Got to get the men to safety, he realized. Only chance is to run for shore.
Vambran scrambled in the direction of a small cluster of mercenaries, one of whom was Horial. "To the shore!" he shouted, motioning in the direction of the coast, which appeared to be a little more than a mile away. "Pass the word, and make for the shore! Horial! Sound the retreat!"
The sergeant nodded, drew his small curved horn from somewhere in his belt, and began to blow the familiar tune signaling the men to fall back. All around, Vambran began to hear the call.
"Retreat! Retreat!" the Crescents shouted, and coolly, like the disciplined troops they were, the mercenaries began to move away from the wreckage of the destroyed ship, making their way toward the shoreline as fast as they could.
Vambran cringed at the wails of despair the other men, the sailors in the water, sent up. There would be no rescue for them, and they knew their doom was upon them. Silently, as he ran, Vambran asked in a prayer for forgiveness from Waukeen for abandoning men on the field of battle. But he did not have the resources to stay and fight to save them, nor could he carry even a single one of them with him atop the water. And if the kraken returned…
The lieutenant did not head for the shore straightaway, but rather, he made a quick circle, hoping to find other Crescents who needed his aid. Hoping, and yet not hoping, to find Kovrim. As he passed one particularly large section of ruined ship, he spied Captain Za'hure, stretched out along a bit of decking, sprawled on his back, and staring at the sky.
No, Vambran realized, seeing the large gash across the other side of the captain's neck. Those eyes are not looking at anything.
Vambran lurched as two stinging darts of pain slammed into his side. He staggered and turned to see what had hit him. Most of the pirate ships had gathered in close by then, and several of them had set smaller boats down into the water. One such craft was coming directly toward the lieutenant, and standing in the very prow, a callous smirk upon his face, was the man in the blue coat and red hat. He held a wand in his hand, which he still pointed in Vambran's general direction.
Snarling, Vambran turned toward the fellow, yanking his crossbow up off his hip. But when he reached for a bolt, he found that his quiver was empty.
They all must have floated away, he realized dismally.
The wand-wielding adversary had initially flinched away at the sight of Vambran preparing to line up his weapon, but when he realized he was in no immediate danger, the fellow barked a short laugh and raised his wand again.
Cursing his ill luck, Vambran turned and sprinted away as fast as he possibly could. He staggered again as two more of the magical missiles struck him from behind, arching his back and nearly falling over, but he kept on running, knowing that he had to put some distance between himself and the mage attacking him.
Reaching into his shirt, Vambran pulled his holy coin, which he wore on a chain around his neck, free. He sighed in relief that it was still there and not lying at the bottom of the Reach. Then he offered a quick prayer to Waukeen and cast a spell. Instantly he felt the surge of speed he had prayed for, and he shot forward. Sprinting in strides easily twice as large as would normally be possible, Vambran rushed away from the devastation of Lady's Favor, lamenting the loss of every man in the ambush, but knowing he had been given no other choice.
As he ran, he considered what had just happened. Such an attack was more than just mindless cruelty and brutality, the lieutenant realized. Nine ships was a number for sinking, not boarding and pillaging. And the appearance of a kraken could not have been coincidence. It was all a well-measured attempt to kill every man on board that ship. Someone had wanted them all to die. He had a pretty good idea who that might be.
CHAPTER 5
"Blast that lucky son of a bullywug!" Grozier growled, standing behind Bartimus and staring into the image displayed in the large mirror. The two men, along with Junce Roundface and Falagh Mestel, were gathered in the wizard's chambers, observing the results of the sea ambush Falagh had arranged through some of his contacts.
"You should have told me how much magic they had at their disposal," Falagh muttered, standing behind Bartimus and to his left. "They are more stoutly equipped with it than the typical company. If I had known, I could have warned my associates."
"Did you see how fast he ran?" Junce said, laughing. "He shot across the water like a bolt out of a crossbow!" The assassin had strolled away from the mirror and was in the process of removing a stack of loose papers from a corner of a bench. "Isn't there any place to sit in here?" he complained as he just slid the last of the parchment sheaves unceremoniously onto the floor.
Bartimus peered around at the fellow, more than a little anxious about his things being disturbed. "Please don't do that!" he said crossly, half rising from his own chair to go and rescue the materials. They were either the last few pages of a treatise on the mating habits of the cockatrice, or else they were diagrams for crafting a new type of siege engine. The wizard couldn't remember which stack he had set there.
"Never mind that," Grozier snapped, slamming his hand down on Bartimus's shoulder. "Where did Matrell run off to?"
Sighing, Bartimus sank back down and focused his attention back on the mirror. The image in the frame rotated to the right, in the direction they had last seen Vambran as he ran. He was already a mere speck on the seascape by that point, and Bartimus had to shift the frame of reference rapidly in order to bring the mercenary into full view again.
Vambran was just stumbling onto the sandy shore of the coastline when Bartimus's magical scrying re-centered on him.
"Where is that?" Grozier muttered. Bartimus wasn't sure whether his employer meant that to be answered or not, but he peered at the stretch of coastline closely to see if he could determine the location more precisely. All that he could make out was a long strip of sandy beach backed by an endless stretch of trees.
"That's the Nunwood, near Hlath," Falagh said, pointing at the trees. "That's where my associates were instructed to attack. It's not a terribly welcoming stretch of coast, something of a no-man's-land between Reth and Hlath. All the endless skirmishing that goes on between all the mercenary companies earning their coin, you know. There's little there but a few villages and lone cottages, most of them long abandoned. Oh, and lots of beasts feeding on the dead. We picked that spot because it was unlikely that anyone else would see the attack." The man shifted to look over Bartimus's head more directly at Grozier. "No witnesses that way."
"Ah," Grozier said as he began to count the number of figures in the image on the shore. "Well, there are certainly plenty of folks there now who saw the whole thing," he said sardonically. "So I guess we have some witnesses after all."
"Now, look," Falagh said, squaring himself and folding his arms across his chest. "You asked me to set up an ambush, to sink a ship. Based on what you and that pregnant priest told me, nine ships and a summoned kraken should have been more than enough. But since you never revealed that Matrell and his men would be so well prepared for such an eventuality, it wasn't, and that's just coin wasted. I do not like wasting coin."
"They're mercenaries! What did you expect?" Grozier answered, shifting around to stare back at his guest. "I would have thought someone as clever as yourself, with all of your experience controlling trade on the high seas, might have considered such a possibility. But I suppose that was too much to hope for."
Bartimus wanted very desperately right then to scoot his chair back from between the verbally sparring men and get out of their way, but he saw no easy method of extracting himself without drawing even more attention down upon his own head. Grozier was just as likely to demand that he summon a spell and send it at Falagh as to allow the wizard to excuse himself.