evade her, but Vixa closed in as if pulled by an invisible line. With a sideways snap of her jaws, she swallowed the fish whole.
Heels thumped her sides. By Astra! She was three fathoms down, and she’d completely forgotten she had a passenger! She arrowed back to the surface.
“Will you please not do that!” the dwarf exploded as he gasped for breath.
This time the noises she made were apologetic.
For the rest of the day Vixa kept to the surface, her nose pointed north. When she tired and slowed, Gundabyr climbed off her back and held himself up by clutching her dorsal fin. This gave her some respite from his weight, but they couldn’t make much progress that way, so they kept such breaks to a minimum.
Late in the day they spied a ship, toiling under tack against the breeze. Vixa altered her course toward the wallowing two-master.
“Ahoy!” sang out Gundabyr.
A human sailor put his head over the high rail. “Ahoy! Who calls?”
“Down here!”
Vixa swam alongside the ship’s port side. The sailor gawked when he spotted the dwarf riding a big black- and-white dolphin.
“Blow me to Balifor!” he yelped. “What in Rann’s name are you doin’ down there, mate?”
“Riding a dolphin, of course. Slow down, Vixa. I want a word with this fellow.”
She complied, matching her speed to that of the creeping ship.
“Can you tell me where we are?” Gundabyr asked.
“We’re eight days out of Balifor city,” the sailor responded, his eyes starting from his head.
“Where’ll we make landfall if we keep heading due north?”
“Uh, Silvanesti-but you don’t want to go there, mate. They don’t allow visitors.”
“Did you hear that, Vixa? Silvanesti!”
She responded with a pleased affirmative.
“What did it say?” asked the sailor, awestruck.
“No idea,” Gundabyr replied with a shrug.
Someone on deck called out. “Haynar, you laggard! Who’re you talking to?”
The sailor turned away. “Captain! You won’t believe it, sir! There’s a dwarf in the water, ridin’ a-”
By that time Vixa had rounded the bow of the slow-moving vessel and was cruising up the starboard side. No one else caught a glimpse of them. Vixa could imagine the poor sailor trying to explain what he’d seen. A dolphin chuckle shook her.
It was late evening their third day at sea when the wind changed to easterly and blue-black clouds piled up on the horizon. The smell of fresh rain wafted to Vixa from miles away. Soon they could see bolts of lightning snapping from cloud to sea.
“Looks as if we’re in for it,” Vixa chirped wearily.
“Hmm, looks as if we’re in for it,” Gundabyr said.
The ocean was getting rougher by the minute. Wind blew in gusts of hot and cold air, and cool rain pattered over the tossing waves. Gundabyr raised his salt-crusted face and let fresh water fill his mouth. He swallowed repeatedly.
“Rain,” he sighed joyfully.
A thunderclap punctuated his sigh. The rain fell harder. Vixa found it more and more difficult to swim on the surface against the wind-driven waves. She bobbed her head and screeched to warn Gundabyr she was planning to submerge.
“What? What’re you saying?” he demanded. As the water level reached his chin, he finally understood. He took a great gulp of air and pinched his nose shut.
Vixa dove no more than two fathoms, swam hard for twenty heartbeats, then surfaced so Gundabyr could breathe. This wasn’t terribly successful. The wind was whipping the waves eight to ten feet high. Vixa struggled on, boring through the towering waves.
“Quite-a-storm!” Gundabyr shouted.
She agreed silently. She hadn’t eaten since earlier that day when a few small fish blundered into her path. The constant hard work of swimming was draining her strength. Her body felt like a longbow held too long at full draw-ready to snap. Doggedly, she pressed on through the howling squall.
Lightning struck nearby. It left a bitter smell that was quickly washed away by the pouring rain.
It was black as night now. The only things visible were the waves, thrown out in bold relief by each flash of lightning. Vixa had no idea which direction she was traveling. The churning ocean could have spun her to any point of the compass. When the storm had first struck, the wind had been easterly, hitting her on the right flank. She decided to keep the wind on her right.
After a time, the water took on a new taste. Mud. Vixa rolled onto her side and peered through the dark water. She couldn’t see the bottom, but there was a thick cloud of dirt in the water. Was it shallower here?
Each stroke of her flukes was like the blow of a lash. Vixa panted hard through her blowhole. Gundabyr was ominously quiet now. She could feel his heart beating, so she knew he was alive, and his hands were still clenched about her dorsal fin, but he hadn’t spoken in a very long time.
On a downstroke of her tail, Vixa felt her flukes drag against something. She arched her back and ran her snout through sand. Land! They must have made land! Unless-she hated even to think it-unless Coryphene had managed to summon the kraken again.
She drove ahead until her belly dragged in the sand. Waves washed against her and the dwarf. Spray lashed her eyes, but Vixa heaved herself out of the water and flopped forward. Another roller caught her and shoved her higher on the beach. Gundabyr was knocked from her back and taken away by the surf. Vixa had no strength left even to cry out to him.
Another wave hit her. She rolled over in the wet sand, coming to a stop against a pile of driftwood. By a vivid bolt of lightning, she saw trees some distance away. No trees grew on the kraken’s broad back. They had made it to land!
Vixa closed her eyes. She was so spent she could barely think, but had to will herself to transform. She filled her mind with her true form, envisioning legs, two arms, and her elven face. The change seemed to take an eternity. Exhaustion made concentration difficult. The heat of her dolphin blood was a growing agony. At last, she felt her skin crawl and her limbs stretching into place. Her dolphin squeal of triumph became the glad cry of an elf maiden. Now the cold knifed into her bones.
With her last ounce of strength, Vixa reached out her hand. Her fingers closed on a piece of slick driftwood lying nearby. Her eyelids fluttered down, and she lost consciousness.
The lightning flashed. The cool rain fell.
She awoke with the sun in her eyes and the squawk of wheeling sea gulls in her ears. Vixa turned her head and saw she was several yards from the hissing waves. She sat up slowly. The beach was wide and empty. The driftwood she had clung to was part of a shipwreck, sticking up from the sand.
Just as she’d begun to worry about Gundabyr, Vixa saw the dwarf’s vest lying on the beach next to her. At least, it used to be his vest. Now it was in two pieces. The cotton lining had been torn away from the outer woolen material. She picked it up and studied it. A smile slowly appeared on her face. Without further ado, Vixa donned the two garments.
Vixa saw bare footprints leading into the woods. The dwarf had obviously regained consciousness first and gone exploring. She hoped he’d find them something to eat. And drink. Vixa’s throat was parched. A long, cool drink of water would be paradise just now. That, and half a roasted ox.
As if on cue, Gundabyr appeared out of the trees, his thick arms laden with fruit. He nodded in response to her greeting, then dumped his load of plums, wild grapes, and thorn apples on the sand before her.
“If you’re as hungry as I was, dig in,” he said cheerfully. “I’ve had my fill already, so don’t be shy.”
Vixa took an apple in each hand and bit into them alternately. Juice ran down her chin. They were the finest apples she’d ever tasted.
“Yup, they’re good,” Gundabyr said, agreeing with her happy sigh.
She interrupted her chewing long enough to ask, “Do you know where we are?”
