Douglas Niles - Prophet of Moonshae

As it was, the weight of the waterlogged bow, coupled with the drag of splintered planks, slowed her down just enough to doom her. A heaving swell raised them high into the air, and Alicia had a sickening image of a shore lined with massive, brutal rocks.

Then the longship crashed onto the boulders, and the sound of splintering wood and shouting men filled the air. Alicia felt herself tossed upward, and she tried to curl herself into a ball to lessen the inevitable shock of landing. Nevertheless, she crashed into a solid surface of stone with stunning force and lay motionless-still conscious, but unable to move. Icy water doused her, covering her completely as she feared that she would drown. Finally the brine receded, and she gasped and choked as it washed away.

All around her, Alicia heard cries of pain and the groans of the injured, even over the smashing of the waves and the splintering, tearing sounds of the Gullwing's destruction. Crying in agony, she tried to sit up, but collapsed after raising her head an inch off her rocky pillow. Explosions of pain whirled in crimson torture through her mind. She closed her eyes, but that only made the torment worse.

Then, where her body contacted the ground, she felt a strange thing, as if a soothing balm caressed her, washing away her pain. As she lay still, the feeling of warmth spread throughout her body, the rocky ground forming a soft and well-cushioned bed beneath her.

Finally she dared to look around, and her blurred vision slowly cleared. The princess couldn't locate any members of the crew, but she tried to convince herself that that didn't mean they had all perished. She had landed among huge boulders, and they blocked her view to either side.

By the time she had forced herself to a sitting position, relieved that she could do so without pain, several men came into view. Brandon led the group, and they cried out with relief when they saw her.

"Lady Princess!" gasped Brandon, his voice thick. "By the gods, if you had been-"

"I'm not," she said quickly, not wanting him to go on. "Can you help me up? What about the others-Tavish, and Keane, and your crew?"

"Your companions survived," Brandon said, assisting the woman to a grassy knoll above the reach of the waves where the ragged castaways had gathered.

In addition to the three Ffolk, only Yak had survived of the firbolgs, the one called Loinwrap drowning in the wreck. A dozen of Brandon's crew had also perished, leaving the prince with fewer than twoscore warriors. Many had suffered broken limbs or other injuries. Now the healthy members of the band tended the wounds of their comrades while Keane and Wultha went to make a reconnaissance of the area.

"We've landed at the right place, in any event," announced Keane, upon their return. "We found a village that was ransacked by horsemen. No one is alive there now, but the hoof-prints were still visible."

"Going which way?" demanded Brandon, his hand instinctively seizing the hilt of his axe.

"Inland."

"But how can we catch them now?" groaned the prince in sudden and complete dismay. Alicia had never heard him so disheartened. "Even if they continued to follow the coast, without the Gullwing, we couldn't hope to pursue!"

"I know where they went," Tavish said suddenly. "And that dragon, too. It explains why it hasn't attacked us before!"

"Where?" demanded Alicia, Keane, and Brandon.

"The Moonwell-the Fairheight Moonwell! May the goddess forgive my ignorance, I should have seen it days ago!"

Tavish cried, shaking her head in frustration.

"Why would they go there?" demanded the Prince of Gnarhelm.

"The goddess!" Alicia exclaimed. "The power of the Earthmother returns, and these knights go there to destroy the hope that was born!"

"I–I meant to speak of this earlier. Now I regret the fact that I didn't," the bard stated with unaccustomed solemnity. "But I've dreamed of the well each time I sleep these last few days. A power awakens there that offers tremendous hope for the isles, but it's a frail thing and menaced by great danger. I believe that it's imperative we go there, with all speed!"

"I remember your tale of this well, and your description of its location," interjected Brandon, addressing Alicia. "It's at least four days' march from here!"

"But less than that for horsemen or for a flying beast," the mage observed grimly.

"Keane!" Alicia said suddenly. "Do you have some way you could get us to that well quickly?"

"I wish, Princess, that I did," replied the sorcerer with a shake of his head. "I have a spell-teleportation-that will take me there in an instant. But it will not benefit anyone else."

"Isn't there something you can do?" demanded the princess.

"As I said, I can go there myself," he said curtly. "And it may be that we have no other tactic available to us."

"Not good enough," grunted Brandon. He seemed to have shaken off his despair. Once again his voice was commanding and controlled. "You have great power, but alone you could fall to a single arrow, or even a well-thrown rock. No, we must travel together."

"Those who can march, at least," Tavish noted, with a look at the dozen or so injured men who were having legs or arms splinted by their companions.

In another hour, a bedraggled band of castaways shivered under a steady rain. The injured had been moved to the village, quartered in as much comfort as possible. Finally those who could walk started across the lowland moor. In minutes, the buildings of the tiny community had vanished into squall and murk.

Surrounded by the storm, the companions marched on.

Larth and his twenty-five mercenaries rode as if all the beasts of the Abyss pursued them. The ponderous war-horses lumbered across the rough country of the highlands, carrying the knights to their mountain goal. The captain allowed them four or five hours of rest during the night, but cursed and kicked them back into the saddle before first light. Fear gripped Larth, a fear such as he had never known. He feared that he would be too late-that he would fail his master.

The thought of facing that softspoken robed figure, the Nameless One, and suffering the brunt of his wrath as penalty for Larth's blunders sent cold daggers of ice into the knight's belly. So he drove himself, and he drove his men.

And they rode through the rain toward the Moonwell.

"Hold thee, beast!" shrilled Pryat Wentfeld, brandishing the Eye of Helm as he crawled from beneath the felled trunk of a massive cedar.

The whirlwind of his air elemental subsided into a great humanoid-shaped being of translucent gas. Now the thing pushed and ripped its way through the huge woodpile in search of the cleric who had summoned it here.

Finally the priest shouted a command word, even as the animated mass of air loomed before him, ready to pull the stout body apart in a cyclonic death swirl, and this time the force of his magic held the beast in check.

The clang of swords against steel still rang from the shore as the two knights battled both each other and ever-increasing exhaustion. But neither could gain the edge that would allow him to win the fight. At the stake, an invisible Newt busily chewed at Danrak's bonds, and slowly the druid tried to work himself free.

"There!" shouted the cleric, his voice shrill with bubbling fright as he tried to control the being from another plane he had summoned. Pryat Wentfeld pointed at the staggering form of Hanrald. "Kill him! Destroy him!"

The air elemental, subject to the pryat's will, swirled toward the battle at the same moment that Danrak finally pulled his hands free. Swiftly he untied his feet, grateful that his guards still gaped at the fight. Then abruptly the druid sprinted toward the well, breaking past the surprised men-at-arms who had ignored their presumably helpless prisoner in lieu of the spectacle of battle around the pond.