The slumbering waters of the reef inhaled deeply, swelling with the rising moon. Dreams danced between floral blooms of bone and stone. The moon faded beyond the horizon, and the ocean released a breath of warm currents and plankton upward to the surface. Rise and fall, ebb and flow, the wine-dark sea watched and waited.

*Intrusion*

The hollow creaks and thuds of a wooden hull broke the serenity, sending fish scattering into coral abodes. The unnatural displacement of the surface of the water was a nuisance, like an unpleasant itch between the shoulder blades.

*Food?*

The crackles of straining wooden planks came from the hull of an unusually large ship. A merchant galleon much like the three others it had already collected down near its silty floor. The collection, which contained hundreds of boats, was one of the last things that still sparked joy. It was even through these same trophies that the living waters had come to know what the outside world called it. Blackwater Reef.

This ship would have made a fine addition… but the reef was not hungry today. Losing interest at the realization, the craft became little more than a nuisance. Batting at the rear of the vessel with frustrated currents, it cooled its heart until winds began to blow inward across its waves to push it along its path more speedily.

Blackwater returned its attention to the colorful skeletal forests of coral and fish, waiting for the disturbance to pass far enough that the bright little fish emerged once more. A few of the larger denizens remained, unable to easily hide in the minute nooks and crannies. A sleek, powerful looking tiger shark cruised along like a living harpoon. In the dim distance behind it, the many algae coated masts of the reef’s collection stood tall. And further still, the misty barrier that marked the boundary of Helheim. It reminded the reef of something… Something that once stood tall, in broad green clusters.

The shark twitched, instinctively snapping its sinuous form towards movement that the beast’s finite senses were more attenuated to than those of Blackwater itself. The massive predator dove downward and to the east, driving itself with an urgently beyond hunger. The Blackwater Reef knew better than to ignore this sign.

*incursion*

The fine grains of sand and oceanic detritus swirled inward as a sinkhole formed nearby. VERY nearby… Currents shifted, and the water pulsed with a soundless burst, all roads lead to the core as the myriad creatures of the reef swarmed inward. As the sinkhole disappeared into a murky, cloudy depth, the enemy arrived.

Wide, lidless eyes looked in both directions over noseless faces and impossibly huge mouths full of long, thin fangs. Webbed hands and feet allowed ungainly humanoid bodies to move with unexpected grace and precision. Heedless of the natural dangers, the deep ones charged en masse out of the briny film of the newly formed underwater lake. Most of the creatures nearby were too small to do more than obscure their vision, but the currents were quickly bringing more into the fray.

Sharks tore at their limbs, leaving black swirls of congealing blood. Barracudas struck at their eyes and bellies. Jets of ink fouled their aim. Armored claws snapped at their delicate flippers. The ocean writhed with bloody-minded ferocity! But the deep ones were quick, and far more clever than the simple beasts they faced. The first wave was pushed back to the sinkhole, but there, the Blackwater’s creatures lost the momentum.

A new term sprang to mind, drawn from memories ancient and faded.

Raid. This was a raid. The enemy had baited them out of position, and leaving the reef vulnerable to a greater force. With a voice of fury and thunder and vulcanism Blackwater Reef spoke.

“DRAUGAR…”

Already an undulating abomination was pulling its spear from the eye of a shark, shoving it out of the way and charging forward, towards the core. It dodged a desperate grab by an octopus, spiraling down to skim the sand with impressive speed. The shock and pain on the abomination’s fish-like face as a bloated, blackened hand punched out of the silt and grabbed it by the throat made the flood of seiðr that came from it all the sweeter.

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

If the beasts of the sea were a shield, here then was the ax. What had been a wild stampede swiftly evolved into a proper battle as the drowned occupants of those many ships ran along the ocean floor in great loping bounds. They grouped together, holding aloft moldering bucklers, green planks, and other barnacled fragments to form defensive shield walls around the enemy. Rusty blades stabbed at the deep ones from behind the shifting cover, pinning them down until the weapons began to break.

The undead lashed out with monstrous strength, bashing the intruders with their shield until those too crumbled away. The waters were thick with the shredded remains of the denizens of the great trench beyond the misty borders, but as the ancient and waterlogged equipment broke down the Draugar were left with nothing but their mortal remains to fend them off.

The Blackwater Reef reached upward, in a desperate bid for survival. The driving currents had drawn the galleon toward the core, while the unnatural chill of the waters pulled at the very winds. A dim memory, gray and distorted with age, floated to the surface. Another raid, spurred on past reason by the blessings of Þórr when his mighty hammer clashed in the sky above, taken for a portent of victory.

The waters nearest the blue agate core began to boil and swirl as the reef poured its all into a furious, whirling gale. Let the enemy know the might of Þórr! The Blackwater was the hammer now!

Booms of thunder and crashing waves sent the shimmering surface above into a chaotic frenzy. The dungeon knew that the gods had blessed the endeavor when the rush of magic flowed back inward as each life aboard the ship was extinguished. It reveled in the haze of battle, the sensation of flowing into the lungs of terrified sailors. It filled them. Claimed them. Changed them.

With a muffled crash, the currents drove the downed galleon toward the pit. Rent sails fluttered in the currents, dragging the behemoth along until the driving waters slammed the keel into the ocean floor. Like some mockery of its former self, the sunken vessel carved a path in the sand, wakes spiraling to either side to form great plumes of dust.

It slammed into the pit and folded in upon itself with the force, crushing enemies and blocking their egress. Then came the real threat as the freshly reanimated Draugar punched through the hull to wreak havoc upon the aquatic beings from beyond. No moldering husks with rusted blades these, this batch was fresh, vital, and strong. Those without weapons tore into the enemy with sheer bare fisted brutality. Blackwater exalted in the destruction as though it was its own personal Wild Hunt. It was the orchestrator of its very own Ragnarök. It was awake. He was ALIVE!

The crumpled remains of the deep ones sank to the floor, and the lesser fauna emerged from the forest of coral to feast upon them. Grinning and panting with exhilaration, the azure specter of Blackwater strode over to the new additions, sending his fresh guardians to man the hidden posts their predecessors had abdicated. He moved swiftly, for there wasn’t much time. Already he could feel the flush of lucidity leaking from the edges of his vision.

He walked up to the last Draugr, exhilaration slipping into a pale shadow of mild approval as he looked the muscular warrior over. The Draugr was tall, broad, with a crimson beard that drifted in the tide. Armed with ax and shield, he would make a fine guardian. The Blackwater Reef circled the man, noting the unfamiliar pattern to the shield he wore. Runes along one edge caught his eye.

“G…Gu…nnar’s… shield.”

That name… He had never seen this man before. Why was this name familiar? He struggled to bring forth some tattered scraps of the past, but only the sense of deep familiarity came to his call. The color was leeching slowly from the fringes of his world, and Blackwater Reef clung all the more desperately to that question.

Why was that name familiar? Why did he know that? Why did he remember… He fought against the winds of time, and the seeping fog of ages they pushed into the crystalline matrices of his mind to cloud his thoughts. WHY DID HE REMEMBER?! WHY DID… WHY?! Why…

“Why does it matter?” the dungeon asked, unsure of why it had been so driven just moments ago to pursue such a pointless thing. Wordlessly sending the Draugr off to its post, the spirit of the reef numbly noted the return to its preferred state of peace and quiet. The fog rolled in, blurring all within a sleepy haze once again. The ocean sighed with the passage of the moon over the horizon, tumbling once more into the dreams that swam between the floral blooms of bone and stone.

A fluttering scrap of memory swam from shape to shape, trying to make its way home, trying to reach the core. The shadow of paranoia, born of centuries of constant assault, snapped its jaws around the lesser dream. The last fleeting sliver of Gunnar Egilsson, now consumed by The Blackwater Reef…