the man’s abdominal wounds. Rather, they looked pitted, ragged. As Tyranny looked closer she saw that the man’s face was similarly injured by what looked like fresh pox marks. His liver remained intact, telling Tyranny that if Adrian was right in her assumptions, this fellow had been of unendowed blood. She looked curiously at Adrian.
“What destroyed his eyes?” she asked. “And what caused these red marks on his face?”
Adrian shook her head. “I don’t know,” she answered. “It looks as though acid or some other caustic material was sprayed onto his face. That might also be what destroyed his eyes. But one thing is certain.”
“What is that?” the privateer asked.
“If these poor souls were alive during their mistreatment, they suffered horribly,” Adrian answered. “I’m talking aboutterrible pain, Tyranny-the kind that drives even the strongest mystics mad. What happened here is an outrage of massive proportions. I fear that a new Vagaries scourge has somehow been loosed on Eutracia. If we don’t stop it soon, more such atrocities seem sure to follow. But why bring these people here and then impale them? If they hail from Birmingham, herding them to this shore took great effort. They could easily have been tortured and killed in town.”
Tyranny cast her gaze back out across the sea. “I know why,” she said. “It was meant to be a warning. They knew that the fleet would arrive soon, and they wanted this travesty to be the first thing that we saw. It worked.”
Adrian was about to reply when she heard the flurry of Minion wings. As two warriors landed nearby, everyone hurried over to greet them. One of the warriors was male and rather young; his senior officer was an older female. They quickly approached Tyranny and clicked their boot heels together.
“We have finished the shoreline body count that you asked for, Captain,” the female warrior said. “The impaled victims number two thousand six hundred and thirty-three. There are no survivors.”
Tyranny’s heart fell. If these people came from Birmingham, it likely meant that the entire population of the town had been wiped out.
“Is there word from Birmingham?” Traax asked.
The female officer pointed toward the western sky. Everyone turned to see a cluster of dark specks approaching.
“A patrol returns from the village as we speak,” she answered.
As the figures in the sky grew larger, Tyranny soon realized that six of the twelve warriors were carrying a litter. She couldn’t tell what the litter contained, but she was eager to find out. As the patrol descended toward the shore, everyone ran over to meet them.
The newly constructed litter was about three meters square and made of freshly cut tree branches lashed together with rope. It was more like a cage than a litter, Tyranny realized. As she ran nearer, she finally saw what it contained. She and her group came to a quick stop.
The Minion warriors had captured a snarling, hissing beast. Tyranny had never seen anything like it. She approached cautiously, stopping about three meters away.
The half-man, half-serpent was a grotesque creature. The hairless skull was olive in color. A pair of twisted, sharp horns rose from either side of the skull. Long pointed ears lay on either side. The eyes were wide apart, with dully opaque whites and vertical yellow irises. Its mouth soon opened, sending a bright red forked tongue slithering forth to test the air. Before the mouth closed again, Tyranny saw sharp yellow teeth and a pair of deadly incisors flash in the morning sun.
Its upper body appeared to be human, and its muscular arms looked strong. From the waist down its body was a scaly, snakelike tail. Like the thing’s torso, the tail was olive in color, but it had dark spots all along its length and gradually tapered to a forked end. When it saw Tyranny approach, it coiled up and viciously hissed.
Without warning the creature suddenly shot forward and grasped one of the litter’s wooden braces. Hissing madly again, it used all its strength to try to rip the cage apart. The sturdy cage rocked wildly, but it held. The defeated beast then slithered toward the back of its beech wood prison and coiled up protectively. As its dark eyes bored into Tyranny’s, a quick shudder went through her.
Her mouth agape, she looked at the senior officer, who had also been one of the litter bearers. His name was Davin, and Tyranny had come to respect him during the past week’s sea trials. Although Davin was a graybeard, few warriors could outdrink or outfight him.
Tyranny pointed at the monster in the litter. “What in the name of the Afterlifeis that thing?” she breathed.
Davin unsheathed his dreggan. Before answering, he shoved his dreggan blade into the cage and poked at the creature. It hissed again, exposing its deadly teeth.
“We don’t know,” Davin answered, “but most folks wouldn’t want to meet it alone on a dark night! When we found it, it was lying in one of Birmingham’s streets, unconscious. One of the citizens must have stunned it. When we tried to capture it, the thing came awake. It injured one warrior, then spat at another, blinding him. It hasn’t spat again since its capture, so we think that a certain amount of time must pass before it can do that again.” Davin pointed to the rows of impaled corpses. “We believe that this thing and many more like it are responsible for these atrocities.”
“Can it speak?” Tyranny asked.
Davin shook his head. “Not that we have seen,” he answered. “But we all know that means nothing.”
Adrian took a step closer. “A warrior was blinded, you say?” she asked.
Davin quickly raised one hand, warning the sister to stay back. “That’s close enough,” he said. “The venom it spits seems to be acid. It burns the skin and harms the eyes. We have several healers caring for the warrior that this bastard blinded. They are hoping that the blindness is temporary, but they can’t be sure.”
Adrian looked at Tyranny. “That would explain the strange facial wounds that we saw,” she said. “My guess is that many more of these victims have them as well.”
Davin turned to look at Tyranny. “If it please the captain, the blinded warrior should be seen by one of the Conclave Wizards. I request that he be flown to Tammerland immediately.”
Tyranny nodded. “See to it at once,” she ordered. “But before you go-what of Birmingham?”
A dark look crossed the warrior’s face. “Birmingham no longer exists,” he answered. “Every building was set afire. By the time we got there, most were already consumed. We saw no citizens-dead or otherwise. It seems that they were all herded here and then killed. The phalanxes are doing what they can to control the last of the flames.”
As she sheathed her sword, Tyranny looked angrily at the ground, then back at the rows of grisly corpses. She had learned all that she could from this butchery, and it was time to go home and inform the Conclave. Her task would not be a pleasant one. She cast a hard gaze toward Adrian.
“I head for Tammerland,” she said. “Traax will come with me. You, the other acolytes, Scars, and the four phalanxes will remain here until you receive word that the ships’ new cradles have been finished. While I am gone, you are in command. If more of those beasts appear, get the Black Ships and the phalanxes into the air immediately. The monsters don’t seem to have the power of flight, so being airborne will give you a great advantage. But I don’t think those creatures will return.”
“And why would that be?” Traax asked.
Tyranny sadly cast her gaze toward the rows of corpses once more. “Because if Adrian’s suspicions are true,” she answered softly, “these monsters got what they came for.”
The privateer turned to look at Davin. “Build another litter,” she ordered. “I am taking six of these corpses back to Tammerland for further inspection. After I have gone, I want the remaining bodies burned. The Conclave failed to protect these people. Immolating their remains seems the least that we can do.”
Davin clicked his boot heels together and went to carry out his new orders.
“The bodies that you take back should be preserved by the craft,” Adrian offered. “Faegan would insist on it.”
Tyranny nodded. “You’re right,” she answered. “Please enchant on six of them. Make sure that at least one of them is without a liver. But leave the impaling staffs in place. I want Faegan and the other mystics to see exactly how these people died.” Adrian nodded her agreement, then walked off to start her grisly task.
As she waited, Tyranny looked out across the Sea of Whispers. The freshening wind smelled clean, making her wish that she could go straight back out to sea. Instead, as she stood in the drying blood among the glistening entrails, her heart became heavy once more.
