They Come To Feed

Chapter 7

The thorn boma was completed by sunset, and the pirates added several of their own number to the watch set by the Gambusi, but no attack came that night nor the next. As morning sun slowly crept its way over the eastern horizon, the officers of the Osprey joined N'tibi in her hut to palaver and learn more of the danger that brooded over the island.
    N'tibi and the pirate officers were joined by Tonga their translator, the child M'boto, and a Gambusi hunter named Wazu. Each of the Gambusi spoke in turn, and Tonga translated their tales to his shipmates.
    M'boto told his tale of the cave in great detail, and the pirates occasionally asked for explication on certain points, their faces tense. Next spoke Wazu, and his tale was a strange one.
    Wazu was a brave man and the morning after the attack he had gone hunting for the tiny gazelle that were common on the island, just as he would on any other day. His hunt took him far into the interior of the island to a small valley that lay between the Great Mountain and the Place of the Giant Stone Hut.
    As the pirates listened to Wazu's tale unfold, they asked questions, and so they came to understand that the Great Mountain was the location of M'boto's cave, and what Wazu called the Giant Stone Hut was in truth the citadel they had seen from the ridge. The Gambusi could not know the Atlantean origin of the citadel, as it had been there since long before they had settled the island.
    Wazu's tale became more strange, as Tonga continued to recount it to his companions. When Wazu had entered the valley it was getting late in the day. Wazu had hunted overlong, and the sky was getting dark. His hunt had been unsuccessful and he had been preparing to turn back toward home; luckily the moon was full and it lit his way through the forest. Then he heard a loud commotion in the jungle ahead him. Stealthily, he approached the peculiar sounds and saw a frightful scene.
    What Wazu witnessed was a titanic battle between four of the alien monsters and the island's only other species of large predator, whom the Gambusi name Gulkun. Gulkun, and its mate Gulkuna were massive serpents, huge venomous constrictors with thick armoured hides, easily massive enough to swallow even a large man whole. Only two of these great reptilian predators of the Elder World remained on the island, and the male was locked in terrible combat with the octopoidal monsters.
    Gulkun struggled with four of the tumbleweed-like star-spawn, his great treetrunk thick bulk crushing shrubs and splintering small trees. The tentacled things sought to envenomate Gulkun through his squamous hide, but their tendrils and acidic toxin seemed to have little effect on the huge reptile's armour. Gulkun snapped at the creatures, then striking suddenly, Gulkun's footlong fang struck home, penetrating deep into a star-spawn's globular core.
    The effect of the venom on the multi-limbed creature was drastic and immediate. The tentacular monster seemed to shrivel and deflate. The three remaining star-spawn renewed their attack upon the serpent, but now they focused their attack on Gulkun's unarmored eyes and mouth. Gulkun snapped his massive jaws at another of the star-spawn. He captured the thing, but his fangs had missed their target, and the alien tumbleweed became lodged in Gulkun's throat. Suddenly the huge draconian snake began thrashing about, putrid foam boiling from its mouth. The two remaining unearthly organisms blinded Gulkun's unblinking eyes with their own caustic excretions. With a galvanic convulsion, the mighty limbless dragon died.
    The two remaining aliens retreated, disappearing into the shadowy forest. The serpent's head now became little more than a ruined husk. The two star-spawn that remained nearby appeared to be dead, Gulkun's venom having found the second spawn at last. Wazu watched unmoving for long moments, but in time he summoned up his flagging courage and went to examine the dead creatures more closely. As Wazu stared down at the withered monsters, one of them started to palpitate, a static discharge and pinkish aurora playing over its surface. The creature seemed to be reconstituting itself, and the second began the process soon after. They were not dead, they had merely been dormant. Growing fearful, Wazu ran back to the village with all the speed of a sirocco.
    As Wazu's story drew to a close, Grimm and Freyja turned, finding each other's eyes, and simultaneously breathed the word, "Lindworm."
    "There were two serpents?" Grimm asked. Then he added, "I begin to form an idea."