The galleon responded like a crippled scow, nearly heaving over in the swells. Jerick got her bow around just as the big surge hit. Red Wake climbed up the wave and nearly leaped into the sky before crashing down to the sea once more.
Jerick’s golden tooth rattled out of his head and flew into the ocean. He blinked once, twice, and when he opened his eyes again, the temple at the island’s summit was gone.
Lava poured down the volcano’s slopes and into the sea, sending up great gouts of white steam. The storm overhead died away quickly Perhaps, with Tempest dead, the typhoon no longer had its strength.
“If I didn’t know the gods had left Krynn, I’d swear it was a miracle,” Jerick said, watching the rapidly calming sea.
He let out a long sigh of relief. Then Red Wake listed again, and he returned to the task of trying to keep her from sinking.
Mik felt himself rising up.
It was beautiful here-and peaceful.
Why would he want to be anywhere else? he wondered.
Something hard hit him across the cheek.
“Wake up!” a voice cried. “I didn’t pull you out of the deep just to have you die on me!”
Mik coughed the seawater from his lungs, and his eyes flickered open.
“Were you hying to drown yourself?” A mixture of anger and worry flashed across Ula’s beautiful face as she cradled him gently atop the swells.
Mik managed a weak smile. “I thought drowning preferable to being fried,” he said.
“We’ll still be boiled alive if we don’t get out of here quick. That lava’s heating up the sea awfully fast.”
The two of them glanced back at the spot where the temple had once stood. Lava flowed through the cleft, down the mountainside, and into the breakers.
“It’s almost as though the dragon and the temple never existed,” Ula said quietly.
“If the dragon hadn’t existed,” Mik replied, coughing, “a lot more of our friends would be alive.”
“Well, at least someone we know is still kicking,” she said, pointing toward the floundering Red Wake.
The sea elf towed the battered sailor over the rapidly calming waves and, in short order, they reached the crippled ship.
Jerick pulled them aboard. “Ready to work?” he asked, smiling broadly. “We need some new hands.” Then peering over the side, he said, “By the lost gods, what’s this now?”
Mik and Ula turned and saw a shape moving just below the waves headed toward the ship. It was about the size of a redtip shark, but no telltale fin broke the surface. A moment later, Trip’s smiling face poked up out of the surf.
“Did I miss anything?” he asked. “The dragon really knocked me silly. Where’d she go, by the way?”
“To the abyss, I hope,” Mik replied.
“Great,” Trip said. “I didn’t like her anyway. Could you give me a hand? I don’t think I can haul Shimmer up by myself. You wouldn’t believe the trouble I had dragging him here.”
Instantly, Ula jumped over the side and helped Trip push the bronze knight onto the galley’s listing deck. She climbed back aboard and knelt at her friend’s side.
Shimmer’s left shoulder looked as though it had nearly been torn off, and he bled from more than a dozen wounds, but he was alive.
“Hey,” Trip said, “did you see? The volcano blew up. How did that happen, by the way?”
Mik leaned back and closed his eyes. “When Tempest fell into the crater, the volcano erupted.”
Shimmer’s orange eyes flickered open.
“You’re alive!” Ula said.
“Barely,” he replied. “But I think… I will heal.”
“I wish,” Mik said, “that everyone who began this journey could say the same.”
They all fell silent for a moment, remembering their lost friends and crewmates. Jerick’s healer, sporting a nasty cut across her forehead, came to the bronze knight’s side and began tending his injuries.
“Look!” said Trip, pointing toward the clouds.
A brass dragon arced high overhead, flying just below the receding storm. It circled the ship twice and then winged off to the west.
Mik shook his head and sighed. “Now the Order of Brass shows up,” he said.
“Don’t stop to help or anything, you accursed metal beastie!” Jerick called, shaking his fist at the far-off wyrm.
“I’m sure they’ll send someone out to check on Kell’s men,” Ula said, “and the fate of their lord.”
“He died… trying to save the isles,” Shimmer gasped.
“So the temple is gone,” Jerick said. “But what about the treasure? Did you ever find it?”
Mik looked at Ula, Trip, and the wounded dragon. “Oh yes,” he said, “we found the treasure.” The four survivors nodded wearily at each other.
Jerick frowned, his bushy red eyebrows nearly meeting over his hawkish nose. “So, where’s my share? The key? The diamond?”
“Gone,” Mik replied, “in the service of the isles.”
“The service of the isles… !” Jerick sputtered. “Don’t tell me you’ve gone do-gooder on me, Mik me boy. Next thing I know you’ll be wantin’ a job aboard Red Wake!”
Mikal Vardan laughed, and put his arm around his friend’s shoulder. “This old scow?” the sailor asked jovially. “Not likely. Not while there’s a fresh wind at my back and an open sea before me. Not while there’s a coin of treasure left to be found somewhere in the Dragon Isles.”