“To me!” it called.
Only four pikemen were able to respond, and the Harskeel, bloody sword in
hand, led them to the nearest exit. On the way, they gathered up one of the
wounded bats. Could it talk, they would question it later.
Wikkell stood glaring down at the giant worm, his breath still coming fast
from his exertions. “Call off your bats!” he ordered the coiled
creature.
Deek uncoiled slightly and scraped part of himself over the rock beneath his
body.
“H-h-have y-your W-whites c-c-cease t-their
d-d-destruction!”
Cyclops and worm glared at each other.
“You have allowed them to get away!”
“I-I h-have a-allowed it? I-it is y-y-you w-who a-allowed it!”
Behind Wikkell, one of the Whites screamed, struggling with three bats who
had stuck their feeding tubes into him.
“While we stand here arguing, they move further into the tunnels.
Perhaps we can strike a bargain? We can work together. There are three of them,
after all; we can divide them up when we catch them. They all look alike… who
is to know?”
Deek considered this for a moment. Aye, better to have One Eye where he
could be seen, and there was some merit in the plan, not that he intended to
share anything once the men were collected.
“A-a-agreed!”
Wikkell held his smile in check. Once they caught the humans, he could smash
the worm with a big rock and that would be the end of it. In the meantime, it
would be better to have the witch’s thrall where he could keep his eye watching
it.
“Let us go, then,” Wikkell said.
“W-wh-what of y-
your
W-w-whites?”
Wikkell turned to look. Most of the Whites were down; a few still hurled
rocks at the swooping fliers.
“Let the bats have them; thus far they have only gotten in my
way.”
“A-as h-have the b-b-bats.
C-c-come.”
Deek moved quickly, but with added caution. He trusted One Eye less than the
distance he could fly like a bat, which was to say, not at all.
Together, cyclops and worm started for the tunnel.
In his chamber, Rey’s impatience simmered to a roiling bubble.
In her bed, Chuntha’s agitation at being kept waiting blossomed like a
bitter fungus.
“Which way?”
Conan asked as the three
fleeing humans came to a triple forking of tunnels.
Tull scratched at his beard. “I dunno,” he said. “I never
took this route afore.”
“One is as good as another,” Elashi said.
“The
center path.”
Before either man could speak, the desert woman hurried into the chosen
tunnel. Tull raised a questioning eyebrow at Conan.
Conan shrugged. “She is like that. I have found it better not to argue.
It saves much time.”
The two men followed Elashi.
“Best you slow down,” Conan called to Elashi. She was perhaps ten
spans ahead of the Cimmerian youth and running nearly full out.
“Can’t keep up, Conan?” she called back.
“No, it is just that—”
His words were interrupted by Elashi’s scream. She dropped suddenly from
view, and her disappearance was followed almost immediately by a splash. Conan
increased his speed and skidded to a halt on the damp rock just short of where
the desert woman had vanished.
He found himself on the edge of the largest cavern yet, balanced on a rocky
lip overlooking a vast lake; he could not see the far shore as the fungal glow
faded rapidly with distance, the water being illuminated only by the roof, a
good ten spans above.
A span or so below Conan, Elashi came up from the water, which reached only
to her hips. Conan grinned down at her. “I can keep up. It is just that we
don’t know these tunnels and we might happen upon something unexpected,”
he said.
“I hate you!” Elashi said.
Tull slid to a stop next to Conan, overbalanced and nearly fell but was
stopped by an outthrust brawny arm.
“Take care,” Conan said.
Tull nodded, regaining his breath.
“The Sunless
Sea.”
“You know this place?”
“I have seen it from a different vantage point, but yes.” To
Elashi, Tull said, “Best you exit the water, lass. There are certain
creatures
who
live in it—”
Whatever ending Tull intended to his sentence was lost in the splashing
Elashi made as she frantically left the water. To Conan’s left was a kind of
beach a few steps away, and it was but four heartbeats before Elashi attained
this drier vantage point. A short ledge led from the mouth of the tunnel along
the rock wall to the beach, and Conan and Tull made their way down to the shore
to join the woman.
Elashi began to remove her wet clothing, wringing it out as she did so.
“Give me your cape,” she said to Conan, who managed to keep
himself from smiling as he tendered the garment. The fall had served her right,
but it was probably best to refrain from speaking it thus. She wrapped herself
in the cape, which was hardly drier than her own clothing.
“So,” Conan said, “what of this sea?”
“I know only a little about it,” Tull answered. “It widens as
you see here, and narrows to a small river’s width in other places.
S’posed to go on for miles and miles, though it’s more like a large
lake ‘n a true sea—the water ain’t brine.
I learned this from a White I
captured once.”
“Go on.”
“No one knows for certain where the sea ends, but it might be that it
eventually emerges above the ground.”
Conan looked at the still water. “That would be reason enough to follow
it.”
“Had
we
but a ship and rowers,” Elashi
put in.
Sarcastically, as usual.
“That might be possible,” Tull said.
“After
a fashion.”
“How so?”
Conan asked.
“There are creatures in the water. A form of giant whiskered fish is
among them. As big as a house, if the White could be believed.”
“So?”
“In my youth I fished the great western rivers,” Tull said.
“These bottom fish contain large bladders filled with air. When the
creatures die, they will float for a time. With one of them, we might make a
raft. We could use fins and large bones as paddles.”
“All well and good,” Elashi said, “but how are we to collect
this monster fish?”
“We have your swords and my knife,” Tull said. “A sure stroke
in a vulnerable spot would slay one.”
“And what is to draw one of these fish to a place where we could slay
it?” she continued. “We have no bait.”
Conan and Tull glanced at each other,
then
back at
Elashi. The two men grinned. Whatever else the desert woman was, she was not
slow of wit. “Ha! You are both mad!”
“The other choice is to stay here forever and face the worms, bats,
Whites and
cyclopes
,” Conan said, “not to
mention the wizard and the witch.”
“Then one of
you
may act as bait!”
Tull said, “I am the fisherman. I must watch for the signs of the
creature.”
“And I am much better with my blade than are you with yours,”
Conan said. “Do you think you could slay a fish as large as a house with
that needle you carry?”
“I will not do it,” Elashi said. “You are both addled
completely out of your feeble minds!”
Tull sketched a picture of the fish in the wet sand near the water’s edge.
“You must drive your blade in here,” he said, indicating a spot just
behind the head.
“Angled in thus, to sever the great
nerve within the spine, here.”
Conan nodded.
“The flesh is soft, as is the bone, but it will require a powerful
stab, likely to the full depth of your blade.”
Conan nodded again.
Tull stood and brushed the sand from his hands. “Farther along the
shore, just there, is a likely spot. You see that spire of rock that juts out
over the water?”
“I see it.”
“If the
lass swims
in the deep water below it,
you will be positioned to stab the fish as it passes underneath.”
Elashi grinned at this.
“Ah, a shame.
I would
be willing to go along with this moon-mad plan, but alas, I cannot swim a
stroke. Ask Conan, he knows.
So much for your plan.”
“No need to swim,” Tull said. “You will dangle from the rock
spire. We can cut that cloak into strips for a swing.”
“But—but—” she began.
“So much for your objections,” Conan said.
It took less than an hour to make everything ready. Elashi hung from the
spire, only her feet touching the surface below. Tull had her waving her legs
back and forth, agitating the water. Above her, Conan stood with his sword held
in both hands, point held down. Tull watched the water in the distance.
“If you allow a fish to eat me, I shall never forgive you, Conan. I
will follow you around the
Gray
Lands
for ten thousand years making you regret it, I swear.”
Conan considered that thought and found it as unpleasant as any he had ever,
had. To be tormented by a woman’s bitter tongue for eternity, aye, now there
was a truly hellish thing. Surely Crom would not punish any man so?
“Look there,” Tull said. He pointed.
Conan looked. A wide ripple seemed to be approaching them. “I see no
fish.”
“But you see the water of its passage. It will have to come closer to
the surface as it approaches.
In a moment… ah, there!”
Something thin and spined broke the surface.
“Its dorsal fin!”
Tull cried. “Make
ready, lad!” To Elashi he said, “I’ll pull you up when it gets close
enough.”
“You had better!” Elashi said.
“By Mitra, it’s a big ‘un,” Tull said. “You could feed a
whole village for an entire moon on it!”
“Should not you pull me up now?”
“A moment more.
Conan?”
“I am ready.” The Cimmerian took a deep breath, allowed it to
escape, and tightened his reverse grip on the sword’s handle. Here it came,
closer, it was getting closer and closer…
“Up we go, lass!” Tull started tugging on the twin ropes of cloth
holding Elashi. She came up half a span—
—then the strap on the left broke. The wet
pop
!
of
the cloth was joined by the woman’s scream as she clutched the remaining
support, nearly jerking Tull from his perch.
“Mitra’s ass!”
Tull hollered. He began to
pull Elashi upward again.
Too slow.
The fish would be
there in another instant and—
Elashi scrambled up the cloth strand like a monkey, continued past the end
Tull held and clambered over him onto his back just as the fish reached the
spot where she had dangled.
Screaming a wordless sound, Conan leaped from the spire, landed wide-legged
upon the back of the fish, and drove the point of his sword downward with all
of his strength. His chest and stomach and shoulders contracted, his arms
flexed with power, and the blue iron sank to the hilt in rubbery flesh. He even
managed a grin. Why, this was simple.
The fish thrashed, tossing the outlander from its back as a maddened horse
would throw a legless rider. Conan hit the water and was battered by sudden
waves. The fish’s tail slapped the surface next to him as he came up, barely
missing him, and the force of the thrashing tail sent the man tumbling through
the water like a wood chip in a storm-swollen ditch.
Despite the roiling water, the Cimmerian man aged to orient himself and
start swimming for the shore. He attained the base of the spire and climbed
rapidly, joining Elashi and Tull within a moment.
Beneath the trio, the fish’s struggles lessened. Conan’s strike had been
true. After a few moments the great breast stopped moving on its own. Slowly
the dead fish rose to the surface, bobbing up on its side, water streaming
downward from scales the size of platters.
Conan grinned at Elashi. “
Behold,
our
boat.”
Elashi wrinkled her nose. “It has a loathesome stench already. In a few
days it will stink to the ends of the world.”
Conan and Tull looked at each other. Some people could find fault
everywhere. Give them a chest of gold and they would complain of the weight
they must carry.
W-we h-h-have th-them!”
Deek said. He and
Wikkell had paused so that the worm could speak: moving and talking at the same
time was all but impossible for Deek’s kind.
“How so?
I see no one here but us.”
“Th-
this t-t-tunnel l-leads
to the S-s-sunless
S-sea.”
“Ah.” Even though Wikkell had spent very little time in this
region of the vast
Black
Cave
system, he could not help but know of the sprawling underground lake.
“Then they are trapped.”
“S-s-so it w-w-would s-s-seem.”
“Then let us proceed apace. I feel certain that the two of us can
capture and hold a mere three humans.”
“W-w-without a d-doubt,” Deek agreed.
There were limits to Rey’s communication spell. Wikkell was either beyond
the reach of the magic or dead, the latter being somewhat more unlikely. Still,
either way boded ill for the wizard’s plans. If the prey had managed to somehow
elude the cyclops and move beyond Rey’s range to speak to his
servant, that
was bad. If Wikkell were somehow indisposed
and unable to answer Rey’s call, that was also bad. Not for a moment did the
magician consider that the cyclops might ignore his hail. So either of the two
choices was unacceptable, and yet one of them must indeed be the case.
Katamay Rey moved to a chest of assorted magical impedimenta and began to
rummage through it. There was no help for it, then. He would have to gather
supplies and a retinue and go find Wikkell, or the barbarian, or both.