"Do you mind walking with me along the deck?" the wizard asked Iahn. "I thought I saw something in the water, but it fell behind."
"We move swiftly through the water," observed Iahn. "But let's be sure we remain ahead of what you saw. Which was…?"
"A glow."
"Hmm."
Ususi followed the vengeance taker down the deck toward the stern, stepping around coils of rope, barrels lashed to the railing, and other stowed supplies. At the stern, a short ladder led up to a rear-facing platform perfectly positioned for staring aft. Beyond the glimmer of the ship's lanterns in the foaming water, all was dark. The shushing sound of the vessel's passage through the sea wasn't as reassuring as Ususi had found it earlier.
"We'll wait here a while," counseled Iahn, peering into their wave-tossed wake.
Ususi nodded.
A noise like tearing fabric caught Ususi's attention. She touched Iahn's shoulder but saw his head was already cocked, listening.
Ususi whispered, "Was that a sail?"
Brilliant purple light flashed in the ship's wake. She was answered.
"Be ready," mumbled Iahn. The vengeance taker held out his damos.
A light touch from his other hand opened an orifice in the disk. Ususi shuddered as she glimpsed the oily, resinous liquid quivering within.
Iahn smoothly removed three bolts from the bottom of his crossbow and dipped their points into the well.
Ususi moved back a pace from the vengeance taker-she didn't want to be nicked by accident. She rehearsed a few spells in her mind-Ususi was adept at producing blasts of fire and arcs of lightning, energies sufficient to deal with most threats. She preferred lightning…
Something squirmed in the darkness behind the ship, coming closer.
An awful shape oozed out of the night to stand before them on the edge of the platform. It was a creature formed half of bone and half of blackness so dense it possessed actual substance. In silhouette, it was a faceless, wingless demon. Its bony claws were long and tipped with the void. A needle-thin shard of Celestial Nadir crystal poked from a hollow in its forehead.
"Shadow eft!" said Ususi in surprise.
Iahn fired one of his poison-tipped bolts, which caught the creature squarely in the chest. It threw back its head, opened its mouth in a silent scream, and toppled off the back of the ship.
"What is a shadow eft?" asked the vengeance taker, nonchalantly cocking his crossbow with the second poisoned bolt.
After getting her breath back, she said, "Shadow efts were assassins for the ancient Imaskari. Efts were kept in suspended animation until some noble needed to eliminate a rival. Then an eft was programmed and decanted. An eft assassin, being part shadow, could find and kill most creatures before they even knew they were being stalked."
"I've never seen one before."
"Shadow efts haven't been in the world since the Imaskari Empire failed," said Ususi, a note of wonder in her voice.
"What about that crystal in its head?"
Ususi shook her head. "Nothing in my studies connects shadow efts with Celestial Nadir crystal-although now that I think of it," she said, "maybe the old Imaskari stored shadow efts in the Celestial Nadir when they were in stasis. If…"
Iahn's shadow suddenly revealed itself as a monstrosity of bone and darkness. Night-dark claws plunged into the vengeance taker's back, and he stiffened with pain and surprise.
Iahn's blood dribbled onto the deck as he struggled in the monster's grip. The shadow eft rose straight into the night, its feet dangling, as if being reeled upward by an unseen rope. The retreating eft was taking Iahn with it.
"No!" yelled Ususi.
The wizard uttered the triggering syllables for a difficult spell.
Then she commanded, in the language of Imaskar, "You are dismissed; desist and return to your plane of birth!" Magic unfurled from her mind and fingers, discharged through the air, and connected with the rising shadow eft.
The eft melted into the darkness. Ususi sucked in a breath. Gone?
Or merely unseen? Then Iahn dropped hard onto the deck. The impact knocked the crossbow from the vengeance taker's grip. With a single clatter and bounce, it bounded over the railing and was swallowed by the water with nary a splash.
"Effective," coughed Iahn, a hint of strain in his voice. He stood, slightly unsteady.
"I'm sorry about your crossbow, Iahn."
He shook his head and raised a hand.
"And I'm sorry I dropped you, too."
The vengeance taker nodded. Blood seeped down his right arm, but he was already reaching into his kit. He pulled out a tiny vial. Ususi recognized the vial's design-before she'd left Deep Imaskar, she'd purchased elixirs in similar containers. Its fluid was charged with a spell of minor healing.
Iahn unstoppered the vial and tossed down the contents. A flush passed across his features and his posture straightened, though the rents in his clothing remained. The vengeance taker dropped the empty vial back into his kit.
"Do you think we've seen the last of them, Iahn?"
He shrugged. "Can't say. I doubt it. You tossed three crystals overboard? We'd best assume one more eft, at least."
Ususi looked around, trying to see into every hollow and shadow, squinting hard. A bad strategy-her imagination tried to convince her that each pool of darkness hid a lurking eft. Could she banish the shadows as she had the last eft? Well, she could do better than that, now that she thought about it.
"I've got something that might work," she murmured, and fumbled with the various scrolls at her belt. She had six leather tubes affixed, and in each were three or more fine parchments on which were penned active spells encoded in magical glyphs. While she kept many spells mentally prepared, the scrolls served her for emergencies, bearing effects she might want on rare occasions. She also had a few spells of unique potency given to her by powerful friends, or looted from ancient tombs.
"This one, I think," Ususi said, and pulled out a brownish, crumbling parchment on which yellow symbols glimmered with their own internal glow. "Ready yourself for an early sunrise, Iahn," she warned the vengeance taker, and she began reading.
The words were merely the keystones of the magical structure already imbued in the fabric of the ink and parchment. As she spoke each word, the fiery yellow writing faded, and a brilliant charge grew on the edge of her consciousness.
With the last word uttered, light as bright and unforgiving as the sun blossomed overhead. She'd grown accustomed to the daystar over Faerun in the years since she'd left Deep Imaskar, but the transition from night to day sent a jolt through her eyes, dazing her for a moment. She saw one of Iahn's hands jerk up to shade his eyes, and simultaneously heard a terrible screech from behind the closest mast.
The spectacular burst blossomed across the wave-tossed water and illuminated half the deck in bright sunlight. A shadow eft tumbled out from behind the mast, scrabbling for a hold with clawed fingers. Its form grew ragged and pocked as daylight ate at the shadows that served as the eft's flesh.
Despite the creature's agony, the faux sunlight wasn't enough to kill it, or even stop it from charging straight for Ususi. The wizard unconsciously backpedaled, but the thing was on her in a moment. She raised an arm, ready to unleash another spell. Ususi saw a sweeping claw waver in the air, becoming paper-thin, as if shedding the dimension of width, enhancing its sharpness to a supernatural degree.
She shrieked and threw herself back, but the shadow claw caught her across her face, left arm, and side.
Searing pain shattered her thoughts, and the strength seemed to pour out of her legs. The wizard sprawled onto the deck, her head lolling.
Iahn, exquisitely illuminated in the fading sunburst, crossed into Ususi's dwindling field of vision. With a quick step, the vengeance taker pivoted his upper body and lunged, punching with a right cross.
His hand, instead of being balled into a fist, was open, and the damos strapped to his palm gaped.