Descent into the Depths of the Earth (33 page)

“Hot damn!” The girl reached out a hand to the dazed Private Henry. “You all
right?”

“Um…”

“Yeah. All glory to King Um! Whatever, kid. Now’s
not
the time!” Escalla picked up Polk’s folded portable hole and shoved it down her
cleavage. “Time to run!” A horn was blowing, summoning more kuo-toa. “Jus! Pack
it up, man. Time to flee!”

Roaring and cursing, Jus was surrounded by kuo-toa guards,
all of them reeling away from the white blade. One lunged in with a pole arm,
lost the business end of the weapon to Jus’ sword, then jerked as a massive
blow opened its guts. Another slashed with its claws, ripping Jus’ shoulder. As
Cinders sheeted fire to incinerate a ring of guards, Jus trapped his attacker’s
hand, slammed one hand against the monster’s arm and snapped its elbow. It fell
back, screaming as Benelux ripped through its chest. The sword twisted, whipped
out, and flicked up looking for targets all in a single horrid blur.

The kuo-toa leader had already disappeared through a secret
door beside his throne. With guards thundering in from the temple outside, the
secret passageway seemed like a good idea. Jus threw himself at the door even as
it slid closed, shattering the panels and making the kuo-toa leader reel back in
fright. The creature leaped down a set of stairs with powerful shoves of its
stumpy legs. Jus loomed in the door, terrifying with his brilliant sword,
blood-smeared armor, and smoking hell hound skin.

“Move!”
Jus bellowed to his companions. “We’re going this
way!”

Jus shoved in through the door, and Private Henry instantly
followed at his heel. Escalla made to follow, then suddenly blinked and swerved
back into the throne room.

“Wait! The receipt!”

The piece of parchment lay on the floor beside the scribe’s
severed hands. Escalla dived toward the receipt—only to look up in shock to see
thirty enraged kuo-toa charging straight for her. A massive barrage of harpoons
showered toward her. She threw her hand up in a spell, her magic shield snapping
up an instant before the rusty harpoons arrived. The shield staggered as spears
struck like a thunderstorm, spraying sparks and snapping points. One harpoon
punched through the shield, and Escalla screamed, twisted aside, and had the
middle ripped out of her dress. With the kuo-toa lunging toward her, the girl
hurled herself backward in panic, screeching in frustration as the monsters
overran the receipt. She flew backward through the secret door, harpoons
ricocheting madly from her shield.

She bumped into Henry’s back. The boy was stuck halfway down
the stairs. As a dozen kuo-toa charged for them, Escalla blasted her black
tentacles spell into the passage entrance, blocking the doorway with tendrils
that caught hold of screaming kuo-toa and tossed the creatures aside.

“Jus! We’ve got company!”

The spell would last for a few minutes, no more. Escalla
blundered about in a blur of wings until she dragged out her little light-stone.
The sounds of screaming, throttled kuo-toa, thrashing tentacles, and alarm horns
made conversation almost impossible.

“What’s the hold up, Hen?”

“A door just slammed! The Justicar is on the other side of
it!” Henry pressed his ear against a wooden door that blocked the passageway. “I
can hear movement but can’t hear fighting. He won’t answer when I call!”

“Great.” Harpoons clanged from the magic shield, tentacles
thrashed, and kuo-toa roared. With hundreds of angry monsters at her heels,
Escalla yanked her light stone out of her cleavage to look at the door, noticing
the folded up portable hole between her breasts as she did so.

“Polk! You still in there?”

“Yep!”

“Are you peeking?”

“Yep!”

“Polk, I’m gonna give you such a pinch when we get outta
here!” Escalla yelled into the dark. “Jus, come on man, open the door! What’s
the hold up?”

* * *

On the other side of the door, the Justicar’s eyes bulged.
The garotte around his neck jerked tight, and his fingers bled as he tried to
pry the wire from his throat. The kuo-toa snarled, heaving backward on the
garotte to try and tear Jus’ head off his shoulders. High priest of an assassin
cult, the kuo-toa hissed with the pleasure of the kill. Jus tried to rear and
slam the monster against the walls, but the creature outweighed him, shoving him
against a pillar and heaving viciously at the ranger’s neck.

Jus tried to punch backward with his fist but struck only the
harsh hide of the monster’s arms. His elbow viciously slammed backward and
failed to connect. He tried to rake his boot sole down the monster’s shins, but
the creature hopped and stepped away. With his air shut off, Jus staggered and
heaved, while at his belt Benelux cried out excitedly with advice.

Drop your weight! Turn into him!
The sword jittered like
a school marm.
Look out! Don’t let him bite your head!

From the other side of the door, a little fist began pounding
at the door.

“Jus! Jus, I mean it! This isn’t funny! There’s about a
million fish out here!”

Whipping his free hand down to his side, Jus tried to draw
his sword. The weapon was too long to free from its scabbard until Jus loosed
the first few inches, gripped the blade in his gauntlet and whipped the weapon
clear.

A spell exploded somewhere on Escalla’s side of the corridor.

“Jus, open the door!
Open the door!”

The Justicar rammed the sword hilt back, crashing the pommel
into the kuo-toa’s skull. The fish snarled and ducked, the next blow glancing
off its angled skull. Jus reversed the blade and stabbed backward past his
flank, slamming the weapon home and drawing a wild roar from the kuo-toa. Still
the wounded creature held on, arching backward with renewed frenzy as it tried
to tear the Justicar’s head off. Cinders thrashed to no avail, and blood poured
from Jus’ upper hand. The wire garotte had cut through his leather gauntlets to
slice into the flesh of his hand like a giant razor blade.

Jus stabbed backward again—the sword skipped clear of fish
scales—and then again, this time jamming into flesh. The kuo-toa screamed,
released its garotte, and smashed down with its hand. Benelux clanged protesting
to the floor, struck out of Jus’ bleeding grasp. Still holding the ranger from
behind, the kuo-toa tried to strangle him with its bare hands. It bit at his
head, getting a mouthful of Cinders’ fur and breaking teeth on Jus’ metal
helm. The Justicar gave a vicious noise and grabbed the kuo-toa’s hand, snapping
a finger and bringing yet another bellow of pain and rage. He broke a second
finger, then a third, breathing at last through a throat that felt ragged with
pain.

Behind him, the door exploded inward, flying to pieces,
revealing a furious Escalla hovering in midair with magic still boiling around
her fist.

“I said open the damned door!”
Pausing in mid yell, the
girl saw the kuo-toa strangling Jus from behind. “Hang on!”

A flame bolt ploughed into the kuo-toa’s back, blasting open
flesh and scales. With a roar of agony, the monster released Jus and whirled
aside. An ice blast from Escalla’s wand hit it in the chest and sent the
creature skidding across the floor. Jus dived, the sword Benelux sweeping up in
his hands as he snatched it from the floor. A crossbow bolt from Private Henry
stabbed into the monster’s thigh. The creature made a swift look to a box in one
corner of the room. It opened its arms, screamed the syllables of a spell, and a
magic gate flashed into being.

Jus and Escalla both lunged forward, Escalla smashing her
lich staff into the creature’s back. An instant later, Jus gave a hoarse roar
and speared his sword through the creature’s skull. Still screaming, its body
flopping with horrid vitality, the kuo-toa leader took one step forward, drawing
Jus and Escalla to the threshold of the gate.

Jus and Escalla stared for a brief moment into a watery
universe of palaces and kelp. Enthroned on a couch of pearls sat a titanic
being, a creature with a naked human female’s torso and the head and arms of a
lobster. Surrounded by countless thousands of priests, kuo-toa, carnivorous sea
beasts, and lesser gods, the entity turned to look at the intruders at her door.

The dead priest tumbled forward into the water. Escalla gave
the sea goddess a nervous little wave.

“This one’s broken! We were just returning it!”

The sea goddess roared.

Jus lunged back into the secret room, snatching Escalla out
of the gateway an instant before it crashed shut.

The room was chaos. Kuo-toa raved, harpoons clanged against
the walls, and the place stank like a slaughterhouse. Chained to the walls were
the rotting bodies of half a dozen armored gnomes, their weapons and treasures
at their feet. Rot-grubs still writhed through the corpses moving in and out of
eye sockets.

Private Henry was madly turning the windlass of his crossbow,
a quarrel held between his teeth. The magic tentacles were failing, and kuo-toa
struggled past. Fingers shaking, Henry slapped in the quarrel and shot the
leader, making the creature tumble and fall. His crossbow was empty, and still
more kuo-toa charged into the room.

Desperately searching for an escape, the young soldier saw a
crossbow lying among the weapons piled at the dead gnomes’ feet. He snatched it
up and stared helplessly at the alien shape of the weapon. He made to fetch his
own weapon back, but the kuo-toa surged forward with a hissing roar. Escalla
pushed the boy back, opening her hands and sending a dense poisonous fog
thundering out to fill the other room.

“Jus, find a damned exit! Hurry!”

There seemed to be no other doors. Looking swiftly at the
walls, the Justicar lumbered over to the far end of the room, his bleeding
fingers probing at his bruised throat as he ran. Every breath was agony. He
threw a healing spell to repair the worst of the pain.

“Cinders, look for doors! That fish came here as an escape
route!”

The hell hound wailed unhappily, fish-spittle dripping down
his fur.
Big fish bit me! Fur all gooey!

“We’ll wash it later! Look for doors!” Jus whirled, slamming
his sword pommel against a wall of solid stone to test for hollow spaces beyond.

Benelux gave a squawk of panic and outrage.
I say!
Careful!
The sword screeched as she was used as a hammer yet again.
Stop!
No! Wait! One of my pommel pins is shaky!

Jus swore, striking chips from the stone as he hammered at
the carved walls. With kuo-toa raving and blindly hurling spears, Escalla pushed
Henry back toward the far wall, made to follow, caught sight of the kuo-toa
priest’s box, and instantly swerved aside. The lid already stood open, and all
sorts of glittery stuff could be seen inside. Escalla dived straight into the
chest and began burrowing like a crazed little mole through coins, pearls, and
knickknacks.

“Polk?”

“Yep?”

“Incoming!”

With the portable hole partly open, Escalla burrowed into the
treasure trove, stuffing away anything light enough for her to shift. Pearls,
loose change, a mummified thought-eater, a dead cone shell… Polk screeched
as dross and rubbish showered him in his hidey hole.

Far across the room, Jus turned and bellowed hoarsely in
rage, “Get out of there! Move!”

“But there’s still stuff here!”

“Do it!”

A kuo-toa staggered wheezing and reeling through the poisoned
tog. The creature held a long staff tipped with pincers. It saw Escalla even as
she flicked into invisibility. Lunging at her with the staff, it caught her
tight. Escalla squealed, kicking her heels as she became visible once again. The
girl sent an electrical shock chasing down the staff and into the fish monster’s
hands, causing absolutely no effect at all.

At the far wall, Jus bashed his sword hilt against solid
rock, then suddenly heard the answering echo of a hollow space. He banged the
sword on the wall again, and the pommel broke. Benelux screeched in dismay as
the gaudy golden unicorn pommel, now sadly battered out of shape, fell clanging
to the ground. Jus cursed, half turned, and caught sight of Escalla being shaken
like a leaf on the end of a kuo-toa pincer staff.

“Escalla!”

The kuo-toa slammed the faerie against a wall. She fired
magic golden bees at her captor, but the swarm bounced and scattered from the
monsters hide. Another bash against the wall rattled Escalla’s teeth. Now
cluttering mad, she gave a snarl of rage and raised her hand, preparing her most
savage fireball spell.

Jus took one look at the building storm and screamed,
“Escalla,
no!”

The spell detonated, catching Escalla’s captor in the back
and blasting it apart. The explosion whirled Escalla like a leaf, sending her
wailing through the air.

“Waaaaaaaaah!”

The girl flew through the air, landing bottom-first upon a
carving of an angler fish. The carving’s dorsal ridge felt indelicate enough to
make Escalla’s eyes start from their sockets. She grabbed the carving to slide
free, hung for a moment on a lever, and then fell as the lever shifted and a
grating nose began from somewhere inside the walls.

The wall beside Jus and Henry slid open, revealing a set of
steps leading west. Jus lunged toward Escalla, grabbed the stunned faerie by the
scruff of her wings, and ran toward the closing door.

A shimmering gateway was opening in the room behind them.
Apparently the sea goddess was miffed. Kuo-toa fought their way into the room
through Escalla’s poisoned cloud, some dying, some wheezing, and others foaming
with rage. The Justicar dived and rolled through the swiftly narrowing doorway
just before the sliding door slammed shut. Coming to his feet, he tucked the
faerie under his arm, Polk still giving muffled yells from down her cleavage.
With the battered sword in his hand, Jus pushed past Henry and led the retreat.