Joe observed a colossal wave cresting over the Haven’s roof with more than a little consternation. This massive crest looked like a dozen that had already passed by, having been deflected by the vessel’s [Storm Shield], which shunted the surge of seawater around either side of the living hull. Even so, Joe found himself wincing as the avalanche of seawater fell onto his arcane shielding.
The Storm Wardens had not held back on their promise of a serious storm to break the heat.
Despite the stability enchantments woven into Joe’s new home, these mammoth sea swells were still able to shake the reinforced houseboat more than he had expected. Joe and his roommate were in a frenzy, dashing around to secure all the loose objects they had left out. Over the summer, Joe and Yuk had grown complacent, and now they were paying the price. The ship had coasted through every squall before this one without a twitch. Now the two of them were in a frantic race to catch all the items rolling off shelves and counters.
Tezeno, who had become a full-time guest over the last few weeks, had no such difficulty even though the man had brought a considerable amount of gear with him. Joe just assumed it was physically impossible for the order-obsessed defender to ever leave anything out of place. While Joe and the living swarm were chasing after their belongings, Tez had nothing needing to be locked down, all his belongings were properly stowed, as always. At least this allowed him time to help Yuk make sure all their Margen-themed decorations were fully affixed to the walls.
Hah’roo was aboard as well. She was here to help Joe with his current project, which was on hold until the Haven was battened down. Of course, she was not about to pursue any of the loose fruit or rolling baubles. That was a lesson Joe needed to learn on his own. She was standing on deck in the fury of the storm, arms thrown wide screaming joyfully back at the howling winds. Maru had convinced Finn to place one of his mighty clawed feet on the trailing end of Hah’roos rope-dart, in hopes it would prevent her from being hurled into the storm should a blast of wind somehow bypass the ship’s wards.
When the last stray shoe was tossed into his foot locker, Joe sighed and headed back to the main room of the houseboat. After he flopped onto one of the couches, Bayu and Ranu jumped up next to him and settled in, their spectral bodies barely denting the cushions. From what Joe was getting through [Parasitic Connection] and his enhanced hearing, it sounded like Yuk and Tez were wrapping things up in Yuk’s room.
Joe had a heavy towel and light robe with him in preparation. Sure enough, a few minutes later, the galeling ducked out of the monsoon and shook herself in the doorway. She was soaked from head to toe and clearly loved it. Before she could shuck off her wet clothes, Joe pelted her with the bundle of cloth.
“Your turn for a lesson, Hah’roo. Remember, no dropping trow in public.”
“We are in the sanctity of your abode, far from shore, in the middle of a squall,” the white-skinned woman scoffed as she dried her blue hair. “This is far from public.”
“Tezeno is here.”
“He hardly qualifies as a guest any longer, Joe.” Her wet clothes were coming off, to be hung by the door, but the huntress was attempting to remain somewhat modestly covered. “Besides, he has seen me unclothed many a time already.”
“And you make him blush every time you do it,” Joe shot back, putting his feet up on the low coffee table. “It’s harder to tell now with how bronzed he’s gotten over the summer, but it's still noticeable if you look for it.”
“Fine. I still think it is a ridiculous custom,” she huffed, sliding on the robe. “Clothing is meant for warmth and protection. I cannot imagine what idiot decided it needed to be a barrier against witnessing one another’s bodies.”
“I don’t make rules, I just follow …”
“You follow only as many rules as you absolutely have to, Joe,” a dour-sounding voice interjected. Even though the tone suggested it, Tezeno was not angry with Joe in any way. It was just the manner in which he spoke; archons in general had hard monotone voices.
Yuk flowed along the ceiling over the justiciar's head. “We agree with Hah’roo. You guys are way too obsessed with your bodies and how you are clothed.”
“Your viewpoint is pretty far off the norm, bud,” Joe rebutted. “The demographic of discorporated ragamuffins is an extremely small group.”
A few overly exaggerated psychic sniffles were projected telepathically, as everyone settled around Joe.
“Alright,” he started. “We can now get back on track. So, as I was trying to say before everything started falling off the shelves, I have been trying to find a starting point to remove the curse from Finn’s pack of akhluts. I think they could be a great ally to Fort Coral if they were not constantly being tormented by their endless hunger.”
Joe looked at the rhino-sized four-legged orca, plonked across the Haven’s deck. The black and white beast was completely oblivious to the pouring rain and sea spray. Finn was staying close because Joe had asked him to, but Joe could feel the big guy wanted to go playing in the swollen waves.
“By becoming my companion,” he continued, “the curse’s drive on him has been diminished, but it is still there, always nagging at the poor dude. It’s worse for the other akhluts. Even if the sea-chimeras just want to go their own way, we still should help them. They are being tortured by the curse.”
“You know you have my help. Even if you were not a zephyr, Joe, I find this malediction foul,” Hah’roo hissed.
“So what did you find in the library, Joe?” the archon asked as he took a seat across from Joe.
“So the quest is named the Curse of Tarkik. I found out who Tarkik is. Or maybe was. He was a priest of a being called Roubedosq,” Joe stated as he grabbed his notebook from where he had wedged it between the cushions. “Roubedosq is sort of like a god but not as powerful as the gods. It is worshiped by a bunch of amphibious races here in the Hornwood.”
“A yaksha,” Tezeno supplied. “Yaksha is the term we use for beings that are not fully gods but are still fed by worship and will bequeath power to their followers.”
“Thanks. The book called them ‘Idonics’ which sounded weird to me. I like yakshas better. Either way it sounded like Tarkik was or is one of Roubedosq’s head priests. His tribe, the Ghugg Beddoz, was made up of shellycoats and grindylow hags. I’ve tried to find out where they live, but that is where I keep hitting a dead-end. No one seems to know. Even the diviners I asked say the location is hidden from them. The only thing they were able to say for sure is that it’s located someplace on the coast of Hornwood.”
“That is not much to go on Joe. There are thousands of miles of coastline between the Baerrok Peaks, around the point, and down to the Voiceless Dunes,” Tez stated.
“I know.” Joe had tried to put the region of Hornwood into perspective and worked out it was about the size of Spain and Portugal combined. The biggest difference was that Hornwood looked like its name depicted, a horn that pointed to the northeast instead of the southern-hanging ox-hide shape of the Iberian Peninsula.
Fort Coral was in the middle of the eastern coast. Further south, on the edge of the Voiceless Dunes, was the trading metropolis of Al Russut. On the very point of the horn was the pirate city of Defiance. The last heavily populated community on the peninsula was just across the channel from Peregrin Bay, Wilderoost. That frontier port was once a province of Duskrug, but it declared its independence from the kingdom around forty years ago and since has grown to rival Fort Coral in size.
Besides these four cities were countless small hamlets and villages along the roughly three thousand miles of coastline. As far as Joe’s research had revealed, any one of them could be where Tarkik hailed from.
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“So Hah’roo,” Joe stated looking to the woman beside him. “As the only bounty hunter I know, how would I track down someone when I have almost no idea where to start?”
“Well the fact you have a quest is a very good place to start. I have a scroll of [Watcher’s Word] which will enhance the voice of the One Above. Paired with some other form of divination you should be able to bypass the divination obscurement that is hiding the tribe. I can weave you a [Lattice-knot Compass] but I would need to add some expensive gems to make it last. [Psychometry] is alway great if you have something belonging to your target, which you do.”
“I do?” Joe stammered. "What?”
The rope-dancer pointed over her shoulder to the storm-washed deck beyond the reinforced glass windows. Her gesture must have been noticeable enough; Finn lifted his huge head to look toward the group. “The Curse of Tarkik resides right there. Let us use it to find its maker.”
“That will work? Perfect. I just need to get a scroll then.”
“No need,” Hah’rro stated reaching toward her belt pouches. "One of the things filomancy is best at is divination. Not the foretelling kind, like [Prophesy] or [Augury]. But knot-magic excels at finding the connecting thread between things. I use [Psychometry] in almost every hunt I undertake. Give me just a minute and I’ll have one for you.”
“Is that how you found me in Heron’s Reef?” Joe asked, watching her white fingers flicker and spin the cord into a stream of bindings.
“No. You are frustratingly divination-proof, Joe. Thankfully the small man helping you was not much of a criminal mastermind. He put you on the very first ship departing the city which was accepting passengers. It was a fairly easy guess as to where you might be. Once I had the likely vessel, all I needed to do was cast a quick [Augury] to see if boarding the Tide Dancer would help me get paid. As I was not trying to divine on you directly, I got my answer and you were on my hook.”
“Clever,” Tezeno remarked, giving an impressed nod of his chin.
The knotwork streaming down from the galeling’s hands was nothing like the charms Joe had seen her make before. Instead of something that would eventually be tied into a bracelet, this construction looked more like a patterned net. A minute later she tied off the last knot and held up the star-shaped lattice, with a wide grin, that look one gets when they’ve accomplished a task well.
“Done. Between this, your quest, and a casting of [Watcher’s Word], we should be able to find where to start our hunt.”
An idea occurred to Joe. While they were rising to their feet Joe reached out to the first being he met in Illuminaria. Careful to keep his thoughts away from his connection to Yuk, he projected “Hey Hawking? Do I need the [Watcher’s Word] scroll? You and I talk all the time without it.”
True, but you know the rules. I cannot answer questions outside the scope of basic world knowledge and our interpersonal interactions. The knowledge you seek clearly falls outside those parameters. The spell [Watcher’s Word] will create an exception to the limitations of our exchanges allowing me to exert my influence over your divination.
Still, even without the spell yet in place, I can warn you of one of the perils of the [Psychometry] spell. The spell connects you directly to the target of the inquiry. In most cases this is harmless but to use [Psychometry] to access information about beings who function on a significantly higher level of existence than your own might result in feedback that could damage your pattern.
“Wait, what? This spell could damage my soul?”
If you choose to use that terminology to describe your pattern, then yes.
“Then why the heck do people use the spell? Psychometry sounded like a spell folks use all the time.”
It is only perilous if one uses it to try and delve into the facts about a being far greater than oneself. I just wanted to warn you not to try and use the spell to directly seek information about the Gods and their avatars, the Scions of Hell, the Queens of the Fey, and other such superior entities. These are beings of power magnitudes greater than yourself.
“What about this Tarkik guy? Is he way out of my league?”
Now you are fishing, Joe.
“It was worth a shot, right?”
You may keep telling yourself that if it makes you happy.
Knowing Hawking’s dismissal, he focused on the group around him. Tezeno had an environmental protective aura but Hah’roo was reluctant to utilize it. While they would not be buffeted by the storm, any warding barriers might dilute the divination. Instead it was decided that Yuk would keep most of himself inside while Tezeno would brace Joe. Hah’roo would be on hand in case Joe needed any help with the magic.
Joe had far more raw magic power than the galeling ranger, but power and finesse were not the same thing. Some spells require one, or the other, or both. [Psychometry] Joe would be fine with; more mojo was better. Integrating [Watcher’s Word] would normally require a diviner's expertise, but as soon as Joe began the spell, he felt Hawking take the wheel and finish it without any effort.
For the first time, except for the illusion from his dream, Joe could almost see Hawking. The mysterious being was not contained by a body or specific entity in any way or form. He was light. Hawking was inside everything, Hah’roo, Finn, Tezeno, the Haven, the ocean, the rain … everything. All of it was filled with inner flickering fractal sparks, similar to the motes in the Mark of Death but a thousand times more complex. Joe finally understood the name of this world. Hawking was part of everything and Hawking was illumination. The world of Illuminaria was bound together by the countless luminous filaments of the One Above.
You haven't even begun [Psychometry] and already you are delving too deeply into powers far beyond your ken. Cast the spell, Joe, and stop trying to peek behind the curtain.
“I … you … I didn’t do this. It just happened.”
SPELL, Joe.
Joe laid his hands on Finn’s scintillating skin and activated Hah’roo’s knotted divination. In his head, he had firmly fixed the words “the Curse of Tarkik.” When the spell connected, a floodgate opened, and Joe was bombarded with imagery.
He saw the ocean to the north and the thousands of channels that wove among the trees, a great bayou of green water and hanging vegetation. The croaking people were hunting the boggy delta, their coats of shells flashing in the sunlight. They could not stop their hunt for kelpie and dobarcu, even the dread catoblepas. They had to bring back food for Roubedosq, who gave them power and summoned the beast to be hunted. Without the Great One they would have no power to hunt and no abundant game to be hunted. This was the cycle of the bayou. Everything for Roubedosq, so that Roubedosq could bring more.
The vision faded as quickly as it came, but Joe knew exactly where land the shown to him was. He had been pouring over maps of the Hornwood for weeks. In the middle of the long northern coastline was the Otter Slough, a swampy delta where the Washwanoch River met the ocean. The Washwanoch was one of the biggest rivers in the region, flowing through the Hartwald, the great forest where Earcellwen and her elven ally, Naenaeon, came from.
“It worked.” Joe thought to his two mental companions, not ready to try to shout over the rumbling ocean, splattering rain, and crashing thunder.
“Sweet,” Yuk replied, using another expression he had picked up from Joe. The swarmling was unaware Joe was talking to more than one entity at that moment.
The outcome was not in doubt, Joe. You likely did not need the impetus provided by [Watcher’s Word].
As Hawking’s presence vanished from Joe’s awareness, an odd speculation flickered through his head. Hawking had known the extra spell was not needed but he wanted Joe to use the enhancement anyway.
While Joe was not confident which of these ideas was correct, he was certain one of them was; either Hawking had just performed an experiment on Joe or the mysterious entity had just wanted to be seen.
Joe was snapped out of his reverie of Hawking’s strange revelation by a sudden burst of movement from Tezeno. Sensing some sort of peril, the sentinel had bound out of his chair, summoning a heavy silver shield onto his arm. The guardian was glaring at the oncoming waves out the window. The group mirrored Tez, leaping up and whirling around to see what had spooked the defender. Their reaction must have transmitted to Finn outside. The big brute also surged to his clawed feet and roared a challenge.
Joe scanned the marching swells and spotted what had triggered the guardian’s danger sense. A massive dark shape was plowing through cresting waves. Orangey bronze scales coated a long sinuous tail, which was driving what looked like a mix between a sea serpent and a maned beast straight at the Haven. The huge maw that bellowed back at the akhlut could easily swallow Joe whole.
“Ah crap,” Joe groaned. He had heard dozens of sea-lions stories since he had come to Fort Coral. None of them sounded good for the men under attack or the ship they were on.