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A boy--holding a harpoon taller than its bearer in his twiggy ar the rolled nets The point bit into his side Auron lashed out with his tail, sending boy and weapon overboard Pain driving hied it: he tore apart fittings, struck wheel and tiller ropes, and finally hurled the re on to the hold He splintered enough oil-soaked wood so that even the an to crackle and pop as they spread

He crawled back to the rail and poked his head up The other "hunting" boat with the harpoonships raised sail, abandoning their tangled nets and floated lines Auron did not know if they were coht the fire--and he did not wait to find out He went over the far side

Water and Fire! The fishermen chased him even underwater Thecluhting heat in his body with their courage Auron plunged as far down as he could and clung flush to the rocky bottom The men swa underwater, giving his ca; they waved to each other and floated slowly toward the surface, back to back and harpoons ready to stab at whatever ca to the sides of the launch

Auron accepted the draw and watched their little flat-bottoer ones He came up to breathe and took in the havoc he had loosed Two fishing boats burned Horribly blackened bodies floated in the gentle waves of the bay under seagulls already dropping for afire slick kept the birds from another body, probably that of the deter at the deadelse One bore the boy Auron had knocked overboard Theships

Auron swa the water ahead of the swirl of his snakelike body The boy floated facedown in the water, pale and unresponsive as the dolphins poked hinawed at Auron, despite the fading heat of battle He took the dead or unconscious boy by the neck--breaking vertebrae as his jaws closed--and swaside for a ard Its eye held no merriment this time

BOOK TWO

Drake

IF LEGENDS KNEW WHAT AWAITED,

THEY’D SPEND THEIR YOUTHS DIFFERENTLY

--Naf Touraq

Chapter 10

The seaside days of plentiful fish, oyster, and lobster er that much harder to bear

He crossed rainswept, stone-studded, uninhabited country for two days after cliht the white tips of the faintand under the rocks They were hardly worth the effort of tiiven how many it took to make a mouthful