Path of the Whisper Woman

When I had time to think, which wasn't often as I wove through tentacles and tried to knife Ambervale in the side, I decided that fighting her was a lot like our overall fight with the Lady Blue. Too big to fight properly so we were forced to expend terrible amounts of effort just to cut our foe down to size and meanwhile she trampled over everything as she blindly pressed forward in the name of revenge. No concern for anything outside herself and her ultimate goal. It would have been nice if I could simply bash her head in and called it a day while the fish disappeared back where they came from but nothing was ever that easy.

I couldn't deal Ambervale a fatal blow. Not from the ground and not without help. Now that she had doubled in size she was closing in on being twelve feet tall. I could reach her stomach wound and not much else of importance. She didn't seem to really notice the other cuts I made to the lumps and unprotected patches on her tail and sides.

Ingrasia, Ziek, and Ana had better luck since they were all taller than me and still had their spears, but their united front was a harder temptation for the surrounding fish to ignore. More opportunistic blows came after them when they devoted themselves fully to attacking Ambervale.

I could have stayed with their group to act as another shield or attacker, but we had naturally separated out as the fight picked up again. I was too used to acting as an independent fighter and we hadn't practiced fighting together as a cohesive group despite the lessons Ziek had led in the Seedling Palace. Things had moved too fast between the time I joined the Hundred Eyes sect and got pulled into the delta by Esie's manipulations.

So, instead, we fell into a pattern of decoy, distraction, and attack while I absorbed everything about their fighting as quickly as I could. It was clear that they had spent plenty of time fighting together. Though, at times, I couldn't shake the feeling that, while not bad, the actions they took could have been better if there was a fourth person there. Someone they expected to be at their back when they were all fighting together. Perhaps they thought I could have filled the hole for now, but I had no idea how Ingrasia's last apprentice I hadn't met yet fought, and I knew better than to add something completely unexpected to the mix. That would be asking for mistakes and errors when we could least afford it.

Ziek took point. She absorbed the heavy blows when they couldn't be avoided and used her spear more like a staff to block and redirect blows. Ingrasia and Ana used her defense to take advantage of any opening Ambervale let slip. Ingrasia's moves were quick and light, and it was easy to picture her skipping along on a railing high in the air despite the muck coating our feet. Ana had the most standard fighting style with her spear out of the three of them, but more than once she used her voice to push the other two to act, such as dodging a blow they didn't see coming. She helped to control the battlefield in their favor and I sorely wished Ambervale wasn't deaf so she could use her blessing on the traitor too. I was sure it was devastating when her opponent couldn't escape her coercion.

All in all, the three of them seemed more at ease fighting fish and an abomination than I would've expected. It blurred the lines between sects once again and made me start to wonder what threats they might have faced in Azabel's territory that would push them to coordinate their fighting so well, but I pulled my focus back to the task at hand.

The Knife Dancer's Revenge potion wasn't going to last forever and I'd become a liability once it was done. Nothing could matter at the moment but finishing Ambervale off and learning how the others worked as quickly as possible so I could take advantage of the opportunity they offered.

My arm finally started tingling back to life, so I began to work my way back to where I dropped my spear. Reach and stabbing power were too important to abandon the weapon completely.

Now that we were engaging her in a fight, Ambervale kept her place in the middle of the sandbar and took advantage of the distance her new tentacles and tail allowed her to cover. She used one arm of five tentacles to pin down the others so they couldn't advance easily to strike her body and keep them where she knew they were while the rest squirmed and flailed through the space around her trying to find me when she wasn't completely distracted by the poison still running down her front. The skin there was puffy and red, but she seemed to be getting used to the pain—or just so enraged that it didn't matter anymore.

I did my best to avoid touching or blocking anything that came my way. My best defense lay in her not knowing where to find me which made going for the spear a bigger gamble since I couldn't be sure if she knew she had knocked it from my hands and was waiting for me to go after it so she could trap me. Or if it really was just laying there not being much use to anybody.

Still, it was a gamble worth taking. My knife had trouble getting past her blubbery skin and scales so I hadn't managed to do much real damage to her with it. Nor could we just wait for her to bleed out because Ambervale gave no indication of slowing down despite the fact that she should have lost too much blood to function if she was still human. A drop of demigoddess blood wasn't to be underestimated, apparently. Those on the walkway were likely to get overwhelmed sooner than later due to the sheer number of fish as well and my gut said they weren't going to stop their focused assault while Ambervale was still around.

I shoved my knife in my belt and dove through the gap between two tentacles. The muck kept me from rolling as far as I would've liked but it helped absorb the impact on my hurt shoulder. Then I had a nice stretch of open ground as Ambervale guessed wrong for where I would be. I sprinted forward. Shouts came from my right as Ambervale managed to wrap a tentacle around Ziek's spear but I couldn't help them. Instead, I used the distraction to weave by a few more tentacles as Ambervale redirected them to go after the others.

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My spear was tantalizing close. I reached for it—only to scramble back as her tail nearly pummeled me into the ground. At the same moment I felt the strength and focus that had been pushing me suddenly flag. The potion was weakening. Gritting my teeth, I pushed through the sudden weakness and lunged forward as Ambervale's tail pulled back. My hand curled around smooth wood and I twisted to hug it close and take the incoming blow on my back.

The impact pushed me towards Ambervale until I was only an inch or two from where her legs fused together. Disgust threatened to break my resolve as a fin fluttered near my nose, looking like a fish drowning in a bag of flesh. But I tore my gaze from the awful thing and speared her in the hip.

A screech like nails scraping over rock filled the air and suddenly the air around me was replaced by slimy, scaly tentacles. Good. The others could have a breather.

I braced myself, ready to spear any and everything I could when the ground under my feet disappeared. I dropped into a hole that immediately started filling with water. Confusion nearly clouded the last of the Knife Dancer's Revenge effects before I looked up and saw Morwen, the Beastwtcher's sect, leap off a ramp of dirt over the hole I was in. Hattie reached down into the hole she had made a moment later, offering me a hand and grinning like this was the best day of her life. If they were here then Esie and the rest of group had to be as well.

Rather than waste the sudden reprieve I'd been given I took another drink of the potion and felt strength and focus fill me again. My heart also stuttered in a way that didn't feel normal but I ignored that as I took Hattie's hand and let her haul me up out of the hole.

Taking stock of the situation, I found my assumption was well founded. After helping me, Hattie switched to helping Nix with crowd control. Between her holes and Nix's blessing that seemed to rebuff the fish, they were able to open up more space for everyone to maneuver. Given the size of the sand bar Hattie couldn't make holes wherever she wanted unless we wanted everything to be underwater, but she placed the ones she did use well and Morwen used her own blessing when she had the chance to control the earth and collapse some of the holes. Hattie even opened one directly under Ambervale which neatly hampered her ability to use her tail and dropped her a few feet so we could reach her upper body and head easier. She would have fallen farther but her bulk got stuck.

Esie and Kaylan had set up opposite of Ingrasia and her apprentices and the two groups were trading harrying the abomination and hitting as hard as they could when her attention shifted. Esie's spear dripped with something before she jammed it into Ambervale's chest. Ambervale screeched and shudder but she couldn't escape whatever poison Esie had just shoved deep into her body.

I wasn't exactly happy to see the new help but I couldn't deny that the new numbers made a difference. Ambervale couldn't overwhelm us nearly as easily now that we were more even matched numberwise and all the whisper women clearly had combat experience despite Hattie being the only Peacekeeper. Not that was a true surprise, since only a true fool would ignore combat training living in Her territory, but it was eye opening to see everyone hold their own. I wasn't sure how everyone else was getting past their disgust, but I was ready to go again now that I had my second drink.

Something stopped me before I could go running in, however. I ducked as a tentacle whipped by and my gaze dropped to the hole filling with water by my foot. When I looked back at the fight I realized what it was.

We were doing better but we still couldn't deal Ambervale a fatal blow. Between all her tentacles and height, even in the hole, and her scales protecting her most vulnerable areas, we couldn't get close enough to skewer her where it mattered or force our way through her protections when we did. It made me glad she still didn't have her sight and hearing. If she did, this fight would have been skewed even more in her favor, though she did a good job of keeping track of us as it was.

She'd die eventually, if her still weeping wounds didn't get her then exhaustion and a well timed blow would, but I still thought that would take too long. Give too much time for her to slip free with another surprise or for the delta to be compromised.

Something more had to change and I knew what it was. On the shore, Juniper had taken out the modified fish soldier with her water. I wasn't sure if she could still form the water sphere now that the pearl was embedded in her forehead, but that all encompassing attack could clinch our fight with the abomination.

I caught sight of her still on the walkway, still looking like she was bending all her concentration on trying to get Cascade to listen to her. If she could get the snake to attack Ambervale, that would be even better, but so far it looked like she was locked in a losing battle. I wouldn't be surprised if their connection was too new and the feast of fish before Cascade too alluring that Juniper couldn't get reason past the snake's blood lust.

"Juniper. Water sphere."

I shifted out of the way of another attack as I kept my gaze on Juniper. She didn't so much as twitch in response to my wind whisper. It seemed I had a similar with her as she did with Cascade. She was too locked in on trying to speak with the snake that she couldn't hear anything else.

I sent a second whisper just to make sure it wasn't my boon somehow failing along the short distance but she still didn't respond. Huffing out a breath, I set out a course and made my way over to Ingrasia amid Ambervale's wild attacks.

As I reached them, I helped spear a tentacle that was trying to sneak past Ziek to ensnare Ana. It recoiled and she smiled her thanks at me as she kicked a fish off her spear. Ziek had a spear too but Ingrasia didn't. I figured she had gifted Ziek hers when Ambervale had ensnared the one Ziek was using to defend.

I handed my hard won spear off to my mentor and indicated Juniper. "She has an attack that help us put an end to this. I'll go get her while you keep it occupied."

Ingrasia glanced at the horde of fish between me and the walkway and tried to hand the spear back. "You'll need this."

"Keep it. I'll be fine." I stepped back before she could try to make me take it again. "I'll collect it from you soon."

My knife was much more effective against normal fish. While I wasn't looking forward to how much I'd have to scrub it before I was willing to eat off it again, at this point more yellow blood wasn't going to make a difference. It would have to be enough along with my temporary strength and speed. The spear was better used for keeping everyone else safe.