'She can't leave her young one,' said Risala, distressed. Kheda reached for her hand and laced his fingers through hers with a comforting squeeze.
'Can't she fight back?' protested Naldeth as he saw the smaller beast pressing close to its mother's dark flank.
As he spoke, the mother whale rolled in the water with surprising agility and smashed her mighty tail down towards the pursuing sea serpent. As the creature lurched away, they saw it was darker than the other, with a thick black edge to the long fin running down its back.
'She can't fight both of them,' Velindre said with measured pity.
The second serpent was now cutting a curving course through the water between the chosen victims and the rest of the fleeing whales. As the mother rolled again to put herself between her young and the black-finned serpent still harrying her, the greenish serpent dived. It reappeared snapping at the frantic youngster. Blood blossomed briefly on the turmoil of foam, shocking scarlet amid the muted colours of beasts and ocean.
'We have to do something!' Naldeth looked from Kheda to Velindre.
'Why?' The magewoman looked back, impassive.
'Why let an innocent creature suffer?' the younger wizard demanded with some heat.
'Sea serpents must eat,' Kheda said with mild regret.
'Serpent for danger and chaos,' said Risala involuntarily. 'But twin serpents of any kind can be an omen, of renewal in death or hope after peril's evaded.'
'So we mustn't act for the sake of not altering some omen?' Naldeth demanded belligerently.
He looked back out to sea where the mother whale was now striving to force the persistent greenish serpent away from her youngster. The smaller whale circled on the surface, blowing out a plume of spray snatched away by the wind. The black-finned serpent briefly broached the surface to snap at the ugly raw gash in the youngster's flank before disappearing into the depths.
'I don't see any sense in drawing those serpents this way,' Kheda said curtly. 'Haven't you heard tales of them wrecking ships?'
'Have you ever seen that happen?' snapped Naldeth.
'No, and I'd never seen a dragon before last year,' Kheda retorted. 'As it turned out, the poets' tales didn't tell the half of it.' He looked out to sea. The mother whale was drawing a circle of foam around her youngster, nimble despite her great bulk. The serpents were swimming the other way, looping through the water, drawing gradually closer and closer.
'Velindre, if you won't do something, I will,' Naldeth warned.
The magewoman looked at him, exasperated. 'The antipathy between fire and water—'
Scarlet steam exploded in front of the black-finned serpent as it broke off its circling to dart towards the mother whale. Kheda glimpsed a brilliant streak of white light cutting through the air as Naldeth made a throwing motion. The sea around the greenish serpent boiled furiously as well. The mother whale shrank back from this incomprehensible happening and blundered into her youngster. Both vanished below the seething waves along with the greenish serpent.
The black-finned serpent twisted this way and that, lethal mouth agape. Naldeth flung out both hands. He would have overbalanced if Kheda hadn't caught him with a strong arm under his elbow. The black-finned serpent
rose out of the water in looping confusion, snapping at its own coils. The mother whale reappeared to vent a noisy plume of spray and then dived deep, her wide tail smacking down hard on the surface of the sea. There was no sign of her young or of the greenish serpent.
'What have you done?' Risala watched, appalled, as the black-finned serpent's teeth ripped into its own hide. Dark blood stained the frothing water around it and uncanny crimson reflections ran along the creature's coils.
'The other one's making its escape.' Velindre's eyes grew distant for a moment, unfocused. 'The two whales are following the rest. The young one is badly bitten. Are sea serpents poisonous, Kheda?'
'Opinions vary,' he said shortly, withdrawing his arm from Naldeth's elbow. 'What did you do?'
'Burned the oils in its own skin.' The young wizard leaned on the rail, still intent on his magic. The sea serpent's struggles grew more laboured. Its blood was now a black slick on the surface of the water, glinting with scarlet malevolence. He shot a defiant glance at Velindre. 'At least those whales have a chance now.'
Can you do something like that to a dragon?
Kheda decided not to ask.
Coral gulls appeared to hover over the dying serpent with raucous cries of anticipation. Unseen scavengers from the deep pocked the sea with ripples as they tasted the spreading blood. The serpent floated motionless on the swell, then began slowly sinking. As the last hint of magic faded, the gulls dived, beaks tearing. Vicious angular fins cut through the soiled waves and the serpent's hide reappeared here and there, coils thrust up from below. Blunt grey heads broached the surface as the sharks ripped into the moribund sea serpent.
'Satisfied, Naldeth?' Velindre placidly resumed her meal of sailer pottage.
Kheda saw that the young wizard had gone pale beneath his tan, eyes wide with the shock of memory as he stared at the sharks. He shook the youth's shoulder briskly. 'The wind's shifted and strengthened. Some slack in those forward lines wouldn't come amiss.'
'What?' The wizard looked at him, bemused, before recollecting himself. 'Yes, of course.' Ungainly as he supported himself with the rail, he slid down the ladder to the deck and retrieved his crutch to stump away.
'How can we read the omens if he does things like that?' Risala looked abruptly down at the planks where Naldeth's discarded bowl was rolling to and fro, trailing sailer pottage. 'And we don't want to be wasting food,' she added crossly.
Kheda realised with some surprise that he still held his own bowl. He looked at the remains of his meal. 'I think I've lost my appetite,' he said apologetically.
'Me too.' Risala took Kheda's bowl from him and jumped down to disappear into the stern cabin.
The silence on the stern platform was broken only by the scrape of Velindre's spoon.
'Do you want me to take a turn at the tiller?' Kheda offered after a few moments.
'Not until I'm sure we've picked up that current I mentioned. After that, you two can share watches with me and Naldeth. He has no great feeling for water but his fire affinity gives him sufficient sympathy with air to be sure we're following the course I set him.'
Kheda glanced towards the young wizard, who was now standing in the prow, looking out across the ceaseless barren swells. 'When did that happen to him?'
'Three years ago.' Velindre said unemotionally.
Kheda yielded to his curiosity. 'How did you persuade him to risk himself in Archipelagan waters? What does this voyage to the west offer him?'
'The chance to learn something new about the magics of elemental fire.' Velindre smiled thinly. 'Something sufficiently extraordinary that our fellow mages will want to talk about his splendid new discovery whenever they encounter him, rather than trying to find a way to ask how he lost his leg and was he really a hero who saved those settlers. Either that or they tie their tongues in knots trying to avoid mentioning anything about it.'
The disdain in her answer left Kheda disinclined to enquire further. 'I'll go and see where Risala's got to.'
He climbed down the ladder and ducked his head to enter the low stern cabin. In the dim light filtering through small windows set beneath the aft beams, Risala was scraping the unwanted food into a bucket. 'We can throw this into the water at dusk if you're going to try fishing,' she said curtly.
Let's not discuss whether or not there might have been omens in the struggle between whales and serpents that Naldeth has polluted.
Kheda gestured to the barrels lining the wooden walls. 'What food are we carrying, besides sailer pottage?'