Chapter 21
Twenty-One
Asmall army of slimy mutants were running across the sand toward us and we weren’t even close to the shore yet.
If they caught us still in the water, we were doomed.
They’d swamp our boats, and we couldn’t fight and tread water at the same time.
Trax was strong, but he was just one Squalo trying to pull two boats.
“Everybody, row like your life depends on it!”
They did, but I don’t know if that extra effort made much difference. We were still a good thirty yards out. At this rate, by the time we reached solid ground, we’d be entirely surrounded, trying to fight aquatic monsters while struggling in who knows-how-deep freezing cold water.
“I’m going to jump ahead and slow them down.”
“By yourself?” Azarin grabbed my sleeve. “You’ll be killed!”
“It’s better than rowing.” I gently removed her hand, then lifted one glove and made a fist. “Ascend.”
The air solidified around my arm and yanked me violently up and away from the boat.
As the wind cut right through my damp clothing, I had a terrible thought.
Neither Trax nor the locals mentioned the creatures having anything like arrows or spears they could throw, and I was currently presenting a wonderful target if they did.
Luckily, I didn’t get knocked out of the air, so that must have been a no on them having any missile weapons.
Rather than going straight up, I ascended at an angle.
Azarin had taught me to keep my eyes on my destination, so I concentrated on a spot above the beach.
When I looked down, the boats were behind me, the shore was still ahead of me, but from here, my arc would let me fall on the beach if I did everything right.
I aimed my other glove at the solid ground, released the Ascent spell, and began falling.
“Descend!”
As I focused on the sand, air magic curled about me and tugged back against gravity.
I was still dropping fast, but at a velocity where landing would merely hurt, not break bones.
Thankfully, my hasty calculation worked, and I fell toward the island instead of plummeting directly into the water.
I even managed to stick the landing—mostly—as my boots hit first, and I took a few running steps before tumbling.
My heroic effort got me a face full of grit, and then a wave of saltwater crashed into me, soaking my clothes anyway—I’d landed too close to the edge.
That shock of cold made me yelp and jump to my feet.
The monsters were shuffling this way fast. They were of various sizes, between gnome to dwarf height, except they were lumpy, bipedal, and squishy.
Their awkward gait created a weird, moist squelch noise.
It was difficult to tell their true shape through the clothing they wore, made from slimy leaves and vines.
That had to be what the fishermen called seaweed.
Their arms were too long, and flopping about behind them as they waddled, like their bones were too soft.
Their gigantic eyes were fixed on me, and their black beaks snapped hungrily.
Trax had been right about one thing. They sure didn’t look like they wanted to talk it out.
Azarin landed gracefully beside me. “What’re you waiting for? Blow them up!”
I’d not been expecting her to join me, but I was way ahead of her on the blowing them up part, as I’d already pulled a snail grenade from my vest. I concentrated on the Red embedded in the iron, and the instant the magic awoke, I hurled it as far as I could. And I had a good throwing arm!
As the snail grenade sailed through the air, it began to shine. It hit the ground in front of the herd of mutants and bounced. By the time it rolled in front of their stomping feet, it was glowing bright orange.
BOOM!
Iron snail fragments zipped through the monsters. They stumbled through the dust and spreading smoke. A couple of them fell over. A few blundered to the side dazed.
Azarin had not only landed smoothly—she’d not even gotten her shoes wet—but she’d done so with a wand at the ready.
This particular wand had been among the magical items I’d taken off the Frunza Tarlev students.
There’d been another wand too, but Trax had accidentally eaten that one along with the user’s hand.
With Azarin’s affinity being air magic, this wand worked a lot better for her than the rest of us, so she’d kept it. She didn’t have the skill to replicate the enchantment yet, but Azarin knew enough to set it off.
“Daggers of Air!”
It helped me to think of the Clear like it was a sort of heavy air that could solidify temporarily, just like the invisible ropes that helped slow my falls. Only for this spell, the Clear hardened little bits of atmosphere into vicious little knives which sped into mutant flesh.
They were barely visible whipping through the salty mist. The monster Azarin was pointing at began leaking purple blood from the tiny puncture wounds that appeared in its chest. The one behind it must have caught a stray air dagger right in the eye, because that big protruding globe suddenly burst, squirting jelly.
Our attacks surprised them, but they weren’t even close to being defeated.
Despite injuring several of the creatures, the rest of the weird horde were still approaching, only more cautiously now.
They spread out across the sand dunes. Some were still coming right at us, but more started flanking to the sides.
Trax’s assurances aside, that seemed a lot more cunning than ratlets!
Azarin and I only needed to break the monsters’ charge long enough for everyone else to get on solid ground.
I threw my second snail grenade at a knot of mutants, but this time, they understood the danger, and threw themselves beak first into the sand.
From the angry hooting, some got hit by fragments, but that explosion wasn’t nearly as effective as the first one.
“They’re surrounding us,” Azarin warned as she jabbed another monster with fast pointy air. When that one took the punctures and kept charging, she hurled a copper shock rod at it. “Jolt!”
Her aim was off, only hitting it in the foot, but the rod fused to its skin, flashing and crackling with sparks and pops.
While the monster’s muscles twitched helplessly, I swiftly drew the bargemaster’s handgun, aimed, and shot it right through the beak.
Purple brains flew out the back side of its pointy skull.
The recoil stung my palm, and grey smoke billowed, but the creatures didn’t seem any more frightened of firearms than they had been by our spells.
I glanced back to see that Trax’s upper body was out of the water, and he was struggling up the beach, with a pair of taut ropes over his shoulder.
As soon as the bottoms of the boats started scraping the unseen bottom, the braver Outcasts jumped over the side to wade the rest of the way.
In his enthusiasm, Rufus forgot how short he was, sank beneath the waves, and promptly began flailing and drowning.
Krachma hoisted him up by the collar and carried him until the dwarf’s kicking feet could touch ground.
We’d bought a bit of time, but not quite enough.
Azarin and I were mostly encircled by mutants now.
I tossed a pocketful of screws to one side in the hopes of stalling the charge.
The little bits of steel went molten hot and began careening about, shrieking at a higher pitch than the creatures.
When the screws hit water, they went out in a puff of steam, but when they hit rubbery flesh, they stuck and burned.
Purple blood hissed and monsters squealed.
Then the others were on us!
A squishy man-mollusk tried to grab Azarin, and my Shroud of Fire covered its face.
Its skin was so moist and slimy, it didn’t catch, but the flash and heat caused it to flinch and cover its eyes with lids that were so thick, they made a slap noise when they closed.
Azarin yanked out the tiny double-barreled handgun Neves had left her and plugged that monster in the chest. Azarin was notoriously inaccurate with guns, but they were so close now, even she couldn’t miss.
I barely managed to duck a long arm that swung my way.
We learned then that their limbs had several extra joints, because it suddenly changed direction, allowing claws to hook the edge of my cloak.
It yanked me off-balance, sending me stumbling across the wet sand. Another monster tackled me from behind.
It was on my back. One ropey arm wrapped around my head. Its black beak snapped at my neck. My skin got sliced open by an edge designed to pry open clam shells.
I was about to die.
And then we were both getting the ever-living hell shocked out of us by one of Azarin’s Jolt sticks.
She’d hit the monster with it, but since we were both covered in salt water, the spell jumped bodies and I got zapped too.
Having been hit by this spell in training, I knew my muscles would seize up uselessly for several seconds, then I’d be able to act.
Which I did, faster than the surprised monster, as I broke away from its arm, spun about on my back across the sand, and kicked it square in the eyeball.
The heel of my boot left a dent. It let out a horrible wail, then began crawling after me, clawing at my legs.
Trax appeared and sliced its entire head off with his coral sword.
“There is an injury upon your neck, Carnavon.”
“Not as bad as his,” I said as the monster’s head rolled past me. I got back up and mashed my glove against my wound. It stung, but nothing was squirting, so it was just a scratch. Back to the fight.
The rest of the Outcasts joined the battle, but so did a bunch more squishy monstrosities. Some were popping out of where they’d been hidden beneath the sand dunes. There were tons of them.
“Oh shit!” I threw a flame shroud onto a sand-coated beast that was wriggling out of the ground only a few feet away. “They’re everywhere!”
“Apologies. I could not smell the buried ones. My earlier assessment as to the quantity of mutants may have been optimistic.”
Rade swept past me and slashed the monster I’d stunned.
Purple blood flew high as the deadlander’s sword cut deep.
Then he swept the enchanted blade in an arc, and the monsters just beyond his reach were pelted with black bits of shadow that materialized out of thin air.
Those congealed into spiders which went to biting.
That particular shadow spell was more of a distraction than a weapon, but a distraction was good enough, as Rufus hacked one’s legs out from beneath it with his axe, and Krachma brained the other with his mace.
It was utter chaos. Spells were going off everywhere. Monsters were dying and more were replacing them.
The biggest of the mutants were just over five feet tall, and most were far smaller, but their reach was disproportionately long, and their claws were sharp.
I got cut again on the arm. Bognar cried out as his helmet pot got swatted off.
Danny was run over, then Krachma hit that monster so hard, it flew back and splashed into the sea.
Sifuso might have been a coward when there was an arena full of people watching him, but here he went into a vicious frenzy, stabbing wildly with a pair of daggers, like he’d gone too crazy to remember any spells.
Lacertians must have a really strong fight or flight reflex, and there was no chance for flight here!
A monster clawed Sifuso across the chest, leaving three deep red lines.
Our lizard man hissed angrily and slashed it right back, once, twice, three times, splitting seaweed until a big pile of purple guts sloshed out.
Poor Bognar got clobbered again, and by some miracle, Danny actually landed a spell and froze the monster’s arm before it could end our carpenter’s life. Slime turned to ice, slowing it long enough for Rade’s sword to cut that arm off at its second elbow.
Rufus was going to town chopping mollusk beasts with his battle axe. I remembered he had a spell called Stinging Sand, and we were standing on a beach fighting things with gigantic bulging eyeballs. “Rufus, use Stinging Sand!”
“Why didn’t I think of that? Good idea, Carnavon!” He lifted his axe to slam the haft against the ground.
I shouted, “Everybody, close your eyes!”
The spell went off, and in his excitement, Rufus must have used far too much earth element, because it was like the entire beach rose up to blast us. Sand went everywhere.
When the sand cloud fell, I was glad to see the Outcasts listened to my warning, and the monsters, thankfully, had not.
Most of those near us stumbled about, their big rubbery lids crunched shut.
All they could do was swing reflexively, and a few even clawed each other.
We made fast work of everything around us while they were blind, and many monsters fell to steel, lead, or coral.
“There’s a new bunch on the right,” Azarin shouted.
I looked over to see at least a dozen fresh mutants lumbering our way, but they were still far enough out that I could use a snail grenade without the risk of hitting my friends.
Krachma’s mace dripped purple as he pointed it at the nearest pile of broken bricks.
“Debris.” When he swept that mace toward the approaching monsters, the bricks shook, then flew up and followed the mace’s arc right into the mutants.
The bricks hit hard enough to bruise meat and even break bones.
As they flailed under the impacts, my glowing snail grenade landed between the injured beasts, and two seconds after that, the explosion sent purple bits flying.
One of the monsters that had been hanging back opened its beak and let out a long screeeeee. That must have been their signal to retreat. Every one of them, fresh and wounded alike, waddled down the shore as fast as they could and dove into the ocean.
We all stood there, breathing hard, covered in sand, purple blood, and the sticky mud created when those two things met.
There were dismembered monster corpses everywhere.
I looked around to make sure none of us were among the dead, and by some miracle, we weren’t.
Already, the big white sea birds were circling, hoping to feast on the bodies.
The Outcasts were triumphant.
“I got sand in my gills. That is very irritating. Should I pursue the food?”
“Naw, Trax, we’re not here for them. Let’s find the treasure so we can get the hell off this rock.”