“Well that’s sure shit on our breakfast.”
Loriabeth kicked some sand loose from the gently sloping shore-line, birthing ripples from the placid water beyond. It stretched out before them like a vast mirror, black around the edges and bright in the centre where the three suns illuminated an island. It was small, no more than a hundred feet from end to end by Clay’s reckoning. Sitting in the centre of the island was a structure some thirty feet high with sloping walls of intricate construction. Clay assumed it to be much the same as the structure in the forest, except it was completely free of any encroaching vegetation. The shaft rose from the structure’s roof, disappearing into the haze of the three suns several hundred feet above.
“A forest, a desert, now a sea,” Sigoral mused. “It’s as if someone built a miniature world in here.”
“More of a lake than a sea,” Loriabeth said. “But it’s still too damn broad for my liking.”
Clay blinked sweat as he peered at the island. “Maybe three hundred yards. Not an impossible swim.”
“For us,” Loriabeth said. “Not you. Anyways.” She kicked more sand into the water. “Who’s to say what’s already swimming about in there?”
“If we had enough wood we could built a raft,” Sigoral pointed out.
“Meaning a long walk back to the forest.” Loriabeth looked at the Reds circling above. Their altitude had definitely reduced over the past hour, coming low enough for Clay to gain a full appreciation of their size. Although considerably smaller than an Arradsian Red, they were still of sobering proportions; seven feet from nose to tail with a wing-span even broader. Plus there were twelve of them, enough to overwhelm their guns if they came in a rush.
“We follow the shore,” Clay said, nodding to left and right. “See what we can find.” He chose the right on a whim and started off, glad for the swallow of Green he had taken earlier. He had been strict in rationing his intake, not knowing how much longer this journey would take, and didn’t like to think about the inevitable moment when it ran out.
It was Sigoral who found it, his eyes being attuned to picking out objects of note in a body of water. It rose from the lake’s surface some ten yards off shore, the faux-sunlight gleaming on the crystal it held. Another plinth, just like the one from the platform.
“Well,” Clay said, swinging himself towards the water. “We know it won’t work for either of you.”
He saw Loriabeth swallow a protest before moving to his side, Sigoral falling in behind. As they waded into the water the circling Reds broke their silence for the first time, piercing shrieks cutting through the air as they swung lower still.
“I think we’re making them angry,” Sigoral observed, tracking a Red with his carbine.
“Hungry, more like,” Loriabeth replied, pointing a pistol at the shore-line. “See how they won’t venture over the lake’s edge.”
Clay glanced back, seeing she was right. The Reds, now barely twenty feet off the ground, were wheeling around at heightened speed but veering away every time they came close to the shore-line. Something’s keeping them at bay. He immediately turned his gaze to the water, peering through the surface for any sign of danger but seeing only clouds of silt disturbed by his lumbering passage.
A sudden flare of agony in his leg brought him to a halt as the water seeped through his bandage and into his wound. He cried out, the crutches slipping from his armpits as he shuddered and would have fallen if Sigoral hadn’t caught him about the waist.
“Green,” Clay gasped, his body throbbing and sending white flashes across his vision that told of an imminent faint. It seemed to take several seconds of eternity for Sigoral to fumble the cap from Clay’s canteen and hold it to his mouth. He drank deep, the undiluted product burning its way down his throat and squashing the pain into a small, pulsing ball at the core of his being.
“We gotta go!” Loriabeth said, her words accompanied by the snick of a cocked revolver.
Clay swung his gaze back to the shore, seeing the Reds had all now come to rest on the sand. They shrieked a continual chorus of frustrated hunger, jaws snapping as they fanned their wings, tails coiling like angry snakes. With every shriek they inched closer to the water as predatory yearning vied with fear. He turned back to the plinth and forced himself on, shouting with the effort. By the time he reached it the water was over his belt, and the drakes’ cries had risen to fever pitch. He slumped onto the plinth, slapping his hand to the crystal. Nothing happened.
“Think you can get any from here?” Loriabeth asked Sigoral. They were following in Clay’s wake, backing away from the shore in slow careful steps.
“One for certain,” the Corvantine said, aiming his carbine. “Should I shoot?”
“Not yet. Might stir them up even more.”
Clay grunted in frustration and slapped his hand to the crystal once more then swore as it failed to produce the hoped-for glow. “Seer’s balls! Do something!”
The crystal blazed into life, the sudden flare of light enough to blind him for a second. He blinked tears, hearing a rush of displaced water. When his vision cleared he saw the surface of the lake rising in a huge elongated swell that stirred memories of Last Look Jack. A Blue, he thought wearily. Of course.
But it wasn’t a Blue. The water fell away to reveal a long, narrow structure of algae-covered granite, extending from the shore to the island. A bridge, Clay realised with a laugh that died at an upsurge of squawking from the Reds. The appearance of the bridge seemed to infuriate them, overthrowing their last vestige of fear.
They rose in a cloud of dust, wings drawing thunder from the air. Three came straight at them, skimming low over the water, whilst the others split into two groups and swung out to left and right. Sigoral’s carbine cracked and one of the onrushing Reds tumbled into the lake. Loriabeth’s revolvers blazed, cutting down the other two. Their speed was too great to allow for head-shots, so they failed to die immediately, thrashing wings and tails churning the water white and crimson, distressed shrieks loud enough to pain the ears.