Black wizards - Douglas Niles [118]
They were trapped on the narrow ledge, as a hundred bloodthirsty dwarves came charging down the cavern behind them.
* * * * *
"I sure wish you could talk!" exclaimed Newt. This is boring. How much farther do we have to fly, anyway? Are you sure you know where we're going? I'm getting tired!"
In truth, Robyn too wished that she could talk – if only for the purpose of telling Newt to shut up.
She, too, was growing very tired. The gray waters of the Strait of Alaron rolled beneath her. It had been below them for many hours – exactly how long, she did not know. The steady tailwind had helped them, but she wasn't sure how much longer she could keep flying.
"There! I see something!" Newt shrieked, suddenly. "Is that it? It has to be it! Oh, please be it!"
Her eyes – the eyes of an eagle – saw it too. Now it was merely a brown smudge in the northeast, lying at the very limits of her vision. Yet the smudge grew more distinct – she saw regions of forest, and hills, and fields. Soon they would be over it.
Alaron.
* * * * *
Green water pressed heavily against the sea bottom. Giant things lay here. The splintered hulls of doomed ships littered the sandy seabed, like skeletons of impossibly huge creatures. Other, living things lay upon the bottom, or burrowed into its sand – squids, blue whales, and darker creatures that never ventured into wafers tainted by sun.
A sound came softly into these black waters. It originated in Kressilacc as a slow, pulsating vibration – a deep thrumming that fell far below human hearing, but could be felt though the sea as a heavy command. Sharks and barracuda darted nervously away from the sound. Whales and porpoises clung to the surface, desperately splashing toward shallow water.
For the Deepsong had begun.
Sythissall began the song, seated in his vast throne made from the hull of a Northman longship. His wide gills, two-foot-long gashes in the side of his blunt head, Hexed rhythmically in and out. His concubines and priestesses took up the call, and soon all of the sahuagin of the city sat or floated, motionless except for the Hexing of their gills.
The pulsations traveled through the water, along the bottom of the canyon and across its rim, traveling through the darkest, deepest reaches of the sea with growing intensity.
From these enshrouded regions, and from everywhere under the sea, the sahuagin answered the call. The message thrummed deeply through the earth itself, summoning the claws of the deep.
Their powerfully muscled legs and wide, webbed feet propelled the sahuagin toward Kressilacc as fast as any fish. Tridents and spears thrust before them, hooked nets trailing from their silver belts, the warriors hastened to answer their king's command.
Each sahuagin was affected by the ancient cadence. Their white, flat eyes grew wider, and the bristling spines on the males stood tall and menacing. Slowly, the sahuagin drove themselves into a frenzy. Sythissalland Ysalla were pleased.
And Bhaal was pleased.
XVI
The Dwarves
The mob of dark dwarves howled toward them. Tristan looked into the chasm at his feet – it was easily a thousand feet deep and several hundred across. The ledge they stood upon ended abruptly to either side of them. It was about ten feet wide, and twenty long. The whole area was outlined in the milky green glow of the ubiquitous fungi.
"Damn!" he cursed, turning to look up the tunnel. Daryth stood watchfully in the mouth, which was only eight feet wide. It seemed as good a place as any to meet the onrushing horde. Even if each of them killed a score of the enemy, though, Tristan knew they would still be overwhelmed.
"Hold them for a minute, if you can," said Alexei, unrolling one of his scrolls. He seemed remarkably unconcerned by their situation.
"We'll do that," said the prince wryly. "I don't suppose you have a spell in there that can build us a bridge?"
"I might have something better," said the mage.
Before Tristan could ask what he meant, the first dwarves came into sight,