Surrender to the Will of the Night - By Glen Cook Page 0,79

too fast for an old man not used to hard work. He thought they might be hunting him.

Not even sorcery availed him. These creatures were indifferent. Maybe they were immune, simply by always having lived inside the supernatural.

He expected no better luck with the denizens of the harbor. But in just minutes he felt a tug on his line so determined it was clear something down there was fishing for dinner, too. Februaren pulled. The thing pulled. The old man had more success. He glimpsed something like a miniature kraken. A squid. He had eaten squid all his life. Squid was popular throughout Firaldia. Too bad he had no olive oil or garlic.

This squid was miniature only by comparison to the krakens of nautical legend. It outweighed the Ninth Unknown. And had the reach on him, too. Its long tentacles were a dozen feet in length. It failed to take Februaren only because the old man had the better leverage.

The monster would not give up.

The Ninth Unknown was just as stubborn.

Tentacles slithered up over the edge of the quay. The monster began to lift itself out of the water. It turned, tried to reach over the rail of the hulk. Its eyes …

Startled, Februaren stared down at a face almost human, contorted in desperate effort. Those eyes were intelligent but mad with hunger.

It let go the quayside, hoping to topple Februaren with its weight. He did stumble but not enough to go over the rail. Just enough to see the tentacles reaching. Enough to see the water suddenly churn and give up three heads that looked almost human. Shoulders and torsos and weapons followed. Short harpoons in manlike hands plunged into the monster’s unguarded back.

Februaren surrendered his fishing gear. It was time. Time to get off the hulk, too. He watched the struggle as he went. The people of the sea were gaunt with starvation. They were weak. Though they were three and the monster one he knew they would get the worst of this. The kraken would feed.

He employed his last resources once he reached the quay, hitting the monster with a spell meant to paralyze. The spell would immobilize a human for hours. This kraken was not human. But its struggles did turn sluggish.

Februaren collapsed.

He went down with enough reason left to make sure he kept stumbling away from the water as he did.

* * *

Someone was singing. The voice was remote and eerie and the words were alien but the melody was familiar. It went with a love song sung first in the dialect of the western Connec a hundred years ago. Cloven Februaren recalled making love to the refrain out of the Khaurenesaine.

He smelled a powerfully fishy stench.

He lay where he had fallen, right cheek hard against cold, damp stone, palms burning from abrasions. He cracked the eyelid nearest the pavements. What he saw so startled him that he gave himself away.

Five feet away, seated cross-legged, facing him, was a young woman, singing while she worked. She wore nothing that had not been on her at the moment of her birth.

Had he the strength he would have turned away. She might be without modesty but he had his, even after all these years. But he was too weak to do more than flop and make noises even he did not understand.

The song faded into gurgling laughter.

The mer got onto her knees. Putting those together. She extended a hand with something in it. The fishy stench grew more powerful. “Eat!”

After struggling into a seated position, Februaren could see what the mer had been doing. Carving flesh from a tentacle.

He was much too hungry to worry about what that flesh used to be. Or how badly it smelled now.

His stomach would soon rebel. But sufficient to that moment the evil. He seized the food.

The girl said, “I have … been sent out … to watch. Our debt. Your spell saved … many lives.” Clearly, she was not accustomed to speaking a human language. But she did warm up quickly.

The little Cloven Februaren knew about the people of the sea he had learned from books. They could change shape and walk among men but only for a short while. Only in extraordinary circumstances would they put themselves through the pain necessary to gain legs. The change, in this case, had been perfectly mimetic. And the mer had deliberately revealed that.

She cautioned, “You don’t eat too much. Small bites. Chew, long times. Or get sick. When you get stronger, make