Tarjana's belly and hadn't allowed her to visit with him much. He watched over the princes in Vahaxtyl, and even though the malenti priestess told him they should return to the sahuagin city and change the currents that were passing through the minds of the populace as the princes spoke out against him, Iakhovas resisted. Clearly, he followed his own agenda.
She felt new movement. Something was slithering in from the left. The sensation pulsing through her lateral lines made her skin tighten in primitive fear. She turned to face it, dropping the trident's tines in front of her.
'Welcome,' Iakhovas boomed.
He moved his arms and floated twenty feet down through the water to the sea floor. Puffs of sand rose up around his boots, then quickly settled again.
Three figures glided across the ocean floor from beneath a coral-encrusted arch. Laaqueel's senses told her more of them remained in hiding, but she could not tell how many more. She studied the figures, opening her eyes to their widest to use what little light the depths held.
They looked like surface dwellers, dressed in clothing rather than going naked as most races in Seros did. There were three men, none of them possessing any remarkable features. They carried no apparent weapons, which surprised Laaqueel. The only surface dwellers the malenti priestess came in contact with who hadn't carried weapons were magic-users.
'Welcome,' one of the men greeted. The word sounded foreign to his lips. 'You have received word through Vurgrom of the Taker's Eye?'
'Yes,' Iakhovas said. 'I was told the eye resides in Myth Nantar.'
'And so it does.'
'I have brought gifts for the Grand Tor, a means of increasing his own armies,' Iakhovas said.
He whirled the net above his head and it grew, increasing in size until it was as big as Iakhovas. He flung it away from him and still it grew. Something struggled within the strands.
When the net finished growing, it was huge. Tritons moved against each other inside it, striving desperately against the hemp strands.
The tritons were humanoid in appearance. They had the pointed ears and beautiful features of elves, long manes of dark blue and dark green hair. From the waist up, they could be easily mistaken for sea elves. From the waist down they were covered in deep blue scales. Their finned legs ended in broad, webbed flippers.
'How many?' one of the strangers asked.
Thirty-four,' Iakhovas said. 'Four above the agreed-upon price. A gesture of good will to Grand Tor Arcanaal.'
'He will be most appreciative,' one of the men said. He gestured and shadows swam from the darkness, moving through the water smoothly, their arms at their sides. Two men swam to the net and grabbed it, then towed it back toward the gloom.
The tritons cursed and called on their god Persana but it was to no avail. They were doomed to their fates at the hands of the men Iakhovas gave them to. In only minutes, they were gone from sight and no longer heard.
The man gestured again. Another man swam from the shadows bearing a gold chest inlaid with precious stones, marked with sigils of power. He handed it to Iakhovas. The man turned and swam away.
Come, Iakhovas commanded, gesturing at the water and opening the gate again. We have much to do.
Shaken and mystified by the encounter, Laaqueel propelled herself after Iakhovas.
Look back, priestess.
The serenity of the feminine voice was startling. Laaqueel glanced at Iakhovas as he summoned the gate.
He does not hear me, priestess, the serene voice went on. My words are meant for your thoughts alone.
Who are you? Laaqueel asked. The voice was the same one that she had heard in Coryselmal as she was turned back from death.
Patience. All will be explained. For now, turn back and see the lies that Iakhovas has woven for your eyes to see.
Almost unwillingly, Laaqueel finned around, sweeping a hand through the water with the webbing open. The men were still in sight, only they weren't men anymore.
The three figures had deep purple skin that darkened to inky-black. Iridescent tips and lines marked the dorsal fin on their heads and backs. The heads were not oval like a human's or an elf's, but rather elongated and stretched out like that of a locathah. Their jaws formed cruel beaks.
Instead of two arms, they had four, all of them with humanlike appendages instead of the pincers or tentacles Laaqueel knew were also possible on the creatures. Their lower bodies ended in six tentacles.
Iakhovas lies, the serene voice said. He's not as invincible as he would have you. believe. You must watch yourself. Then the voice was gone, a slight pop of pressure that faded from the inside of Laaqueel's skull.
'I am Myrym, chieftain of the Rolling Shell people, and I bid you welcome.'
Pacys believed Myrym to be the oldest locathah he'd ever met. Cataracts clouded her eyes, but she gave no indication of missing anything around her.
The fin at the top of her head ran all the way down her back. Other fins underscored the forearms and the backs of her calves. The huge eyes were all black but were unable to both focus on the bard at the same time. The locathah turned her head from side to side. She wore a necklace made of threaded white and black pearls that would have been worth a fortune in the surface world, and a sash of netting that held a bag of different kinds of seaweed, coral, and shells. The old bard's own magical inclinations told him the net bag contained a number of items of power.
They sat at the bottom of the abyss in a grotto between a crevice of rock made easily defensible by stands of claw coral. Fist-sized chunks of glowcoral had been used to build cairns around them, punching holes in the darkness of the sea bottom. The tribe sat scattered about her, nearly three hundred strong, covering the ledges above them as well as smaller caves. The young in particular pooled together in schools, floating and watching with their big eyes.
Three days ago, the music had brought Pacys south and east of the sea elf city, drawing him toward Omalun and the Hmur Plateau at the base of Impiltur. The old bard couldn't lay name to what exactly pulled him, but he'd been insistent about going. Taranath Reefglamor had assigned guards to him and provisioned them well. The sea elf guard waited further up the Hmur Plateau with the seahorses they'd used as steeds.
Seated cross-legged only a few feet from the locathah chieftain, Pacys ran his hands over the saceddar, underscoring their conversation with a gentle melody that spoke of calm seas and the patience of her people, their willingness to sacrifice so they might live.
Khlinat sat only a little distance away, laughing at the antics of the foot-long locathah children as they swam close to him to investigate, then swam away with quick, darting movements.
'Thank you for your hospitality,' Pacys said, listening to the music that crooned within him. 'I didn't know what drew me out here, but I think I know now.'
'We were drawn to each other,' Myrym told him. 'We've only been in this place two days. We have kept moving. The sahuagin have come into these waters, and the surface world has developed a strong distrust of anyone who calls the sea home. We have received word that our locathah brethren in the Shining Sea have allied with the Taker, an unfortunate choice that will affect us all.'
'I know,' Pacys replied.
Khlinat chuckled heartily as one of the small locathah children finally got the nerve up to touch his beard. The sudden explosive laughter sent the locathah child swimming for its life, threading under and between stands of rock thrusting up from the seabed.
'Oh, an' yer a quick lad, ain't ye?' the dwarf chuckled. 'A-dartin' through them waters like that, it's a wonder ye didn't brain yerself.'
The locathah child cowered behind the nearest adult, who laid a tender hand on the child's head. The other locathah laughed with the dwarf.
Even in that moment of levity, though, Pacys could sense the innate fear of the locathah tribe. They hadn't known peace and prosperity for generations, nor were there any reassurances now.
'What do you know of the Taker's beginnings?' Myrym asked.
'Nothing.' Pacys paused his song. 'All whom I have talked to have told me only that he was born long ago,
