Chapter Seventeen: Dangerous Waters

PEARCE

"What's going on?"

"What the hell's wrong with this ship?"

Pearce had been chatting to Byron, Edwin and Jeff in the lounge on the fifth floor when Nightwind lurched.

Titus came up frantically and asked, "Do you know what's—"

"Out of the way!" shouted Pearce, shoving him roughly and carelessly aside.

He squeezed through the witches and wizards gathered in between the columns of bunk beds and fought to reach the door. He rushed up the flights of stairs connecting the levels three at a time.

WHAM!

A force collided hard against the hull. The ship tilted. Pearce lost his balance on the steps and fell. He got up hurriedly. He swerved around a girl going in the opposite direction and pushed past two boys and an adult before emerging out of the trapdoor and onto the deck. Whit and Elsa were lying prostrate on the floor. Pearce approached the starboard bulwark and looked down at the restless sea. Beneath, a thick, very long snakelike neck slithered.

"My goodness!" Elsa said to Whit. They had gotten up and seen it as well.

"It's a sea monster," Whit gasped in horror, glancing at Elsa and Pearce. "We're being attacked!"

"Not just by one," Byron responded from the port, "Looks like there are several of them!"

"What?!" Whit yelled in disbelief.

People were coming up on deck and lining the bulwarks. Words concerning "water snakes," "assault" and "sea monsters" spread rapidly from lip to lip as each of them glimpsed the convoluted, slithering beings in the water below. Pearce ran to the port and leaned out over the side. Byron was right. There was indeed more than one snake. The deck was filling up with more and more magicians.

"No, no, no, this is impossible," said the captain. "I have sailed through this part of the sea many times, I know it extremely well, and I swear that there are no creatures in these waters!"

Wisty asked, "You've never encountered any of them?"

The captain shook his head fiercely. "Not once, not ever!"

WHAM!

"Are you sure?" Wisty asked.

"Absolutely, a hundred per cent sure!" The captain begged, "Please, you guys have got to believe me. If I had known that a monster dwelled in this area, I would have told you. Listen, I'm serious, I would've told you!" His ten crew nodded vigorously in agreement.

"All right, captain, we believe you." Whit held up his hands in a soothing gesture. "Chill, OK?"

Elsa said, "If nothing deadly lives in the sea, then where did this creature come from?"

The witches and wizards looked at each other questioningly, but nobody answered. Pearce reflected at the bizarre moment before he got on the dragon ship, and realization dawned on him…

He said quietly, "Hans."

The utter silence was deafening.

"Come again?" said Whit.

Every single person was gazing at him. Pearce looked into their faces and repeated with clarity, "That sea monster was sent to us by Hans."

A boy with curly chestnut hair named Edwin retorted, "It can't be."

"That's preposterous!" An adult shouted from the crowd.

"Ludicrous!" Beric cried in assent.

"It's downright absurd," stated Byron. "There is no way, no way Hans could have known we were coming."

WHAM!

Pearce's glare could've made one's skin smoulder. "Is there, Byron?" he challenged. "While we were waiting on the beach for the magicians to board the ship, I noticed two men nearby staring suspiciously at us. The size of our army may be conspicuous, but no other traders at the port paid attention to us like that. There was inexplicable hatred and fear in their eyes. It was as if they knew something we didn't. I watched them climb into a boat with their stuff and row away from the shore. They were Hans's soldiers."

Anna asked, "But how could you tell?"

Pearce counted off every point he made with his finger. "They were armed in chainmail, they had gleaming dark helmets, a midnight blue cape fastened around their shoulders, and they wore a golden-trimmed black surcoat with the markings of a golden sugar maple on the front. Does that sound familiar to you?" Elsa and Anna both opened their mouths to speak, but he cut them off, "And I wasn't the only witness. Our friend Whit here saw them too."

Whit picked up the story, "When they found out Elsa rescued Anna from Shadowland and gathered an army in the City, they most likely returned to Arendelle as soon as they could to report the news to Hans. Hans responded by arriving to the other side of the sea and used sorcery to conjure up a creature to kill us. He knew. He knew we were coming for him."

"And he is probably strengthening Arendelle's defences at this very moment and getting ready for battle," Pearce added.

"Why did neither of you say anything?" Elsa scolded.

Whit answered, "Because we weren't sure! We weren't fully certain that the men belonged to Hans or that they'd be able to warn him about us."

"You. Should've. Told. Me!" Elsa advanced on him threateningly and shrilled in anger, "You literally let them slip through your fingers. If I had been aware of it back then none of this would be happening!"

Pearce retorted defensively, "What could you have done if you knew?"

WHAM!

"I would've killed them! I would have killed them to prevent them from disclosing the information to Hans!"

Wisty stepped in between them and shouted, "There is no point bickering over it now! It already occurred. You can't go back in time to change it!"

Elsa bawled to Whit and Pearce, "UGH! This was all your fault!"

"Hey!" Wisty grabbed her wrist. "Don't talk to them like that!"

WHAM!

Elsa jerked her arm away. "Shut it, Wisty," she said. Pearce could tell her mood was turning dangerously dark.

Emmet piped up, "Surely a boat is bound to sail much slower than a ship? How did those two men get there before us?"

"I don't know," snapped Whit. "They used magic to bewitch their boat to make it go faster, what does it matter? You dim-witted piece of—"

"Guys, could you please stop fighting? Please?" Janine beseeched. "We are in danger. We need to get our people to take shelter, now!"

A colossal creature erupted out of the sea, sending the gently lapping waves seething and churning, spraying Pearce with tiny droplets. The monster loomed over the ship. It was something out of a nightmare. Its muddy purplish-brown skin was rough and scaly, and its frame was silhouetted against the late afternoon sky. Nine broad, incredibly lengthy serpentine necks sprouted from a single body half submerged in water, the closer they were to the body the wider in width they became. Joined to the end of each neck was a head that awfully resembled that of a baleful, menacing dragon. Intimidating spikes lined their spines and covered the top and back of their heads, and when they hissed, Pearce was able to take in the sharp, pointy molars, incisors and canines framing their open mouths and their reptilian, forked tongues. The sight of it was revolting. The dim red glow behind the nine pairs of eyes made it fearsome and terrifying to behold.

"Good gracious!" Anna gasped. Her face was as white as chalk.

The creature let out a thundering roar. Two of its heads swooped down on them like vultures, causing the witches and wizards gathered below to screech in fright and scurry out of the way. They couldn't give the monster a wide enough berth due to the limited room on deck, with many tripping over each other in a terrified rush to get to safety.

"EVERYONE GET BELOW DECK!" Whit bellowed over the top of his lungs. "You hear me? STAY BELOW THE DECK!"

The magicians responded without objection, but the confusion and fear, coupled with the amount of people trying to scramble into the one trapdoor meant they were nowhere near fast enough. Pearce stood and watched, frozen and paralyzed, as a jaw closed around the waist of a male adult and tore him into pieces. Another head bit a woman in half. People made for the safety of the ship below with feverish haste. They didn't even bother running down the stairs, but jumped in threes and fours, fives and sixes, through the opening in the ground, all trying to fit through. Those who fell ended up being trampled on and ignored, but eventually they'd crawl, yelling in pain, to the edge of the square hole and tumble into it.

Whit looked scared as hell. "MOVE QUICKER!" he commanded.

But they couldn't move quicker. The rate in which people were fleeing was already at its maximum, and there were still a lot of them on deck. The nine heads of the monster was killing fast. Pearce saw a few people try to distract the creature with bolts of magic, but it only served to annoy the monster. In thirty seconds, dozens of people had fallen prey to it.

Almost a hundred, maybe even more, were dead in a minute.

At two minutes and a half, the casualties were only racking up.

In six minutes the deck was beginning to look like a bloodbath.

Pearce dreaded how many more they were going to lose.

"HURRY!" Whit ordered again.

He wished Whit would quit hollering. It was useless. No matter how many people were plunging in through the trapdoor, it was going to remain the same size.

"GO, GO, GO! HURRY UP!"

"Stop yelling yourself hoarse, Whit! They're moving as fast as they can," cried Pearce.

A girl's scream sliced the air. It was Cynthia. She was a hundred feet up, and her legs and chest were dangling from the sides of one of the creature's mouths. Her friends were calling her name, but no matter how many times or how hard she screamed, Pearce knew she was done for, that there was no saving her. The creature chewed Cynthia up entirely, flesh and brains and all, they heard the distinctive crunching of skull and bones, and all they could do was goggle.

Those who narrowly escaped the jaws of the monster lost a limb or two and were stumbling and hobbling around, but their suffering didn't last long before they had bled to death. However, it was the magicians who were bitten and inflicted with minor wounds that perished the quickest, and Pearce wondered why. He regretted not having put his armour on. It would've offered protection from bites and wounds, but then he had not been expecting a sea monster assault, and he didn't think the creature cared about your armour, shoes, or hair—it'd swallow you whole nonetheless.

"Titus, WATCH OUT!" Pearce heard Whit roar.

One of the heads went straight for him. Titus sprinted as speedily as a dart away from it, but not before the creature's teeth had scraped his shoulder. Yikes! Titus screamed. He touched his shoulder. His hand came away red. The layers of clothing that covered the wound had been torn, and blood gushed out of it.

"No!" shouted Whit. Titus's eyes rolled back into his head and he fell backwards. Whit caught him by the armpits. "Titus! Titus, wake up! Wake up!" Whit shook him, but the nineteen-year-old wizard had gone completely unconscious. Within two minutes, he was dead. Whit brushed away tears with the back of his hand, stood up, and let go of his friend's lifeless form.

Three heads dived straight in Pearce's direction, and he instantly leaped out of their reach and rolled on the floor. The three boys who were beside him weren't so lucky, and Pearce couldn't help but gape as they were being devoured. His eyes searched everywhere. He couldn't see where his friends were and didn't have any idea what was happening to them, but he hoped they were still alive and that Wisty was alright. How large an appetite did this monster have? It was always hungry. Never full. It carried on consuming the remainder of magicians who still hadn't yet made it below. And the shrieking and screeching, so much noise…Pearce wanted it to stop, wanted them to shut up. It was giving him a headache and causing him to panic more than he already was. He ducked, dodged, swerved and dived in order to avoid the heads; oh, there were so many of them. He was extremely fortunate he wasn't injured so far.

The witches and wizards had all retreated by now, so the deck was mostly empty, and Pearce was glad of the increased space for movement. His friends stayed as well, trembling uncontrollably, and he was amazed that they were unharmed. The monster had sunk below the waves, but Pearce knew it was just looking for another opportunity to strike.

"Right, enough is enough! We can't just be sitting ducks. It is time to slay the creature. Elsa, Byron, Emmet, Janine, withdraw from the deck," the captain commanded. "We'll want as few people up here as possible for maximum manoeuvrability. Go!"

Elsa asked, "Why us?"

"Because you cannot fight with a sword—"

Elsa protested, "I can wield one—"

"Yes, but you do not specialize in it! You are more talented with a bow and arrows."

Byron said, "Come on, Elsa. Just do what he says."

The four of them descended through the opening in the ground without further argument.

"Wisty, you're an archer as well. Go with them," the captain addressed her.

"I have to be with my brother," Wisty said stubbornly. "I've never stayed out of an adventure before—"

"You call this an adventure? Your people have been slaughtered! This isn't about being a hero or proving yourself—"

"Let her stay," said Pearce. There was finality in his tone. The captain stared at him and hesitated, and he stared back, his gaze unfaltering.

The old man blinked and looked away, and Pearce knew that he was defeated. "All right," the captain consented. "If you really want to, then who am I to stop you?" He closed the trapdoor, and now it was just Pearce, Whit, Wisty, Anna, Ross, the captain and his ten crew on deck.

Anna asked, "So, what are we supposed to do?"

The captain said, "I've never seen a creature like this, but it has to have a weakness. Whit, Wisty, Pearce, summon you and your friends' weapons. Sailors, ready the ballistae for firing."

The men stationed themselves around the three large frame-mounted crossbows spaced equidistantly from one another atop the deck, with four grouped at the centre ballista and three at the ones on either side of it. Meanwhile, Ross and Anna held out their arms, and Whit materialized their weapons with his powers, Anna her sword, Ross his great axe. Then, Whit and Pearce visualized their weapons in their mind, and magnificent swords appeared in their upraised hands. Pearce gripped his fingers around the hilt, which was embellished with elaborate blue designs. He turned the sword over and liked the weight and feel of it.

"LOAD!" cried the captain.

The creature remerged. The men retrieved a steel bolt that was six feet long and loaded it into a sliding trough in the stock of each ballista. They cinched back the trough into firing position by the windlass. But the ballistas were pointing in the opposite direction. The magical ship sensed this, and spun the ballistae around in a circle so that they faced their target.

"Aaaand...FIRE!"

Three bolts flew simultaneously through the air at breakneck speed. They struck the monster's bellies. It reared up and hissed in pain. The men reloaded and used the windlass to pull the throwing arms back into firing position.

The captain cried, "AGAIN!"

Another three bolts were launched, and two found their marks in the monster's body and neck. It was no good. Instead of killing the creature, all they were doing was provoking it. Livid, the nearest head seized hold of a leg of one of the crew, who screamed helplessly, and tossed him sideways. He was caught by another head which then ate him.

"Do not stop! Keep firing! Keep firing!"

Bolt after bolt was launched at the malevolent being. One of its elongated necks lunged for Wisty, and Pearce emitted a supernatural force at it. The neck hissed angrily, retreated, and made for him instead. He aimed. Violet electricity shot out from his fingers and surrounded the head, causing it to shriek painfully and convulse. The others were unaffected. Three of them charged at Pearce altogether, intent on killing just him. He dashed to the side. Somehow he didn't think he could manoeuvre out of the way this time.

"Cut off the heads!" Whit shouted to his friends. He magically expanded Ross's great axe so that it grew twice as big. "On three, guys, are you ready?" They nodded. Whit hollered, "One!"

BAM! The creature's bellies crashed against the port bulwark, knocking three wide gaps in it. Splinters of wood flew everywhere.

"Two!"

The necks lowered to reach their prey and their underside brushed the floor. There were screams as one of the ballistae was crushed by one of the heads.

"THREE!"

With loud grunts, Whit, Anna and Ross swung their weapons and—chop, chop, chop!—brought them down upon the necks of the monster, severing their heads nice and clean.

A mistake. A grave and terrible mistake.

Everybody gawked, horror-struck and petrified, as two more heads grew back out of the stumps in a matter of seconds, just as menacing and baleful as the previous ones. What had been a total of nine heads now became a total number of twelve.

One of the crew fainted. Ross dropped his axe, stunned.

"WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!" Wisty screeched.

Pearce racked his brain for every beast he had heard of or read about in any mythology. A particular one surfaced. He wanted to hit himself for being so slow. How could he not have realized sooner?

"The creature is a hydra," he told them. "We are dealing with a hydra! It mainly feeds on humans. Every time you cut off one of its heads, two more grows in its place. Its bites are poisonous. Victims who are bitten die within two minutes."

Whit responded, "So that was why the magicians who were wounded died faster than those who bled to death, and why Titus had lost consciousness almost immediately." He stepped forward. "It all makes sense!"

"Don't!" Pearce yelled at him in alarm. "Don't step on that!" Whit looked down at the pool of blood at his feet, which was still oozing from the stumps of the creature's old heads. "The blood of the hydra is tainted. If it comes in contact with your skin, its venom will kill you just as fast as the bites."

Whit moved further away from the puddle. "I'll keep that in mind," he said, sounding startled.

Anna said, "Telling us this is great, but we still don't know how to slay the monster. How do we prevent the heads from growing back?"

Pearce said, "With fire."

A neck came at Whit. Whit didn't run but remained still, enticing the predator towards the prize. Wisty created a fireball in both of her hands and said, "Whenever you're ready."

Pearce waited. When the neck was inches from Whit, Pearce gave an almighty cry and then beheaded it. Wisty hurled her balls of fire, and the bleeding stump was ablaze. The neck thrashed about, but no new heads germinated out of it. One, Pearce began the countdown.

"We are so glad to have you here, Wist," said Whit.

"My pleasure," she replied.

Steel bolts continued to soar and hit the hydra. One neck had so many bolts sticking out of it that Pearce was surprised it was still alive. When it sprung at them, Anna decapitated it with a slash of her sword, and Wisty set it on fire. Two. Ross hewed off another head, which was immediately engulfed by flames. Three. Whit eliminated an especially aggressive one. Wisty threw fire at the remnant section and watched delightfully as it squirmed and burned. Four. Anna cut off the next head that lunged. Wisty's flames consumed the stump, but as the neck flailed blindly, it bumped against the ship's dragon figurehead, which caught fire and started to burn. Whit hurriedly extinguished the fire with a spell before it could spread. Five.

Seeing what they were doing as a more effective strategy than shooting the hydra with bolts, the captain and the crew abandoned their ballistae and lobbed torches at the severed ends. Six. Seven. Eight. Pearce guessed the ballistas were more powerful against humans than a mythical creature.

It was tricky, trying to lure and kill the monster while dodging and escaping its snapping jaws at the same time.

A remaining head pounced on Ross, fracturing the mast at the bow of the ship. The top half collapsed directly on top of Ross, bringing the sail down with it, knocking Ross to the floor and covering him. Ouch, Pearce grimaced and thought. That must've been painful. Ross crawled out from beneath the sail frantically, but the hydra was faster. It opened its mouth. Pearce, who stood next to it, swung his sword downwards and hacked off the head, then ducked as Wisty's fireball flew at the leftover neck. Ross rolled away from the streams of blood gushing out of it, and Pearce recoiled as well. The hydra slammed into the starboard, the ship tilted left, Ross was thrown across the deck, and he slid towards one of the gaps the monster had left in the port bulwark. His fingernails clawed at the floor, but there wasn't anything he could cling on to. He let out a panicked squeal. He was going to fall off the ship! Pearce raced to Ross's aid and caught him just as he was about to disappear over the side. Oh no, the hydra, it was coming for them! Pearce pulled Ross back up and lifted him to his feet. With superhuman speed he whisked Ross to the aft. Their bodies smacked against the stern, and the creature missed them by centimetres. Hoof!

During the short period in which Pearce was busy saving Ross, Whit had managed to chop off another one of the hydra's heads. Nine. Too many of them were now scattered all over the deck, so Pearce used telekinesis to hurl them into the sea. Then he made the venomous blood staining the wooden floor bubble and vaporise. He hoped nobody tripped and inadvertently landed on it.

They were close, so close to getting rid of the creature. Two more heads swooped down upon Anna and Whit. They braced themselves for the attack, swords at the ready, and Wisty lit up their blades with a flick of her wrists. The hydra attempted a ferocious bite, but Whit and Anna jumped aside. Slice, slice! They decapitated both of the necks. Ten and eleven.

One more to go.

The last head would be the hardest to kill. It was the largest, and no doubt the most powerful, requiring you to put all your energy into killing it. Still grasping his sword and without really thinking about what he was doing, Pearce ran to the tallest mast in the middle, grabbed hold of the rungs of the ladder, and began to climb, higher and higher, until he got all the way up to the crow's nest. Above him, the mainsail billowed in the wind. The immense monster threshing in the sea made the water tempestuous, thus it was very unsteady up here. Pearce carefully rose into a standing position. The turbulent waves smashed against the hull, causing Nightwind to wobble, but Pearce maintained his balance.

He looked at the people below and called, "Wisteria!"

He tried to make clear to her his intention with his gaze, and Wisty nodded to show that she understood. She focused on Pearce's sword, and fire wreathed the bloodstained blade. The creature, craving a taste of their tender flesh, charged at Whit and Anna. Pearce measured the distance by eye. This will be a long drop, he concluded. He hoped he wouldn't cripple himself. Pearce brandished his sword. Without further contemplation, he leaped from the crow's nest, crying triumphantly, and brought the flaming sword two-handed down upon the last surviving neck, putting all his strength behind the blow. Twelve! Sharp pain surged up his feet, but his legs were not broken. The head was severed neatly and parted from its neck. Clutching his twisted ankles, Pearce thumped the floor.

Whit evaporated the pool of blood and stemmed the flow from the stump, then flung the lifeless head into the sea using his telekinetic power. He bent down beside Pearce and his hands hovered over his ankles. White light issued from them, bright and pure. Pearce felt the healing energy mending his injuries. When he moved his ankles to test them, they no longer hurt. He thanked Whit and pushed himself back up.

The hydra, now headless and defeated, the end of its necks burning, floundered about in the water. Its flailing lasted for another few seconds before its life gave out and it sunk beneath the waves.