The third shot hit the railing near Glawinn. Splintered wood flew into the air as the ten-foot shaft punched an eighteen-inch hole dead center in a pirate's chest. Laden by the corpse, the shaft careened on, knocking down pirates like tenpins. It forced the body across the deck, then tore through the railing on the other side.
Cries of fear and prayers to gods filled the air. For a moment, the pirates' resolve seemed broken.
"Live or die, you damned brutes!" Azla yelled down. She hurled herself over the forecastle railing and landed in a crouch on the pitching deck. The choice is in your hands and in your blades. Do me proud!"
A ragged cheer rose with her scimitar. "For Captain Azla! For Black Champion!"
The caravel dropped into another trough as Jherek heaved himself over the forecastle railing and dropped to the main deck.
"Young warrior," Glawinn called.
"Aye."
"If that's a slaving ship and she has a cargo in her hold, it may be that our attackers are holding a blade to their own throats. You understand?"
"Aye."
Jherek understood immediately. If the slaves were freed and given a chance at their own freedom, many of them would take it.
"I will stand with these men and lead them into the battle," the paladin said. "If you are able, perhaps you can raise us another army to even the odds."
"Aye," Jherek answered.
"Arthoris!" Azla roared.
The old ship's mage stepped forward. He was a gnarled man with long gray hair and a groomed beard. He wore robes with sigils and symbols on it and carried a staff. "Aye, Cap'n."
"Give them something to remember us by."
Arthoris raised his staff and chanted in a strong, clear voice. The heavens above him darkened as if a storm were coming.
"Ballista crews," Azla called. "Ready…"
"Ready, Cap'n."
"Fire!"
One of the shafts gutted the boarding party along the slaver's starboard side, breaking their ranks. The second shaft hammered into the mainmast a good twenty feet from the deck. For a moment the missile's fluted edges held it embedded in the wood, then the mast gave way with a horrific crack. The top of the mast listed to the side, bringing down more canvas and pulling the slaver hard over to port.
Black Champion's crew cheered again, calling out vile oaths at their attackers. The slaver crew shouted out in anger. Before they could recover, Arthoris launched his attack.
Three lightning balls leaped from the old ship's mage's staff and struck the slaver. Peals of thunder split the air. The lightning balls struck the boarding crew, burning them and knocking them from their feet, but only incapacitated a couple of them.
The slaver vessel pulled away, disengaging from the attack. With the two broken masts and only one remaining, she wasn't any faster than Black Champion.
"Cap'n!"
Azla turned, spotting one of her officers near the ship's hold.
"Come quickly!" the mate called.
All his arrows gone now, Jherek joined the ship's captain at the hold. Another man stood below with a lantern. The pale yellow light played uncertainly in the darkness as the ship yawed across the waves and reacted badly to the wind due to the tattered sails. There was no mistaking the heavy shaft that had broken through Black Champion's side.
X
10 Flamerule, the Year of the Gauntlet
"The Taker thought he could defeat Umberlee?" The prospect astonished Pacys.
Myrym gazed at the old bard with her luminescent eyes and said, "Yes. She stripped his weapons from him, yanked the magic eye from his head and scattered it into its many parts, then caused storms to drive the weapons inland to the heart of Faerun. The elves had only just abandoned Eiellur and Syorpiir during the War of Three Leaves to settle in the Selmal Basin.
"Then Umberlee reached into the heavens and caused stars to fall, crashing into the land and altering coastlines. It was almost enough, it is said, to drive the sea elves back to the surface, but they stayed. They became part of those whose destiny it was to cross paths with the Taker."
"In Myth Nantar?"
Myrym nodded. "All things above and below once passed through Myth Nantar. The elves named it City of Destinies because of the stories they'd been told about the Taker, but already they'd begun to forget some things."
"What is in Myth Nantar?"
"That I cannot answer, Loremaster. There are some events foretold that must be lived through."
"You never said what Umberlee did with the Taker." "In her rage, the Bitch Queen thought she killed him. Umberlee broke her lover, shattered his bones, and spilled his blood."
"I was told the Taker's eye is in Myth Nantar." "Only part of the Taker's eye is there," Myrym answered. "It is a key piece that the Taker will need to make his weapon complete again. No one knows where in the city it is. The Dukars took charge of the eye fragment when the Coronal at Coryselmal gave it to them after the birth of Myth Nantar."
"The Dukars?" Pacys repeated. "I thought they were only legends."
"No, Loremaster." Myrym's rebuttal was gentle. "Despite all your travels, there is much you have yet to learn. Tell me what you know of the Dukars."
"They were wizards," Pacys said, recalling the few, seldom heard stories he'd been told over the years. "At first they were brought together in Aryselmalyr. Some believe they were historians, and others thought they were warriors seeking to take all of Seros as their own territory. It's been said that Dukars could speak to the sea and have it listen, and grow weapons from their own bodies. I always thought them to be purely myth."
Myrym shook her head in disbelief. "Ah, the tales of gods-struck humans and jealous elves. The Dukars are real."
Jherek watched helplessly as the sea cascaded into the hold around the ballista shaft stuck through Black Champion's hull. Already the water was up to their ankles, swirling around the stores and crates in the cargo area.
"Damn," Azla swore at his side. "Umberlee is getting her tithing today." She raised her voice so the pirates in the hold could hear her. "Tear off your shirts and breeches, use them to plug up the hole around that damned shaft."
"What are you going to do?" the young sailor asked.
"I'm going after that ship," Azla declared.
"You could rip out Black Champions bottom in the chase," Jherek protested. "The currents are already gnawing at her."
Azla's eyes blazed. "Unless you can pull a chunk of earwax from your head, cast it into the water and grow an island out of it, I don't see that we have much choice." She marched from the hold to the boarding party.
"She's tucked her tail between her legs and run," one of the pirates yelled.
Jherek saw the slaver vessel limping away to the south, evidently trying to leave the area with no further confrontation.
"They're not going to get away," Azla said in a stern voice. "They've holed our ship and we're sinking. So we're taking theirs in turn."
Her crew turned to look at her in amazement, clearly not wanting to believe it.
"Bring us around," Azla ordered.
The pirates sprang into action, shifting what sailcloth was left after the gargoyles' attack and cutting free other canvas that only impeded their progress.
As he stood on the deck, Jherek could feel the sluggishness of Black Champion's response as she came about.
Sabyna approached. No tears showed in her eyes now, and she acted as if what passed between them only a few moments ago had never happened. "What's wrong with the ship?" she asked.