David Drake - Godess of the Ice Realm

Ilna hadn't noticed any orders passing. The sailors all knew what had to be done and did it. She could learn to like sailors; competent ones, at any rate… though the only problem she had with competent people inany walk of life was that she found so few of them.

There was little in the landscape but rock and heat and the sulfurous wind. On the horizon something pulsed orange-red, possibly a volcano. Except for that, Ilna couldn't see anything farther away than she could fling a stone. The sun was a huge dull blur through clouds ranging from sepia to a yellow so dark it could scarcely be called a color.

Something shrieked in the distance; or maybe it was just wind through the rocks.

"What happens now?" Tellura asked, his voice muffled. He was holding the bosom of his tunic over his mouth and nose to breathe. "Are they going to smother us? Is that it?"

Ilna doubted that a layer of coarse wool would help much with the brimstone; besides, she needed her hands for other things. Her fingers formed knots in yarn with the flawless certainty of raindrops falling on a pond.

"Not that," Chalcus said. He held his incurved sword in one hand, the dagger in the other. "There'll be company, have no doubt, my friends."

Hutena was the only crewman who'd seen the fragments of human bodies on theQueen of Heaven. Bad though this air was to breathe, no one could imagine it had causedthat slaughter.

Chalcus gestured toward the higher railing. "Kulit and Nabarbi," he said, "keep watch to starboard side. We don't know which direction it'll come fr-"

Pointin screamed piercingly. Ilna turned.

A huge thing shambled out of the swirling darkness. It walked on two legs and had two long arms as well, dangling near the ground as it hunched forward. Nothing else about it was manlike. Hard, smooth plates like insect armor covered its limbs and body.

Shausga drew his bowstring to his right ear and loosed. The arrow cracked against the creature's narrow chest and glanced off.

The creature raised its arms, opening the pincers in place of hands. It came on, gurgling like the last wine from a bottle.

Ilna stepped over the railing, lowering herself carefully to the ground. She could've jumped, but she wasn't sure of the footing-and she wasquite sure that she couldn't afford to fall on her face at this juncture.

"It's twenty feet tall!" Ninon cried. "By theGods, it's a demon from Hell!"

Ilna smiled faintly. The creature might or might not be a demon, but it wasn'tfrom anywhere: it had stayed home. TheBird of the Tide and her crew were the ones who weren't where they belonged. She walked forward, holding the knotted pattern between her hands.

Another arrow, then two in quick succession, struck the creature. Two skidded away like rays of light from polished steel; the thirdwhack ed the ridge between the creature's bulging, faceted eyes. The shaft shattered and spun off in the wind like a handful of rye straw.

Ilna kept walking. She hoped there was enough light for the creature to see her pattern. Animals didn't see things the same way humans did.

She smiled more broadly. It would be-briefly-a pity if this thing's eyesight wasn't good enough to slip into the trap she'd so skillfully woven for it.

The air had been hot, but the ground was oven hot. Ilna almost stepped on one of the cracks zigzagging across the rough stone; heat radiating up from it struck her callused foot a punishing blow. When she glanced down, she saw a tremble of orange light at the bottom of the narrow crevice: molten rock flowed between the solid plates.

The creature rubbed its elbows against the sides of its torso, making a shrieking sound like that of a cicada hugely magnified. It stretched a jointed arm toward Ilna's face, the pincers opening fully. Each curved blade was as long as a sickle's.

Ilna spread her knotted pattern above her head. If it didn't work, she didn't want Chalcus to think that her last act had been to hide her eyes from the sight of death reaching toward her.

The creature staggered. Its arm froze in mid air and its mouth opened slightly; the jaw plates spread sideways, not up and down. Its breath reeked like a tanner's yard, rotted foulness and the savage bite of lye.

Ilna didn't move; her eyes were blind with tears from the brimstone. Behind her Chalcus shouted words that the wind whipped in the other direction. Men ran past Ilna on either side; they were blurs of movement, not individuals.

An axe rang; Hutena gave a high-pitched cry of triumph. Ilna blinked; bringing the scene into sudden focus. She realized she'd been afraid to take her eyes off the creature for fear that it too would look away and break the binding spell.

The creature began to topple sideways. The bosun wrenched his axe out of its right knee in a wave of syrupy blood. The other sailors hacked with their blunt-tipped swords, aiming at the knees and ankles. Their blades generally clanged and bounced back, leaving lines scored across the creature's hard casing.

The creature hit the ground with the point of its shoulder, cracking the rock. It continued to stare at Ilna, its eyes like those of a landed fish. Chalcus stepped close, judged his victim, and stabbed through the creature's open mouth with the quick skill of a wasp paralyzing a spider.

The creature leaped like a beheaded chicken, both legs spasming; the right one flailed sideways at the broken knee. Chalcus wouldn't let go of his sword, so it pulled his feet off the ground. He kicked at the creature's chest with a great cry and jerked his blade free.

The creature toppled again. It half turned, its eyes sightless when the brain behind them died. It crashed into a needle of wind-carved rock, wavered there for a moment, then flopped onto its back. Its limbs waggled like a dying beetle's.

"Back to the ship, my lads!" Chalcus called, hoarse from the searing atmosphere. "We don't want to be left here when Lusius and his fellows call theBird home, as they surely will."

Ilna lowered her hands, bunching the pattern together between them again. Hot as this place was, she'd felt a chill as the creature died. She hadn't killed the thing with her art-she doubted that she'd have been able to kill it or she would have tried-but there'd been a link between her and her giant victim there at the end.

Everyone was all right. Chalcus and the six sailors were, at least; she didn't see Pointin, but the supercargo would be in the hold out of sight unless he'd become a different man from the one who'd survived the attack on theQueen of Heaven.

"You took no harm in the business, my dear one?" Chalcus said, suddenly at her side. He'd sheathed his dagger so he could wipe the swordblade with the tail of his silk sash. The creature's blood had congealed to a tarry smear.

"No," Ilna said, "though I'll be glad to leave this place. I wonder if Lusius and his wizard know where they're sending ships or if it's just that they're ready to be looted when they come back?"

"Sir!" cried Shausga, pointing with his sword toward an arch which the wind had carved from the surrounding rock. He was left-handed. "Mistress Ilna, there!"

A monster like the first came through the arch. In the whirling shadows Ilna thought it was smaller, but once clear of the rock it rose onto its hind legs. Tall as the first creature had been, this stood half again as high.

"Right, well, we know the job now, lads, so it won't be so hard," said Chalcus. He hacked to clear his throat, then whipped his sword in a shimmering figure-8. The steel was as clean as it'd been when he boarded theBird in Carcosa. "But I think we'll wait here close by our good vessel, as we know now how the business will go."

Another shrilling cry sounded, very close though Ilna couldn't tell the direction in this waste of rock and fire and darkness. The creature walking toward them hadn't made the terrible sound. Its arms were lifted, the elbows splayed out to the sides.