Bruce Cordell - Plague of Spells

The wizard whirled, her eyes searching for the speaker.

"And you!" Seren accused. "I should have dealt with you permanently the first time around, ghost girl. I'm sure your ability to hide will prove ever so useful against a kraken!"

Thoster chuckled.

"Seren, she saved your life," Japheth protested despite his desire not to get drawn into the wizard's childish rant. Angry blood pounded in his temples.

"No time for squabbles," Raidon Kane interjected. "Some-thing approaches."

A distant gurgle grew louder. Japheth had been aware of the noise for a while but had discounted it as just one more strange background noise. He did so no longer. It was the sound of water flowing. A lot of water.

A bolus of liquid blasted the top off a coral dome not ten paces from Japheth. The coral cap was propelled so swiftly upward by the water jet that it crashed into the vault's ceiling, exploding into rubble. The geyser of water remained, a column of flowing sea connecting floor and ceiling, cold and dire, threatening to fill the entire vault if its flow was not dammed.

Rock detritus and water rained down, pelting everyone.

A piece of shrapnel drew a bloody line down Thoster's left cheek. He swore an oath in a language Japheth didn't know.

Seren uttered an arcane word, and a mundane-looking wooden shield materialized. It began to whirl around its mistress, too late to shield her from a stone that had clipped her head.

Fed from the inrushing water, the pools dotting the vault's floor began to reach toward each other. The darting witchlights were blurred with the haze of water vapor in the air. The farthest domes and obelisks became difficult to pick out. But moving shapes on the periphery snatched Japheth's attention.

A phalanx of perhaps twenty shuffling, spear-carrying kuo-toa emerged from the mist, no more than thirty or forty feet away. Their skin glistened with moisture from the roaring water jet. They didn't seem hindered by the rising water, which lapped at the creatures' calves.

Seren hurled a narrow stream of fire, crisping the lead combatant instantly. Japheth matched her with a sizzling eldritch blast of his own, disemboweling a kuo-toa. It stopped and pitched over face first in the water. Their fellows didn't flinch-they trampled their former compatriots' bodies without shifting their vicious, predatory gaze.

"Your sword!" yelled Seren, pointing at the burning blade.

"Angul is not yet required," the monk replied.

The kuo-toa's forward progress paused a moment as they launched a flight of spears. Japheth's cloak wrapped about one that tried to enter his skull through his eye, diverting it elsewhere. Another spear struck Seren's whirling shield, splintering it.

"If your weapon is as powerful as it looks, we need it now!" the wizard returned, her voice cracking.

Raidon retrieved the spear that had shattered Seren's shield. He hurtled it back into the advancing mob, skewering a kuo-toa in the throat. He replied, "The sword's ego is overwhelming. I prefer not to subject myself to him until absolutely necessary."

The pirate captain's eyes narrowed, his eyes suddenly avaricious. "Him?" asked Thoster. Raidon didn't respond or seem to notice the pirate's expression. Instead, he charged the phalanx, his feet slapping small craters in the water with each step. The monk's sword blazed brighter as if petulant at being ignored. For all its light, it burned impotently, point first in coral.

Captain Thoster glanced once at Angul, then lit out after Raidon, unsheathing his golemwork blade. Water beaded up and ran off Thoster's sword as if the weapon were forged of mallard feathers instead of iron.

The kuo-toa phalanx, down three from the dozen or more that first appeared, tensed against the monk's charge, drawing new spears from those strapped, to their backs. They extended them, intent on skewering the man.

Raidon leaped, and his trajectory became an arc. He rose neatly over the highest spear tip. He landed in the midst of the phalanx. Their formation broke apart, as all instantly attempted to turn inward. The monk's hands were like water wheel pistons, a blur of motion Japheth could barely discern. The cerulean tattoo on his chest seemed to gleam brighter.;¦ with each creature he slew.

Thoster crashed into the outer circle of distracted kuo-toa. He struck down two instantly with his envenomed mechanical blade, opening a hole in the already crumbling formation.

"This is too easy," muttered Japheth. He scanned the periphery of the vault and glimpsed movement.

"Over there!" he yelled, pointing. At least three more groups of kuo-toa spearwielders materialized through the mist. With them came other creatures, some recognizable as squid-like beasts the size of hounds, a few so misshapen he couldn't immediately classify them.

The warlock uttered a series of arcane words and directed a beam of dire radiance into one of the groups, dazzling their eyes and disrupting their forward progress.

"And above us, Japheth!" Anusha's voice yelled in his ear. He looked up.

The kraken was back.

The Year of the Secret (1396 DR) Taunissik, Sea of Fallen Stars

Icy warnings blared from the Cerulean Sign on Raidon's chest, a new pulse with each heartbeat. As if he didn't already know all these fish-men were touched by corruption.

Still in a guarding stance, Raidon palmed a slashing spear haft with his left hand. He jerked, pulling the kuo-toa forward, directly into a rising right knee. The kuo-toa's head crunched, and the creature fell away. The monk retained his grip on the spear, spinning it like a staff. He spun it around one-handed, landing a resounding blow along another kuo-toa's head. He leaned into the rebound to clip a second foe, then put his other hand on the shaft so he could thrust the butt end of the spear into a third foe's throat. The kuo-toa tried to scream but choked instead. The staff lengthened Raidon's reach, but the blows it delivered were not as powerful as his Sign-enhanced fists.

The choking kuo-toa cried out, tried to turn, but fell into a bloody heap instead. The ship captain stood behind the corpse, his strangely clicking sword beaded with water and blood, a manic expression making his face a strange mask. Something in that expression and the shape of the man's head reminded Raidon of the kuo-toa themselves.

"More's coming, my Shou friend," panted the captain. He pointed the tip of his blade at the scurrying fish-men drawing nearer through the artificial rain. The captain's grin expanded. "More for us to kill."

Raidon's symbol suddenly turned as cold as a blizzard. He looked up. Just visible through the water streaming down from the ceiling he glimpsed… a great flock of bats? No. A single creature, one with vast arms of squalid black muscle. It was the very beast Cynosure had revealed to him. Gethshemeth.

The great kraken clutched a head-sized orb in one tentacle, and in another, a humanoid figure carved of stone, a mere doll in Gethshemeth's tentacles. It hunched over the tableau, its arms flickering and weaving overhead as if it cast a spell requiring all its gesturing arms.

As if being waved forward, a half dozen more kuo-toa formations rushed across the flooding vault. Before they reached Raidon, Gethshemeth reached down and set its doll down not far from the monk. He saw it was actually about twice his height. Another stone behemoth, like the one he'd dispatched on first arriving in the chamber.

The statue shuddered forward, its arms rising.

Raidon charged it. From his focus of concentration he projected stone-shattering force into the heel of his right hand. Threads of coolness reached from his chest, down his arm, and interlaced themselves with his focus. His spellscar, its shape that of the Cerulean Sign, aided him all on its own.