“The Deep Ones aren’t known for playing nice with anyone, let alone Fey females. Checking to see if there’s a known Waterbound presence up here...” Off in Heavenbound Hall, records were quickly accessed, even as there was a lot of transcribing being done for the preparation to go to a non-electrical tech level. “None. Which doesn’t mean they aren’t there.”
The Waterbound were a diverse bunch, scattered between those that were truly Wavebound, and those bound to Oceans, Seas, Lakes, and Rivers. Indeed, they ranged from some of the weakest Place Spirits all the way up to the massive Oceans, and then the true Elemental Pact beyond those.
There were a LOT of Warlocks around with Water-based Pacts.
“A convenient source of watery-corpses for making Briny undead,” Legion observed fatalistically. The Illuminati already had a transfer point nearby. There was no reason they would not introduce some corruption for power into the local human population that they could take advantage of.
“No doubt they simply call the missing ‘the price of the sea’, never imagining that is precisely what it is,” Traveler spat.
“And justify it to themselves by pointing out their homes don’t get attacked from the sea,” Legion nodded immediately, gritting their teeth. They were totally experts at justification for murder, and sighed. “More idiots...”
“I’ve a lot of ground to cover, and there’s time. Waterjump to me when you are free. I’ll have even more work for you!”
Legion nodded in resignation, pushing away, and floated in the air for a moment before plunging into the cold waters of the North Sea.
They didn’t have the range of a true Caster, but unlike most such, they could Waterjump repeatedly, and with their relationship with the Elements, had no need for a Lived-Line for accuracy, although having one did extend their range.
Ninety miles was within that range. The power of Water swirled around them, and escorted them east.
--------
They rose from the water outside a narrow gorge in the grey rocks of the Norse coast. Attempting to negotiate the passage there with anything larger than a rowboat would have been suicide, and on a rowboat still probably suicide.
Flying, not so much an issue.
Their Astral Ward cloaked them from the Grantors sensing a Water Pact, although they doubtless had servants in the waters to alert them to any trespassers. Even from far in the distance, Traveler’s Commune clearly indicated there were magical beasts of size in the waters nearby of more than animal intelligence, probably able to take on whales or orcas. Sea serpents or giant eels, probably, warned to stay away from humans for fear of discovery.
One of them was in the waters beyond here.
There was no Stillflight field. From an Elemental perspective, that was an Earth power, and so creatures of Water would not have it. Pact-born flying powers wouldn’t work underwater, unlike magical spells, so it wasn’t much of an issue for Waterbound, who would simply retreat into its depths.
Invisible, they stood on the air with Angel Walk and surveyed the place beyond.
Hazy sunlight spilled down from the narrow top of the gorge, illuminating the dispersed force of the waves on the waters here, which were much deeper than they appeared, and went back further in, forming a grotto out of easy view of anything silly enough to climb to the top of those rocks, its waters in ceaseless, quiet motion.
Two bathing rocks were out there in the light, and they saw two of the Grantors there.
Sirines...
The legendary tempters of sailors were far from restricted to the Mediterranean, and indeed, with the triton presence there, were quite rare. They deigned to take the form of beautiful humanoids, somewhere between elves, fey, and humans, and their hypnotic songs were on a par with those of harpies, with rather more magical power in the water.
The grotto went much farther back, and was illuminated in the distance by witchlights or similar things. So, they had two to deal with.
Opening the Eyes of Heaven to take a good Look at the two naked Fey sunbathing in the faint light made them forcibly relax to stop from clenching their hands too hard.
Black, turgid and fickle, with that cloying distance of a manipulator who had others do their killing for them, as if using the hands of others absolved them of the sin.
Yes, they knew that mindset quite well...
The problem was that killing them both would instantly alert the other three, as would moving them, as the sirines could all sense the presence of one another without trying. There was a Pact Grantor here who had shared that Granting authority with her subordinates to a lesser degree.
However, there was one bit of good news, in that the creature in the water down there was a minion of the further of the two sunbathers, and so wouldn’t be alerting anything further in.
Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.
They looked down and into the water, focusing past the wave-action and swirls of debris, to see what was down there.
It was a Greenland Shark... sort of. Its jaws were too big, and it was forty feet long. It might not even have been able to fit easily through the crevasse into this place. Certainly anything coming into this place would have gotten a most unwelcome surprise.
Magic could change things, but Greenland sharks grew slowly. This shark was probably five hundred years old or older if it grew naturally.
How long had these sirines been here?
They pushed off along the air, not bothering to pop their wings as unneeded.
The two sunbathing sirines were clearly not expecting trouble, especially a Sword sweeping through silently out of invisibility and chopping through the head of the first, then flickering over next to the second and plunging down through her face into the stone.
There was no mark on either sirine, but they wouldn’t wake up from the shock of a Mercy deathblow for hours.
They looked at the skulls mounted in places of honor down at the water-line, rattling occasionally in a passing wave.
Human, elven, dwarven, orc, even a hyn one there... and at least two human children.
There was a glint of bone from the passageway ahead, smoothed down by high-pressure water jets over time, and they already knew what they were going to be seeing.
Invisible again, treading on air, they walked forward into the grotto where witchlit skulls gleamed as trophies and foci of power for the inhabitants of this place.
They had no eyes right now, so they couldn’t close them, and could only watch it all and make plans.
------------
A hooved foot struck stone, chipping it with the force, and the fey beauty there spun around in shock from the fresh new skull she was slowly and painstakingly cleaning to a blinding white state.
They all glared at her, that impossible flawless beauty, and knew they couldn’t possibly hurt her in the slightest. It was a powerful glamour, and the only defense against it was to not be able to see her.
That was fine. In their left hand was a specific skull, taken from a rather large Deep One. The pale-skinned, golden-haired vision in front of them gasped to see it. “
Legion flicked the top of the old skull off with a razor-nailed thumb, exposing the rolled-up golden cloth within the braincase. Casually, they flipped the skull up to their mouth, bit into the folded shawl, and sucked it down as the nereid actually ran into them, clawing frantically at them... harmlessly and uselessly, although every cell in their body lit up in delight at the contact.
They brought the skull down, and the nereid clawed at their eyeless face and the patterns of the Mask Tat there. Silver, heavens-blue clouds, aquamarine whorls, and black-red flames glowed back at her, clearly looking at her, unable to make a move against her, only endure the attacks... because the fight was already over.
There was just a flash of black and red hellfire in the back of her throat, sucking in that golden shawl, and the nereid started to scream.
A second later, her body spontaneously reverted to the water it was made of, splashing to the tiled floor of this room... every tile Bone-Warped from the polished white skulls of the fey thing’s victims.
A nereid’s soul was in its shawl. By eating it, they had Consumed her and sidestepped her immunity to being attacked by anything with a sexual interest in her... which some of the ex-Ruedians definitely were.
The nereid was now screaming on the Hellpact, its hydrous Elemental nature fully on display: a purple-black water blob, capricious, inhuman, uncaring, vain, cruel, and merciless. They stared in the Pactspace at it as Wrath and Scorn went to work on it in passing, and turned around to head back to the two sirines now laying unconscious in their rooms. A new Pact gleamed in the grips of the Hellpact, a dark and fluid thing of lives lost to the Waters, and the other four tied to it were about to join it.
--------
The three fishermen had just finished pulling into the dock and were preparing to start unloading their catch into the fishery’s slides when she came down out of the sky like a meteor.
There was no reduction in speed as she slammed to the ground, but the impact was absolutely silent, a pulse of golden light radiating out from where she landed, shivering the dock... and blowing all three men there, but none of the other fisherman, nor the cannery workers, right off their feet.
They were all men there, and gaped at the valkyrie or angel come down from Heaven, bearing down on them with a dire aura and shining silver eyes, golden hair, and a burning Sword in her hand... and a naked skull clutched in the other.
The three fisherman, one seeming near his sixties, the others in their thirties and probably his sons, scrambled awkwardly in their heavy coats as they all clambered back to their feet.
Pure instinct had every man there backing away from the trio. Everyone knew what silver eyes represented now, and if those angelic wings and that Aura weren’t beating the fact into them, they had absolutely no wish to get between this woman and the three of them.
She said nothing, merely holding out the polished white skull in her hand at them as the frightened men got to their feet.
Black, gold, and grey flames gathered around the skull, dripped down from it in a rush of liquid flames... and as they fell, like pigments across an unseen canvas, they painted a picture.
A face. A man, and one they recognized, phantasmal flesh and features inked into existence, staring at the three men in front of him.
The image reached out to point at the three of them. “Henrik. Jorian. Lars. You murdered me and offered me up to the Drowned Witches to satisfy your Pacts, as you have so many others over the years. This Heavenbound found me, and has done for your witches, she has.” All three men went pale. “There’ll be no more Pacts for your sons, nor those of Ulfi and Leif when she reaches them. Heaven has come for your sins, Drowners of Molde, and the Waters are having you at last!”
“No!” the father, Henrik Ivarsson, shouted, bringing up his hands. Inky aquamarine power surged out of his hands, going right through the ghost from the skull, but avoided hitting the golden-haired, statuesque Heavenbound behind still holding it up.
She barely acknowledged what he’d done, letting not a peep of sound escape her as she frowned.
The Sharding stroke divided the older man in two, and the halves of his body crumpled to the ground as the golden light cut him in twain.
His sons panicked and tried to retreat, their own hands coming up, and that blast of eldritch energy the hue of the deep, dark ocean, blasted out at her... and again just missed her, as if they couldn’t bear to shoot her.
She ignored the blasts calmly, and her Sword flicked back and forth so fast only the golden fires on it allowed those nearby to realize it moved at all. Arcs sliced through the necks of Henrik’s sons, and they dropped down next to their father as their heads rolled free of their necks.
Even the most idiotic of the men looking on realized there was something going on when the corpses and heads did not bleed...