Things that go thump in the light * Strange fish * A familiar destination

One reason Stax thought he was dreaming was that the light wasn’t a sharp, clear light like you’d expect from a lighthouse or a lantern mounted on a boat. And it was the wrong color. Rather than being the orangey-red of fire, it was a pale, blue-green light that seemed to shimmer and wobble.

Stax reached over the side of the boat and splashed water on his face, to make sure he was awake; he had troubles enough without chasing a figment of his imagination across the dark, seemingly endless water. He accidentally swallowed some of the water and gasped and coughed, the noise sounding dangerously loud amid the ocean’s vast, still darkness.

The light was still there, ahead of him and a little to the right. That should be east, Stax thought, except when he looked at the compass the needle indicated the light was to the northwest. Either the compass had started pointing somewhere else, or the boat had drifted again while he slept over the oars.

“We’ll worry about that later,” Stax told himself in a croaking whisper, his voice rough and raw from salt.

He began to row toward the light, half-expecting it to disappear as he did so, revealed as another trick played by the cruel sea. But it was still there, shimmering in the night. It wasn’t until he was much closer that Stax realized that the light wasn’t coming from a structure on land or from a boat, but from under the sea.

Mesmerized, he drew closer, rowing slowly and straining his eyes to see through the water.

Below him, he saw a strange, eldritch land: pale hills and valleys beneath the surface of the sea. There was a forest down there, but one made of strands of kelp, waving in the currents. And atop a white hill was a sprawling castle made of ghostly green stone, surrounded by a scattering of towers. The mysterious light that had drawn Stax seemed to emanate from the castle.

Stax let the boat drift, enchanted by the strange sight. He was so focused on what he saw that when the thump came against the bottom of his boat he was nearly knocked overboard.

“Wh-what?” he yelped, swiveling his head and trying to find his attacker. The boat jumped again, and he heard a deep, gurgling growl from somewhere in the water nearby.

Stax knew that sound all too well, and pulled frantically on the oars. The boat leapt forward, toward the castle, as Stax rowed as hard as he could.

Something flashed in the darkness, glowing purple. A trident, Stax thought, but this light was a continuous beam, from ahead of him. As he rowed, the beam swiveled and landed on his chest. He stared down at it, puzzled.

The beam turned yellow and Stax cried out in pain. He felt like his flesh was burning. He ducked, pulling at the oars, and turned the boat away from the burning light.

He was above the green buildings now, awash in their spooky radiance. Below him, the scene that had seemed so enchanting had turned terrifying. Spiked creatures like giant fish swam below him, gazing up at him from pitiless single eyes, and he could see the gray-fleshed shapes of drowned swimming toward the surface, their mouths black Os.

Another purple beam flashed past the boat, lancing out into the night. Stax rowed hard, trying to put distance between himself and the undersea castle and its defenders. Something thumped at the bottom of the boat again, knocking Stax sideways and causing him to lose his grip on one of the oars. That sent the boat into a spin, and water washed over the side.

Stax fumbled for his wooden sword, yelling defiantly. A glowing purple shaft flashed by his ear, and this time it really was a trident. He dropped his sword and pulled hard on the oars, grunting with the effort. The glowing castle was behind him, but not far enough, and he waited for the trident to strike him between the shoulder blades, or for the burning light to find him again.

Keep going, he told himself. Keep going, keep going, keep going!

He rowed until he couldn’t anymore, his arms falling to his sides. He was panting now, desperately gulping for air. His chest hurt where the strange yellow light had touched him.

But he was alive.

Stax risked a look back over his shoulder. He’d rowed farther than he’d thought; the greenish light was a dot far behind him. Far enough, perhaps, that the guardians no longer considered him a threat, or had given up the pursuit.

Stax wanted desperately to rest, but he forced himself to keep rowing. If the wind or the currents pushed him back over the strange castle, he would be attacked again, and this time he doubted he’d escape.

Stax rowed until he couldn’t see the light behind him, and then rowed until he was exhausted again. And then—not because he thought it was a good idea, but because he couldn’t help it—he fell asleep at the oars. When he woke up, it was day. The sun had climbed a fair distance above the horizon.

There’s not a lot I can tell you about the next two days, because they were pretty much the same as the days I’ve told you about already. Stax rowed until he was too tired to row any longer and had to slump over his oars, apparently dead to the world, and then he woke up with a start and rowed some more. He no longer talked to himself—he was too weary to do that—and he barely looked at the compass. He simply rowed. At this point, he could barely remember a time when he’d done anything else.

It wasn’t until he saw the islands that his exhausted brain started to work again. He saw two at once, one to his left and one to his right, and they looked much the same, dots of dirt and rock.

But Stax’s brain didn’t work right away. He was so overwhelmed by his ordeal that he assumed his mind was playing tricks on him. So instead of landing on the closest island to rest, he simply rowed past it. But then he passed more islands, some to the north and some to the south, and finally something about them struck him as familiar.

A couple of hours later, there was no doubt at all: There were the gray bluffs, and the shipwrecks in the surf. This was the broad bay into which the raiders had sailed after leaving the perilous Sea of Sorrows.

Stax didn’t know whether he’d found his way back there by pure luck or some dimly perceived memory, but now he rowed with grim determination, and even found himself thinking of the sad, ruined tower he’d been so desperate to leave. He rowed until his arms were shaking and nearly limp, staring at the water ahead of him with wide eyes. He was racing the sun again; it was starting to set behind him, and the sky ahead of him was already darkening. Some instinct told Stax that he had used up all his reserves of strength and courage, and wouldn’t survive another night exposed to the Overworld’s dangers. So he rowed and rowed and rowed.

The first stars were emerging when he saw a familiar low swampy place ahead of him, with pale sandy hills behind it and a spike of stone rising from the beach. Stax cried out and turned for the beach, rowing until the boat crunched into the sand and pebbles beneath it. He tried to stand, couldn’t, and fell over the side, landing on his hands and knees in the shallow water. Gasping, he made himself stand, gritting his teeth as his brain insisted the world was bobbing up and down around him. Step by step, he forced his legs to work, carrying him through sand and mud to the familiar patched door in the tower.

Hands shaking, Stax assembled his bed and then collapsed onto it.

“Well, I made it,” he muttered.

He tried to laugh, but nothing came out but a dry, awful-sounding croak.