immediately urged Swiftide up and around, back toward the tower.
'Take Charan upwater to Nalos, Wavestar, and protect her and the sword. We'll follow when we can, but I've got to go help, and keep anything else from following you,' Keros called back to the trio, which stayed on its course despite the protests of its young charge. 'Good currents, friend.'
While it hurt tremendously to do so, he had to leave Charan to check on his parents. She was safe-he knew that-but he had to be certain their parents were safe as well, even though the rage in his mother's scream left that outcome in serious doubt. Keros shrugged off his fears and headed for the huge opening torn in the side of the Tower of Numos. He got some grave satisfaction at seeing the kraken that created the entry dying under a score of military tridents. He just hoped the battle inside fared as well as the one outside.
Even before he reached the central Great Vault, Keros heard the screams of the wounded and the moans of the dying. Swiftide reluctantly swam into the building despite the smells of fear and death, due to his loyalty to and trust of Keros. They followed the path torn open through numerous walls and defenses to breach the Great Vault. Keros had never been inside it, and his first view showed him his first war.
The room was over seventy feet high and round on all sides save the wall where the doors once stood. Gleaming white coral lined all surfaces, and numerous holes were smashed into the walls, revealing hidden caches of items, books, and sundries swiftly looted by morkoth invaders.
The great Armory of Xynakt should have floated on the currents at the heart of the chamber, trapped in magical ice that never melted. Keros knew the armory had already been violated, since Naran had given him one of the artifacts-that strange surface-worlder weapon called a 'sun sword'-that now swung around Wavestar's neck, heading for safety in the upwaters.
A cloud of blood, shards of ice, and flotsam swirled where the artifacts once bobbed. Only the largest of the pieces remained intact, though it held the most malefic treasure of them all, the desiccated Claw of Xynakt-or, more properly, Xynakt's entire left arm, with the powerful gem set in its palm. The ice held it for now, but the red glowing tentacle cast by a large morkoth who hovered near the ceiling was wrapped around it. As Keros watched, cracks were forming on the ice sheath around the claw.
Keros looked down to see hundreds of ice fragments floating in the chamber, along with the broken bodies of priests who died defending their faith and their stronghold. Blood clung in the water, causing Swiftide to begin to panic slightly.
Still, the pair moved forward, and Keros called out, 'Mother! Father! I've come to help!'
Instantly reacting to Keros's shout, a morkoth slid into his path, clicking its beak and menacing them with its claws, only to be met by a fierce head butt by Swiftide. Keros followed that with his small trident, skewering the creature's heart, but the attack cost him his weapon as it remained lodged in the chest of its victim.
Keros dropped the trident just as he spotted both his parents in the lower parts of the chamber. He recognized Naran by her strong, clear voice as she cast a spell paralyzing the foes facing her, though Keros saw another trio of morkoths close around her. Despite her own danger, she seemed intent on another part of the room. He followed her eyes and found his father, pinned at the midpoint of one wall by a trident through his leg and trunk, blood clouding thick around his slumped figure. -
'No!' Keros yelled, and spurred his steed forward. 'Help my mother, Swiftide. I've got to save my father.'
Keros dived off Swiftide's back, diving sharply down, dodging ice shards that now acted as obstacles rather than defenses. Keros swam in search of a weapon conspicuously absent from his father's hands for the first time in years. Behind and above him, Keros heard the loud cracking of the ice and his mother yelling, 'Keros-get out of here nowF
Naran's voice intermingled with the loud neighs of Swiftide, as the hippocampus lent his hooves and fins to battling the morkoth. Keros wanted to explain why he was here, but he couldn't even explain it to himself. His father seemed dead, but his legacy would not be abandoned to these scavengers.
Keros kept a sharp ear out for incoming attacks, but surprisingly none came as he tore through the rubble on the chamber floor. A glint of dark metal revealed what he sought: an ancient tapal that had been in the family for seventeen generations. It had been Moras's weapon for Keros's entire life, and its deadly beauty was apparent to the young triton as he picked it up. Razor sharp on the external edge, the metal arc wrapped along the outside of his forearm and up around his knuckles, coming to a point on the thumb side of the grip with another deadly point near his elbow. Settling the bladed weapon on his right arm and straightening his arm out with the tapal forward, Keros started up toward his father, but a voice inside his head stopped him short, a spell of his father's, no doubt. Moras spoke quickly, but with more emotion and strength than Keros had personally heard in years.
Keros, my son. I know you mean well, but you must ignore us. Our fates are in Persana's hands. Naran and
I know for what we fight-to prevent Axar Xyrl from claiming the magics of this place. Hurry, for he nearly has the prize he seeks. Thwart him there, then we can look to our own survival.
The spell did not allow Keros to communicate back, and to speak would draw more attention to himself. Silently, he swam away from his father and began weaving among the larger ice fragments nearer the floor. Keros soon noticed that few morkoths bothered to look for him during their moment of triumph. A resounding crack sounded like a death knell in the Great Vault as the ice sheath shattered under the pressure of the magical tentacle.
Keros saw his mother's face contort in horror, though numerous morkoths hemmed her and Swiftide in. Keros swam around toward the back wall, and he followed the silver-beaked leader of the morkoths with his eyes. The large morkoth moved forward and out of Keros's sight atop the hovering iceberg. Within moments, the light in the room took on an greenish tint. The remainder of the ice shattered with a blast of green. Keros heard the sound he learned to hate earlier that day: the grating beak-clicking of morkoth laughter.
Looking upward again, he saw the larger morkoth- the Axar Xyrl his father named-waving the petrified tentacle of a long dead morkoth leader, a green gem glowing brightly in its palm. Keros grinned as he heard his mother finish a spell, and saw arcane energies immediately come into play. Naran transformed her trident into pure energy and launched at Xyrl- only to watch the magic dissipate harmlessly.
While everyone's attention was focused on Naran and Xyrl, Keros leaped upward from almost directly beneath the claw, intent more than ever to heed his father's words and keep the Claw of Xynakt out of morkoth hands.
They might have it for the moment, he thought, but they can't hold it if Persana aids me now.
'Whole lives can take place between heartbeats,' was a church teaching Keros never believed until now. In the short seconds it took him to close the space between himself and Axar Xyrl, he watched in dread as the morkoth took notice of Naran and trained the claw at her. His hands only feet away from the morkoth's tentacles, Keros screamed as the claw coruscated with green energy that enveloped Naran. Keros watched in horror as he saw the flesh burned from his mother's skeleton, then her bones were blasted to ashes. During it all, Axar Xyrl's clicking laughter continued, though it seemed to slow to a crawl.
'Mother!'
Grief-stricken and angry beyond belief, Keros continued swimming upward with his shout. Appearing instantly after the attack, not even Axar Xyrl could defend against the sudden assault. Keros kept his arm straight as he swam past the morkoth. The tapal's cutting edge effortlessly scored a long wound across the morkoth's chest and the outstretched arm that held the Claw of Xynakt. While the tapal damaged the arcount, Keros used the element of surprise and his anger-driven strength to wrest the mummified tentacle from Axar Xyrl's grasp with his left hand. He then continued swimming up toward the ceiling and over to the gaping doorway, maneuvering out of range of some spells and using the debris they caused to gain cover from morkoth attacks. Keros had reached the ceiling by the time the whole attack even fully registered to Axar
Xyrl, who screeched in pain at his wounds and in frustration at realizing he had lost the Claw of Xynakt so swiftly.
In those moments, Keros could have swum out of the Great Vault and headed out toward open water, away from those who wished to use the artifact he now held. His concern for his parents and friends slowed him as he wondered how to get to them safely. He whistled for Swiftide to join him, though the fearful whinny he heard in response told him his trusted mount was still trapped. He heard the grating, sibilant voice of Axar Xyrl address him then.
'Escape Axar you shall not. Return the claw, you must, or watch more die you will. The high priest father is-
