Chapter 5: The Sea Monster
The ship slipped through the straits with the caution of a cat crossing a wet street. Every eye watched the water, scanning for serpent coils or the dark shape of a hungry Kraken. Nothing moved but the gentle swell, and the sun climbed higher, and the tension slowly bled out of the crew until the deck took on the lazy rhythm of any ordinary afternoon at sea.
Below decks, in the cramped cabin he shared with his own melancholy, Lord Dravion of the Dark Elves sat upon his trunk and stared at the timber wall with the profound misery of a poet who had nothing to rhyme. The others had their passions. Scoffer had his appetites, Brutehilde her iron purpose, Polly her pregnant love. He, Dravion, had nothing but his art, and his art had nothing to feed upon, and the loneliness sat in his chest like a cold stone in a wet boot.
He sighed a sigh that would have moved the hardest heart to tears. No one heard it.
He sighed again, louder. Still nothing.
"The world," he murmured, "has forgotten Lord Dravion."
His hand drifted, almost absently, to the fastenings of his trousers. A poet must feel deeply, he reasoned. And he felt so very deeply. The weight of his solitude pressed upon him, and what was a man of refined sensibilities to do with such feelings but give them expression? The trouser fastenings came undone with a theatrical little click. He shucked the breeches down past his thighs and sat back upon the trunk, shapely elven legs like polished obsidian gleaming in the dim lantern light.
His cock stood at attention, a respectable length for a Dark Elf of noble blood, dusky and proud, curving slightly upward like a question mark aimed at fate. He took it in hand and sighed again, this time with rather more feeling.
"Ah, sweet despair," he intoned, stroking slowly. "Thou art my only companion in this hour of woe."
The strokes came quicker. He leaned back, eyes half closed, imagining himself the hero of some tragic romance, torn from the arms of his true love. Honeymuff's impish face flickered through his mind, and he banished it. No. Something nobler. A princess in a tower. A queen of sorrows. A woman who would appreciate his finer qualities and not mock his verses.
"Come to me," he whispered, his voice catching. "Come to me, O muse of my aching heart."
His hips rocked forward into his fist. The pleasure built with the lazy inevitability of a tide, and he gave himself to it fully, moaning in a fashion he considered appropriately tragic and artistic. The trunk creaked beneath him. His heels drummed against the wood.
"O sweet release," he gasped, "that I may know thee in my solitude—"
"That's it, love, give it some stick!"
Dravion's eyes snapped open.
A ragged cheer went up from the doorway. Polly Panzerfaust stood there with her arms folded, a grin splitting her face, flanked by Scathach Scarface and two of the deckhands, all of them utterly delighted. Polly began to clap, slowly, rhythmically, and the others took up the applause.
"Marvellous performance," Scathach said, leaning against the doorframe. "Was that from the heart?"
"Bravo," added a deckhand. "Encore!"
Dravion's ears burned crimson. His cock, however, remained stubbornly at attention, and he found himself in the ridiculous position of neither wishing to continue nor willing to stop while an audience watched. He had, after all, a reputation to consider.
He cleared his throat. His fingers tightened around his shaft.
"Ladies," he said, with as much dignity as a half-naked Dark Elf in a cramped cabin could muster, "you have witnessed a private moment of profound artistic feeling. I trust you will respect its sanctity."
"Sanctity my arse," Polly said cheerfully. "Finish the job. We want to see the finale."
Dravion blinked. The absurdity of it washed over him, and then, unexpectedly, something like inspiration followed in its wake. A poet thrived on experience. What experience could be richer than this? To perform, to be adored, to spill his essence before an appreciative crowd! His melancholy lifted like morning fog.
"Very well," he declared, and took his cock in hand once more. "Then witness the very soul of a Dark Elf laid bare!"
The applause resumed. He gave himself to the performance, stroking with a newfound theatrical flair, throwing his head back and crying out in a manner that was half passion and half operatic aria. The deckhands whooped. Scathach let out a low whistle of appreciation. Polly kept up her steady clapping, and her encouragement spurred him on.
"Faster, love," she called. "Think of something filthy!"
He thought of Honeymuff, of her wicked grin, and then he thought of the moment his seed would spill before this crowd, and the strange thrill of it pushed him over the edge. He cried out, a single wordless note of release, and his climax painted the cabin wall with a surprisingly generous arc of dark elf seed. The audience roared.
"Bravo!" Polly shouted. "Bravo, you magnificent bastard!"
Dravion slumped against the trunk, panting, his cock softening in his grip, a wild light in his eyes. He had never felt so alive. The loneliness was gone, replaced by a strange, dizzying joy. He laughed, breathless.
"Ah, my friends," he said, fumbling for his breeches. "You have shown me the truth. The art of self-love is the purest art of all, for it requires no audience, yet it brings pleasure to all who witness it. I shall compose a poem!"
And he did, there and then, with his breeches still around his ankles, in a voice that carried through the cabin and drew a few more curious faces to the doorway.
"O gentle hand, companion true,
Who knows the need before I do,
Who brings the lonely soul to bliss
With but a simple, joyful fist!
Ask not for lover, friend, or spouse,
When thy own palm may please thy house!
For in the dark, when all alone,
A man's best friend is his own bone!"
Polly doubled over laughing. Scathach wiped a tear from her eye. The two deckhands applauded afresh.
"Put that in your next recital," Polly managed, gasping. "You'll bring the house down. And who knows? I may even give it a suck for ya!"
"I say, would you really?" blushed Dravion.
"Sure," grinned Polly. "It would cost you 10 gold, though - temple rates."
The applause died down as Polly and her entourage finally wandered off, leaving Dravion to compose further verses in the warm glow of his unexpected triumph. The ship settled back into its quiet rhythm, and the long afternoon passed with the sun arcing slow and golden across the sky.
By nightfall, the Sea-Nymph's Revenge was running under a doubled watch, lanterns swaying at bow and stern, every pair of eyes straining to catch the glint of shallows or the dark shape of a whirlpool. The straits remained quiet. The only sound was the lap of water against the hull and the occasional creak of rigging.
In the captain's cabin, the lantern burned low. Nell had shed her pristine uniform, folding it with habitual care over the back of her chair, and now lay on the narrow bed in just her thin linen shift. Tanna sprawled beside her, one hand trailing through Nell's long white hair, the silver braid loosened and spread across the pillow.
Nell had been quiet for a long time, and Tanna felt the stillness of her against her side, the slow rise and fall of her breath. She stroked her hair and waited.
"I feel good about this course," Nell said at last, softly. "I cannot explain it. The hermit was a madman and his advice was nonsense, but there is something about these waters. A calmness." She turned her head, meeting Tanna's eyes in the dim lantern light. "I feel almost... adventurous."
Tanna smiled, slow and warm. "Adventurous, Captain?"
"Mmm." Nell's hand drifted down, fingers tracing along Tanna's hip. "There is something I have been curious about. You mentioned it once, in passing. A gift from Ulrika, I believe."
Tanna's brow furrowed, then cleared. A flush crept up her cheeks. "You mean the butt plug."
"Yes." Nell's voice had gone low, almost shy. "The enchanted one. I confess I have thought about it more than I ought. What it might look like. What it might do. What it might feel like wedged inside a woman's arse."
Tanna let out a breath that was half laugh, half shiver. "You want to see it."
"I want to pull it out of you myself."
The words hung in the warm air between them. Tanna's heart beat a little faster. She had worn the plug all day, as Ulrika had taught her, the strange smooth weight of it a constant secret presence in her backside. She rolled onto her stomach and pushed herself up on her elbows, looking back over her shoulder at Nell.
"All right," she said. "Have a look, then."
Nell's breath caught. She sat up, then knelt beside Tanna's hips, her pale fingers hovering over the swell of Tanna's arse. Slowly, reverently, she drew the shift up and over Tanna's thighs, exposing the firm curve of her cheeks and the dark line of her crack, and there, nestled between them, the base of the plug, a smooth rounded disc of polished obsidian that caught the lantern light.
"Oh," Nell breathed. "Oh, it's beautiful."
Tanna giggled, muffled against the mattress. "It's got a little enchantment on it. Makes it feel... bigger. Or smaller. Depends what you need to stir the blood."
Nell touched the disc with one finger, circling it. Tanna shivered. Nell's other hand came to rest on Tanna's arse cheek, squeezing gently, and she leaned in close, her breath warm against the plug.
"I'm going to pull it out slowly," she said. "Tell me if it hurts."
"It won't hurt. The spell makes sure of that. Just take your time."
Nell wrapped her fingers around the base and began to draw it out. The plug was long, perhaps seven inches, tapering to a bulbous head, and Nell felt it slide free inch by inch with a soft resistance. Tanna moaned into the mattress, rocking her hips back to meet the pull, and Nell watched the dark shaft emerge from her stretched pink hole with a fascination that made her mouth water.
When the widest part came free, Tanna gasped and clenched, and the plug slipped into Nell's hand, warm and slick. Nell held it up to the lantern light, turning it over. It was indeed beautiful, carved from polished obsidian with intricate runes etched along its length, faintly glowing with a deep violet light.
She brought it to her nose and inhaled. The scent of Tanna's arse rose from it, musk and salt and something faintly floral, and Nell's cunt throbbed at the intimacy of it. She opened her mouth and ran her tongue along the length of the plug, tasting the slickness left behind, a little bitter and utterly Tanna.
"Fuck," Tanna whispered. "Nell."
Nell set the plug aside on the blanket and leaned down, pressing her face between Tanna's cheeks. She nuzzled the stretched hole, then lapped at it with her tongue, broad and flat, and Tanna gasped and bucked back. Nell pushed her tongue inside, wriggling it into the slick, eager hole, tasting her, breathing her in, and her hand snaked around and found Tanna's clit, swollen and hot, and began to rub in tight circles.
"Gods," Tanna moaned. "Yes, yes, right there, oh—"
Nell finger-fucked her arse with two fingers, slick and easy, thrusting in time with the rub of her thumb on Tanna's clit. Tanna's arsehole gripped her fingers greedily, and Nell lost herself in it, in the feel and the taste and the sound of Tanna's ragged breath. A woman's arsehole was not something she had considered before this voyage, but now it was all she could think about, how hungry it was, how yielding, how it clenched around her fingers like a mouth.
"Nell, I'm close," Tanna gasped.
"Come for me," Nell said against her skin, and she drove her fingers deeper and ground her thumb against Tanna's clit.
Tanna came with a strangled cry, her whole body shuddering, her arsehole clenching and fluttering around Nell's fingers. Nell held her through it, licking and stroking until the shudders subsided and Tanna lay limp and panting on the mattress.
Then Tanna rolled over, flushed and grinning, and picked up the plug from the blanket on the floor. It gleamed in the lantern light.
"My turn," she said.
Nell's eyes went wide. "Oh. I'm not sure I can take it. You said it was for you."
"It adjusts to whoever wears it," Tanna said, sitting up and patting the mattress. "That's the enchantment. It'll feel tight, but it won't hurt. I promise. You wanted to know what it felt like."
Nell's mouth worked. A hot embarrassment warred with a pulling curiosity in her belly. She had wanted to know, desperately, in that private part of herself she rarely admitted to. She crawled onto her hands and knees, bared her own arse to the lantern light, and felt the plug pressed against her hole.
"Breathe out," Tanna said. "And push down a little."
The obsidian head was cool against Nell's entrance. Tanna pressed gently, and Nell felt the rim of her arsehole stretch around the blunt tip, wider than she had ever stretched, and she gasped at the pressure building inside her.
"That's it," Tanna murmured. "Take it slow."
Nell gripped the blanket in her fists and pushed down as Tanna eased the plug in, inch by agonizing inch. The sensation of fullness was overwhelming, alien, her arse stretched and invaded, and she felt her cunt wetten at the violation. The runes on the plug seemed to pulse against her insides, warm and strange.
"Oh, gods," Nell breathed. "Oh, it's so big, I can't—"
"Just a little more."
The final inch seated home, and Nell cried out, her whole body shuddering. She felt utterly stuffed, her arsehole stretched around the wide base, the length of the plug pressing against some deep pleasure point she had never known she possessed.
"Stay still for a moment," Tanna said softly, stroking her back. "Let it settle. Feel it."
Nell breathed, deep and slow. The plug seemed to throb inside her, and with each throb a little wave of pleasure pulsed through her, and she began to rock her hips back, riding the strange sensation, wanting more.
"Tanna," she gasped. "When I come out of this voyage, the first thing I am going to do is buy a plug of my very own."
"I'll let you wear it through tomorrow," smiled Tanna, kissing Nell warmly. "It'll let you get used to the feeling. You can give it back tomorrow night."
Nell's tummy quivered at the thought of carrying the plug inside her for an entire day, and her bum fluttered eagerly around the hardness in her ass in response.
The plug stayed snug inside Nell through the long night, a warm, insistent presence that woke her twice with a dull pulse of pleasure, and each time she pressed her thighs together and bit her lip and said nothing, while Tanna slept on, smiling faintly against the pillow.
By morning, the base of the plug sat hidden beneath the starched line of her uniform trousers, and Nell found she could not stop thinking about it. Every step made the obsidian shift slightly inside her. Every roll of the ship sent a tiny wave of sensation through her arse. She climbed to the quarterdeck with a red face and tried very hard to look like a captain who was not carrying an enchanted butt plug up her backside.
Down in the galley, Greta the Grubgirl presided over her domain with a ladle in one hand and a wooden spoon in the other. The great iron cauldron bubbled and steamed, releasing a smell that was vaguely porridge-like, vaguely meaty, and vaguely alarming. Her orcish nose, broad and keen, twitched with satisfaction. She had added oysters, a pinch of salt, and a measure of last night's beer for morale, and the result was, in her considered opinion, a triumph.
The crew crowded in. Scathach sat at the long table with her boots up on the bench. Two deckhands spooned porridge into their mouths with the weary resignation of men who had done this before. Brutehilde stood by the door, arms crossed, a small tower of muscle looming over the others, her iron-balled plaits clinking softly as she surveyed her domain.
"Greta," she announced, "that smells like a dead crag-cat that's been left in the sun."
"Exactly the point, girl," Greta beamed. "Boils the impurities right out. Nothing left but goodness."
The ship canted. A slow, groaning lurch that had everyone in the galley grabbing for the table. Mugs slid, porridge slopped, and the cauldron shifted on its iron hooks with a screech. Then came the sound. A vast, wet, sucking sound, like something enormous breaking the surface, and the whole ship shuddered as a weight struck the hull.
"Now what in the nine hells—" Brutehilde began.
A tentacle slammed down across the deck outside, thick as a barrel and covered in suckers the size of dinner plates. The wood groaned beneath it. Another tentacle snaked over the rail, and another, and the ship canted hard to port as the great dark shape of the Kraken rose alongside, its maw gaping, its eyes like twin moons of ancient hunger.
The Sea-Nymph's Revenge screamed. Or rather, the people on it did. High and shrill and full of sudden terror, and Captain Nell's voice cut through it.
"All hands! Repel it, repel it! Poles, hooks, anything!"
She ran for the side, and the plug shifted inside her as she moved, and a bolt of pleasure shot through her belly so sharp that she stumbled. Her arse clenched hard around the obsidian shaft, the runes pulsing warm against her insides, and with every terrified pound of her heart the plug seemed to throb in sympathy. She gasped, mortified, and shouted again.
Brutehilde was already there, heaving a spare spar over the rail, using it to shove against the nearest tentacle. The thing did not budge. It was like trying to move a mountain with a matchstick. The tentacle tightened around the hull with a sound like crushing timber, and the ship listed further.
"Push, you great hairy cow!" roared Brutehilde at herself, straining, her muscles cording with the effort.
"It's coming through the planks," answered Polly, appearing at her side with a boathook. "If we had any planks we'd be fine, but it's got the hull, luv, and it's squeezing."
Outside, the Kraken pressed its enormous face against the rail. Its eye, green and black and the size of a dinner plate, blinked slowly, regarding the frantic little creatures with something that might have been curiosity. It did not appear angry. It did not appear hungry, exactly. It simply appeared very large, and very close, and very much not going anywhere.
"Poke it!" Brutehilde bellowed. "Poke its eye, you fools!"
The deckhands jabbed with poles. The boathooks stabbed at the tentacles. The Kraken did not flinch. One tentacle draped over the bow, wrapping the bowsprit in a lazy, almost affectionate coil. The ship groaned. A plank split with a sound like a whipping crack.
Nell gripped the rail, white-knuckled, her face a mask of terror and something else entirely. With every lurch of the ship, the plug drove inward, a little deeper, a little harder, grinding against that hidden pleasure point, and her gasp came out half scream, half moan. She could feel herself slickening, could feel the obscene wetness spreading between her thighs even as the ship shook around her.
"Captain, are you all right?" Ulrika Grimquim appeared at her elbow, concern in her hard eyes.
"Fine," Nell choked. "Peachy. Bloody magnificent. Have you got a plan?"
The hours-long battle left her with a busy and distinct feeling. The last of the breakfast cauldron went overside at noon, dumped by Greta with a curse and a pang of culinary grief, and the splash of its contents drew the Kraken's eye for a long moment. The creature stared at the cloudy water, its tentacles slackening, and then it slowly, gently, released the hull.
The ship righted itself with a groan.
The crew stood panting, poles in hand, staring at the enormous eye as it blinked once, twice, before sinking beneath the surface. The water closed over it. The straits were calm again.
"Well," said Brutehilde, fists still clenched, breathing hard. "That was... that was—"
"Terrifying," said Polly. "Utterly bloody terrifying. I need a drink."
The rest of the day passed in a blur of nervous glances and white-knuckled watches. The Kraken did not resurface. The straits stayed quiet, the water glassy and still, as if the great beast had never been there at all. But the memory of that enormous eye lingered in every mind, and the crew moved about their duties with a wary silence.
Nell endured. Every step, every roll of the hull, every stumble sent the plug shifting inside her, and with each shift came a pulse of pleasure that made her breath catch and her cheeks flush. She tried to think of charts and courses and the welfare of her ship. Her arse had other ideas. By the time the sun sank below the horizon and the lanterns were lit, she was so wound up she could barely sit still.
She gave the night watch their orders with a tight voice and a red face, then fled to her cabin.
Tanna was already there, stretched out on the narrow bed in her smallclothes, watching the door with a knowing smile. The lantern burned low, painting her skin in warm amber light.
"Long day, Captain?" she asked.
"You have no idea." Nell shut the door behind her and leaned against it, breathing hard. The plug throbbed insistently inside her, a constant, demanding presence. She crossed the cabin in three strides and stood over the bed, looking down at Tanna with an expression caught somewhere between exasperation and hunger.
"I need it out," she said. "Now. Before I do something embarrassing on the quarterdeck."
Tanna's smile widened. "That bad?"
"Worse. I nearly ordered the crew to abandon ship just so I could go below and—" She cut herself off, fists clenched. "Just get it out of me."
Tanna sat up, her hands finding Nell's waist, drawing her down onto the bed. Nell went willingly, eagerly, sprawling across Tanna's lap with her arse in the air, her trousers already half undone. Tanna peeled them down, baring Nell's cheeks to the lantern light, and there it was, the obsidian base of the plug glistening in the shadows.
"Gods, you wore it all day," Tanna murmured, stroking the taut skin around it.
"It nearly drove me mad." Nell's voice was muffled against the blanket. "Every step. Every roll. Every time the ship lurched, I felt it grinding against—" She shuddered. "Please."
Tanna wrapped her fingers around the base and drew it out slowly, savouring the resistance, the way Nell's hole clenched and fluttered around the retreating shaft. Nell gasped into the mattress, her hips rocking back involuntarily, and when the plug finally slipped free she let out a long, ragged moan of relief and loss both at once.
Tanna held it up, runes pulsing faint violet in the dim light. It was still slick with Nell's warmth. She turned it over in her hand, then set it aside on the blanket and pressed a kiss to the small of Nell's back.
"There," she said softly. "Better?"
"Much." Nell rolled over, flushed and breathless, her thighs pressed together. "I don't know how you wear that thing every day. I was a wreck. The first thing I'm doing when I can is buying my own, like I said, but I need to train. I need to get used to it."
"You do," Tanna agreed. "But for now, it's better staying with me. You've felt what it does. I've had practice. I know how to carry it without looking like I'm about to faint."
Nell's eyes flicked to the plug, then back to Tanna's face. "I want to see you put it back in."
Tanna's eyebrows rose. "Oh?"
"Please." Nell's voice had gone soft, almost shy. "I want to watch. I want to see how it fits in you."
Tanna smiled and shifted on the bed, drawing her smallclothes down over her hips. She knelt on the mattress, facing away from Nell, and offered her arse to the lantern light. The curve of her cheeks was smooth and firm, and Nell watched, entranced, as Tanna reached back and spread them with one hand.
"Watch closely," Tanna said, and pressed the base of the plug against her hole.
The obsidian tip nuzzled her entrance, and Tanna pushed. Nell watched the dark shaft sink into Tanna's arse, inch by inch, the skin stretching around it, the runes flaring brighter as they slid home. Tanna sighed, a sound of satisfaction, and rocked her hips back to seat it fully. The base nestled flush between her cheeks, and she flexed, and the plug throbbed visibly.
"So it just stays?" Nell breathed.
"It stays. And it moves when I move." Tanna reached back and pressed two fingers against the base, wiggling it slightly. "Feel?"
"It's beautiful," Nell whispered. "Gods, look at you."
Tanna turned, grinning, and crawled over Nell's body, straddling her shoulders. Her cunt was wet, glistening in the lamplight, and she lowered herself slowly, deliberately, until her folds brushed Nell's lips.
"I'll show you how I thank you for letting me have it back," she said. "And for wearing it all day without complaint."
"I did complain. I complained a lot."
"You did. But you still wore it. Now open up."
Nell opened. She had no choice, not really, not when Tanna smelled like that, musk and warmth and the faint sharpness of arousal. She caught Tanna's clit between her lips and sucked, and Tanna gasped and ground down against her face.
"That's it," Tanna breathed. "Gods, that's it."
The plug throbbed inside Tanna's arse with every rock of her hips, and Nell felt the faint vibration of it through the skin, a strange, erotic rhythm that made her cunt ache. She lapped at Tanna, broad strokes of her tongue, then focused on the clit, circling it, teasing it, while her hands came up to grip Tanna's arse and spread it wide. She pressed a finger against the base of the plug, wiggling it, and Tanna cried out and bucked hard against her mouth.
"Fuck, Nell, keep doing that—"
Nell pushed her finger against the plug, working it in time with her tongue, and Tanna's thighs began to shake. The runes flared, the enchanted shaft swelling slightly inside her, and Tanna's groan turned to a full-bodied shudder.
"I'm going to—Nell, I'm going to—"
Nell didn't stop. She drove her tongue deep, then up, flicking the clit, and Tanna came with a ragged cry, her whole body convulsing over Nell's face. Nell drank her through it, licking and sucking until the shuddering subsided and Tanna slumped forward, bracing herself on Nell's shoulders.
"Well," Tanna managed, breathless, "that's one way to say thank you."
Nell licked her lips, tasting Tanna's warmth. Her own cunt was drenched, throbbing, and she pressed her thighs together against the ache. "Any time."
Tanna laughed, soft and warm, and slid down Nell's body to curl against her side. She reached between Nell's legs, fingers finding her slick slit, and began to stroke slowly, lazily.
"My turn to say thank you properly," Tanna murmured against her ear.
And Nell, too wrung out to argue, let her.
Nell woke to the smell of Greta's porridge drifting through the cabin, and to Tanna's hand still resting warm and possessive between her thighs. She stretched, wincing at the tenderness between her legs, and found Tanna already awake, watching her with that knowing smile.
"Morning, Captain."
"Morning." Nell's voice was hoarse. She cleared her throat. "How are you feeling?"
Tanna's smile widened. She rolled onto her stomach, and her hand drifted back to press against the base of the plug nestled between her cheeks. "Ready for anything."
The breakfast bell rang, and they dressed with a lazy reluctance, Nell's uniform crisp and starched, Tanna's armour strapped and polished. The plug sat hidden inside her, a warm, familiar presence that made her walk with a little extra sway.
They made their way to the galley.
The first sign of trouble came as a shadow, sliding across the deck like a dark cloud passing over the sun. Then the water ahead of the ship bulged, and the Kraken rose.
It was bigger than they remembered. Its enormous eye fixed on the ship, and its tentacles uncoiled from the depths like lazy serpents, reaching for the hull with a patient, inexorable hunger.
"All hands!" Nell shouted, her voice cracking. "Again! Repel it!"
Chaos erupted. Deckhands seized poles and boathooks, stabbing at the approaching tentacles. Brutehilde grabbed a coil of rope and swung it like a flail, cracking the nearest appendage with a sound like thunder. The Kraken did not flinch. A tentacle swept across the deck, sending two deckhands sprawling, and wrapped around the mainmast with a groan of straining timber.
But Tanna was already moving.
She crossed the deck in long, easy strides, the plug shifting inside her with each step, sending a steady current of pleasure up her spine. It was like a fire in her belly, fierce and focused, and she embraced it. She drew her sword, a long, wicked blade of dark-elven steel, and charged the nearest tentacle.
The first one was wrapped around the bowsprit. Tanna jumped onto the rail, ran along it like a tightrope walker, and brought her sword down in a two-handed arc. The blade bit deep. Black ichor spurted, and the tentacle recoiled with a sound like a wounded whale, releasing the bowsprit and whipping back into the sea.
Polly's jaw dropped. "What the fuck, Sharp!"
Tanna grinned, wild and fierce, and the plug pulsed inside her, driving her onward. She charged the second tentacle, the one crushing the mainmast. She ducked under its sweeping curve, planted her boot on its suckered underside, and climbed. The tentacle thrashed, trying to shake her, but she held on with her free hand, the plug grinding against her insides with every jolt, and her vision went white at the edges. She reached the top of the coil, raised her sword, and brought it down again and again, sawing through the thick, rubbery flesh.
The tentacle collapsed. It fell to the deck with a heavy thud, twitching, and Tanna rode it down, leaping clear at the last moment with a triumphant cry.
The crew stared at her. Nell stared at her. Brutehilde stared at her.
"The fuck," said Polly, "is in your arse?"
Tanna laughed, breathless, and the plug throbbed in delighted agreement. She raised her sword, pointing it at the Kraken's enormous eye. The creature blinked slowly, its head turning to regard her with ancient, patient curiosity.
Tanna bared her teeth and charged.
She was nearly there, nearly within striking distance of that great moon-sized eye, when Greta's voice erupted from the galley companionway.
"STOP! PUT DOWN YOUR BLOODY SWORD AND STOP!"
Tanna skidded to a halt, nearly pitching over the rail. The entire crew froze. The Kraken's eye swivelled to the new arrival.
Greta the Grubgirl emerged from below deck, her enormous green bulk filling the companionway, a huge steaming pot of slop in her arms. She was beaming.
"Look at him!" she cried, gesturing at the Kraken with the pot. "You daft great dunders, he's not here to eat you! You're not even worth a snack. He's come for the smell!"
"The smell?" Brutehilde said, incredulous.
"My cooking!" Greta's beam widened. "He smells it! He smells my lovely, lovely stew, and he's curious. That's all. You great oafs, don't you know a hungry tummy when you see one?"
The entire crew looked at Greta. Then at the Kraken. Then back at Greta.
"Is she cracked?" Polly asked.
"Probably," said Scathach.
But Greta was already clambering up onto the rail, heedless of the drop, and tipping the great pot over the side. The slop splashed into the water in a great grey-brown mess, and the Kraken's eye followed it down.
It looked at the floating slop. It looked back at Greta. Then, slowly, with a gentleness that seemed absurd for a creature of its size, it dipped one enormous tentacle into the water and stirred the mess around. A second tentacle joined it. And then the Kraken lowered its enormous head, inserted a siphon into the water, and began to drink up the slop with great, satisfied slurps.
"See?" Greta beamed, patting the Kraken's nearest tentacle as it coiled over the rail. "He's just hungry. Nothing but a great big puppy."
The Kraken's tentacle gave a playful wave. Spray exploded across the deck, soaking the crew. The crew stood there, dripping, utterly agog.
"Now stand to and look lively," Greta added, swinging back down to the deck, "because the rest of you have been stuffing your faces all morning and this big lad is hungry. I'll need a crew for my next batch. I shall call it Kraken Stew, in his honour!"
Tanna lowered her sword slowly, eyeing the enormous creature as it slurped contentedly at the water's surface. Her arse throbbed with a proud pulse, the plug still buzzing happily inside her. She sheathed her blade and raised a hand to the crew.
"Stand down," she called, her voice carrying across the deck. "All hands, stand down."
The crew obeyed, lowering their poles and boathooks, staring at the giant animal with a mixture of dread, disbelief, and a growing, ridiculous fondness.
In the water alongside, the Kraken gave another happy flick of its tentacles, and a wave of spray caught Tanna square in the back. She grinned, spluttering, and saluted the beast.
"Good lad," she said.
The Sea-Nymph's Revenge ran before a gentle wind, her sails full and taut, her hull riding the swells with an ease no one aboard had felt for days. And in the water alongside, just below the surface, a vast dark shape kept pace with her, sliding through the blue like a mountain given grace.
Down in the captain's cabin, Nell had spread the charts across the table. Ulrika Grimquim stood at her right, arms crossed, jaw set. Brutehilde loomed on her left, iron-balled plaits clinking softly as she leaned over the parchment. The lantern swung with the ship's motion, throwing shifting light across the inked coastlines and soundings.
There, marked in fading ink, was the course Nell had chosen. And there, rising from the edge of the chart, was the danger they had feared.
"Spire Waters," Ulrika said. "I never thought I'd see the day we came back through here."
"Nor I," said Nell. She smoothed the chart. "But I have a plan."
"What plan?" Brutehilde demanded. "We spent an hour this morning fending off a creature the size of a keep, and you want to speak of plans?"
"It's here," Nell said simply.
She pointed at the porthole.
Brutehilde and Ulrika both turned. There, parallel to the hull, shadowing them through the clear green water, was the enormous silhouette of the Kraken. It swam with slow, deliberate strokes of its tentacles, keeping pace with the ship with barely any effort. Its eye, vast and unblinking, rolled up to look at the hull as if checking that its charge was still moving.
Brutehilde blinked. "That's the... that's the thing that tried to crush the ship."
"Tried and failed." Nell's mouth quirked. "It wasn't trying to crush anything, Brutehilde. It was curious ... and hungry. Greta fed it, and now it has adopted us."
"Adopted us," Ulrika repeated flatly.
"Indeed. Look." Nell tapped the chart. "It keeps pace with us every moment of the day. It does not venture ahead or fall behind. Every time Greta empties her cauldron, it rises to the surface, consumes the contents with evident satisfaction, and returns to its guard position." She lifted her chin. "That creature is the best signpost we could possibly have asked for."
"Signpost?" Brutehilde's brow furrowed. "Explain."
Nell pulled herself up, her hands on the table edge. The plan had come to her during the long watch, standing at the rail and watching that vast shape slide through the moonlit water, and it had felt, for the first time since storm and hermit, like the ship had a true guide.
"The Kraken is a creature of the deep ocean," she said. "It cannot abide shallow waters. The very weight of it would beach it, and it knows this. So as long as it swims alongside us, we are in deep water, safe from sandbanks and hidden reefs."
Ulrika gave a slow, considering nod. "And the whirlpools the hermit warned of?"
"It will not approach them. No creature does, not without desperation. A whirlpool that would wreck this ship would trouble it not at all, but the currents that spawn such things pull at its tentacles, and it fears them. It will detour long before we ever see the signs." Nell's finger traced the chart. "That gives us an early warning better than any gull or hermit."
A silence fell. Brutehilde let out a long breath and folded her massive arms. "So we're following a giant squid like it's a guide dog."
"The alternative," Nell said dryly, "is following a madman's advice about seagulls he ate."
"Fair point," Brutehilde muttered.
Ulrika was studying the shadow again, and there was something almost like approval in her hard eyes. "And beyond the practical matters," she said, "there's the deterrent effect. I'd wager there's not a pirate vessel or sea-monster within a hundred leagues that would dare approach a ship with a Kraken keeping stride."
"Quite so," said Nell. "We might have been boarded by polite pirates and charming captains earlier, Ulrika. I suspect that will not trouble us again. Not with our new friend abroad."
Brutehilde barked a laugh. "Friend."
"He's a friend," Nell said firmly. "We shall treat him as such. And his name," she added, with a flicker of that dry amusement, "is Lefty."
Brutehilde's eyebrows shot up. "Lefty?"
"Because he swims off our port side. I thought 'Righty' might confuse the helm."
A beat of silence, then Ulrika laughed, a short, surprised sound she seemed to have not expected to escape her. Brutehilde shook her head slowly, a grin cracking through her sternness.
"The captain names a monster," she said. "Gods help us all."
The chart was rolled up. Nell dismissed them with a nod, and they went out into the warm sunlight, where the deck had relaxed into that lazy rhythm once more. Scoffer was sitting in the scuppers with his legs over the side, tossing scraps into the water. The Kraken's tentacle rose, caught the scraps in mid-air with surprising gentleness, and descended again. Scoffer gave a satisfied grunt.
At the rail, Greta held her ladle like a sceptre, keeping watch over her underwater charge.
"I'll have the next cauldron ready by dusk," she called up to the quarterdeck. "Plenty of body in it. He likes it thick."
Nell, standing at the helm, let herself smile. It was a strange company. A strange heiress and her wizard, a smelly orc, a minotaur without a sense of direction, a poet fool, a pregnant elf and her streetwise lover, an interplanar horror wrapped in oilskins, and now a tentacled sea-god following them for the smell of dinner ... not to mention a cheeky pixie and a knight too beautiful for her own good.
And she, captain of it all, with knowledge of the deep waters and a growing certainty in her chest.
She touched the starched line of her coat, and there, so faint she could have imagined it, came the ghost of a pulse, as she remembered the throb of Tanna's plug and the future promise of one of her own.
As long as the Kraken swam alongside, they were safe from the shallows, from the whirlpools, from most dangers of the deep. And as long as Greta kept feeding him, he would stay.
The ship sailed on, and the shadow glided beneath the waves beside her, patient and immense.