of one of the jellyfish's tentacles. Bubbles boiling from his mouth, he clung with one arm and tore at his armor with the other.
My ears aching from the pressure, I hovered at his side, helping him, fumbling with the clasps and buckles. The ornate regalia of Term's Fury fell into the depths, one piece at a time. When it seemed we'd disposed of enough-and in any case, our air was all but gone-I half dragged him to the surface, then to the side of the boat. A line dangled in the water, and I put it in his hand.
To my relief, men were still fighting on deck. The jellyfish had wrapped some of its tentacles around the cog itself, and appeared well on its way to capsizing her or tearing her asunder.
'Hang on to the rope,' I said.
Hylas tried to answer but could only cough. I drew my knife and swam away from the boat, weaving my way through a mesh of writhing tentacles.
As before, the jellyfish didn't molest me. Even the crabman didn't notice me at first. Perhaps the monsters were too intent on the destruction of the ship, or perhaps the cloudiness of the water, and the effort I made to come in on their flank, helped conceal my approach.
As I prepared to attack, the crab sensed my presence and turned, grabbing for me with its pincers. Somehow I twisted out of the way, then raked my knife across the soft orb at the end of one of its eyestalks.
The crab recoiled and fled into the depths, and the jellyfish broke off its assault on the cog. Realizing that the colossal beast would be all but indestructible, I'd Tioped to deter it by disposing of its handler, and my tactic had paid off. Still, I'd accomplished very little. No doubt the jellyfish would resume its depredations soon enough.
When I paddled back to the cog, I learned that three militiamen had perished in the battle. Under the circumstances, that was fewer than we had any right to expect. The ship itself was crippled but capable of limping back to port. On the way in, Hylas's face was bleak. I wondered bitterly if he was grieving for our fallen comrades or his lost gear.
That night, when we were still exhausted and dispirited, the crabmen attacked the settlement. Four more warriors died, along with sixteen of the townsfolk.
I knew more or less what the men were going to say. It was clear from their conspiratorial air, to say nothing of the lookout posted at the barracks door, but I judged it wiser not to let on.
'Very well,' I said, 'what did you want to talk about?'
'Captain Hylas,' Vallam said. Some trick of the wavering candlelight made the old scars on his face look raw and new. 'You told us to give him a chance, and we did, but he isn't working out. These… schemes of his are killing us like flies.'
'We lost a few men before he arrived, and we've lost a few since. Considering what we're up against, we could expect nothing better.'
Dandrios shook his square-jawed head. 'It's different now. That high-born lunatic doesn't care about lowly militiamen. He'd sacrifice us all to rejoin his precious Fury. Well, Talona wither me if I'll die for that. We want you to lead us, Sergeant. Hylas can disappear.'
Vallam smirked. 'We'll tell everyone the crabmen got him.'
'No,' I said. I'd seen mutiny before, and no matter how wretched the deposed officers had been, it was always a disaster. Once a company of warriors decided they had the option of pulling down their commander, discipline decayed until they were no longer an army but a rabble.
Vallam scowled. 'Sergeant-'
'No!' I repeated. 'Whatever mistakes the First Captain has made, he's our leader, and we'll follow him in accordance with our oath.'
'I won't,' Dandrios said. 'If we cant get rid of Hylas, I'm leaving.' He turned away, presumably to gather his belongings.
Wishing he weren't so much bigger than I, I yanked him back around. 'No one's deserting, either. The town needs us.'
'Bugger the town,' he said.
'All right. If you've no backbone, it comes down to this. Run, and 111 hunt you down and make you wish the crabs had gotten you.'
He snarled and swung at me, a haymaker fit to break my skull. Happily, a man has to wind up for a punch like that. I saw it coming and sidestepped. In any common brawl, I would then have kicked my opponent in the knee, but Dandrios wouldn't be able to serve if I lamed him. I hooked a blow into his belly, then a second into his kidney.
The punches didn't faze him. Spinning, he clipped my jaw with his elbow. My teeth clacked together, and I stumbled back into one of the bunks. He scrambled after me and grappled, immobilizing my arms. I butted him twice in the face, and his grip loosened. I twisted free, then kneed him in the stones.
He gasped and doubled over. I kicked him, laying him out on the floor, then, careful not to damage him too severely, went on kicking for a while. I didn't like playing the bully, but matters had reached such a pass that the only way to maintain order was to make the garrison more afraid of me than they were of the crabs.
When I finally stepped back from my victim, I judged from the militiamen's wide eyes and white faces that I'd made my point. But it was only a temporary remedy. Ere long they'd be talking of making me disappear, or simply start slipping away in the dark.
They might have been surprised to learn that afterward, as I wandered the benighted streets, trying to calm down, I flirted with the notion of desertion myself. I didn't want to die for a lost cause, either.
Musty-smelling books and scrolls littered the First Captain's desk, and Aquinder perched on a stool beside it. A gray-bearded old man with a nose like a sickle, clad in a ratty scholar's gown, he was Port Llast's closest approximation to a sage, and in truth, had considerable skill as a herbalist and chirurgeon.
He gave me his usual curt nod as I stepped through the door. Hylas greeted me with the constraint that had entered his manner since the battle on the water. I didn't know what the change portended, but I preferred it to the cocksure posturing of yore.
'Please, take a chair,' the young knight said. 'I've asked Master Aquinder to come and ponder with me, and it occurred to me that it would be worthwhile to hear your thoughts as well.'
'If I can help,' I said, 'I will.'
'As serious a problem as the jellyfish is,' said Hylas, pacing restlessly about, 'the crabmen are the greater threat. Unfortunately, as you warned me, they're too numerous to exterminate, but if we could figure out why they've allied themselves with the sahuagin, perhaps we could somehow sever the bond.'
I cocked my head. 'I confess, that tack never occurred to me.'
'Sadly,' said Aquinder, 'those sages who've studied the crabmen agree that they're insular creatures, with no ties to any other race. None of the available texts provides the slightest insight into the local colony's anomalous behavior.'
'So I hoped you might have an idea,' Hylas said. He gazed at me with a hint of desperation in his eyes.
Wonderful, I thought. He finally wants my opinion, and I haven't got one. Then, however, a notion struck me. I suspected it was a stupid one, but I offered it anyway. 'We have fresh carcasses from last night's skirmish. We could cut one up.'
Aquinder's gray eyes narrowed. 'You mean, dissect it?'
'If that's what you call it,' I said. 'I've heard that's what sages do when they want to learn about a creature.'
Hylas and Aquinder exchanged glances. The scholar shrugged and said, 'Why not?'
We dissected the carcass where it had fallen. Stripped to the waist, I used an axe, mallet, and chisel to break open the dead crabman's shell. His sleeves rolled to the elbow, Aquinder probed the creature's stringy gray flesh with a lancet and tongs. It wasn't long before both of us were spattered with reeking slime. Meanwhile Hylas looked on anxiously.
None of us knew what we were searching for, nor did we actually expect to find anything. Yet when it appeared, it was unmistakable. A coin-like disk of pol ished red coral, wedged between two of the chitinous plates that armored the crabman's head.
Aquinder wiped it clean with a linen kerchief, then inspected it with a magnifying lens. He grunted, and Hylas asked what he'd found. Ignoring him, the old man extracted a pink quartz crystal from his pouch and touched it to the disk. The crystal glowed Uke a hot coal.
