/ want to make the monsters go away.
The words were branded into her memory, but she could not recall if it had been her father, Dak, or her second husband who had spoken them.
You can't, she suddenly understood. No one can make the monsters go away but me.
"Myrmeen," Reisz urged, "we made a mistake. Let's leave while we still can. If he's right and those things escape-"
"Retreat," she hissed, still watching Shandower's eyes, worried that the fervor she saw within him might one day stare out at her when she looked at her own reflection.
"I'm not going without seeing what's down there," Shandower said as he shoved Reisz out of the way, took the heavy rope in his hand, and yanked the door upward.
Looking over the assassin's shoulder, drawn in perverse fascination, Myrmeen was certain that she was staring into the pit of ultimate damnation. Dozens of monstrosities lay below, their bodies intertwined as they writhed frantically. Many were climbing the walls and two were on the stairway leading up to them. At the center of the gathering lay an obese, grotesque creature that appeared to have the power to manipulate its own body as if it were clay, stretching its muscles and tendons into shapes that seemed strangely familiar to Myrmeen. The monster's stomach was immense, lined with a set of jaws large enough to swallow a man whole. Its face was marked with huge, egg shaped eyes, and a wide, gentle smile.
Myrmeen suddenly recognized the shapes it was forcing its body to create: Musical instruments.
Blood-soaked tendons stretched to the consistency of strings for a large pink harp, while hard muscle coalesced to form a lute near the base of the monster's incredible bulk. A long, thin appendage shot from beneath its layers of fat that had been its jaw, with holes suddenly appearing to mark it as a wind instrument. The host of smaller, equally inhuman creatures stopped and turned, their mad, chattering sounds dropping away in anticipation.
"Lucius!" Myrmeen shouted.
The mage was already gesturing, his hands stretched before him. The sound of thunder roared in the confined space and a flash of lightning burst from Lucius's hands. The light was so intense that it nearly blinded those gathered above the hold. The fleshy harp and lute were destroyed by a deadly bolt of bluish red light, and the monster wailed in agony, odd music accompanying its screams.
Myrmeen suddenly felt drowsy and saw her companions exhibiting signs that the effect was not limited to her. "Lucius," she screamed, "again! Kill it before-"
A geyser of water burst through the hull beneath the monster, revealing a horrible rip in the craft's shell. The music stopped suddenly as the creature was blasted upward by the force of the water. The ship tilted, and two of the smaller monstrosities vaulted out of the hold. Then the door crashed downward, shaken by the motions that had knocked all but Shandower from their feet. The deckhand who had been with the group turned and ran.
The first creature looked as if it had been sewn together from the bloody remains of corpses on a battlefield. It squatted on four arms, each poised in a different direction, and had a thick, ball-like torso. Its head drooped and peeked out from between the cage of arms. The monstrosity beside it was female, with overly large arms that hung to the floor and tiny hands growing from every part of her body, including the hollows where her eyes should have been. The first creature spoke:
"The crew, the guards at the shore, they were meant to be our feast, our payment for enduring this awful journey. We hunger. Vizier BeUophat promised us sustenance."
"Feast on this," Shandower said as he ran his glowing hand through the monster's fatty torso, its body collapsing. The woman with too many hands drew back, her hands suddenly detaching from her body, falling to the floor, and racing toward the assassin. The probing fingers closed over the startled killer, their razor-sharp nails biting into his flesh. Reisz drew his sword and buried it in the skull of the woman who had spawned the hands.
"Idiot," she said, gore running down her scalp as the flaps of her head sealed around the weapon. She drew Reisz close and kissed him full on the mouth as a new set of hands began to manifest on her body.
Suddenly, Shandower pushed himself forward and plunged his glowing blue gauntlet between her shoulder blades. The multitude of hands fell away as the woman collapsed. Reisz did not try to retrieve his weapon.
"We have to get out of here," Shandower said in alarm, awakened from his bloodlust to embrace the reality of their imminent deaths. The group raced through the corridors leading to the stairway, then climbed to the main deck as the ship pitched to one side. Myrmeen prayed that the monsters in the hold would be trapped there, drowning before they could escape.
Ord greeted them at the top of the stairs. "The men who had been floating, they fell!"
Lucius nodded. "I had to release that spell."
"They mostly jumped overboard. Before that, one of them lost his grip, then floated out into the sky."
"It doesn't matter," Myrmeen said impatiently. "We have to get back to our boat."
The craft they had rented to take them to the derelicts was anchored near the ships that had helped them stage their ambush, its rotting appearance making it look like another corpse in the graveyard of boats. All but Lucius leapt over the edge into the icy waters. The mage remained, gathering his will, and sent another blast of energy straight down, into the hold. The ship buckled and he was thrown free into the waters. Myrmeen swam to his side, rescuing him from drowning, as he had been left weak and trembling after using his power. Behind them, the black ship was in flames, Lucius's second bolt of energy sparking the conflagration.
They made it back to their boat, disturbed by the sight of a small craft embarking from the harbor. As they sailed into the night, Myrmeen prayed that they would avoid the members of the corrupt merchant company. Averting her gaze from the smaller vessel, she watched as the black ship containing its cargo of monsters went under, one end pointing out of the waters until it was sucked down by its own weight, disappearing beneath the surface without a hint that it had been there at all.
Krystin had been ordered to wait at the inn. Naturally, she was now more than a mile from that location, on her way to visit a shopkeeper named Caleb Sharr. Sharr had always been generous in supplying a scrap of food when she had needed it the most, or a bit of sage advice when she desired it the least. Nevertheless, she loved the grizzled, middle-aged man and had missed talking to him. She knew that soon she would leave Calimport forever, and she wanted him to know that she was well. He often had called himself an old fool where she was concerned and she would not have had him any other way.
The Lhal woman, on the other hand, had been particularly cold and distant tonight, her thoughts even farther away than the storm she had heard engulfing some part of the desert. The rains gathered on the outskirts of the city like a skulking thief waiting for the right moment to enter Calimport and strike.
Krystin turned her thoughts from the storm and recalled her conversation with Myrmeen in detail. The woman had explained the dangerous nature of the operation they were undertaking tonight and said that, despite Krystin's training, the girl was not yet ready for a mission with such a high degree of danger.
"In other words, I still can't be trusted," Krystin had said, to which Myrmeen had no reply. The woman had left her side, an icy breeze marking where she had stood. Seconds later, Ord had joined Krystin.
"In other words," he had whispered in his sly voice, "that woman has no idea who you are."