his feet staggered from the impact with the speeding longship, but the sleek vessel's keel rode up onto the raft, and now the ship was stuck there.
Two columns of huge scrags lurched forward, while the smaller sahuagin threw themselves with abandon at the gunwale of the longship. Human defenders quickly scrambled to their positions, but even as Krell-Bane exhorted his troops, he saw northmen fall, slain by trident and scimitar, tooth and claw.
In another moment, the first of the fishmen had scrambled onto the enemy craft.
In the darkness of the depths below, the body of a giant squid lurked, hearing the sounds of battle, waiting for the report of victory. Sinioth would not involve himself in this battle. Instead, he would let his children bring the bodies of his enemies to him.
10
Brandon cursed, and veteran northmen sailors tumbled from their rowing benches, dislodged by the force of the collision. The
But as she stood again, the princess realized that the deck felt solid under her feet, and she could see no sign of a crack in the solid planks of the hull. She tried to tell herself that, just maybe, the
If water was not pouring in, however, the same could not be said of the sahuagin. Dozens of fishmen leaped toward the longship's hull as soon as the two vessels collided. In a few seconds, many of them sprang to the gunwales and scrambled into the shallow hull.
Following the impact, the prow of the longship rested on the broad, timbered deck of the enemy raft. Stout, waterlogged beams formed parallel keels separated by the long strips of water. Under the weight of Brandon's ship, the bow of the raft wallowed beneath the waves. With the fishmen scrambling all around, it seemed as though the two vessels were firmly locked together.
Brandon shouted an inarticulate cry and split a sahuagin skull with his great axe. Wultha picked up one of the creatures in his huge hands, snapping the creature's spine before casting it into the faces of two of the corpse's charging compatriots.
Keane, meanwhile, snapped the words to a quick spell and crushed something like dried threads in his left hand. He pointed at the fishmen with his right. Immediately strands of gooey string shot from his extended fingers, wrapping themselves about several of the approaching monsters, binding them securely to the hull. The creatures snapped and snarled, but their most diligent struggles couldn't break them free. Even more were ensnared as they attempted to crawl over the original targets of the web.
Hanrald, holding his great longsword in both hands, cleaved his way through a pack of the sea monsters, slicing a huge scrag into pieces small enough that he could kick them over the side. The lack of armor, which he would have worn for any battle on land, didn't slow his aggressive tactics in the least. He shouted and roared, leaping this way and that, muscles tensing for each bone-crushing blow.
But not all of the attacks went the way of the humans. Three northmen in the bow fell, fatally wounded in the first rush before they even had time to draw their weapons. Others felt the kiss of sahuagin steel-hooks and spears, scimitars and tridents-as more and more of the creatures spilled into the longship's hull.
Alicia's keen longsword drove through the shelled breastplate of a scale-faced fishman, and then she gasped as the creature fell, for beyond it loomed a much more formidable foe.
Nobody had to tell her that this was one of the scrags. A wide mouth, like a shark's, gaped open to reveal many rows of short, barbed teeth. Stringy hair, like strands of pale kelp, straggled across the monster's smooth scalp, while pale, dead eyes stared with all the emotion of a fish.
But there was plenty of threat in the creature's actions as it raised a double-pronged spear and aimed it at the unarmored princess. Powerfully clawed feet gripped the gunwale as the creature loomed, monstrously huge.
'Down!' shouted the mage, then watched as Alicia scrambled back from the looming horror of the scrag.
The fireball exploded with a white flash that, for a split second, seemed to outshine the sun. The mage had pushed the center of the spell well past the longship's hull, but tongues of flame sizzled outward in a seething hellfire that licked along the gunwale and singed a corner of the sail. Several scrags perched on the rail vanished, incinerated to ashes in less than a second, and the following wave of sahuagin perished, shrieking, in another moment.
The respite gave the princess enough time to climb to her feet. She thought of her staff and immediately seized the shaft of wood, stamped it on the deck, and shouted the command:
The shaft began to grow, extending upward in shoots of green branches, planting feet to either side. The tree creature reached out with its tough, branchlike hands-and promptly fell over as the longship rocked on a gentle swell. The flailing branches knocked sahuagin and northmen down together as the magical being struggled to gain its balance on the unstable platform.
Exasperated, Alicia raised her sword against another scaly, fang-bristling face that appeared at the gunwale. She could hear the crunching and creaking of timbers as the two wooden hulls scraped together, a sound broken by the screams of sahuagin and scrags crushed between the vessels.
She sliced the head from one of the fishmen, ignoring the gore that spewed from its neck. The corpse toppled backward, and then once more she faced a huge sea troll. The creature sprang to the gunwale, balancing on its clawed, webbed feet while it brandished a trident over its head and thumped a fist against its solid, heavily muscled chest.
The princess darted forward to attack, deflecting the monster's forked weapon and gashing its thigh with her silver long-sword. The creature bellowed and thrust, driving the prongs of its trident into the deck beside Alicia's foot. It struggled momentarily to pull the three-pronged spear free, and this was all the opening the princess needed.
Alicia aimed a wicked slash at the thing's scaly belly, watching as her keen steel sliced halfway through the vulnerable area. The sea troll gagged and choked, slipping backward as green blood spurted into the longship, across Alicia's legs. She paused, gasping for breath, waiting for the creature to fall dead.
Instead, she saw the gashes in the scrag's body slowly mend themselves, as if an invisible pair of healing hands pulled the sides of the wound together and bound them. For several moments, the monster wobbled, as if it would still perish, but then its eyes snapped open, boring into Alicia, and once again the creature raised its trident.
Forcing her dread to the back of her mind, Alicia lifted her sword to parry the coming blow, feeling as if she moved through a dream. The blade clashed against the gleaming steel tines, but one of the barbed tips scored a gouge across the woman's shoulder, tearing through her light tunic to puncture her skin. The princess ignored the pain, driving her own blade inside the creature's defenses, plunging the tip through the monster's belly and then pushing forward with all her strength.
Green blood splashed over her hand, and she felt the bile that rose in her throat. With a final shove, she forced the monster backward, off the rail, then clung to her sword with all her might as the beast fell away, almost dragging her weapon with it.
Finally she pulled the gore-streaked blade free and slumped against the gunwale, looking for her next opponent. A few sahuagin fought for their lives against the men of Brandon's crew, but they quickly met a gory fate.
