Seaborn

As it seemed like everything I’d tried to cobble together was falling apart, I wasn’t surprised when I heard Burdette saying just loud enough for me to hear him, “This is what happens when you listen to an elf!”

I didn’t have time for him. Maybe I shouldn’t have tried to run south. Maybe it was a mistake. Maybe heading east would have been better, or even not bothered with the feint to the west and just ran in that direction like there was a chance to save our souls there.

Or maybe we’d be dead if we’d tried going east. Maybe our feints really had bought us time. Maybe if I hadn’t made the decisions I had, we’d be dead already.

I knew I was in over my head since Jones told me navies would be hunting me. This force catching up to me just proved it.

If I tried turning north again, I’d turn straight into the embrace of two warships and a cutter, all of which were prepared for me. If I continued south, I’d crawl to the Emerald. Unable to submerge, the legendary ship would crush me. It had the highest ship level ever attained, 3 times my own level of 4. It was commanded by competent men, at least one of whom I knew would do anything to see his duty completed.

The Death’s Consort had never been a ship I loved, but now it felt like a confining liability. I briefly wondered if I abandoned her if I could make a clean getaway. Alright, I considered it for longer than a brief moment, but I couldn’t bring myself to abandon my crew just yet, however they might hate me. I had a responsibility for them: a duty to fulfill.

That duty meant I didn’t have the freedom to run. Was this how Jones changed into who he was today? One shift at a time, from noble responsibility to enslaving souls? Or had he never shared my outlook of what the sea meant?

“What are your orders, Captain?” Phillip asked me. He was burned and his armor was dented, but he was still standing. Myota and those he’d nabbed with medical skills were going through the wounded and dying. Lightning normally killed outright, stone shrapnel maimed, and fire could do both. A lot of my fighters that still lived lacked body parts they’d had minutes ago.

“See to the wounded. Spread any fighters across the ship; don’t lump them together again. We’ll try and do any more fighting with the ballista until we know where our fighting strength is at.”

“Aye, Captain.” He said, then hesitated. “Half of our fighters are dead. At least half.”

“Save whoever we can. We’ll fight another day.” Phillip left me, not saying the obvious thing: that we hadn’t made it out of the fight we were still in. That was true, but I meant it when I said I didn’t intend to have my fighters marshal again. The Spirit of Retribution had proven that the enemy was prepared to take us on there. They’d spent a fortune on those runes they’d used – nearly 100 runes in a matter of seconds! I couldn’t count on them being out of them, though. I wasn’t facing privateers who had to pinch pennies: these commanders would sink my ship and claim it justified all taxpayer funds they’d appropriated.

At the helm I turned to Burdette and gave my orders. “Continue on a southerly heading …”

“That’s madness!”

“DO AS I SAY!” I shouted in his face. It was all I could do not to reinforce my orders by holding a knife to his throat. “It’s the best option we have!”

“We should make for land,” he argued. “Beach on the island, fight them there – slip out to the ocean on foot maybe …”

“And the whole crew would be dead in a day.” I said. I wouldn’t be, but everyone else would. Maybe if the Consort was destroyed, they’d be linked to me instead, but I had no guarantee of that. “No, the Athair is keeping us from diving. But it has a range, we just need distance.”

“It’s proven that it can stay exactly as close to us as it wants!”

“I’ll take care of the Athair,” I snapped. “And the Spirit if she wants to play again. You make the best speed you can south, and cross your fingers that we get enough distance before meeting the Emerald.”

“You’ll take care of them?” Burdette said skeptically.

I stuffed my Captain’s hat in my spatial bag and spun on my heel. “I may suck when it comes to a fair fight, but I’ve still got tricks.” Thinking that seeing me go overboard would be bad for morale, I shouted “I’ll be back!” as I went over the side.

I went over the port side, where our enemies couldn’t see me disappear. Casting every speed buff I had and utilizing every swimming skill boost, I headed for the Athair. Ships could tank a lot of damage, but they were also incredibly fragile. Like when Sadeo had crippled our first cutter with an explosive bolt to the rudder, a small but tactically placed weapon could do a lot of damage. Particularly in waters where maneuverability was necessary to avoid reefs and shoals.

If I’d asked any of my crew to do this, they wouldn’t have had the capability, yet I didn’t even doubt my own ability to swim to a ship that was underway. It wasn’t like they were sailing with the wind, now were they?

I caught up to the Athair right as they tacked to stay in the navigable waters. I grabbed a few handholds among the barnacles to direct myself towards their stern. Their rudder was scraped free of barnacles, something they’d do more often than scraping the entire hull. Some kelp had somehow gotten stuck in it, though, and was dragging along behind. I had the strangest urge to clear it out, despite what I was here to do.

I waited. I was antsy, and every yard we sailed was distance that the Consort wouldn’t have to get away. Yet if this was to be done right, it had to be done when the Athair was making a turn.

They tacked again, and the rudder turned to redirect the ship. There would be men adjusting the sails up top, redirecting them to catch the wind as the ship’s angle changed. This was my moment.

I pulled a spear from my bag and let go, floating behind. I’d practiced throwing my harpoons a lot, and it was an easy matter for me to sink the point into the wood of the hull with the haft laying alongside the rudder in its turned position. Four more harpoons joined it along the rudder, totaling half of what I carried these days. Then I swam upwards to the top of the rudder where the control bar attached, relaying the input from the helm. Breaking the surface, I laid my hands on it to freeze it when the rudder tried moving back to amidship. It pressed against my spears and was stuck, causing surprised shouts from above.

The Athair continued to turn.

Thinking it wouldn’t be long before someone investigated, I ditched my freezing attempts. I wished there was a way to trap the spears, as I was sure someone would be diving down soon to check. Maybe … no, whoever came first would no doubt be a strong swimmer, so the only option that came to mind wouldn’t work.

I’d have to wait in ambush. As the Captain in charge of this very important vessel, Commander Darius wouldn’t be a fool. He’d suspect sabotage somehow, even if it wasn’t his first thought. But they were welcome to send the elites after me – the only time they’d managed to pin me down yet was when I was stuck on board a bloody carrack. I could get away from whomever they sent.

So I swam along the keel to about the middle of the ship, hooked onto some barnacles with the toes of my boots, and laid on my belly along the belly of the ship. The water running along the hull was constantly trying to pull me off, but I could handle it. I maneuvered my crossbow out of my bag – it was a cheaper one than I liked, but I’d had to get something with limbs that would fit through my bags’ opening. I loaded it and waited.

I was all set to remind myself to be patient, but I’d put a very attractive bait out – the ship was still turning, and if Commander Darius couldn’t un-foul the rudder, he’d be doing a 180 soon. I felt the ship slow as the Athair was forced to reduce speed while its divers went in. That was my warning.

Commander Darius knew better than to send me repairmen one at a time, or even to send a force from just one direction. Splashes from both sides of the ship, the bow and stern alerted me to what was happening. I didn’t move.

Two men sank into view on the port side, one on the starboard. They glanced over the hull but missed me, their focus on the stern. A swimmer drifted into view from the stern now, signaling all clear. One of the two on my right took that as a cue to surface for air – apparently not the best swimmer. The one on my left sighed in relief. That marked him as being able to breathe underwater. If Commander Darius had water breathing potions, he should have given them to his whole team. This one was using a spell – marking him as a water mage.

My bolt pierced his head.

I surrendered the crossbow to the depths – my training had shown me the reload time wasn’t worth it – and pushed away from the hull. A harpoon hit the remaining fighter right about where his liver should be; the stream of bubbles that escaped his mouth as he screamed indicated that he wasn’t going to be in the fight much longer. A blessed weapon fell glimmering from his hand, indicating exactly what his role had been.

The remaining fighter and the swimmer at the stern had yet to notice my attack.

I took the opportunity to look for the person who’d entered the water from the bow. I’d been showing him my heels, and had depended on the reactions of the other fighters to indicate whether he’d spotted me. My scan showed me that I wasn’t facing either a fighter or a mage, but a shapeshifter just finishing the change into an enormous saltwater crocodile.

Ohhh boy.

I darted towards the remaining fighter and saw him just as he saw his speared comrade. The man darted for the surface again, probably to warn the ship that there was a threat after all. I got him first. The blood in the water would be the only warning he’d give.

I wanted to finish off the last swimmer at the stern next since he was no doubt the one trying to remove my spears, but the shapeshifter hadn’t missed my attack on the second fighter and was coming for me with all the attacking power a 25 foot skilled shifter could bring to bear.

I’d fought normal-sized crocodiles before, though they weren’t shifters. I had an idea of what to expect. Still, the burst of speed the thing lunged 15 feet with had to be a special skill. I anchored myself to drop below it and still its teeth nearly caught me!

I threw a harpoon at it from below, but it got lucky as it twisted out of the way to find me, the harpoon glancing off its hide. It came at me again, though this time it didn’t use an ability-lunge. If it had, my trident would have gone into its gullet. Instead, the inside of its mouth got jabbed as it diverted. A normal creature would have continued on, circled around and attacked with its mouth again. This shapeshifter chose to slap me with a rough tail filled with 300 pounds of muscle.

Yes, I went tumbling. I lost 43 HP too.

Having a lot of experience reorienting myself underwater, I realized that we’d moved closer towards the stern and risked disengaging to take care of the last human. The man looked surprised to see me, having been focused on pulling out my second harpoon. That surprise let me grapple with him and turn him into a human shield against the crocodile right behind me. No sooner had the beast turned aside to spare the life of his shipmate then I began stitching the back of the swimmer with a dagger. -6 HP, -7 HP, -6 HP … You could place a lot of HP damage with a low-damage knife if you moved fast. Trainer Kane back in Tulisang would be proud of how fast I laid the damage on.

Actually, Kane would probably be rooting for the Athair in this fight.

My human shield soon became a meat shield, one I didn’t trust to stop the last beast I faced. I released him and pushed away from the rudder, which was now blocked by 3 harpoons, the swimmer having dislodged one and wiggled another loose.

The cooldown on the shifter’s lunge had expired, as it tried it once again. This time it was ready for my drop, though that didn’t help it as my trident was still poking at its mouth.

The Athair wasn’t turning any more because the water flow wasn’t being directed over it. The Athair was drifting. It was a risky thing to do when there were known reefs.

The crocodile circled me, probably baiting me to throw my trident. It could tank the damage if I did, then charge me. I waited. We were both running the clock: he was waiting for reinforcements from the ship, I was waiting for the Athair to run into a situation it couldn’t back out of.

No reinforcements came. I wondered if the strongest combatants had been placed on the other ships, as the Athair seemed to have been designated as a primarily support vessel. Maybe the fighters on board just couldn’t hack it underwater.

I did have magical means to supplant my martial abilities, even if my small repertoire of spells was further limited by their usefulness in this underwater engagement. I cast my favorite spell, half a dozen watery limbs forming around me, as the shifter charged again. I hadn’t relaxed my wariness and met it with the tines of my weapon, but this time it tried spinning. The tips of my trident were knocked away, but I still dodged its opening mouth. Its body hit mine, and my minor HP loss would have been the only thing of note in our exchange if not for one thing: I didn’t let go. The limbs from my developed water whip spell lashed around the beast, and even if they didn’t do much damage they let me hold on long enough to grab it with my normal limbs.

Channeling a spell I’d been waiting to try in combat, I electrocuted the shifter with shocking touch. At least, I tried to. It backfired. The spell turned into an area of effect rather than direct attack when underwater. Since I took reduced physical damage due to my curse, I thought I could absorb the damage and stun my opponent. It was the opposite. I didn’t quite electrocute myself – losing minimal HP for the attack – but it still nearly knocked me away from the shifter.

The crocodile, on the other hand, hardly seemed to notice. It’s naturally tough hide was probably augmented by some damage resistance skill.

So … what spells did I have in my arsenal that could deal with defenses like that. Nothing? Alright, martial skills it was.

Clinging to the crocodiles’ back with my watery arms, I stretched a hand into my bag and grabbed a rope. My skill with knots let me tie the line around the beast just under its arms before it rolled and somehow managed to smack me away with its tail again.

Fishguts, but that tail hurt!

Still, it was trailing a line now. I grabbed the line and hung on, prompting it to turn and lunge at me again, back where we’d started. If I failed a single dodge I’d be dead, but this shifter obviously wasn’t used to anyone being able to dodge him and didn’t have many other options.

After a few more exchanges, I had a series of loops knotted together. The shifter looked clearly hesitant as I was continuing to dodge as I prepared this, but he continued nevertheless. Kane said that a failure to adapt killed many experienced fighters. He’d also said that failing to master the basics did the same, but I was partial to the first saying.

When the crocodile lunged, I snagged one of the loops in its mouth. What followed was a wrestling match as I attempted to bind the creature. I failed – it was way too big and unwieldy – but I managed to tie its mouth closed. It seemed to understand that was the end. It stopped rolling and looked me in the eye. Then, in a grunting murmur in its throat, it spoke.

“You know when I’m gone they’ll just send more.”

“Really? I replied, my voice surprising it even more than its had surprised me. “Who’re they going to send after you?”

When I pulled out a dagger the shifter tried rolling to throw me again, and when that failed it tried to streak away from the ship, hoping I’d let it go to stay behind. I didn’t. If the shifter changed back into a human it would be free of my knots and able to hunt me, and I didn’t fancy giving it the chance. My dagger found its eye, convincing the massive creature to thrash more, even if my strike was hardly lethal. Still, fear of being blinded in its other eye motivated it to shift back into human form to grapple with me. It was a mistake. While he still had an impressive health pool as a human, his skin wasn’t the tough hide armor anymore.

As I noted how much XP I’d gained from him, I heard a sound echoing through the water that brought a feral grin to my face. Sure enough, the Athair had run aground. It wasn’t as damaging as breaking her keel open on a reef would be, but it served my purposes just fine. The Consort had a chance to escape.

Catching up to my ship again cost me a lot of stamina, forcing me to take one of the old potions in my bag. The green colored vial was bracing, living up to its purpose even if it tasted worse than the old syrupy red ones had.

My return wasn’t triumphant or celebratory, but a matter of fact. The men dropped me a ladder and I returned to the helm for a report.

Burdette glanced at the Athair as it dropped further behind us. The Spirit of Retribution and the remaining cutter were no longer keeping their distance, instead trying to close with us.

“Not bad,” my mate said. “Bloody impressive for one man. But whatever you did, I don’t imagine you’ll pull it off twice, will you?”

“Not likely,” I agreed. If I hadn’t gotten the drop on the team below the Athair, I’d have had to flee. The other ships would no doubt be preparing countermeasures for me too, now. “But if we can get far enough away from the Athair, we can dive.”

“We’re coming up on the point we were forced to surface this morning,” Burdette said. “I hope you’re right about that distance thing.” He nodded towards the last ship standing in our way, waiting for us like she’d known the whole time we’d be back. The Emerald.

The vessel Athair has restricted your ship’s ability to dive! You are unable to alter the depth of your ship.

Trying just brought me the same message, but the ship had to have a maximum range. We just had to find it before getting crushed by the monstrosity that was even now moving to intercept us.

Come on, come on!

The vessel Athair has restricted your ship’s ability to dive! You are unable to alter the depth of your ship.

Sadeo came up to the helm to speak with me. “Hey Dom. You’re looking wet, as usual. Listen, I know what I said about grand battles, but I just want to make sure you’re not heading towards that big ugly thing up there on my account.”

“No, we’re running and it just happens to be in the way.”

“Oh, okay, good. Because if you were I’d want you to know that there is no conceivable way where I can cripple, slow, or even irritate that thing before it turns this ship into mulch, gartin?”

“Gar … gartin?”

The kitsune shook in annoyance. “Sorry, been awhile since I slipped languages. I mean, you understand?”

“Yeah, I hear you buddy. Still, take whatever pot shots you can. Might mean some decent experience if your gunners get lucky.”

He shook his head. “They’d have to get really lucky against that hull. It’s tough even for me. But sure, you’re the boss. They’re your munitions.”

As Sadeo left, I turned to Burdette and quietly asked “What’s the casualty list?”

“We had some more bleed out on the ship because of that effect before Myota could stabilize them. 104 dead in that last engagement.”

I reeled even as I forced myself to look at the bodies stacked like logs wearing bloodstained rags and shredded armor, though the deck had drank any pooling blood. 104! Out of 140 fighters that we’d marshalled – the 140 on board who had any combat abilities – three quarters had been slaughtered in the one engagement we’d attempted. Minus the people we’d lost earlier as well, and the deserters … the overcrowded former slave ship wasn’t overcrowded anymore.

Not to mention the fact that those left wouldn’t be able to fight.

“Injured?” I asked.

“23; honestly that’s pretty low. Probably because those with survivable injuries bled out before they could recover.”

I glared at him. Maybe he was justified in his comments, but I didn’t want to hear them right now.

“Damage report?” I prompted.

“The attacks were aimed at killing people, there’s only superficial damage.” He gestured at the three holes in our decks from the first attack we’d suffered. “Still have those things though.”

“We can get away with damage like that and repair later.”

“Yeah, I’m still waiting on the part where we get away.”

The vessel Athair has restricted your ship’s ability to dive! You are unable to alter the depth of your ship.

Too bad I couldn’t have submerged right then just to make a point to him.

“How long do you think before the Emerald intersects us?”

“Hour and a half? That’s until they’re in firing range, anyway.”

I glanced back at the stranded Athair behind us. It would be enough. It had to be.

It nearly wasn’t.

As the Emerald was starting to fire ranging shots, I was constantly attempting to dive, disrupted by the consistent message that the Athair was still strangling us. Until suddenly, rather than get a message, the ship began to flood.

We were free! And in waters that could hide us!

I shouted some choice invectives at our pursuers as the waves washed over our decks. Shortly thereafter, our strange flag was waving goodbye to those who’d tried to trap us.

It was still a race, as the ships could still follow us until late tonight, but we were out of the jaws of the trap. We just needed to stay away from the Athair’s magic until we could truly vanish. The rest of our pursuers were welcome to come down and meet us on our terms! Well, they certainly wouldn’t be welcome, the gaping holes in my ship were indicators they hadn’t used the last of their resources.

The mood amongst my crew was far from joyous, but there was relief from the tension. Like men who’d been holding their breath for longer than they thought they could as they clawed for the surface, now they felt like they’d breached the waves and took a collective breath. For many, this was the cue to fall to their seat and weep over the import of it all; the loss of the mates who’d stood up to fight.

The palpable relief made me paranoid. I altered the ships course, which was the reason the giant harpoon speared just under the gunwale and out the side of the ship rather than smack in our middle. Unfortunately, it still killed one of my men – obliterated half his chest and left his arm hanging from his corpse by skin.

Before the crew had let down their guard, they would have shrugged off this as just another attack to be dealt with. Now they were shocked into inaction as the tension on the harpoon’s line grew taut, the barbs dug into wood and the speed of the ship slowed.

I growled and tried to push the ship deeper. It fought against our restraint, but couldn’t overcome it. We were like a hooked fish on a line.

If their thought was to pull us to the surface though, they must realize they’d aimed for a bigger fish than they could handle. The line from the harpoon to the surface behind us – the Emerald, slowly but inexorably coming on – was tight enough to hum, but not pull us up.

We’d be easy prey for any follow up shots or for the other ships to catch up while the Emerald dragged us. “Cut that line!” I yelled. Men jumped at my command, pulling out belt knives and grabbing axes or weapons from the fallen fighters. Joash threw out a warning to the others about the dangers of cutting a line under such tension, but the risks of leaving it a second more were even greater. An axe struck … and rebounded. More blades rose and fell, someone even grabbed a saw.

“It’s enchanted!” Joash yelled up to me as the line and harpoon rebuffed every attempt.

Before I had time to think on how to fix this problem, someone shouted “incoming!”

I expected to see more harpoons, but instead I saw people crawling along the enchanted line. Except ‘people’ wasn’t quite the right term.

Different cultures had different opinions about necromancers. In Antarus, anyone who’d wanted to practice necromancy had to get approval from at least a lord, and then had to register any animated beings they created. They weren’t looked down upon as much as they were in Oorkom, but still appeared harsh when compared to the Broken Isles, where it wasn’t uncommon to see a mage and his zombies walking around the street. He might have to get permission from the family of the departed (or the city in case of no family contacts) but the practice itself was considered very productive as these thralls could do many jobs no one else wanted to do.

For instance, undead beings didn’t have stamina thresholds, and didn’t need to breathe. That wasn’t enough to make them fearsome warriors as there were a number of limitations, including a level cap on the thralls comparatively lower than the one animating them. A necromancer had to level a lot in order to raise thralls with any decent combat potential, and such individuals didn’t escape notice.

It seemed like one such person had been recruited, though, and was sitting on the Emerald. I could imagine it now – the most experienced fighters placed on the rapid ships, and the slow, nearly invulnerable Emerald instead stocked up full of as many thralls as their mercenary could manage.

I’d proven we were capable of fighting back. Rather than send valuable high-level fighters, my enemies were giving me high-level fodder. Fodder which – given the numbers crawling down the line – could easily overwhelm my crew of mostly non-fighters.

“Burdette, the helm.” I shouted as I ran to where the harpoon was stuck. “Fighters rally on me! On me!”

I reached into my bag for a crossbow only to remember that I’d lost it in my last fight. I kept a wide variety of weapons and gear in my bag, but I didn’t have endless spares. I pulled out one of my few remaining harpoons even as I shouted for archers to target their heads, and for someone to find me a bow.

Undead came in different varieties. Animated skeletons required more effort to raise on the part of the necromancer, so corpses were preferred. The reason was that zombies needed less magic to operate, as their own system was still borderline-functional. Strikes to the spine would debilitate, and taking out the head would kill, no matter the health pool. Of course, that could be said of just about anybody.

If I’d had my full fighting force, the ranged attackers could have whittled the undead down before they reached the ship, and the ones that made it could have been quickly dismembered. The thralls weren’t intelligent enough to adapt and try something else on their own.

Unfortunately, the few people I did have returning fire weren’t enough to stem the tide.

I lost the use of my trident after spearing it through the skull of one well-armored thrall, then couldn’t remove it. I was forced to give up my efforts as another one crowded in on me. I drew my sword, and hacked into the thrall’s head. It wasn’t enough, and I let go of my sword to dodge a swipe before leaping back in to wrench my sword free and hack again, a large chunk of skull and gray matter drifting down as the strings that held the construct together were cut.

Using spells was of limited use. I could push or pull water to throw an enemy off balance, and I could restrain some with water whip, but nothing I could do would debilitate so many.

The zombies established a foothold on the deck, and I saw no way to rebuff them once they established themselves. Desperate, I swung with abandon, targeting faces and skulls. Some were helmeted, and I had to try and decapitate those. Despite all my speed buffs and advantages underwater, I still took damage.

The zombies seemed to have waves of ten or so – the first would be nearly suicidal in their attempts to cause harm, the last fought conservatively, trying to hold ground. It made sense, given that their controller didn’t likely have any details on the battle. Take out enemies, then hold the ground for more troops to come and repeat the cycle of overwhelming force.

I misjudged one of these enemies by their armored bulk – something most ‘defenders’ wore. It surprised me by crouching and springing forward in a flying tackle. Zombies had no buoyancy whatsoever, and with the weight of the armor it was wearing on top of that, I was pinned.

It held my arms securely and tried to hit me with the only weapon it had left – a bite. Thankfully it wasn’t able to realize that it couldn’t gnaw into me through its helmet, and we remained at an impasse.

Crying for help never looked good, so I moderated my pleas with as much vitriolic swearing I could at the dead thing keeping me pinned. A sailor with an axe came to my rescue. I had just enough time to say “no!” as he wound up his strike before he followed through like he was chopping wood, the axe banging on the thrall’s helmeted head.

Which in turn smashed into me. Ouch!

“The arms!” I shouted – or at least groaned. “Take one of its arms off!”

The sailor had too much adrenaline to be abashed, but at least he dismembered the creature quickly. Once no longer pinned, my own fighting skills finished it off.

There were now at least 30 zombies on my ship, and no end in sight.

I tried to wade into the fray again like a hero, driving the creatures over the side. Instead I lost my sword after a solid swing split a skull in two – and the falling corpse put a bind on the blade and jerked t free of my hand. I tried to retrieve it but was driven back by the press of bodies.

I remembered a time when I never seemed to have a weapon when I needed one. I’d sworn to remedy that, and my bag of holding went a long way to helping me do that. Yet somehow, I’d gone through the entire arsenal I kept in there. My sword, trident, harpoons, ranged weapons … all gone. Now I only had the knives I carried in my bandolier or hidden on my body – many of which were also missing.

The ones that remained found the zombie’s eyes for critical strikes on the brain, or failing that were shoved through the ear into the skull. Trying to whittle down the health of any of these creatures was a fool’s game. They were all leveled in the 20’s with health pools capable of tanking a lot of damage if there wasn’t a critical hit.

The moment came when I had no more of my own blades, and picked up a fallen weapon from the deck. Then the moment came when there were none of those at hand.

It caught me off guard, even as I saw another suicidal zombie crouching to spring at me – this one with an exposed mouth full of teeth. I reached into my bag for something, and whether it was chance or my wayward thoughts on using rope to lash the gnashing mouth of the shapeshifter closed earlier, I found a line in my hands again.

As the zombie sprang, I managed to interpose that rope between me and its mouth. As it tried to gnaw on me anyway, the flesh of its cheeks gave way and the rope was shoved further into its mouth, its jaw nearly unhinged. It didn’t notice.

My hands were free, even though the weight of it bore me down. I grabbed its matted hair with one and its working jaw with the other and snapped its neck – or at least I tried. It didn’t work, though I inflicted some HP damage.

Kane would have been disappointed.

It didn’t grow wise to what I was doing, though, and I managed to break its neck on my third try. Its mouth kept working, but it’s body was crippled. It was now no more than a head that had 300 HP – which was still more than me.

I rolled it away only to be forced to scramble back as more came. My crew weren’t holding. They weren’t able to face this. I nearly shouted to rally on me again, but I was hardly in a position to set a rallying point.

As the nearest zombie grabbed at me, I used the rope still trailing from my bag to loop around its arm. Then I ducked away and pulled. It tripped, and I stomped on its head, but I didn’t do more than a few HP of damage. I retreated again, trying to think of how else to use my strategy.

I retreated against the stack of bodies – my slain crew.

Whatever perk or stat it was that introduced the idea in my head, I was grateful; even if I knew I wouldn’t be forgiven for it.

I tied my line to one of the bodies then threw the body over the side.

The thrall I’d first tied my line to was jerked across the deck, slid into the gunwale, swung its arms wildly for a moment and then was pulled over the side. Zombies were heavy, and they couldn’t swim. They wouldn’t die by being drowned, but that didn’t matter. We just needed to leave them behind.

I shouted orders. Not many crew were willing or able to stand toe-to-toe and bash skulls, but all of my sailors could handle line. If they balked at using the corpses of their comrades as deadweight, it was only a little more resentment to add to the tally they felt they owed me.

“Captain!” Phillip said, making his way to me. I was grateful he still lived. “This will clear the deck, but we still have more coming!”

“Then we’ll hack the side of the ship apart if we have to pull the harpoon out!”

He nodded, then dodged a scrambling zombie as it was jerked past over the side.

Over a hundred bodies were stacked on the main deck. By the time we cleared the deck of thralls the only remains left were those that had been too dismembered to be useful. When forced to adapt again a daring swimmer had swum alongside the Consort, lassoed a thrall, then anchored himself to the sea floor, using his own weight to drag the zombie over. He cut the line above the noose and swam back to repeat it. Soon everyone was doing that, leaving a trail of undead along the sea floor behind us.

We finally hacked the ship open enough to pull the harpoon free, and immediately I began diving – having been unable to take advantage of the deeper water while hooked.

I found my trident buried under a pile of bodies, still stuck in a zombie head. I used a nearby axe to hack the head off, and wearily carried it to the quarterdeck.

“Set a course for the deepest water around,” I told Burdette as I sank to my rear right there on the quarterdeck, working to free one of the last personal weapons I had from gore. “If they try something else before they lose us tonight, I want us to be deep enough they have to deal with the ocean crushing their HP before they even board us.”