“What is that horrible smell?” My‑re asked and tried to turn her head away from the stench.
General Pol covered his nose and shook his head in displeasure.
Carrying a crate full of mushrooms, she tossed her head back and forth to wave away the smell as the pair made their way from the market and back to the Broken Sword tavern. The rocks on Willow Beach crunched under her boots as she saw a large crowd gathering a little way down the shore. The stench got worse the closer they traveled toward them.
“Let’s take a look,” Pol muffled from between his hands.
My‑re snorted out hard a few times to try and remove the stink, but it settled right back in as she inhaled. She gagged, breathing through her mouth. It didn’t help either, as she tasted the rot. “No, thank you. That smell is terrible. Whatever it is, it’s likely dead, and if not, it should be.”
“As a Lord Protector, don’t you think it’s your duty to investigate strange matters? If not, we can always proceed back to the bar where you can help me and serve customers,” Pol said.
She thought it odd that Pol talked about the duties of a Lord Protector. All he cared about was raking in gold, and the odd use of ‘duty,’ ‘help,’ and ‘serve’ sounded too familiar. Maybe the kid in him just wanted to poke something dead with a stick, but that didn’t seem to be the answer either. She eyed the Rirorni suspiciously. “Did Corg say something to you?”
General Pol didn’t look at her and said, “Nooo.”
“What’d Corg say?”
He continued to look away. “Nothing…maybe a bit.”
“What in the nine hells? He had no right to repeat words said between us. If that pompous sod thinks he can manipulate me, he’ll have to train his wit up a bit.”
“Coming to see the whale washed up on shore? Torn to shreds from the sounds of folk’s tales,” came a feminine voice, which sounded like purring.
The pair turned and saw Ssskah, an Aruaki, also known as the Catfolk, and a customer from the Broken Sword tavern. My‑re had heard stories of them growing up in the Rirorni Empire and of their Pride in their ancestral home in the southern reaches of the Rirorni plans and Old Ratan. However, she knew little else about their culture. Ssskah, shorter than My‑re, looked like a bipedal tuxedo cat with black and white on her face and down her front, and she still thought it looked odd for a cat dressed in simple but functional human clothing. My‑re resisted the urge to reach out and scratch under her chin.
“Sure,” Pol replied and motioned for My‑re to follow.
The two followed Ssskah and edged through the crowd to see the creature. The sounds of buzzing flies greeted them. Indeed, the Lake of Mists had deposited the carcass of a gargantuan creature on the shore lying on its side. Small waves lapped against strings of flayed flesh torn from it while small fish with needle-like teeth nibbled at them. Several enormous round holes were all along the beast. Bones, both broken and intact, protruded from the wounds. When alive, the sea creature could have easily swallowed a person whole.
“Ya think a shark got at it?” someone commented.
“That’d be one massive shark. Besides, the lake is fresh water. There aren’t any sharks in there,” Ssskah answered. “It’s not a whale, from what I can tell, but what is it?”
My‑re looked at the thing’s bloated body, black eyes, and multi-layered razor-sharp teeth. It was the size of a whale. She noticed it lay on a long appendage sticking out from its head with a bulb-shaped end. She knew it from her conversation with Corg when they went night fishing.
“It’s a lurker lure.”
Eyes turned to her, and Ssskah said, “Impossible. Those things stay in the deep and are the apex predators of these waters. There’s nothing in there big enough to kill a lurker lure.”
“There is now.” My‑re spotted a craft with about ten Lord Protectors heading out from the nearby docks.
“They must be going to look for the monster that did this,” Ssskah said.
My‑re glanced at the considerable size of the lurker lure, then to the protectors’ smaller craft out on the water. She then said under her breath, “They’re going to need a bigger boat.”