The Floodgate - Elaine Cunningham [15]
The Crinti warriors rode until the sun had set, and they pressed on through the lengthening shadows of twilight. The sounds of gathering night echoed through the trees-the screech of raptors, the snarl of wild cats, the sharp sudden squeal of prey. When it grew too dark to ride, they dismounted and led their horses, trusting the keen night vision inherited from distant drow ancestors.
Dawn was near when they came to a small clearing. In the center of it, the stream flowed out of a small and apparently shallow pool. There was no sign of the creature that had shredded Rekatra.
Shanair left her horse at the edge of the clearing and crept cautiously nearer.
She circled the stream's mouth, peering keenly at the moss-covered ground.
"Bring me a stout stick," she ordered.
Xibryl complied at once, dragging a six-foot length of deadfall wood over and hacking off the side limbs with a hand axe. Shanair took the rough staff and jabbed tentatively at the water. Try as she might, she could not find the spring's source. The bed beneath was solid ground.
"Impossible," she muttered. Raising the stick high overhead, she plunged it hard into the water.
The staff dived so deep and so easily that Shanair nearly lost her footing.
She leaped back, staring in amazement at the two-foot length of wood in her hands.
An enormous green hand shot out of the spring and fisted over the empty air where Shanair had just been standing. The hand was the size of a small battle shield. Webbing connected the four fingers, each of which was as long as her forearm and tipped with talons as barbed as fishhooks. As suddenly as it came, the hand disappeared, slapping back into the incomprehensible spring.
Shanair quickly conquered her surprise and drew her swords. Steel hissed free of Whizzra's baldric. The creak of whirling chain announced the lethal dance of Xibryl's spiked flail. The three Crinti moved quickly, silently into triangle formation around the spring.
Suddenly the clearing seemed to explode. The monster leaped out of the water like a geyser, and its voice was the roar of a waterfall.
The massive creature was twice Shanair's height. Roughly humanoid in shape, it crouched on two froglike legs. Four arms, thickly muscled and armored with dull green scales, lifted into a wrestler's ready stance. The creature's head was enormous, crested with a barbed standing fin and nearly split in two by a fanged mouth. Dagger-sized teeth clacked with anticipation.
The Crinti warriors eyed their foe, sizing up its potential strengths and weaknesses.
"Sahuagin?" guessed Xibryl.
"Worse," Shanair said with a fierce smile. This monster, she suspected, was no creature known to this world. Battle lust burned wild and hot in the Crinti chieftain as she began an ancient death-dance.
The others moved with her, dodging from side to side, dipping tauntingly forward, then leaping back. There was magic in their movements, a lure as potent as siren song. The Crinti did not weaken their enemies. They enticed them.
The creature came on with a rush, taking a mighty swing at the nearest Crinti. Whizzra nimbly dropped and rolled away, and Shanair dived in before the beast could recover its balance. Her left-hand sword thrust hard at the juncture of arm and chest-and slid harmlessly off the scaly armor.
Shanair ducked as another massive arm whistled over her head. In a lightning-flash decision, she measured the power of that swing and decided she could not absorb the impact.
She relaxed her grip on her sword and allowed the blow to send it flying. She barked out a one-word command, naming a much-practiced battle maneuver.
The other Crinti moved out wide on either side of the creature, their weapons flashing as they kept all four of the monster's arms engaged. In came Shanair, ducking under the flailing arms. She gripped her sword with both hands, and launched herself into a powerful upward lunge. Her scale mail hissed against the massive green torso as she rose.
Her blade dived into the lizardlike folds under the creature's