The hobgoblin returned belowdecks, making two more trips, Horace following him on the last one, his wide eyes disbelieving. The goblins protested and screamed as Direfang pitched them over the rail, all save the last-Saro-Saro, who had grown too weak to resist or say anything. Direfang held the old clan leader like Graytoes cradled Umay. He took no pleasure in what he had to do.
“Die free, Saro-Saro,” Direfang said bitterly. He coughed, and he saw Saro-Saro’s eyes sparkle with the hope that the illness had quickly taken hold of the hobgoblin. “Die fast, old one.” Then he dropped Saro-Saro over the rail, the goblin striking the side of the ship before hitting the water and immediately going under the swirling waves. None of the goblins had known how to swim, so the strongest of them bobbed only once or twice before drowning quickly.
Horace gripped the rail and stared at the spot where Saro-Saro had been. “I–I-I don’t understand, Foreman Direfang. To kill them like this …”
“The illness, this plague, had already killed those goblins and enough others,” Direfang said vehemently. He motioned to the goblins edging away from the mast. “Stay back and stay well.”
Two-chins’ mate spoke a little of the human tongue, and she tried to explain to K’lars about the plague and the goblins who were sick in the hold and who were now lying at the bottom of the New Sea, she hoped being devoured by the fishes.
The half-ogre’s eyes widened. He stared angrily at Direfang and took a step toward the hobgoblin leader. “No one told me or Captain Gerrold about any plague. No amount of coin would have gotten you this ship or the other ships, I’m certain, if we had known-”
Horace cut him off, interposing himself between the half-ogre and Direfang. The half-ogre thrust a hand against the priest’s shoulder, but Horace stood firm and spoke forcefully.
“We thought the plague had passed, I promise you,” Horace said. “We’d not have come on this ship if we thought there was a threat to you. Zeboim is your goddess; you follow her, same as I do. I swear on the silvery hair of the Sea Mother that no harm was meant and that my best efforts will go toward ensuring that no harm shall result to you-”
“No!” Two-chins flailed his arms in the air then pointed to the rail.
Direfang was climbing over.
“Rustymane,” Direfang rasped. “Rustymane can lead now. The skull man can cleanse the hold.” The hobgoblin coughed and wiped at the line of bloody drool spilling over his bottom lip. “The mistakes end here. My responsibility ends. The illness ends here.”
He dropped over the rail.
THE SPEAR OF CHISLEV
Mudwort was oblivious to the commotion on deck. She’d heard goblins tromping past the galley door and caught a glimpse of Direfang. She’d noted the surge of goblins piling into the galley and crowding on the benches, waiting for food.
The wizard sat across from her; he’d moved from his table to hers when Two-chins came in to get the priest.
“More room!” Mudwort told a goblin who tried to sit next to her. She stretched and reached out her arm, indicating the goblin should give her that much extra space. “Farther away,” she repeated to the hobgoblin who started to settle in next to Grallik. She added a withering glance and thrummed her fingers against the table. The goblin and hobgoblin complied.
The plate in front of her had been licked clean. For nearly two days, she’d been caught up in her latest seeing spell, and it had left her famished and tired. Sated, her eyelids drooped and she yawned.
“Talk about Chislev,” she said to Grallik, her head bobbing forward. She forced herself to stay awake. “Talk clear, wizard, and talk slow.” Mudwort’s command of the human’s language was limited.
“You should be talking to Horace,” the wizard said. “Horace is a follower of Zeboim, but there’s a part of him that respects all the gods. He’s a scholar of the divine, Mudwort, and he-”
She stuffed her fist in her mouth as she yawned again, shook her head vehemently, and fixed him with a narrowed gaze. “Did not ask the skull man. Will not ask the skull man.” She slammed her fist against the table, making her empty plate jump. The others around them edged away. “Tell me about Chislev. It is important.”
Grallik’s eyes widened. He’d been watching her, and he’d heard her repeat “Chislev” once during one of her far-seeing enchantments.
“She-”
“Chislev is female?”
Grallik nodded.
“There is power in females,” Mudwort said. “But not in gods. Goblins do not-”
“Believe in them, I know.” Grallik rubbed at a smudge on the table and looked up as a sailor came around with a kettle, ladling out more helpings of a meat and potato stew onto plates. The air filled with slurping and belching sounds, appreciative chatter, and plates clanking against the table to hurry the sailor.
“Chislev. Talk some more, wizard.” Mudwort yawned wide. “More about this female god.”
“She is called the Beast and also Kisla, the Mother of Sea Creatures, which is why you should ask Horace about her. Some call her the Wild One as she represents nature.”
“And power?”
“Aye, the wild goddess represents that too.”
Mudwort nodded, beginning to understand Saarh’s interest in Chislev’s spear. Saarh seemed very in touch with nature and eager to accumulate arcane power.
Grallik pursed his lips, searching his memory for what he had heard about Chislev. “Worshipers associate colors with her-”
“Yellow,” Mudwort supplied, remembering the colors on the spear in her vision of Saarh. “Brown too. Mostly green.”
“You know much,” Grallik said, “for one who does not believe in Chislev.”
Mudwort glared at him. “More, wizard.”
Grallik nodded to the sailor, who ladled more of the stew on his plate. “Another helping, yes, a small one.” The wizard stirred a spoon in the stew and noticed that not a single goblin had asked for or been given a spoon. He smiled about that.
“Chislev’s symbol is a feather, of her colors. Her weapon, the short spear.” He didn’t notice Mudwort’s eyes widen, or see her mouth, “My spear.”
He ate a spoonful of the stew. “Most of her worshipers are farmers and hunters, druids too, some bands of elves, and I believe the centaurs of the plains. It is said that the seasons march on her whim, that summer comes when she is passionate, winter when she wraps herself in melancholy. When she is angry, she shows it in violent storms.”
One of the sailors carrying the stew pots stopped at Grallik’s shoulder. “You speak of Chislev,” he said, frowning. “I favor Zeboim, who despises the Mother of Sea Creatures. It was Zeboim’s will that we got through that last blow with nary a problem.” He moved on.
Grallik took a few more spoonfuls of the stew and continued his explanation. “Chislev doesn’t have priests in the same sense as Krynn’s other gods. Hers are the druids, and they protect the forests. As that sailor said, she is known to dislike Zeboim. Their ill will was fostered in the All-Saint’s War when Zeboim defeated her. I know little else, Mudwort. As I told you, Horace could-”
Mudwort had been fighting off sleep for too long. Her head plopped onto her empty plate, and she started to snore.
Grallik shrugged and kept eating.
“Rude things, ain’t they?” said another sailor passing by with slices of bread. “K’lars calls them rats what walk on two legs.”
“Be careful,” Grallik hissed. “A few of those rats can understand every word you say.” He fell to finishing his plate of stew, the clatter of plates and pitchers and the goblin chatter rising all around him.
Direfang struck the cold sea and dropped like a heavy stone. After a moment, however, the water buoyed him up again, just as he’d seen happen with the goblins he’d thrown over. His reflexes caused him to gasp and gulp in the sweet air-his last breaths, probably.