Chapter 89: Drifter

The blue-green glow rushed beneath the stern. Something scraped against the keel, shaking the skiff hard enough to throw Severin against the gunwale. The boatman’s next pull faltered as the hull lurched sideways.

"Keep rowing," Leo said.

Seawater frothed beside the starboard oar as a hooked, chalk-pale head surfaced. Dark pits marked its skull; black filaments hung from a ragged mouth.

Behind it, a translucent mauve sac swelled, then collapsed with a rasping cough. Its dark body stretched beneath the foam, with no tail in sight.

The boatman’s oars stopped dead. "Drifter."

One long fin came out of the water sideways. It struck the starboard oar near the blade with a report like a snapped branch.

The shaft split but held. Wrenched from the boatman’s grip, its handle struck him across the coat and knocked him against the gunwale. He folded around the blow, gasping.

Severin grabbed the back of his coat before he could pitch overboard. At the same time the skiff swung hard toward the skerry. A low shelf of black stone emerged ahead, close enough to break the bow.

"Back to the landing!" Leo shouted.

"We’ll break her on the rocks!"

"Get us close enough to jump!"

The boatman caught the damaged oar and pulled the skiff around on the next swell. The bow scraped weed-covered stone before sliding into the narrow pocket where they had boarded.

Rafael jumped ashore first. Severin shoved the sealed sample case beneath the thwart and followed, then turned to haul Armin onto the rock. Leo had one boot on the gunwale when something struck the hull again.

A black limb scraped the stern. Blue-green mucus spread across the wood, eating into the wet grain with a soft hiss.

"Go!" Leo shouted.

The boatman gripped the oar. "And leave you here?"

"Get to Grayhook. Come back with a workboat and rope."

The man needed no further urging. He drove the skiff backward on the sound oar, cleared the spur, then put the split shaft back into the water and pulled through the pain. He rounded the high ridge and disappeared into the channel.

Something dragged itself onto the lower shelf.

Its pale skull scraped over the barnacles as the dark body followed in one contraction, nearly as long as the skiff’s open interior. Milky veins showed through the skin, and thin sensory cords trailed from either side of its head.

A hooked fin dug into the rock, hauling the creature forward. The other reached across half the shelf. Mauve sacs swelled along its upper flank as blue-green slime ran from the folds.

The larger fin crushed a spread of barnacles to white grit. Kelp flattened beneath the sliding body. Severin recognized the curved strip they had followed minutes earlier, now being scraped raw again.

Leo drew his Ferrovian saber. "Keep above it. Don’t let it push anyone into the channel."

Severin held the middle of the high shoulder, sword in his right hand. Rafael took the left, stripping the glove from his marked right hand with his teeth while keeping his saber ready in the other.

Leo stood a step behind Severin on the upper rock; Armin stayed lower, beside the narrow runnel that drained toward the seaward notch. The Drifter’s head turned toward their boots. Thin sensory cords brushed the stone, testing its surface.

It lunged, scraping its shorter hooked fin toward Severin before its pale head had cleared the lower shelf.

Severin stepped inside the smaller fin’s sweep and cut at the flank. The impact jarred his elbow. His edge opened a shallow furrow of gray flesh but stopped against dense, rope-like muscle. Corrosive mucus smeared the steel when he pulled free.

Brown spots spread along the hissing blade. Severin scraped it against the rock, but mucus clung in the scoring and continued eating into the steel.

Severin had put too much weight into the stroke. His front foot slid on wet kelp, and he was still recovering it when the larger fin came around toward his chest.

Rafael seized Severin’s collar with his bare right hand and dragged him sideways. The fin tore a flap from Severin’s coat as it passed. Rafael released him and slapped his marked palm against the moving limb. Blue-green secretion bit into his skin. Green lines flashed through the wet coating.

The limb wrenched out of its path, pulling Rafael half a step with it before he could recover his balance.

The Drifter’s head and shoulder smashed into the ridge with a crack that Severin felt through his boots. Barnacles exploded from the stone. A heavy fragment broke loose and skidded into the channel, taking half a mat of kelp with it.

Rafael reeled backward, holding his saber out for balance. His right palm was reddening around pale spots where the secretion had eaten through the skin. He scraped it against a wet patch of stone, swallowed hard, and tried to focus his good eye on Severin.

He shoved Severin toward the ridge with his shoulder, barely keeping his own footing.

Severin regained his footing by the ridge. The sword still hissed in his hand, and he kept the blade well away from his coat.

Rafael stepped past him, recovered his line in two short movements, and cut across the fold behind the creature’s jaw. The stroke was quick and neat. Dark blood splashed the rock, but a wash of luminous secretion followed and began marking his edge.

The Drifter recoiled, pressing its pale head toward the stone. Rafael tried to catch it before it turned. His sword glanced off one of the head’s hard nodules and came away with an ugly metallic scrape. The pale surface showed barely a scratch.

"Can’t get through the skull!" Rafael called.

"Forget the head. Cut the flank!" Leo shouted.

Black mouth filaments explored the gap beneath a loose wedge of rock. The Drifter braced its thick hooked fin against the stone and heaved forward. The wedge tore loose under its weight, skidding toward Severin’s boots.

He jumped aside, but a sharp edge caught two toes through the leather.

The longer fin clipped the ledge and struck Severin across his right forearm, driving his sword arm into his chest.

The ledge absorbed some of the impact. What reached Severin still trapped the breath in his lungs and sent him stumbling backward. Mucus streaked his sleeve. A sharp burn spread from his wrist as the substance worked through the cloth, eating toward the skin.

"Armin!"

Armin stripped off his left glove. Water lifted from the runnel and slapped across Severin’s forearm. Blue-green strings tore from the sleeve and sluiced away. Armin turned his marked hand, sweeping the runoff over the outer lip instead of across Rafael’s boots.

Severin dragged the soaked sleeve back. Red welts climbed his wrist where the liquid had reached skin. The cloth farther up had gone thin and soft, breaking when he pinched it.

"Keep your arm clear," Armin said. His collar was darkening with sweat. "It’ll keep eating."

The Drifter turned toward the moving water. Sensory cords curled around Armin’s boot. He pulled back; the hooked fin smashed the stone where his ankle had been, tearing his trouser hem.

Rafael severed the searching cords as they swept after him. Their ends writhed and leaked dark fluid.

Armin’s next step landed badly. He recovered, but Severin saw how close his heel had come to the slick edge.

Severin and Rafael retreated along the high shoulder as the Drifter hauled itself farther up the rock. Their swords were fouled with mucus, and the swollen sacs pumped fresh secretion into its wounds. Severin’s shallow cut disappeared beneath the slime.

"We need to know where to open it," Leo said.

Rafael wiped his blade against a clear patch of stone. It left a rough brown streak, and the corrosion kept eating along the edge. "Another two cuts and this won’t hold."

Leo looked at the mauve sacs, then at the head. "Hold the flank toward me. Just long enough."

Armin rolled water from the runnel beneath the hooked fin, washing the mucus toward the notch. The Drifter braced against the surge.

Severin pulled off his left glove with his teeth, kept his sword in his right hand, and crouched beside the cleaned fold. His bare fingertips found the dark hide pressed against stone. Secretion still stung at its edges.

Green light leaked through the covering over his blind left eye. He pulled heat from the flesh.

Cold passed into the fold from Severin’s fingertips. Moisture crystallized underneath it, thickening the remaining mucus into stiff, hissing ridges. The muscle lost its quick contraction. The Drifter battered its head against the ledge, but the chilled fin followed too slowly.

Severin held until his fingers began to move sluggishly. He tried to let go and found he had to wait for them to answer.

"Now," Leo said.

Armin flicked the last loose mucus from the contact point. Leo had already stripped his left glove. He crouched under the whipping sensory cords and drove his marked palm against the cooled flesh beside Severin’s retreating hand.

His right hand kept the Ferrovian saber angled between his body and the mouth.

Leo sent a tremor through the flank. The near mauve sac fluttered while the farther one swelled more slowly. When he shifted his palm, a narrow ridge stood out beneath the hide and shook against his hand.

The Drifter bucked, dragging his boots down the slope. Leo braced against the ridge and held on.

Vibration surged back through Leo’s left arm. His elbow jerked, and the skin across his knuckles split in two places. Blood ran between his fingers. He forced his palm flat again, his breath coming in sharp, involuntary pulls.

The far sac convulsed. The band underneath pulled tight, transmitting a heavy, uneven beat toward the upper trunk. Severin could feel the vibration through the stone even after the animal twisted away from Leo’s pressure.

"Behind the far sac!" Leo shouted. "Cut where it joins the body!"

Its body contracted around the injured fin. Leo lost contact and hit one knee, his marked arm rigid. He tried to close his fingers; only two answered, and they shook hard enough to scatter blood onto the rock.

Its pale head swung toward him. Severin shoved Leo aside and caught a scraping blow across the shoulder. The larger fin split his coat to the padding; its edge tore skin beneath. He hit the high ridge hard enough to bite his tongue.

Rafael split the reaching limb. Nearly black blood poured over the steel. The Drifter coughed wetly through its hanging filaments and curled around its wound. One sac sagged halfway through inflation; the others pumped harder, sending blue-green secretion across the rock.

Then it twisted away from them.

Its longer fin found the seaward notch. The head dropped toward the channel, the body contracting to follow. Severin could see deep water beyond the lowest stone. If the creature reached it, none of their swords would be useful.

"Armin, stop it!" Leo ordered.

Armin stepped into the runnel and swept his bare left hand upward. Water tore out of the seaward notch in a thick curling surge, hauling pebbles and weed with it.

The wave struck the Drifter’s descending flank and crushed it against the stone hard enough to split another cluster of barnacles. Its hooked fin skidded; the body slid half its length away from deep water.

Armin held the water against the struggling animal, then let it collapse across the shelf. Sweat ran down his crimson face despite the wind. He doubled over, swallowing hard.

"Can’t hold a wave like that again," he managed.

The Drifter gathered itself. Severin saw the contraction begin at the tail, drawing the whole dark length into a tight curve. It was going to launch through the notch, straight across Rafael’s position.

"Rafael!"

Rafael lunged toward the incoming fin and dropped low beside the inner ridge. He caught its moving weight on his bare, already burned right palm. The secretion sank into the broken skin. He cried out as the green lines of his mark flashed and the immense rush twisted sideways under his touch.

The Drifter’s front half rolled onto the high shoulder; its rear remained wedged across the lower notch, within Armin’s reach. A swollen sac burst against the ridge. Dark blood and luminous clots sprayed the barnacle-encrusted stone.

The force threw Rafael to one knee. He reached for a handhold that was farther away than he judged and struck bare stone instead. Vomit spilled between his boots. His good eye struggled to settle on the animal even as its damaged fin scraped past him.

Severin came around the exposed flank too late. His legs had begun answering a fraction after he moved them; the stones seemed to shift beneath him.

The Drifter jerked away from his reaching hand. Its tail struck the ridge near his shin, driving a chip of rock through his trouser leg. Blood soaked the cloth around the cut below his knee.

"Under the torn sac!" Leo shouted. He held the saber in his right hand, his injured left arm hanging close to his body. "The fold below it!"

Armin forced one last narrow sheet of water up the groove beneath the Drifter. It washed the exposed attachment for a heartbeat before collapsing. He sagged against the rock, face red with heat.

Severin thrust his bare left hand under the torn fold while the flesh was cleanest. The residue stung his fingertips; he drew heat before the gap closed.

Green light showed through the covering over Severin’s blind left eye. Frost crept across the attachment, stiffening its torn membrane.

The Drifter clamped down. Its closing fold trapped Severin’s fingers against the frozen muscle. He pulled without success. Mucus hissed beside his wrist, and his heartbeat slowed.

Still gripping his sword in his right hand, Severin felt the animal’s next contraction gather through his trapped fingers. He struck before they stopped obeying him altogether.

The blade sheared through the stiffened fold. Hot black blood struck Severin’s mouth and jaw; he turned his face to protect his good right eye. Under the flesh something dense tore with a sound like soaked rope being ripped apart.

Steel struck harder resistance and stopped. The old mucus was still eating along the edge, and when he wrenched the blade free, a piece broke from it. A hairline crack followed the missing notch.

The Drifter convulsed and nearly pulled Severin into the wound. He tore his left fingers from the clamped fold, leaving skin behind, then stumbled against the ridge. His sword hand shook. Behind him, the creature began rolling toward the water again.

"Rafael! Widen it!" Leo shouted.

Rafael remained on one knee, unable to trust the distance his good eye showed him. He braced his burned right hand on dry stone and searched for the wound with his saber point. It slipped over hide, caught inside Severin’s cut, and gave him the line he needed.

His short, precise stroke severed a pale cord deep within. The Drifter rolled toward him, and he barely dragged the blade clear.

Armin had almost nothing left. He hooked a thin ribbon of water from the runnel beneath the animal’s rear body, which still hung across the notch, and wrenched sideways. It moved the great weight only an inch.

That inch exposed a taut black band running from the torn sac into the trunk. Armin dropped his hand and lurched against the rock, unable to keep the water together.

Leo stepped in, but the Drifter’s hooked fin struck the stone at his boot. He slipped on the fresh secretion, and his first saber stroke glanced off the torn edge of the wound. The creature’s body tightened to pull the opening shut.

He planted his weight against the ridge and drove the curved blade back into the narrow gap.

The Ferrovian edge caught the stretched band and severed it. It snapped back into the torn trunk. The Drifter contracted with enough force to shake the shoulder beneath their boots.

Its tail struck the ridge and showered them with chips of stone. A long fin hammered past Leo’s head, hit the rock, and split along its own edge.

The animal settled heavily across the ledge. Its ragged mouth opened and closed in the wash, drawing no breath. A mauve sac swelled once, failed to empty, and hung slack. The trailing sensory cords twitched against the stone until the last of them stopped.

Nobody fucking moved toward it.

Severin’s breath rasped in his throat. His left hand remained half curled, as though it still gripped the frozen flesh. The cut below his knee throbbed.

Blood from the Drifter had run into his collar, and he could smell the sour chemical sting of its mucus beneath the heavier odor of opened meat.

Rafael rolled onto one hip, unable to find his balance when he tried to stand. His sword lay beside him, its edge brown-spotted and pitted. Armin sat against the ridge and pulled out his thermometer with shaking fingers. He had to try twice before he got it under his tongue.

Leo knelt without using his injured arm. The skin around his left-hand mark had split in several places. Two fingers trembled independently of the others.

"Dead?" Rafael asked.

Leo watched the sacs for another few breaths. "Looks it. Keep clear of the runoff."

Severin inspected his sword. Mucus remained trapped in the scoring from his first cut, eating into the steel throughout the fight. Deep pits marked its lower edge. The final strike had chipped a weakened section and opened a hairline crack behind it. The blade clicked when he touched it to stone. He would not trust it against another weapon.

He rinsed and scraped the blade until the hissing stopped, then slid it into its scabbard. The dagger at his belt offered less than half the reach.

Armin drew out the thermometer, squinted at it, and swore. He unfastened his collar and pressed his palm to the cold rock, shivering despite the heat visible in his face.

"Deep-Touched," Leo said, studying the carcass. He flexed his injured left hand and stopped at the first spasm. "Never seen anything like it in the records."

"From the refuge?" Severin asked.

"Can’t say. The cuts were holding when we checked."

Rafael tried to rise again. Severin got a shoulder beneath his arm. Neither of them made much progress until Rafael found the level rock under his left boot.

The Drifter lay across the notch where it had fallen, its forebody caught against the ridge. The tide was still ebbing, so they left its weight alone. Blue-green secretion continued to leak from the folds touching stone.

Under a torn flap near the ruptured sac, Severin glimpsed a pale curve set deep in dark tissue. It looked too much like ordinary bone. He bent closer, but Leo told him to stay back.

Before the workboat returned, Severin helped wrap Rafael’s burned palm and Leo’s split left hand with strips torn from the clean lining of his damaged coat. Armin pulled his glove back over his mark.

The boatman returned on a larger workboat with two fishermen as the tide ebbed, moving stiffly with one arm against his bruised ribs. They brought boards, rope and tarred covering for the lift. Leo kept them clear of the runoff while they positioned the boards beneath the carcass.

They hauled it aboard and lashed it down, blue-green drops eating at the exposed timber.

At Grayhook, Severin could barely straighten his left fingers. Carrick had prepared a separate waterside workroom to spare the clinic’s clean tables.

After the fishermen lowered the covered carcass onto stone, Leo cleared the room. Carrick pulled on protective gloves and examined the pale curve inside the torn flesh.

Carrick set a probe against the exposed structure, then drew a knife along the seam beside it. The shallow incision opened a little farther. He stopped mid-cut and asked for the lamp. After studying the new opening, he withdrew the knife without widening it again.

"Why’d you stop?" Severin asked.

Carrick laid the knife aside. He followed the exposed curve with the tip of his probe, stopping where it disappeared beneath intact flesh.

"Because I think this thing has ribs."