The skeleton-warrior fell forward and Solon smashed down with his hammer, shattering its skull. The skeleton twitched and was still; then its bones fell apart.
Kendaric turned and scrambled forward on his knees, over the now-loose bones. Solon looked on in amusement. He said, “You’re an ambulatory disaster disguised as a man, but at least this time you’re causin’ them more annoyance than us.” He bashed another skeleton-warrior with his warhammer, sending it backward, then reached down and hauled Kendaric to his feet by the collar. “Now, go see if you can trip up another one without getting yourself killed. That’s a good lad.” He gave Kendaric a push and smashed at the shield of the nearest warrior.
James dueled with another spectral creature and found it no match for his swordsmanship. But the problem was inflicting damage. His rapier would slide off the bones and occasionally nick them, but there was nothing to hit. He was bound to tire eventually, and then the creature would surely injure him.
James glanced over and saw that Jazhara had successfully gotten herself some distance from the foe she faced, while another creature crept up on her from behind.
“Look out behind you!” he called to her.
She turned and ducked as a sword slashed through the air, and, with a deft blow, got her staff between the warrior’s feet. The thing went to the floor literally with a bone-rattling crash.
James had an idea. “Get them on the floor!” he shouted. “Trip them!”
Jazhara reversed her staff one more time and tangled the feet of the creature that had first been stalking her, sending it clattering to the floor. James feigned high, then went low. He dove between the creature’s legs, grabbing them one in each hand, then stood up, toppling the creature behind him. Instantly, he turned and leapt into the air, landing on the creature’s skull with all his weight. A shock ran up his legs as if he had jumped upon hard rock, but he heard a satisfying crunch and felt the bones break beneath his boots.
Kendaric scrambled like a crab, ducking under blows and rolling from side to side. Jazhara followed James’s example and crushed the skull of one warrior with her staff while the second sought to regain its feet.
James hurried to where Jazhara stood and kicked at the rear of the creature’s legs, and she brought her staff down with a savage blow. James looked around the chamber. “Three down.”
“Four,” she said, as Solon crushed the skull of another warrior.
“Let’s work together!” James shouted.
“How?” Kendaric cried as he ducked under another savage sword-blow, blindly waving his own weapon above his head as if it would somehow dissuade the creature’s attack. He scrambled away from the warrior that was pressing him, right into the path of another. With a terrified squeak of alarm he jumped to his feet, and fell backward into a third, knocking it down before Solon.
Jazhara tripped another, enabling James to smash its skull, while Solon finished the one that Kendaric had tripped.
Soon it was quiet, and the only skeletal warriors left were the two still trying to escape from Solon’s magic. Jazhara dispatched them with her crimson flames, and at last they had a chance to catch their breath.
“My gods!” Kendaric said. “That was too much. What more is there to expect?”
“Worse,” said James, turning his attention back to the lock. “Almost certainly, there will be worse.” He studied the arrangement of gems, mirrors, and holes, and said, “A moment of quiet, please.”
He pressed the center of the lock and the light erupted. With deft precision, he moved the gems and mirrors swiftly into place. When the last, a topaz-like gem, threw a yellow light into a yellow hole, they heard a click followed by deep rumbling, and the doors swung wide.
The area before them was vast, and they could smell sea salt as the scent of water reached them. Moving forward, they saw two immense pools, providing narrow walkways on either side or between the two.
“We have to go there?” asked Kendaric.
“You see another route, laddie?” asked Solon.
James hesitated, then said, “Wait.”
He took off his pack and unbuckled it, removing the artifact that had got them through the outside door.
“I think it might be wise to have this handy.”
They set off down the center walkway and when they reached a point halfway between the doors and a distant wall, two pairs of enormous tentacles rose up from the water on either side of them. Kendaric let out a yelp of terror, but James merely held the artifact high above his head.
The tentacles stood poised, as if ready to strike. They quivered in anticipation, but they didn’t attack.
Jazhara whispered, “How did you know?”
“I didn’t,” James replied. “I guessed.”
Solon looked over his shoulder as they moved out of striking range of the tentacles, which then slipped back down into the brine. “Good thing, lad. Those would crush us like bugs.”
James said nothing, leading them deeper into the darkness.
SEVENTEEN - Black Pearl
Kendaric pointed.