After several minutes, he cut off the last one and sagged against the trunk to catch his breath. He spat repeatedly, trying to get the taste of blood out of his mouth. Then he fumbled at his waist for a waterskin and poured its entire contents down his throat. That seemed to help a little, but his tongue still burned. His dark eyes scanned the leaves above, alert for more snakes.
Spotting three descending on him, he leapt to another branch. The starlight spilled down here, from a gap in the uppermost canopy right above him. Rig glanced up, grateful for even a glimpse of the sky. It had been quite some time since he’d seen the stars. Fiona was right, he used them to “steer by,” always had—steering each ship he was on to some new port of call. The mariner contended that he could never get lost, not so long as there were stars to guide him. He felt better, seeing them, felt like he was in the company of old friends—ones who wouldn’t change and become thieves and who wouldn’t stare wide-eyed at men named Maldred.
“Waitaminute,” he hushed. The mariner actually looked at the stars now, not just admired them. Rig climbed a little higher, oblivious to the sounds of battle below. He could see more of the sky from his improved vantage-point, studied a few of the constellations. They were different before the Chaos War—he’d seen plenty of star charts from the time when three moons hung in the sky to know that. And he was acquainted with a grizzled old caravel captain who sailed under those constellations.
But these were the ones he grew up with and had come to consider his friends. He raised a hand, tracing the outline of a dragon’s wing. He wanted to study the sky a bit longer, but a loud hiss sent him scampering to the branch below. It was like climbing around the rigging of a ship, not especially difficult to him, though he’d been away from the sea for several months. Too many, he thought.
Below the mariner, Dhamon was cutting his way through a veil of descending serpents and making his way to a low branch. Dhamon leapt to the ground, the marsh absorbing his weight and sending a shower of malodorous water spraying in all directions.
Dhamon heard the hissing again, louder echoing off the thick trees, heard Fiona snapping orders, heard an ogre growl a series of garbled words in response, heard Maldred jump to the ground.
Fiona was nearby, and Dhamon and Maldred made their way toward her voice, lashing out at serpent-vines as they went. It seemed like forever before they were back in the clearing the ogres had made. Maldred was quick to join the circle of ogres the Solamnic was expertly directing. Dhamon stayed back, eyes darting about for more snakes, slashing at the ones descending on him.
Dhamon wrinkled his nose, deciding that the blood smelled worse than the healing balm they’d put on him in the hospital in Ironspike. He wouldn’t have minded the rain now, to wash some of the odor away. So many serpent-vines had been slain that he was practically tripping on them, and the stench was growing. He gagged as he concentrated on sweeping Wyrmsbane at the serpent-vines that continued to drop, though in decreasing numbers now. There were fewer snakes here simply because he and the ogres had already hacked through most of the vines that had been ensorcelled.
He ignored Maldred’s plea for him to join the circle. He certainly didn’t want to fight shoulder-to-shoulder with ogres that were swinging so wildly with their weapons that they were liable to hit him in the process. Besides, here, away from the throng of ogres, he could concentrate on keeping himself safe, not having to worry about protecting anyone around him.
There was a thick curtain of snakes at the edge of the camp, where none of the ogres had been fighting, and Dhamon made his way toward it, slicing through a few black serpent-vines as he went. He was careful as he approached, their hissing drowning out the sounds of the ogres in the circle, which was well behind him now.
“What magic birthed you?” he muttered, as he came at the curtain from one end, slicing through several serpents with one swing. “What could have possibly caused all of you to… argh!” A serpent-vine had dropped behind him, needle teeth sinking into his shoulder. The snake started wrapping its body around Dhamon’s neck, forcing him to drop Wyrmsbane. His hands shot up to his throat, tugging at the coils. Then suddenly the snake went limp, and he could easily unwrap it.
“Don’t bother to thank me.” It was the mariner. Rig had made it down from the canopy and slew the snake.
Dhamon quickly retrieved Wyrmsbane, and without a word he went back-to-back with the mariner as they worked their way along the curtain of serpents, eventually slaying all of them.
More than an hour after the assault began, the last vine was dispatched, and Rig gulped down the contents of another waterskin, still trying to get the taste of the blood out of his mouth. He retrieved the long sword he’d dropped, while Dhamon kicked small piles of serpent-vines, making sure they were all dead.
Nine ogres had died, either to venomous bites or falls from the canopy. A tenth remained missing. Fiona considered the fellow lost and decided no one should climb into the canopy to look for him. Then there might be two men missing.
“Our numbers have been cut by a fourth,” Maldred announced.
“By someone who doesn’t want us here,” Dhamon added.
“Obviously,” Rig muttered.
Murmurs of «Sable» rippled through the pack of remaining ogres, that one word distinguishable in their otherwise guttural language.
Dhamon turned to Mulok and spat out a series of simple words in ogrish, pointing at the corpses. Then he regarded Maldred. “Maybe the Black, like some of the ogres say, but I don’t think so. More likely one of her minions. If it had been Sable, we’d all be dead.” And if it had been her or another dragon, Dhamon thought to himself, I would have sensed it. The scale would have told me. Like it did when the dragon flew over the Vale of Chaos, and like it warned him of the big green in the Qualinesti Forest. “I would have known,” he said aloud.
Rig was rubbing the blood off his cheeks, gently pressing at the bite wounds and tugging free his last waterskin, upending it over his face and knowing he could refill it in a nearby stream. The wounds stung, and several felt swollen and tender. Maldred seemed to have fared just as badly but was doing nothing to tend to his injuries. The ogres were taking good care of themselves, using their water, some spreading the sap from roots they were digging up. Rig considered trying that, too, then decided better of it. Perhaps such ministrations were why they were covered with boils and warts and overall looked as ugly as they did. Dhamon seemed to have suffered only a few bites, and he blotted at these with a scrap of cloth soaked in alcohol.
Satisfied there was nothing else he could do for his wounds, the mariner began searching around the base of the shaggybark where he’d propped the glaive. He was certain he had found the right tree, as he recognized knobby roots that looked like giant spider legs. Yes, this was the right tree.
“Where?” he whispered. “Where is my weapon?” He knelt and felt the ground, found the impression the haft of the glaive had made. It was too dark to see any details, the tree was so far from the torches. “We’ll see,” he said, rising and striding toward Fiona. He stopped a few yards short of her, tugging a torch free and carrying it back to the shaggybark, unaware that she was following him and that Dhamon and Maldred were watching. The mariner stuck the torch in a solid patch of ground and knelt again.