Chapter Seven #4
“Anchor must be tangled in those damn snaking roots. Ready yourselves while I swim out to dig the fucking thing free,” Porgo told us.
Teryn began packing up the food and emptied the dregs of the tea into his cup as I got to my feet so that I could watch the sailor go about his work.
Porgo leapt over the side, his dive graceful, and sliced into the water like a rapier.
I padded over to the rail as his form sped to the roots.
He looked to be a strong swimmer. Given his profession that made sense.
I, on the other hand, could swim. Not well, surely not as powerfully as Porgo leaping in and out of the brine like a porpoise, but well enough that I would not drown if I tumbled into—
A dark shape appeared from under the boat, cutting through the briny water. I leaned over the smooth wood balustrade as smaller schools of fish exploded outward in a sunburst to avoid the bigger fish now cruising the pool.
“Porgo,” I called out after he surfaced by a large clump of hydrawood. Floating like a cork, he ran his hand over his face to clear the saltwater from his eyes and then bobbed around to look at me. “A large fish is nearby.”
I pointed at the foamy sea. I had seen a few of the large reef sharks that fishermen had caught off the coast of Celear. Massive fish with rows of sharp teeth, eyes as dark as a necromancer’s soul, and hides as tough as leather.
“Pah,” he called back as he turned to face the tangle of roots where the anchor was bound up. “There is naught in these waters that scare me. Now go back to your tea and dry bread, mainlander, and let me—”
His head and shoulders disappeared under the water with a splashy gurgle.
I opened my mouth to yell about the shark when three creatures exploded from the tidal pool below me, long dark nails digging into the wooden sides of the boat.
Instead of hair, they had slimy seaweed dangling down over rotted flesh and glowing green eyes.
I jumped back, stumbling over myself, as Teryn yelped from the other side of the ship.
“Brine hags!” Porgo shouted from the water. “Save the mahouk!”
“As if I need him to tell me my duty,” I snarled, dull headache forgotten as I dove at my small pile of equipment.
I went to one knee to grab my sword from under a mound of cloth totes stuffed with provisions.
A dozen small oranges rolled across the deck just as the monsters slithered between the balusters.
Their bottom halves were like that of an eel, the last bits of sun showing the tail to be smooth, scaleless, and deep green.
A short dorsal fin snaked up the hags’ backs from tail to neck.
Seaweed obscured their faces as they propelled themselves at us, using their thick arms and undulating lower halves to shoot them forward.
“Do not let the tails touch you, for they deliver a mighty shock that can stop a man’s heart!” Porgo yelled out amid grunts and splashes.
Ah, so the rumors of people who were half-fish and half-elf were not all fiction.
Half-eel and half-atrocity was close enough to count.
I ran to Teryn, shoving him behind me, placing myself between the ambassador and the brine hags.
They made raspy clicking noises as they writhed around on the deck, which now seemed to have a layer of slimy mucus.
“Stay at my back,” I yelled at Teryn as a hag swiped at me.
I sliced at her arm, severing a hand cleanly.
Dark red blood ran from the stump. The creature clicked loudly, the sound coming out from behind a curtain of weedy hair.
She slithered behind her sisters, leaving a streak of blood in her wake.
The hand twitched, so I kicked it over the side of the ship. “I will protect you!”
“So noble,” he said as a swirling tunnel of sand swept over us, blinding me momentarily, as he shifted behind me. One hag lunged out. I swiped at her, missing her neck but severing the long green ropes of seaweed. A tail whipped toward me as the dust cleared.
I jumped to the left to avoid the strike, wondering why Teryn felt that now was the time to shift into a small fox.
Perhaps he thought to…I had no idea what he was thinking.
I lunged at one of the hags, cutting into an arm with flesh that hung loose from its bones.
My sword found purchase, slicing into the bone.
Two sounds filled the air. One, the pained clattering of the injured hag, and the other, the pitched keen of a raptor.
From the right, a silver and gray harrier with black barring along the edges of its wings flew into the fray, amber eyes locked on the hag missing a hand, legs extended, talons out.
The bird’s wings were enormous, easily as wide as I stood tall.
The strike was lightning fast, the claws digging into the head of the hag.
The bird beat its wings as if to take off, but the hag was far too heavy.
Instead, the raptor ripped off the top of the undead thing’s head and then took to the air.
A click to my left pulled my stunned sight from what had to be Teryn back to the fray.
Long, craggy claws ripped into my side. The pain was sharp, intense, but it served its purpose.
Bringing my focus to the enemy, I dropped down into a crouch, slid my hand under a blanket, and brought up my shield.
The slam to the gut of the hag winded it just enough that I could drive my sword through its rotted chest. The creature emitted a sound that made me wince before it slumped over my sword.
I caught the flash of silvery-gray feathers in my peripheral as I charged at another hag.
This one slithered back, rising up on its tail, pulling me into the slippery mucus on the deck.
My feet slid out from under me. The hag fell on me as my ass hit the deck, seaweed slapping my face, the glowing green eyes wide as the round hole lined with small sharp teeth.
I brought the hilt of my sword across its face, knocking the hag off me.
Rising to one knee, I swung out and severed the head of the creature with a clean cut.
Foul-smelling ichor pulsed out of the downed thing, coating the deck with more fluids.
Getting to my bare feet was difficult. Teryn was diving at one of the two remaining hags.
One fell on my back as I watched the mahouk rip into the back of the hag he faced, tearing free large chunks of rotted flesh and then taking to the air to avoid long arms flailing madly about.
I let myself fall backward to try to stun my opponent.
The hag clicked by my ear, cold lips and brittle teeth trying to latch onto my neck.
I slammed my head back time and again until I heard the crack of bone.
The things had no nose so the crunch must have been its face.
Its hold around my shoulders slackened. I broke free of the grapple, moved to the left, and got to one knee.
Shield up, sword ready, I waited for the hag to move, but it lay there still as a morning sky.
I drove my blade through its head just to ensure the beast was dead.
If one could slay an undead monster. My knowledge of such was limited to what I had read in books during my training.
The screech of the harrier pulled me from the unmoving hag.
I rose, slid halfway across the deck, and slammed my shield into the face of the lone hag still upright.
The raptor careened out of the sky, a wing clipping my cheek, as it lunged for another attack.
The hag, sensing she was the only one left, perhaps grew frantic.
Her long tail lashed about, catching my calf and delivering a shock that made my body seize.
My blade and shield clattered to the deck.
I fell to my side, shaking violently, unable to catch my breath.
The harrier screamed as I fought against blacking out.
Finally, after what seemed like a lifetime, my legs and arms began to work.
I stiffly moved to my back in time to see Teryn impact that hag full on from a dive that sent both him and the hag over the side of the ship.
“Teryn!” I coughed out, staggering to my hands and knees, and I crawled to the rail.
Bubbles roiled from the water, then the bird emerged from the brine with the head of the hag in his long talons and flew into the air.
Water streamed off its beautiful plumage as it flew in a circle, dropping the head into the trees and then banking low.
I clung to the rail, the weakness in my muscles beginning to fade just as Porgo heaved himself up over the side of the Simin Draya.
He met my look. One side of his face had what looked to be a burn, while his bare shoulders had weeping claw marks.
The harrier landed gracefully on the railing before jumping awkwardly to the deck.
I let myself slide to the floorboards, the toes on my right leg still numb, to watch the bird of prey hop over to the pillows and pluck his golden earring from the overturned pot of tea.
Amid a soft swirling dervish of sand where once stood a harrier now stood Teryn, earring in his mouth.
He spat it into his hand and fastened it through the pointed tip of his ear.
“I much prefer a sweetened biscuit with my tea,” he commented, glancing between Porgo and myself. “Which of you is the most severely injured?”
We both pointed to the other. Teryn rolled his eyes and pulled his robes over his head. “Typical proud males. We have some healing poultices and small flasks of medicinal potions P’tash supplied us with. Since our sea captain is bleeding, I shall tend to him first.”