And after that, it would be free to move.
The image of the kraken swimming free in the same sea as Cale and Jak brought Cale back to himself.
Move, Jak, he said, tearing his eyes from the kraken. Now. Move!
They turned their feet to the ruins and swam. They threw water behind them as fast as they could.
Too slow, Cale's mind kept repeating. Too slow.
Another screech from the kraken filled the sea. The ruins rumbled as the movement of the creature's body shook the pile. A sharp crack sounded and the kraken uttered another shriek, this one in exultation. Cale knew what it signified-it had torn the crystal free of the sea bed.
Faster, Cale! Jak said, his voice filled with panic.
But both of them knew they already were swimming as fast as they could.
Magadon, Cale projected to the surface, but received no response. Mags! If you can hear me, get the ship out of here. Right now. Something is coming, something. . big.
The Source is awakening, Erevis, replied Magadon, and his mental voice boomed inside of Cale's head. I understand its language now, its purpose, its powers. I can use it-
Mags, forget all of that, Cale said. Just get the ship out of there. Right now. Make for Selgaunt. We'll meet you.
Cale said that last though he did not expect to survive. Bubbles streamed from his mouth; shadows leaked from his skin. He kicked, threw his arms out and down. Already his limbs felt like lead. His muscles were burning. How long had they been swimming upward? Where in the Hells was the surface?
He glanced downward just as the kraken squirmed its body entirely free from the ruins. The pile started to collapse, the roar of falling stone loud enough to hurt Cale's ears. Sakkors was lost in a cloud of silt.
The kraken, with one powerful undulation of its enormous body and tentacles, wiggled free of the destruction. It swam backwards, leading with its head, and the glowing red crystal stuck out of the gash in its head like a unicorn's horn. The two outer tentacles ended in diamond-shaped pads covered in suckers the size of kite shields. The creature swam an arc around the ruins, as if testing out a body long atrophied through lack of use. It angled upward and its eyes-as large as wagons-seemed to fix on Cale and Jak.
Keep going! screamed Jak.
They swam with an energy born of terror.
Another shriek of rage filled the deep. Cale looked down to see the kraken undulate its body and swim after them. Its huge form cut through the water as cleanly as a razor. It matched a bowshot with each undulation. Its eyes never left them.
Cale looked up and saw nothing to indicate that they were nearing the surface. No light, no anything. Terror birthed panic.
The kraken was closing, eating up the distance. Cale could feel it.
They were dead, he knew it.
Still, he kept kicking. It was not in him to surrender. He kicked, swung his arms, swam for all he was worth. His heart must surely burst.
He looked back and saw nothing but the kraken's eyes, the pupils as big across as he was tall.
They breached the surface. Air. Starlight.
Gasping, spent, Cale did not allow his astonishment to cloud his thinking.
"Dispel it, Jak!" he shouted. "Hurry!"
Jak pulled his holy symbol and began to cast. Both of them knew that if Jak's spell failed to overcome the magic of the slaad's wand, they would die right there.
As Jak mouthed the words to his spell between gasps, Cale tried to look out over the water, to spot Demon Binder. He did not see it. He hoped Magadon and Evrel had gotten the ship clear of the area.
Selgaunt, Mags, he projected again, and received no response.
He did not bother to look down. He knew what was underneath them. He knew too what would happen if it reached them. The water was blood red and growing brighter. The kraken, with its horn of glowing crystal, was closing. Cale could feel it coming within his bones, the same way he could feel a storm on the winds.
He drew the darkness around himself and Jak. If Jak's spell succeeded, he would take them into the shadows instantly. If Jak's spell did not succeed, then he would die cloaked in the darkness that had become his constant companion.
Jak shouted the last word to his spell and pointed his holy symbol at Cale.
The green glow that tethered Cale to the Material Plane winked out.
Cale felt the waters rising under them. The kraken was right below them. A scream from the creature rose up from the water and burst into the night air.
Cale hoped never again to hear such a sound.
The shadows around them deepened, swallowed them, and took them away.
Magadon felt it when Jak and Erevis traveled the darkness and vanished. If only Demon Binder could have done the same. There was no wind. The ship had no way to go anywhere.
And the creature that long had held the Source's mind captive was surfacing. Magadon sensed its anger. He saw it in his mind's eye-a body as large as a town, tentacles lined with suckers like shields, a savage, curved beak that could rend a ship in two with a single bite.
Kraken.
And it was bringing the Source with it. Magadon's expanded consciousness sensed that the Source jutted like a narwhal's horn from an open wound in the kraken's head. The Source was awakened and surfacing.
Magadon was terrified at the implications.
A crewman called out from the starboard side of Demon Binder and the rest of the crew pelted past Magadon and across the ship to look over the side. Magadon knew what they saw: The glow of the Source had turned the sea blood red between Demon Binder and the slaadi's ship. Magadon heard the alarmed voices of the crew, sensed their growing fear.
The Source, nearly awake now, was still feeding him. He drank all he could, despite the harm it did to his body. He had never felt anything like it. Knowledge poured into him. His head pounded and he felt blood leaking from his ears, his nose. He hoped the warm fluid running out of his eyes was clear and not red. He groaned with the pain, exulted in the power.
Selgaunt, Mags, Cale had projected.
The crew began to point, shout. The glow was growing brighter. The water off the starboard side roiled. Foam sprayed into the air as tentacles as thick around as kegs burst from the sea. The kraken's glistening body followed, displacing so much water that it sent waves into Demon Binder strong enough to cause it to list. The kraken's huge eyes, half-exposed above the waterline, looked first on Demon Binder, then on the slaadi's ship.
It turned and headed for the other ship.
The panicked screams of the survivors aboard the slaadi's ship carried over the sea. The kraken cut through the water like a blade. It closed the distance to the slaadi's ship rapidly. Its body dwarfed the vessel. The screams of the ship's crew grew louder. Tentacles thicker than the mainmast squirmed over the deck, crushed men to pulp, wrapped the ship from maindeck to keel. Wood splintered, shattered. The masts toppled. The ship buckled. The creature pulled all of it underwater and fed on what it wished.
The slaughter had taken less than a five count. There was no sign of the slaadi's ship. The kraken swam a tight circle and started for Demon Binder.
The crew shouted in alarm, and alarm quickly turned to panic. Evrel shouted orders but no one heeded. Some stared at the onrushing mountain, some screamed, some milled about, looking for something, anything, that might allow them to be spared.
Magadon stared not at the kraken but at the Source, sticking out of the creature's head. It was still pouring mental energy into him. Magadon knew what he had to do. He knew it might kill him.
The kraken was closing. Several of the crew screamed defiance at the sea, shook their fists at the beast; others wrapped their arms around their bodies, fell to the deck, and awaited death.