Rising tide - Mel Odom [3]
"And may the Great Shark you take with him into the Wild Hunt that you may forever taste the fresh flesh of our enemies," Laaqueel answered.
"Meat is meat," Thuur said. "Let me make you stronger."
With great speed and care, she raked her claws across Thuur's throat. "Meat is meat. You will never leave us."
Blood misted out at once, spreading through the ocean.
Laaqueel smelled and tasted it even in the saltwater. Hunger pains vibrated in her stomach. She took the dead priestess's knife and began slicing.
"Come, my sisters," she invited. "Meat is meat."
The other two joined her, wolfing down the gobbets of flesh as she sliced them free. More blood stained the water, spreading outward. Even a drop of it in thousands of gallons of water, Laaqueel knew, would draw predators, and they came. Some crawled on multi-jointed legs while others slithered through the water and still more finned their way to the death site.
All stayed back from the sahuagin, acknowledging them as the strongest of predators.
Vibrations through her lateral lines told Laaqueel when the sharks arrived. She glanced up, watching five of the great creatures swim in a circle overhead. She reached out to the predators with her mind, sending out a danger message that would hold them at bay.
The sharks continued to circle until the sahuagin finished eating what they could of Thuur. Meat was meat, and a fallen sahuagin comrade became a meal for the others. That way, the essence of the individual never left the community.
When they were gorged, Laaqueel ordered her party away, allowing the sharks to descend to finish what was left of the corpse. They divided Thuur's possessions and the meager provisions they'd managed to put together three days ago between them. The dead sahuagin was the most they'd had to eat in weeks.
She swam, leading them further south, drawn by the promise of the story she'd discovered almost two years ago. With no other options open to her, the research she'd done offered her the only chance she had at a true and productive future among her tribe.
She had no choice but to believe.
* * * * *
Hours later, Laaqueel stopped the group for the night, camping in the lee of a sunken Calishite sohar. The three-masted merchant ship showed signs of the battle that had sent it to the ocean floor. Blackened timbers thrust up from the dark mud, canting hard to starboard. Wisps of ivory-colored sailcloth still clung to the rigging of the two surviving masts.
Judging from the condition of the wreck and the way the skeletons were picked clean to the bone, the malenti guessed that the ship had been underwater for little more than ten years. Barnacles clung to the broken timbers and sea anemones clustered in small groups. Schools of fish hid inside the broken hold, taking cover from predators.
True dark filled the ocean when the sun sank around the curve of the world. The inky blackness restricted even Laaqueel's sensitive vision until she could see only a few feet in front of her. She sat with her back to the broken ship, her arms wrapped around her knees in a posture the true sahuagin could never manage. In the elf communities she'd infiltrated over the years, she'd learned that such body language in the surface cultures signaled a wish to be alone.
Saanaa and Viiklee maintained their own counsel, sitting apart from her. They'd not spoken to her since she'd slain Thuur.
Finally it was Saanaa, the youngest, who crossed the distance first. Only a few yellow spots showed in her tail. "Favored one," she said, "forgive our uncertainty."
"There is no forgiveness for weakness," Laaqueel told her coldly. "Uncertainty can be viewed as weakness."
Saanaa's gills flared in anger. "Make no mistake about my strength, favored one. Just as Thuur died for her convictions, I stand ready to follow you wherever you lead."
"Good." As sahuagin, she knew she didn't have to worry about the other two surviving priestesses joining together to kill her. Their culture provided