“It’s not about glory, Lord Tartaros. It is about diplomacy and the mitigation of risk. Leaving a representative of our academy is more respectful than some mere note, and surely this show of courtesy will assuage any irritation Ms. Walker might have at being left behind. With luck, you will arrive before our challengers, and we will arrive by the time you’ve finished slaying all the monsters and defeating all the traps. As long as you wait for Ms. Walker to be present to observe the opening of the secret chamber, then no harm will have been done to our relationship with the Latrocinium.”
I knew this was just a ploy to keep his own skin out of danger, but Morton’s plan wasn’t half bad. “I’m fine with that.”
Rade and Azarin both shrugged. It wasn’t like leaving the little guy behind was going to cost us much fighting ability on the shore.
“It’s settled. Morton stays, everybody else aboard.”
The gnome breathed a sigh of relief.
“I don’t know what you’re happy about,” Bognar said. “I’d be more scared of the Latro’s murderess than the monsters.”
“Yes,” Sifuso hissed. “Leave Bognar instead of the gnome so she can poke out his other eye.”
“Don’t laugh at me. It still hurts.”
With four in each boat, we set out. I was cold and uncomfortable. I’d ridden in a water boat once before, but that had been on a lazy deadland’s river. The bay was more of an angry, bouncing, crashing mass that kept soaking my clothing with freezing droplets of saltwater. Rade and Rufus both came from places with bodies of water big enough to require boats, so they were our captains, each trying to teach the rest of us how to use the oars to row. I’d tried to hire a crew to ferry us, but no one in the tavern was foolish enough to risk landing on the island.
Don’t worry,they’d told me.You’ll be fine. It’s not far at all.
That proved to be a lie. This was notfine.Rowing turned out to be a terribly inconvenient way to travel. The island was in sight of the shore, but when you had a bunch of people with no idea what they were doing, on a violently churning sea, where the waves kept pushing us in the wrong direction, our meager progress was taking an agonizing long time. Every time we rode up a big wave, coming down the other side made it feel as if our tiny boat might flip. If it did, we’d surely drown.
The shore was shrinking in the distance and Korthican’s Warning was growing, but at this rate, by the time we got there, our arms would be too tired to fight.
“Anybody got a spell that could speed this up?” Bognar shouted as Danny vomited over the side.
“I’m afraid not. This is a fine example why we have to keep studying,” Azarin called back cheerfully. Despite being from a realm of absurdly tall mountains and endless skies, Azarin didn’tseem in the least bit seasick. It must have been from all that riding about on giant birds.
Danny was sitting next to me, and the poor kid looked so grey, it likely wasn’t just the nausea killing him. Suspecting he was overcome with nerves, I leaned over and told him, “It’s alright to be scared.”
“It’s not that…” He looked like he really wanted to tell me something, but then he looked away, ashamed. “No matter what happens, I appreciate you guys giving me a chance.”
“You’re not going to die, Danny. Being scared when you’re doing something scary is normal. The only person here who’s not at least a little afraid is Rufus.” I nodded toward the other boat, where our dwarf captain had taken up a bawdy rowing song. “And I think that’s because he doesn’t know any better.”
“It’s not that… It’s just… Never mind.”
“It’s going to be alright. Cheer up.”
“I will, Mr. Carnavon.” Danny just gave me a determined nod, like he got it, though I suspected he was faking that temporary courage. He didn’t say anything else for the rest of the trip.
There’d been no sign of Trax yet, then at one point, a grey fin popped out of the water and passed swiftly between our boats. “Oh, there he is.” Except the fin was far too big, and it’d kept going.
“That’s an actual shark.” Then Rade added for my hotlander benefit, “It’s shaped a bit like our dear Mr. Bloodtrail—facially at least—but a shark is merely a big dumb fish, bereft of hands, feet, or decorum.”
“Does it eat things like Trax does?”
“Oh, very much, yes. They’re voracious toothy bastards.”
Now I really didn’t want this stupid boat to flip.
Luckily, a short while later, another fin appeared, and this was accompanied by a mental greeting in the Squalo picture language.
“Hello, Carnavon. I have been observing as instructed. Now I am observing that human water transportation is cumbersome and inefficient. You should learn to swim.”
“That’s a great idea, buddy.”
“The humans who have settled the upper parts of my realm to harvest the element you know as Blue use spells to propel themselves at great speeds through the water and to breathe beneath it.”He even helpfully sent me an image of wizards far more powerful than any of us performing those great feats. “You should get better at magic and do that.”
I got the whole thing; everybody else got weird pictures, flashing letters, or a bit of a headache.
