurgrom roared. “Give me a true man’s challenge.”

Breathing hard, perspiration and blood covering him, Jherek replied, “If there were time, and if there were honor in it, I would, but there’s no time, and the only honor at risk would be my own.”

Jherek glanced at the mage, already willing the bracer into a shield again.

“Pray to your gods, whelp,” Iakhovas said in a cold, hard voice, “that you never meet me again.”

Jherek wasn’t planning on it, but he didn’t say anything. He also didn’t break eye contact. If any of his friends had been hurt, it would have been a different matter.

Iakhovas turned, gestured, then walked into what appeared to be a solid wall, the elf woman at his heels.

When the mage had gone, Jherek left Vurgrom with one of Tarnar’s men holding a sword to his throat. Tarnar’s sailors flooded into the cave. Their captain cowed, the surviving members of Vurgrom’s pirates surrendered easily enough.

Jherek sprinted to the pool where koalinth battled his friends, Tarnar at his heels. Two of the creatures lay dead, silent testimony to Glawinn’s skill. The paladin was on the floor, his sword locked against a koalinth’s spear and his shield holding the creature’s savage jaws from his face.

Changing the shield back to a hook, Jherek hooked the koalinth’s shoulder from behind and yanked the monster off the paladin. The young sailor kicked the sea hobgoblin in the face, driving it back into the pool. He offered the paladin a hand up.

“Hail and well met, young warrior,” Glawinn greeted him in a strained voice.

“Hail and well met,” Jherek replied.

“The helping hand was appreciated,” the paladin said with a crooked smile, “but I’d just gotten him where I wanted him.”

Glawinn’s sword flashed, engaging another koalinth’s trident. He shoved the tines aside, then slid back through and slashed across the creature’s stomach, mortally wounding it.

Jherek shifted the hook back to a bracer and swung his arm out to slap aside another koalinth’s spear. The young sailor chopped the cutlass into the koalinth’s neck, nearly beheading it. He stepped around the falling corpse, moving toward Sabyna.

When he saw hen the copper tresses framing her face, Jherek felt as though he’d been hit in the heart with Vurgrom’s great hammer. Eighty-three days they’d been apart, and not one of them had passed that he didn’t think of her with both longing and trepidation.

Now she was there before him, bent over in a knife-fighters stance, a blade in each hand, battling for her life against a koalinth. The creature struck with its spear but Sabyna turned it to one side and darted in to score a wound on her attacker’s arm. The wound wasn’t life threatening, but it bled heavily.

The koalinth howled in pain, then shoved its head open, the massive jaws aiming to bite her head.

Jherek thrust the cutlass forward, not willing to attack the creature from behind. The blade settled between the creature’s jaws and it snapped its fangs on steel instead of flesh.

“Lady,” Jherek said softly as the koalinth withdrew, “I am here.”

Sabyna glanced at him and said, “You’re alive.”

“Aye.”

Jherek stepped between her and the koalinth as another joined it. Despite the stench of wet leather, the closed-in stink of the cave, and the smell of blood, he caught the scent of the lilac fragrance she wore. Just one breath steeled his arm in spite of the beating he’d taken and the fatigue of racing across five miles of rugged terrain to reach the cave. He felt calm and centered.

“I thought you were dead,” Sabyna said.

Jherek batted away a spear thrust, riposting and slicing the koalinth on the forehead so that blood ran down into its eyes.

“As I feared you might be before I returned,” he told her.

“I wasn’t sure you cared about that-even cared enough to come back from wherever you’d gone.”

Her words hurt Jherek more grievously than any wound he’d received. He grabbed the next spear thrust in his free hand, held the haft, and stepped forward to pierce the koalinth’s breast with the cutlass.

He yanked his blade free and turned to her, full of anger and pain. He kept his words as calm as he could, not understanding how she could doubt him.

“Please, lady,” he said, “I have told you I would lay my life down for you. I would never desert you in troubled waters without seeing you home.”

“You’ve told me that,” Sabyna agreed, “but there’s much you haven’t told me.”

Jherek gratefully turned back to face the koalinth he’d wounded.

“Perhaps we could talk about this another time,” he said.

He parried a spear, knocking sparks from the weapon.

“Do you swear?” Sabyna pressed, stepping up beside him to engage another koalinth.

Her knives flashed as she blocked the spear thrust, then one of the blades flew from her hand, burying itself in her opponent’s throat. Crimson sprayed over her and Jherek.

Jherek hesitated, blocking the spear twice more, then stepping in as he formed the bracer into a dagger and punched it through the wounded koalinth’s heart. Even if the creature fell, another shouldered up to take its place.

“Promise me,” Sabyna said.

“Lady, please.”

Jherek tried to turn the koalinth’s attack, but it was too savage, too fierce. It drove him back as he tried to find an opening.

“I will not be denied, Jherek,” Sabyna said.

“Now,” the young sailor said, thrusting and breaking his opponent’s attack, “is not the time.”

“Your secret, whatever it is,” Sabyna said, “is holding both of us back. Neither of us can be happy until we know where we stand.”

“Lady, I care deeply for you.”

The conversation and the emotion that went with it distracted Jherek. He missed a parry and watched as the spear streaked toward his chest. He managed to turn at the last moment, letting the iron point graze his ribs. He willed the bracer into a hook and tore out the kcalinth’s throat before it was able to withdraw.