Urione rang with conch shell alarms and the tramp of many feet. Coryphene assembled his iron-armed troops in the fish market square. Ordinary folk had vanished from sight, blocking their windows and doors. Just as five hundred of Coryphene’s personal guard gathered in place, a scream tore the air.
Coryphene spun around and saw a melee spilling into the square. A column of six chilkit were trying to force their way up the street. Blocking their path were a dozen Dargonesti warriors, some of them weaponless. An equal number of fisherfolk, armed with nets and gaffs, had taken up the defense of their homes. From windows facing the street, other Dargonesti bombarded the invaders with stones, pots, and endless torrents of oyster shells. The chilkit, ignoring the onslaught of rubbish, attacked.
“Forward!” Coryphene shouted. Out came five hundred scavenged iron and steel swords.
“Close up there!” he barked. “Bring your shields together! First rank, follow me! The rest, hold here!”
He led fifty warriors at a dead run across the square. The beleaguered defenders were fragmenting. The undisciplined civilians were suffering badly as the chilkit ran them down one at a time. Then Coryphene’s shock troop hit the scene.
The Protector of Urione did not shirk his place in the fore. He fended off a backhand blow by a chilkit claw and slashed at the monster with Vixa’s Qualinesti blade. His first strike cracked the chilkit’s armor shell. The creature gave ground, lashing at Coryphene’s face with its antennae, trying to scratch his eyes. With a quick overhand swipe, he managed to cut off the antennae. The chilkit staggered and collided with the creature on its right. It tried to wrest Coryphene’s shield away. Coryphene relinquished the shield and thrust straight at the monster’s upright torso. A crunch, and the shell gave. Roaring a war cry, Coryphene rammed the blade home and out the chilkit’s back. He put a foot to its chest and recovered his blade. The lifeless creature fell back, twitching in its death throes.
Looking over the scene, Coryphene realized that these six were the only foes in sight. A raiding party, he decided, to draw off his troops from the main attack. He had to get outside.
No sooner was his attention diverted than the chilkit mustered their resolve and resumed their furious attack. Two of them forced their way past the line of Dargonesti swords. The remaining three kept up the pressure on the front. Coryphene ordered his line to fall back.
“Excellence! Shall I summon the rest of the guard?” panted one of his lieutenants.
“For what reason? There are only five of them,” was the acid retort.
The chilkit attacked singly, first from one side, then the other. One Dargonesti was dragged out of place and harried. The other warriors, infuriated, charged on their own initiative. Two chilkit were trapped between the Dargonesti and the houses of the fisherfolk. It took three or four elves to handle one chilkit, but they separated the two monsters and hacked away at them. Coryphene cleaved one creature’s blunt head in two with his sword. Any warm-blooded foe would have dropped instantly, but the chilkit fought on, its actions violent and undirected. Two warriors were knocked down by its flailing limbs. Coryphene’s shield caught a blow that was so strong it bent the tortoise-shell double. Down went the Protector of Urione.
Across the square, Captain Telletinor saw his commander fall. “Close ranks!” he cried shrilly. “At the double, charge!”
A tide of blue-skinned fury blasted across the market to crush the remaining chilkit. Afterward, sorting through the carnage, Telletinor and his brother officers found Coryphene, bruised but undefeated. The chilkit’s last act before expiring had been to fall on top of him, and he had been pinned there, the monster’s corpse too heavy for him to lift.
Tired and dehydrated warriors were lining up at the water spouts to douse their gills. Coryphene walked among them, shouting, “Back in ranks! Back, I say! You’ll be wet soon enough!”
He led the guards to the quay and marched them out into the sea.
Behind him, the fisherfolk emerged from their houses to survey the scene of battle. A dozen Dargonesti lay dead in the square. They were tenderly taken up so the proper rites could be performed. Seawater was poured on the pavements to wash away the blood.
Axes appeared, and the fisherfolk set to lopping the limbs off the dead chilkit. The creatures were crustaceans, after all, just like crabs or lobsters. The sea elves always ate dead chilkit, just as the chilkit would have done to them.
A small spark lit the darkness that shrouded Vixa Ambrodel.
Tiny points of light, like the stars she gazed at from her window in the Speaker’s house, twinkled above her. She floated under a canopy of cold stars. A red disk appeared on the horizon, a great staring eye-no, it was the red moon, Lunitari.
She tried to move. Pain lanced through her chest. Vixa inhaled sharply, found cool air, and coughed seawater. She was on the surface of the ocean! How had she gotten here? The last thing she remembered was escaping from the flooded Nissia Grotto-and drowning! She had drowned!
“Be still. Breathe.”
Stiffly, Vixa turned her head. The face of Naxos hovered close by. His arms held her up, keeping her head above the sea swell.
“Naxos.” Her voice was a raspy croak.
“Be still,” he repeated softly. “You were nearly dead when I found you.”
She swallowed painfully. “Ar-Armantaro,” she hissed. “Where are my companions?”
He shook his head. “I do not know. You were the first one I saw. I used the magic of my necklace to bring you to the surface safely.”
It was strange to feel wind on her face again. The pain in her chest and head gradually faded, but she was so weary she let Naxos continue to support her. He was treading water effortlessly, his long legs scissoring in slow, powerful strokes.
“How goes the battle?” she asked.
“The battle is over, for now. The chilkit have breached the wall. Many hundreds of them occupy the plain around the city. Coryphene was able to keep them out of Urione proper, but he lacks the power to defeat them.”
“A siege.”
“Yes. You and I have our own problems, however.”
“Coryphene sent the sea brothers to the coast of Silvanesti to search for a route for Uriona’s invasion. I was called back and arrived in time to see the chilkit on the plain, and all the land-dwellers fleeing the grotto. No wonder, with the chilkit on the loose and a volcano erupting.”
“Volcano? What volcano?”
“In the grotto. There was fire coming from the mouth of the grotto.”
Vixa blinked at him, uncomprehending. Then she remembered. “The gnomefire! Of course, it burns underwater! I’ll wager you’ve never seen fire like that before.”
“You would be right. By its light, I saw you lying on the bottom. Your soul had nearly left your body, so the only thing to do was take you to the surface.”
He was looking at her with an expression Vixa couldn’t read in the dim red moonlight. It disconcerted her. “You said we had problems.”
“Urione is too far away for you to reach without an airshell, and my necklace’s magic is depleted.”
“Couldn’t you change into a dolphin and tow me to land?”
“It’s two hundred leagues at least, but even if I could, would you leave your friends behind?”
He knew her that well at least. She couldn’t leave Armantaro and the rest. She had to know if they were all right.
“Then what can I do?” she asked, anguished.
The unreadable expression returned to his face. “There is a way you can return to Urione,” he said. The usual brash tone was gone from his voice. “It will require you to make a difficult choice, a choice you cannot go back on.”
Cool wind raised goosebumps on Vixa’s exposed skin. “What choice?” she finally asked.
“With my help, you could become a brother of the sea.” His insolent grin flashed for an instant. “Or I should say, a sister.”
