Amree swam from the hold. She had a rope tied around her upper body. She gestured toward the hull and another shimmer quieted the flames, leaving only scorched planks behind. Then the ship’s mage spun toward the Blue Lady and flung out her hands. Bright sparks shot from her fingers and raced across the distance.
Before the spell reached her, the Blue Lady waved again. Something glimmered in front of her and the bright sparks extinguished with horrific cracks less than a foot in front of her. The bright explosions and sound seemed to leave her dazed. Recovering, she hurled another spell at Amree, but blue electricity from the ship’s hull streaked out to intercept it.
Choking on the black water, Shang-Li watched as the squid wrapped its tentacles around Red Orchid and tried to pry her from Swallow. Red Orchid fought valiantly, but Shang-Li knew the squid was too large and too strong. Red Orchid would be ripped free of the ship and destroyed.
Brazen and bold, confident that she couldn’t be hurt by him, the Blue Lady closed on Shang-Li. “I can let you live, manling. Give me what I desire, give me the secrets of those books and I will let you live. You and your father can be liaisons for me with the surface world. You can have good lives.”
No longer able to breathe, Shang-Li couldn’t answer. Instead, he struck with one of the fighting sticks. The Blue Lady put up an arm instinctively to block the blow and keep it from her face. The blade glowed with black fire, and cut deeply into her arm.
Howling in pain and surprise, the Blue Lady fell back. She clutched her wounded arm to her and glared at Shang-Li with murderous rage. “Now you have failed. There will be no mercy. I will destroy you all.”
Shang-Li grabbed the rope and started up toward the ship. Swallow tossed and jerked out of control as Red Orchid desperately fought the squid. The blackness masked the ship from him and he couldn’t clearly see how far he was from the hold. He climbed the rope as his lungs threatened to burst in the water he could no longer breathe.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Strength flagging, Shang-Li tried to hang onto the rope that shivered like a captured snake seeking escape. He hauled with one arm and reached with the other. The sea pressed against him now as the magic protecting the Blue Lady’s lands waned. Pressure built up in his ears and he grew afraid they would burst. Pain throbbed through his skull and his lungs threatened to turn him inside out.
Then the rope jerked forward. For a moment he thought Swallow had shifted and nearly knocked him loose. With the next jerk, he realized that somethingsomeonewas hauling him in. He focused on conserving his strength as the ship took shape before him. The huge shape of the monstrous squid wrapped around Red Orchid like some kind of obscene growth. Blue lightning flickered along the ship’s hull.
Just when he was certain he could no longer hold his breath and his strength was fading, Shang-Li banged against the edge of the broken hull and slid inside. His head broke the water and he sucked in a lungful of air. Before he could recover, Thava yanked him up with one big hand and handed him a flask with the other.
“Quickly.” The dragonborn pressed the flask against Shang-Li’s lips while he was still taking deep breaths. “The water-breathing potion.”
Remembering the damage that could be taken during a swift rise from the depths, Shang-Li took the flask and drank the contents. Almost immediately his breath turned to normal and the pressure in his ears from the ocean pressure subsided.
Swallow jerked again.
“The giant squid has Red Orchid.” Shang-Li started for the hold, then saw that the air-filled canvas blocked the way.
“You can’t go that way.” Iados scowled. “We’ve got to hope she can hold her own until we reach the surface.”
“She will.” Amree spoke confidently. “Red Orchid is strong.”
Two heads, both of them belonging to sea shambles, thrust through the opening in the hull. A sailor harpooned one of them and forced it back outside. Thava stomped the other shamble’s head flat, breaking bone and smearing blood on the hull. The corpse slipped back through the water.
Shang-Li stumbled through the water and over the loose ballast covering the ship’s hull as Swallow tossed. “Red Orchid’s taking a beating.”
“She’s keeping us right-side up.” Amree watched the air-filled canvas with concern.
“How much longer before we reach the surface?”
“I don’t have any idea of how deep we were or how fast we’re rising.”
Iados cursed. “Not nearly fast enough.”
Kwan Yung stood nearby. He locked eyes with Shang-Li and nodded. Another blow, this one from the Blue Lady Shang-Li was certain, rocked Swallow. All of them save for Kwan Yung and Amree feel to the floor. A half-dozen or more sea shambles clustered around the hull break like barnacles and tried to force their way inside. Shang-Li seized the fighting sticks and joined the battle. In short order the sea shambles were dispatched.
A moment later, pale light dawned against the canvas straining against the hold.
Swallow popped up, then settled back down into the water and rolled over onto her starboard side. The rent in the ship’s side showed a patch of blue sky and white clouds.
“We made it.” Iados’s words sounded like a cheer.
“Not yet.” Shang-Li climbed the floor of the ship and up the wall until he reached the rent. Thava and Iados followed at his heels.
“Haul that canvas down,” Amree shouted at the sailors she’d selected to trap the air in the canvas. “If you don’t keep that air in Swallow’s guts, we’re going to end up back at the bottom of the sea.”
Shang-Li hauled himself through the rent and stood once more in the warm moonlight. His heart sang for just a moment, then the Nine Golden Swords warriors, the sea shambles, and the tentacled things all surfaced and clambered up onto the overturned ship. Fighting sticks in both hands, Shang-Li advanced into the fray. He smashed creatures with the sticks, then used the blades to block the swords of the Nine Golden Swords warriors and pierce their hearts and throats.
He moved with surefooted grace on the slick hull, never making a faltering movement. He hammered a tentacled thing, ducked beneath the sword thrust of a warrior, and swung, flicking the blade out unconsciously. The point sank into his attacker’s temple and dropped him to the ground without a sound. He kicked the dead man free of the blade and moved to the next opponent.
With a harsh battle cry, Thava pounded past Shang-Li and rushed to the ship’s prow. Whirling her axe over her head, the paladin leaped from the ship and into the center of the squid Red Orchid fought. Fearlessly, Thava sank the axe into the creature again and again. A tentacle slid free, dismembered and wriggling, and sank into the sea.
The Blue Lady exploded from the ocean on a plume of water only a few feet from Shang-Li. She leaped and landed on the ship next to him, a spear clutched in one hand. Without preamble, she struck at him with the spear.
Shang-Li blocked her attack with the sticks, then stepped smoothly sideways and took the attack to her. He drove her back at first, then she took an extra step backward and threw a hand out at him. A sudden blow struck Shang-Li and knocked him from his feet to sprawl on his back.
“You’re a fool, manling.” The Blue Lady came at him with her spear. “You should have taken the offer I tendered to you. It was generous. At least you and your father would have gotten to live.” She thrust with the spear.
Shang-Li blocked the blow with a quick movement of his foot. The spear point bit into the hull and dug divots from the wood. The Blue Lady drew back to strike again and he knew he wasn’t going to be fast enough to prevent her from at least wounding him. Before she could strike, thick ropes of webbing formed in the air and wreathed around her. Shang-Li rolled and got to his feet.