The scrag grunted in pain, staggered only a little by the blow. It turned quickly, ripping the other hand across at Pacys's stomach.
The old bard reversed his staff and speared it down toward the cobblestones at his feet. He had it braced by the time the scrag's blow came and used it to block the talons away from his body. The end of the staff braced against the cobblestones skidded only a little from the impact, but the blow missed him. Then he was in motion again, stepping back and to the scrag's left. The creature snarled in frustration and anger. It reached for the bard, trying to get hold of him.
As his attacker stepped forward, Pacys lifted his staff between the scrag's legs, tangling them. The creature fell, yowling in surprise, and landed on the cobblestones three yards away. It recovered quickly, pushing itself to its feet. The blood that had splattered its face made it look even more menacing.
Breathing faster than he knew he would have been in his younger years, Pacys twisted the middle of the staff. Foot-long steel blades suddenly flared from the ends of the bard's weapon and locked into place.
The scrag saw the blade too late. Before it had taken three steps, it impaled itself on the staff.
Knowing that trolls in general were hard to kill without fire or acid, Pacys used the leverage afforded by the staff. He planted the other staff blade against the cobblestones and prayed the steel was tempered strong enough to hold. Using the power of the scrag's charge and his own strength, the bard flipped the ten foot tall creature over, throwing it onto one of the nearby burning boats still tied up at the dock.
When the scrag hit the blazing ship, its skin popped and crackled, turning black immediately and splitting open to reveal the red meat below. The creature died before it could scramble off the ship into the water.
Breathing hard, Pacys scanned the nearby water again, looking for further enemies. He twisted the staff once more and withdrew the hidden blades. Mist whipped in from the storm brewing out in the harbor, making him narrow his eyes. He reached for the song, hoping that more of it was there for him.
Some words came to mind as he attempted to describe what was happening, but they were disjointed fragments of the song he'd been weaving together. The battle for the harbor continued. Savvy sea captains mustered their crews and managed to repel some of the boarders. A dragon turtle breathed out steam and burned a griffon and its rider from the sky. The blackened corpses tumbled into the dark water, then the turtle in turn was attacked by a group of mermen mounted on sea horses. The mermen darted at the huge creature, throwing javelins into it. When the turtle had enough, it dived underwater, but the mermen didn't give up the chase and dived on their mounts as well.
A woman's shriek drew the bard's attention. He whipped his head back to look toward the Mermaid's Arms. The festhall had become a bloodbath as sahuagin fought with the patrons. A mass of other fights still filled the street and intersection in front of the festhall. Pacys couldn't help wondering about how many would die before morning.
He drank in all the sights, feeling guilty at being so greedy to see all the carnage. He knew there were other bards in the city, and he knew they'd all have their tales to tell of the battle for Waterdeep Harbor. Realization of that made a small kernel of doubt grow inside him. A wave of heat washed over him from the burning ships at the nearby docks, pushed by the howling winds blowing across the harbor from the Sea of Swords. The stench of brine, tainted with smoke, interspersed with blood, filled the air.
Knowing he could go no further down Dock Street, Pacys turned and went back the other way, back toward Asteril's Way. He saw the guild hall of the Order of Master Shipwrights and noticed the large group of Waterdhavian Guard that had gathered there. Evidently someone had decided to use the two-story guild hall as a staging area.
Pacys ran hard, feeling the familiar aches and twinges start in his knees, and the shortness of breath that plagued him these days. He didn't give in to the infirmity.
Another wave broke over the top of the pilings to his left and cut his feet out from under him. He got to his feet with effort, hacking and coughing as he tried to clear the brine from his lungs.
A loud smack sounded behind him, too loud to be anything human sized. Remembering the dead giant worm he'd seen, the bard turned and stared behind him, raising the staff to defend himself. He thought he had a momentary glimpse of a twenty foot long fish that started pulling itself along by four tentacles, but he saw instantly that his mind must have been playing tricks on him.
Ardynn stood before him, her brunette hair falling past her shoulders in a wavy mass of curls. She stood as tall as him, but had the full glow of a womanly body scarcely concealed by the white gossamer pantaloons she wore over a crimson body suit that left her arms and legs bare. Gold bracelets adorned her wrists and ankles, and the small ruby he'd given her all those years ago dangled from the fine gold chains wrapping her forehead. Her teeth were clean, white, and even. The barest trace of cinnamon scent clung to her as she came closer.
"Have you forgotten me so soon, young minstrel?" she asked in that mocking way she had.
"No." Pacys answered. There was no way he could forget her. The memory of when the bard had arrived at Maskyr's Eye had inspired a number of songs he'd written in his youth and later disguised for presentation in his travels. He'd been seventeen at the time, already tired of the life of farmer and horse breeder, and she'd awakened in him the wanderlust that followed him throughout his life.
Ardynn had been then as she was now, just as beauteous, and her voice sounding like elf-made honey. She'd sung at the Wizard's Hand, one of the finest inns in all the Vast. At the time, she'd been four years older than he was. She'd come to see the village because she'd heard of it and had never been there. When she'd left three days later, Pacys had gone with her despite his father's wishes. He could count on the fingers of one hand how many times he'd returned to the village in the decades since.
"Come kiss me, fool," she said. She lifted her arms out to him.
More than anything, Pacys wanted to go to her, but he didn't. He'd traveled with Ardynn for two years, learning the craft of the bard first, then learning of love, from her. At the end of two years, she'd left him. Ardynn had never been one to be tied down or responsible for too long. For Pacys, there'd been other teachers, other lovers, as he knew there had been with her. His heart, however, refused to feel the pull of any other as much as it did Ardynn.
The bard steeled himself, gathering his wits. The clamor of battle still echoed around him, but it sounded far away, in another place. It was hard to think, and somewhere in the back of his mind he knew there was a reason for that. "Where-" His voice locked up on him. "Do you love me?" He knew that hadn't been the question he'd meant to ask.
She laughed at him and the sound reminded him of sunlit waters trembling through a pebble bed on a distant and early morn. "Of course I love you," she answered. "I could love no other. If you won't come to me, I'll come to you." She walked toward him.
He felt the staff in his hands, but his hands were curiously numb, the familiar grain of the wood hard to touch. He concentrated against the thickness in his mind as the roaring wind pushed against him.
"Where-where was the last place you saw me?"
"Tell me," she entreated.
"It was in Thar," Pacys said. "We'd both heard through our respective sources of the archeological dig going on there by Fannt Golsway. He'd been hired by Thusk Tharmuil to investigate stories of the ogre empire that had been there before Beldoran killed the creatures out a hundred years before."