“I don’t know,” Selena said. “Perhaps another god’s magic? Or even the merkind’s own? I don’t know enough of their magic—certainly not its source—but this could be the result of something gone horribly awry among their own kind.” She rose to her feet from her kneeling crouch. “I don’t know what else it could be. There are no bites on her. No wounds. If it’s poison, it was ingested.”
“I believe I stated earlier my certainty that powerful elements have been at work on the fish people,” Svoz remarked. “It is the product of industry. Foul, black, insidious magic. And I, for one, look forward to meeting the creators of such perfidy, congratulating them on their achievements, and then killing them.”
“Get it off my ship,” Julian said, his tone flat and unamused.
Selena nodded. “Svoz.”
The sirrak poked the mermaid with his foot to ensure her demise. He then whipped his spear point down, and impaled her through her abdomen.
“Svoz!” Selena cried, but the sirrak paid her no mind.
He hefted the mermaid up in an arc, raining fouled blood and ichor over the deck, and tossed the corpse overboard. It hit the water with a dull smack and began to sink.
Svoz turned around, and his triumphant grin faded as he took in the stricken expressions around him. “You’re welcome,” he sniffed.
Julian glanced at the mess and then rubbed his face with both hands. Vigorously. He ordered the crew to swab the deck until he could see his “godsdamn reflection in it” and then turned to Selena.
“If it’s the Bazira—your Bazira—who are capable of capturing and corrupting hundreds of merkind, you realize this changes the game.”
“Are you worried about your fee, Captain?” Selena asked. “I can increase your pay contingent on the danger, if that would please you.”
Her harsh demeanor seemed to surprise him; it surprised her too. This cold…it’s wearing on me. Another thought followed on its heels: the memory of him slinking from the common room with the married innkeeper.
“I apologize,” she said quickly. “I was just discussing with Ilior that we might need help from the Isle of Lords to contend with these Bazira.”
Julian rubbed his chin that had grown a thin scrap of a beard over the course of their voyage. “You’d have a better chance at squeezing a diamond out of a barnacle.”
“I don’t want to endanger your crew. If Accora is somehow corrupting the merkind, then the waters around Saliz might be infested with them.”
Julian made to speak when Whistle whistled again, this time one loud, sharp blast that was full of alarm. Selena didn’t have to look up to see where he’d spotted the danger; the waters all around the slow-moving ship churned.
Julian bit off a curse and unsheathed his scimitars. “Men! To arms!” He ran to the port side. “Half here, half starboard! Get at them before they can climb aboard!”
But it was too late. The Black Storm was surrounded. Mermaid and mermen, all with flowing hair in coppery hues, or inky blue, or rust red, or burnished bronze crowded the waters around the ship in numbers too thick to count. Thirty or more leapt or climbed up the side of the ship with graceful agility to perch themselves on the gunwales on all sides, bracing themselves with iron hooks, or harpoons; weapons that appeared culled from whalers or pieces of sunken ships. Those on the gunwales had dolphin-like tails more often than not, though Selena saw two or three with orange or green fish tails. The females of this ilk bore a ridged fin along their abdomens instead of breasts. Their gills opened and closed, and as Selena watched, two of them dove back into the water, and two others took their place. The dolphin-tailed merkind did not move, but breathed the cold air. Their weapons glinted dully in the morning sun.
None of the merkind were sickly or corrupted, but hale and hearty, if chilled by the northern waters. The sight of them armed and surrounding the ship was at once frightening and exhilarating at the same time. Selena stared at their beauty and knew that she was in the presence of powerful beings that carried all of the sea’s majesty with them. They gazed down on the crew with black or green or gold eyes that were sharp with intelligence…and wrath.
Beside Selena, Svoz stirred but she bid him not to do anything. To harm them seemed like blasphemy, not to any god, but to nature and the oceans themselves.
“You are far from the Heart Waters,” Julian said, his voice faltering only slightly. “What do you want?”
A dolphin-tailed merman at the prow inclined his head. His human chest and arms were striated in shades of blue and white, and bulged with muscles. In one hand, he brandished an immense harpoon. The other he used to brace himself on the bowsprit.
“Who leads?” he asked in a voice that carried a keening sound behind every word.
“I’m captain of this ship,” Julian said.
The merman dismissed him with a glance. His eyes found the Selena and Svoz standing beside her.
“Who works the magic?” the merman demanded. He leveled the harpoon at Selena. “You.”
“I am an Aluren Paladin,” Selena said. “I wield the magic of the Two-Faced God.”
The merman sneered, his blue-eyed gaze taking in Svoz. “Foul magic,” he intoned. “Step forward.”
Julian held out his arms, one scimitar barring Selena’s way. “No. Tell us what you want or leave us in peace.”
“You did this.” The merman turned to his brethren in the water and jerked his head.
There were at least fifty merkind in the waters surrounding the Black Storm, vigilant and unmoving, as if they were standing on something unseen just below the surface. But one patch of water was empty. Three merkind at the perimeter of this space hefted long iron poles, and the dead mermaid Svoz had thrown overboard came to the surface. When Selena had gotten a good look at her, the merkind lowered the poles and let the mermaid slip beneath the waves again.
“You did this,” the merman on the bow said again. “You did this to many of our kind.”
“No,” Selena said, sheathing her sword to emphasize her point. “I did not. We—”
“A sirrak shares your vessel. Foul magic. You kill our people and throw them away.” The merman lowered his harpoon at Selena again. “We see you do this.”
“It wasn’t us,” Niven said, holding his hands up. “We promise you, we would never—”
But the merman turned again to his people in the water and emitted a guttural noise that sounded like a dolphin’s squeal and a man’s barking cough at the same time. The merkind at the rails flapped their tails and drove the butts of their makeshift weapons into the deck in a kind of salute, as a regiment coming to attention might when the admiral approached.
The merman turned to Selena. “You will speak to the Ere’k’aakii, and know your fate.”
Julian shook his head. “This is bad. This is very bad.”
“I will hear what they have to tell us,” Selena said. “It’s not as if we have much choice.”
“Oh, but you do,” Svoz hefted his weapon. “Say the word…”
“Against fifty? And fifty more in the water? You will do nothing until I command you.”