Выбрать главу

Bas-Ohn Koraf took a deep breath of the saltwater and stepped inside. Fritzen and Tailonna followed him. Ilyatha paused outside the crevice. The shadowperson feared bright light, and it took him several moments to realize the light from the fire would not harm or blind him. The flames raced up and down the walls like a roaring campfire, casting eerie light patterns all about. Kof had to step sideways here and there as the passageway thinned, and more than once the minotaur scraped his back against an outcropping. Deeper and deeper they went, until Kof believed they must surely come out on the other side of the ridge. Then the tunnel started winding downward, and it split in two.

The minotaur sniffed, but found his keen sense of smell was wasted beneath the waves. Flames flickered down both passages, but they provided no clue as to the correct course. Extending his spear in front of him, Kof took a step into the left tunnel, then looked over his shoulder and motioned for Fritzen to take the right. The half-ogre nodded, and Tailonna followed him, leaving the shadowperson to follow Kof. The minotaur had not gone farther than a dozen yards when his hooves crushed something brittle. Bending, he discovered a pile of bones that had once belonged to a large fish, a barracuda perhaps, he mused. The firelight playing on their white surface made the shards glisten. Suppressing a shudder, Kof continued to pick his way deeper. He growled in his throat, releasing a stream of bubbles when he saw the passageway ahead divide again. He moved on toward the right, where he had to grip the walls to keep from falling. The floor sloped steeply, bending down in a sharp spiral. Glancing behind him, he spotted Ilyatha moving to the left tunnel. The minotaur waved his hairy arm and nearly lost his balance trying get the telepath's attention. Ilyatha looked at the minotaur quizzically.

I'll not split our numbers again, Kof concentrated, hoping Ilyatha would pick up his thoughts.

Very well, the shadowperson replied. I will let the others know to stay together.

In the other corridor, Fritzen and Tailonna discovered a similar sharp turn, one with a drop-off that sent them floating down nearly fifty feet. From there the tunnel continued, spiraling down even farther. The half-ogre gripped the sides of his head, dropping the net and spear. The pressure here was beginning to get painful, and he wondered how far they had traveled and how much longer the elixir would last. He reached into the pouch on his belt to make sure the other vial was still intact. Tailonna placed a soft hand on his shoulder and pressed by him. They were in the sea elf's element, and Fritzen, gathering his belongings, allowed her to take the lead.

Nearly an hour later, Tailonna and Fritzen stared across a chasm-on the other side of which were Kof and Ilyatha. The magical fire stopped at the edge of the pit, which descended like a funnel into unnatural darkness. The minotaur nudged the shadowperson and concentrated, his great brow furrowing as he tried to convey a message.

I agree with Kof, Ilyatha communicated across the chasm, his words sounding stern inside Fritzen's head. I believe the morkoth lies below, and he is preventing the fire from spreading farther. With that, the shadowperson stepped off the ledge, dropping into the pitch-blackness of the crevice.

Kof swallowed hard and joined him, quickly passing Ilyatha by as his great weight propelled him through the water faster. The darkness swallowed them completely by the time Fritzen and Tailonna joined them in the fall.

What seemed like hours later, the quartet emerged into a large cavern thickly coated with shadows. The pressure was significant here, indicating they had come a long way below the surface of the sea. They could see only a few feet in the darkness, and Ilyatha instructed them to stay together so they would not become lost. Alone, the shadowperson suspected they would be easy marks for the morkoth. Kof swung his spear back and forth in front of him, pressing forward until he reached a rocky wall.

Like cave explorers, the four circled the chamber until they discovered six openings, each so thin they would be a tight squeeze to travel through.

One for each of us and two to spare, Ilyatha thought. We should select one and hurry; the elixir…

Kof nodded, and despite Ilyatha's warning he decided each person should take a different passage, tenuously linked by the shadowperson's telepathic mind. He directed Ilyatha down the closest passage, Fritzen down the next. The minotaur passed by the following two passages, noticing the grades were too steep. Then he pointed Tailonna down one, and he took the other. Each walked into the darkness with a weapon in one hand, and the fingers of their other hand brushing along the wall to show them the way. And all of them lost their balance as the floor disappeared beneath their feet and they fell even farther, sliding down rocky passages that twisted and turned.

Again the four found themselves emerging into a shadowy cavern, the tunnels they followed all bringing them to the same place. Kof growled, emitting a long string of bubbles, then he directed the others to stay together while he circled the chamber, discovering the features of its walls with his hands. When he returned to them, his eyes burned with anger, and Ilyatha winced when he poked inside the minotaur's head to discover what he was thinking.

Kof says this is the same chamber we left several minutes ago. There are six ope?tings-he claims the same ones we ventured down, Ilyatha said, sending the message to everyone. I suspect we never left this chamber to begin with. I think it's an illusion and we're being manipulated. I don't know where we are, but… Before the shadowperson could continue, the cavern's darkness receded, as if light were being slowly coaxed from a lantern, revealing rocky walls encrusted with gems. High above, the edge of the cavern was lit by the ki-rin's magical fire. The flames continued to dance merrily, pointing toward a black shape descending toward the cavern floor. The dark form stopped halfway to the bottom, floating above them.

The morkoth! Ilyatha communicated to everyone. It has been toying with us.

From the waist up the hideous creature looked like a sea snake, though it had a spiky top fin that ran to the crest of its wide, fishlike head. Four spindly arms, like the legs of a lobster, stuck out of its scaly sides. They ended in thin pincers that opened and closed almost rhythmically, their clacking sound cutting through the water. The morkoth's eyes sat to the front of its face, as a human's would, but they were dark, round orbs with flecks of red in the centers. The creature had no ears, at least none that were visible, but it had a mouth that looked like a squid's beak. It opened the beak and snapped it repeatedly, the clicking noise somehow reverberating through the water and unnerving the quartet below. Then the morkoth extended a long pink tongue that looked like a segmented seaworm and wriggled it.

The lower half of the creature's body resembled an octopus, with writhing tentacles sporting suction cups. The morkoth was quite a bit larger than Kof, and all over it was as black as night, though it had faint, luminescent silvery patches of scales here and there. As it moved closer to them, descending slowly through the water, it continued to click its beak and wave its pincerarms, and its tentacles undulated almost hypnotically, drawing tiny air-bubble patterns in the water. Ilyatha and Tailonna stood unmoving, staring at the creature. The spears in their hands fell to the cavern floor as their eyes followed the bubble patterns.

Snap out of it, Kof concentrated, praying that the shadowperson and sea elf would pick up his thoughts.Think! It's mesmerizing you. Wake up! But his thoughts went unanswered. Only he and Fritzen seemed unaffected by the morkoth's writhings. The minotaur growled and stepped in front of Ilyatha and Tailonna. Spear raised, he poked it at the morkoth, but the creature's tentacles remained just out of reach. It continued to writhe, and Kof felt himself grow light-headed. Closing his eyes and blocking out the image of the patterns, he continued to jab upward.