The sea devil's eye

III

4 Flamerule, the Year of the Gauntlet

"Unhand the girl."

Jherek spoke softly, but his words interrupted the raucous voices of the pirates as they terrorized the frightened young woman. The closest pirates noticed him first. They stepped drunkenly backward, stumbling against chairs and tables. Snarled curses reached Jherek's ears.

The girl's rolling eyes met the young sailor's, and for a moment he felt her fear and weakness.

"Mind your own business," one of the sailors said. He took a threatening step forward, drawing a short sword from his hip.

Jherek hesitated only a moment. The man before him was drunk, as were most of the men in the room. Still, they remained fully capable of hurting the girl on the table, and they were just as capable of killing him.

"Help me," she cried softly.

Sparked by his own sense of justice, Jherek spun into battle. He whirled quickly, smashing the flat of his blade into the nearest pirate's face.

The man's nose broke in a bloody rush and an audible crack. He stumbled backward, cursing Jherek in Umberlee's name. His size and the drunkenness of his companions sent a small group of them reeling back for the short bar.

Pressing his advantage as the other pirates fell back and tried to bring their weapons into play, Jherek stepped forward. He swung the chair he'd picked up as he'd approached the group, breaking it across Tharyg's back.

The big man roared in pain and anger as he dropped to his knees on the floor. He turned his baleful gaze toward Jherek and reached for his sword.

Jherek focused on the two men who lunged at him from the left. He met their swords with his own, slamming the blades aside. He twisted the cutlass, wounding one of the men deeply across the forearm. Blood spurted on the man and his nearest fellows.

"Make way, you damned sot-heads!" one of the bouncers standing watch at the tavern called.

Turning to the right, Jherek overturned a table, then kicked it at the three armed men coming at him. The table skidded across the sawdust-covered floor and slammed into their legs. If they hadn't been so impaired by their drinking, maybe they'd have remained standing. As it was all three of them tumbled across the table.

Still in motion, Jherek set himself and met the blade of the man who came at him from the front. The young sailor was already aware that pirates were circling behind him, closing off his escape route to the front door.

"Kill him!" Tharyg ordered. "A gold piece to the man who takes that bastard's head!"

Jherek hardened himself, driving out all merciful feelings that remained within him. Despite their drunkenness, the men were all killers, skilled and experienced at their profession.

His cutlass leaped out like a thing alive, sliding along the man's sword and opening his throat in a tight riposte. Gurgling, dying, the man fell backward, clawing at his mates to help him.

Two men rushed at Jherek with long knives. The young sailor dropped almost to his knees and caught himself on his empty hand. He pushed forward, catching the man on the right just above the knees with his shoulder. Jherek drove the man backward, Lifting him off his feet

A and hurling him into the pirates behind him. They collapsed in a staggering melee.

Recovering, Jherek ripped his cutlass up in time to block the overhand blow Tharyg directed at his head. The young sailor shifted his footing, parrying two more blows from the bigger man, then pushing the cutlass's point through the pirate's heart.

"Bloody hell!" Tharyg gasped, staring down at the steel blade thrust into his chest. "You've done killed me!"

Jherek pulled his sword free, feeling the steel grate along bone. The young sailor gave himself over to his training and to the blade. The cutlass whirled before him, striking sparks from the other blades that reached out for him, creating a rhythm of metal rasping against metal.

He sliced a man across the stomach, spilling the pirate's entrails onto the floor. The other pirates shouted in horror and disgust while the wounded man screamed in fear and struggled to hold himself together. Jherek whirled again, bringing the cutlass around in a flat arc that all but decapitated another pirate.

Seizing the moment when the area briefly cleared around him, Jherek reached the side of the young woman. He sliced the hand from a man who'd been slow in releasing his grip on the girl. With his free hand, the young sailor grabbed the girl's arm and pulled her from the table. The floor around them was slippery with blood in spite of the sawdust. The girl remained wild-eyed, trying desperately to hold onto the young sailor.

"No, lady," Jherek told her in a calm voice as his eyes raked the hellish destruction he'd wrought. "I need my arm."

He had to force her from him, hoping he didn't hurt her or accidentally steer her into an opponent's blade.

A pirate came up behind Jherek, blindsiding him by standing behind the young girl. He didn't see the pirate until the man almost ran him through, but a preternatural sense warned him. Unable to bring the cutlass into play, Jherek let the short sword skim past him when he took a step back. He locked his free hand in the pirate's blouse, then stepped in and pulled as hard as he could.

The pirate spun over Jherek's shoulder and crashed into another group of men, bowling them all down.

Jherek gazed around the tavern room, unwilling to believe he was somehow still alive. Over a dozen sailors were down, most of them never to rise again.

A blade drew in close before he could dodge. The edge kissed the flesh of his upper left arm, ripping through easily. Hot blood spilled down his arm and drenched his blouse and cloak. He managed to keep the few sword thrusts at the girl turned aside.

Whirling again, aware that the drunken pirates were starting to get organized, Jherek glanced up at the heavy wooden wheel depending from the ceiling. Glass-encased candles, most of them still lit, stood proudly around the wheel.

Tracking the line of rope that held the wheel in place near the ceiling, Jherek spied the support post the rope was tied to near the front windows of the tavern. He planted a hand in the girl's back, helping steady her over a broken table and scattered chairs.

"Run," he told her. "Don't look back."

The girl ran, staying low, both hands wrapped protectively over her head.

Jherek picked up a chair and hurled it at a pirate who moved after the girl. The chair smacked into the pirate from behind, two of the legs shooting by his side while the other two slammed into his back. Chair and pirate plummeted toward the floor.

"Get him!" one of the tavern's bouncers shouted, shoving the pirates before him like an incoming tide pushing flotsam.

Taking two quick steps, Jherek swung the cutlass hard into the support pole where the chandelier was tied. The rope parted at once and the wheel plummeted from the ceiling like a rock. The wheel was almost as wide across as a man was tall. When it hit, it carried half a dozen pirates to the ground, burying them under its weight.

Another pirate swung his sword at Jherek's knees. The young sailor vaulted the man easily, placing a hand on the back of the bent pirate's head and pushing off. The pirate skidded face first into the floor.

Jherek leaped to the next table, feeling it skid uncertainly for a moment before snagging on the rough-hewn floor. As it started to tip, he vaulted to the next table near the bay window, then folded his arms over his face and threw himself through the latticework and panes.

Glass shattered and wood splintered around Jherek as he plunged through the window. He landed on his feet, bending his knees slightly to keep his balance. As he stood, he saw Glawinn, Sabyna, and Azla run from the inn across the street.

"This way, young warrior!" Glawinn roared, waving his sword.

Before Jherek could get started, a pirate leaped through the broken window after him and landed on his back. Only a swift move of the cutlass prevented the pirate from raking his dagger across Jherek's throat. Grabbing the man's loose shirt with his free hand, the young sailor bent and pulled, yanking the man from his back. He ran, spotting Talif and Frennick moving quickly through the shadows toward the paladin.

A crowd boiled out of the Bare Bosom. Two of them had lanterns, filched from the tavern's walls. "This way!" someone yelled. Booted feet beat a rapid tattoo against the wooden slats in front of the tavern.

Jherek caught up with the thief and his prisoner easily. He grabbed Frennick by the arm and hurried him after Glawinn.

The paladin raced into an alley beside the tavern where they'd been waiting, Sabyna and Azla close at his heels. Jherek swung around the corner, still pulling on Frennick, who was yelling encouragement to their pursuers.

Glawinn pulled himself up into the bench seat of the freight wagon waiting in the alley. The rear deck of the wagon contained barrels, kegs, crates, and sacks of foodstuffs and other supplies.

"Get in!" the paladin yelled. "Pirate stronghold though this may be, they take care of their own. We've worn thin our welcome here."

Jherek wholeheartedly agreed. Azla and Sabyna easily vaulted into the back of the wagon. The half-elf pirate captain set herself to work at once, smashing open a keg of spirits with her sword hilt.

Glawinn had the wagon going before Frennick was up in the back. The pirate dropped to his knees in an effort to keep from being forced on.

"Leave him," Talif snarled, hauling himself aboard the wagon.

"No," Jherek said.

He sheathed the cutlass in the sash at his waist and hooked his hand under the pirate's wide belt. He heard the yelling approach of the tavern crowd and saw the yellow glow of the lanterns paint long shadows on the wall to his left as they rounded the corner.

There they are!"

"Kill that salty young pup-and his friends!"

The wagon started out slowly. Old horses and a heavy load held them back.

Holding Frennick's belt and the back of the pirate's hair, Jherek lifted his prisoner to his feet and rushed toward the fleeing wagon. In three great steps, he covered the distance. He pulled Frennick over his hip and threw him into the wagon bed.

"They've got Frennick!" someone yelled.

"Or he's with them!" another said. "I never trusted him."

Jherek ran to the wagon and vaulted up. He turned immediately, seeing that the tavern mob was closing the distance. Desperately, he grabbed a nearby five-gallon keg in both hands and heaved it at the lead man.

The keg broke against the man's chest, scattering salted pork across the alley and knocking the pirate back. Four more men went down with him, breaking the pursuit for just a moment.

"Everything goes off," Jherek ordered.

He remained on his knees and tossed the wagon's load over the back as quickly as he could. Sabyna and Talif helped him, shoving things over the end of the wagon.

Sacks of flour burst and spilled filmy white clouds into the alley, soaking into the potholes of the uneven cobblestones. Nail kegs, broken bottles, and shattered jars created more obstacles in the path of the tavern crowd. Potatoes and beans rolled across the stones.

As the load lightened, the horses pulled more strongly. The ironbound wheels rang against the cobblestones, knocking off accumulated rust and striking occasional sparks.

Glawinn yelled to the horses and pulled them hard to the left as they bounded out onto the street at the end of the alley. The new street plunged down and twisted crazily on its way to the harbor.

The crowd from the tavern made the next turn much tighter than the wagon. They were gaining. Other men walking along the new street joined in the chase. Jherek stared at the wolfs pack in dismay. Anything like a quiet escape was totally out of the question now. Flame suddenly flared at his side. He turned and watched Azla fit an arrow to the short bow she'd carried into town.

The pirate captain pulled the string back to her cheek and fired from a kneeling position. The arrow sped true, shedding sparks from the cloth tied just behind the barbed head. The missile found a home in a man's chest. Blue and yellow flames twisted up and caught his beard on fire, wreathing his face in flames. He fell back among his companions.

Azla picked up another arrow that held a scrap of cloth tied to it and drenched it in the keg of spirits she'd broken open.

"Talif," she called calmly, her black eyes searching the street for targets.

The thief held a green flame between his cupped palms. The strange fire emanated from a coin. Azla lit her second arrow from the enchanted coin and fired it into the thatched roof of a nearby warehouse. The flame spread quickly across the wooden shingles.

A cry of alarm sounded from the pirates. More than half of them peeled off and ran for the building. As tightly packed as Immurk's Hold was, and being constructed of wood, Jherek knew there was a real danger of the town burning down if a fire was left untended. He balanced on his knees, his fist curled tight around the cutlass hilt, rocking as the bumpy ride continued.

Azla shot two more fire arrows into buildings they passed, creating even more of a diversion. By then the horses were hitting their pace and the wheels rattled across the uneven cobblestones.

Laaqueel felt a moment of heated resistance, then she slipped through the wooden timber of the bulkhead behind

Iakhovas. In the next instant, harsh sunlight and the unsteady deck of a ship lunging at sea greeted her. Iakhovas had set up gates in the sahuagin castle as well that let him travel immediately to different areas along the Sword Coast.

"Lord Iakhovas!" a loud voice boomed. "Welcome aboard!"

Turning, the malenti priestess spied the tall, big-bellied form of Vurgrom the Mighty. The pirate captain came down the stern castle stairs like a flesh and blood avalanche.

Vurgrom was a mountain of a man, no taller than Iakhovas but easily twice as broad. He had flaming red hair on the sides of his head but none on top, and long chin whiskers that thrust out defiantly. He wore scarred leather breeches and a sleeveless leather vest.

"You called me," Iakhovas stated.

The big pirate captain grinned, swaying slightly as the ship thundered across the ocean waves, pushed by a strong wind.

"Aye," Vurgrom said, "and it's because I've got some news you might be interested in."

The crew tried to get closer to him, but he waved them all away.

"What is your location?" Iakhovas asked.

Vurgrom shrugged and said, "A few days from the Whamite Isles."

"You will be there." Iakhovas's tone left no margin for misunderstanding.

The big man flushed a little. "Aye," he said, "and I won't let you down, Lord Iakhovas, but I have something else to show you-something you need to know about."

Vurgrom dug in a pouch belted at his prodigious waist and produced an oval pearl encased in a golden disk. Laaqueel watched sudden interest dawn on Iakhovas's face. He studied the disk in the pirate captain's fat palm.

"I hired a diviner to look at it," Vurgrom said. "She told me it would lead me to a weapon."

Iakhovas studied the disk. "So it will."

"I've been trying to get in touch with you," Vurgrom said. "The device you gave me wasn't working."

"It worked when it was supposed to," Iakhovas said sharply.

Vurgrom's face blanched. "Of course, Lord Iakhovas," he said. "I only meant that I would have spoken with you earlier if I had been able."

"It's a powerful piece," Iakhovas said.

"It guides us, lord. Place this trinket into a bowl of water and it floats like a lodestone seeking the north."

"The weapon," Iakhovas said, "lies on the Whamite Isles."

Surprise gleamed in the pirate captain's eyes. "You know this?"

"Yes."

Vurgrom laughed and-said, "I should have come to you, lord, instead of paying the diviner."

"You took two days' travel from my schedule," Iakhovas said in a hard voice. "If it weren't for the wind that pushes you now, you wouldn't make your assigned destination on time."

With a shrug, Vurgrom said, "I've been fortunate."

Iakhovas held a hand up. The wind died suddenly and the sails hung limply from the lanyards. Laaqueel shifted her footing. The ship felt as though it had become mired in mud.

"It was more than fortune's good graces," Iakhovas said. "I am seeing to it that you arrive on time in spite of your bad decisions."

Iakhovas clenched his raised hand into a fist. The blast of wind that hit the ship staggered it, almost rolled it over on the cresting wave. The sails popped and cracked, sounding as if they were going to be ripped free. Some of the ship's crew went rolling across the deck, unable to balance themselves quickly enough. At least three men went over the side, screaming until they hit the water. The ship sailed on, having no way to come around for those overboard.

Iakhovas stood as if rooted to the pitching deck.

Vurgrom grabbed the rearmost mast only a few feet away, unable to maintain his stance. He roared and knocked away other pirates nearby. The ship continued to pitch and twist.

"You're going to tear her apart!" the captain shouted.

"The ship will hold," Iakhovas declared. "I won't allow you to be late, Captain Vurgrom."

"I won't be late, my lord." Vurgrom had to yell to make himself heard over the gale force winds. "I won't be late."

"See to it then," Iakhovas threatened. "If you are late, Vurgrom, after everything I've invested in you, you won't 1)6' at all."

He gestured and the golden orb in his eye flared. The world seemed to ripple at his side, like a pool disturbed by a tossed pebble. He stuck his arm into the ripples and it disappeared up to the elbow.

The pirates looked on in superstitious awe. Magic was known to them, of course, but not so familiar. Many of them, Laaqueel knew, had seen more this day than they would in their whole lives.

"Get this weapon if you want, Vurgrom," Iakhovas said, "but I'll want it when you do. You belong to me until such a time as I release you."

Vurgrom held tight to the mast and said nothing.

Iakhovas held out a hand to Laaqueel. The malenti priestess was barely able to maintain her own stance as the ship pitched again and the canvas cracked overhead. Even during her spying days, she'd hated ships. She reached for Iakhovas and felt him take her hand. Her balance steadied at once and she stepped through the gate back into the captain's quarters aboard Tarjana.

"I sense conflict within you, little malenti," Iakhovas said flatly.

He moved behind the table again and resumed his seat. The king of the sahuagin studied her with his one good eye and the golden one, and the malenti priestess felt as though he could see her clearly with both.

"When we arrived here and you saw that things were as I promised regarding the imprisonment of the Serosian sahuagin, your faith seemed to return to you, stronger than before. Now I feel that you are questioning yourself again."

"Faith," she replied, "lies in the ability to answer those questions."

"You are my senior high priestess, and you serve the will of Sekolah. There should be no questions."

"I am weak." The admission was as much to herself as to him.

"I need you strong."

"I will be," she promised. "Have I ever failed you? I returned from the dead at your call."

Not so many days ago in Coryselmal while searching for the talisman Iakhovas had used to sunder the Sharksbane Wall, Laaqueel was certain she'd died at the hands of a vodyanoi, or come as close to it as the living could without fully crossing over.

Iakhovas had been as close to panic as the malenti priestess had ever seen him. He'd worked to save her, using a black skull with ruby eyes he'd gotten from his artificial eye. Laaqueel still felt certain somehow that it hadn't been Iakhovas's efforts that turned her back from death. It had been another, someone with a soft, sweet, feminine voice.

Go back, the voice told her. You are yet undone.

Iakhovas raked her with his gaze. She felt the quill quiver tentatively inside her.

"Go then, little malenti," he said, "and attend to your faith. Answer your questions as best as you are able, but in the end you'll find that the truest belief you have is in me. You may have rescued me from the prison I was in, but I have made you more than you have ever imagined you would be."

Stung by the dismissal and the knowledge of her own uncertainty, Laaqueel left the room and strode back out onto Tarjana's main deck. She walked to the starboard railing and peered over into the sea. For a moment she wished she could just leap in and swim away to leave all the confusion behind her.

Farther along the railing, a group of sahuagin hauled on a length of heavy anchor chain hanging in the water. Bodies-some of them sahuagin of the inner and outer seas, others sea elves-were hooked to the chain. All of them were relatively fresh kills.

Three of the sahuagin group doing the hauling reached down and began plucking off bodies, harvesting them for meals. Razor-sharp talons sliced through flesh and brute strength snapped joints. Gobbets of flesh were torn free and passed around. Crabs and other sea creatures that had taken up brief residence within some of the corpses, and they became part of the meal.

One of the sahuagin warriors turned to face Laaqueel, regarding her with his black gaze. "Join, Most Favored One," he said. "There is plenty for all."

He held out a forearm, not a choice section, but not food to be turned away either.

"I am not hungry," she declared.

The warrior looked at her with consternation. No true sahuagin passed up a meal. A warrior needed to consume huge quantities of flesh to give him the strength to make it through a day.

"I ate the fallen on my return," Laaqueel said.

She knew the warrior probably wasn't listening and didn't care, but she made the excuse so that she might hear it herself. In truth, she was nearly starving. Since her arrival, days ago, in the Sea of Fallen Stars, she hadn't eaten from either dead sahuagin or enemy. The thought repulsed her, made her stomach twist violently within her.

There was no reason that she could think of for that to be so, no malady that she'd heard of that so plagued her people. Sahuagin, even ill-born malenti, were born to eat.

She watched as the warriors who made up Tarjanas crew ripped at the dead bodies and ate what they wanted. She sighed, trying not to think about what Iakhovas had told her, trying not to succumb to the doubts that filled her. Her faith was more fragile than ever, a hollow shell she wrapped around Iakhovas.

She leaped overboard, longing to find solace in the sea.

Black Champion sat at anchor in the harbor. Jherek stood on the ship's deck and looked up at the Earthspur. The huge tower of rock and windswept land stabbed more than a mile above sea level in the center of the Dragonisle, the island where Immurk's Hold was located. Even in the night, the mountain left a shadow across the black water.

Azla was below with the others, questioning Frennick. The pirate captain laid out torturer's tools on a small table, the metal gleaming from the lantern light.

Jherek hadn't been able to stay, nor did Azla permit it.

He struggled with his conscience, telling himself that Frennick deserved all that Azla could think to give him, but it was no use. Through it all, the young sailor remembered that it was his doing that placed Frennick in her hands.

"Young warrior."

Turning, Jherek saw Glawinn approaching him, two steaming cups in his hands.

"I brought you some soup," the paladin said. "I thought it might serve to warm you some."

Jherek didn't want the soup, didn't want to pretend that everything was normal. A man he'd captured was being tortured down in the hold. He couldn't help but listen for the screams he knew must come. Thankfully, the crash of the sea's waves was too loud.

He accepted the cup anyway and said, "Thank you."

"What an awful place this is," Glawinn commented quietly.

"There are people in Immurk's Hold who still maintain an innocence," Jherek stated, thinking of the girl he'd rescued in the tavern.

"That was a brave and good thing you did back there, young warrior."

"It was foolish," Jherek grumbled, then shook his head. "Come morning, the girl will still be on the island."

"You saved her from a bad night."

"Delayed, is more correct, I think." Jherek turned the cup in his hands, absorbing the heat. The soup smelled delicious, full of spices.

"You've got a headful of dark thoughts," the paladin said.

"I look out there, and I wonder how different I am from those men," Jherek said. "Did I ever tell you how I came to Velen from my father's ship?"