Ocean Of Fear (Book 6) Read Online Free PDF Page B

Quan?”
    “That is how they are known among your people. To the Triturids, they were known only as the Enemy.”
    The Triturids were another Elder Race, servants of the Old One Tritureon, who had dwelled along the coasts of the World Ocean many millennia ago. Their ruins could be found from the island of Thuria in the far north to the coasts of Solarea at the Gates of the Dragon Sea. “How do you know what the Triturids thought?”
    “Tumitha gave them shelter. They lived under the shadow of her leaves for many summers. They fought against Dhagoth and his servants during the wars of the Eldrim. You are approaching Triturek, the greatest of their citadels. The sorcerer you seek is already within its walls. His presence has driven the Triturids into a frenzy.”
    “He has not passed beyond?”
    “We would know if he had.”
    “I must find him then.”
    “Be careful in that place. Our people shun the city. It is tainted by the Shadow. It has seeped into the very stones of the place and warped all who live near. The Triturids are degenerate shadows of what they once were. Whatever this sorcerer and his Quan ally seek, it cannot be a good thing. Tumitha wishes you to know this.”
    “Why does she help me?”
    “You freed her brother from the Shadow, even if you killed him. There is a debt there. And she bears no love for the Quan. Wicked they were in ancient times, and dark and fell and mighty. She doubts the passage of time has improved their nature.”
    “I had thought the Quan gone from this world along with their patron.”
    “So had she. She believed they died when their mother, the sea monster Leviathan was slain. This disturbs her. Perhaps one of the forgotten Powers of ancient days stirs.”
    Kormak wondered what else the Great Tree knew that it was not telling him. He felt enmeshed in a vast web. Father Jonas and his Order had own agenda. The Great Tree had its. Doubtless the Kraken and his inhuman ally had theirs.
    “I thank you and I thank Tumitha,” he said.  
    “Best be wary within Triturek. It is a vile place.” Without saying anything more, the elves rose in unison and left. They did not look back.

    “What did they want?” Zamara asked as Kormak clambered up the rope netting on the side of the ship and over the railing.
    “They told me where the Kraken is.”
    “Where?”
    “Less than a day away, in the ruins left behind by one of the Elder Races.”
    Father Jonas looked at him. A sour expression twisted his mouth, as if he had just bitten into bad fruit. “Do these ruins belong to the Quan?”
    Kormak shook his head. “Their enemies, the Triturids.”
    The captain looked at them both, as if wondering what they were talking about.  
    “That does not make any sense,” Jonas said. He frowned, black eyebrows joining together over his nose.
    “The elves said another thing—the Kraken has a Quan with him.”
    “The Black Priest?” Jonas said.
    “I believe so.”
    “That is not good news—the sage Petroneus claimed that the Quan were deadly sorcerers.”
    “They are also supposed to be extinct,” said Kormak.
    Jonas nodded. “In recent times there have been rumours out of Port Blood concerning their reappearance. One of our agents even connected them with the Kraken but my superiors dismissed the idea. They thought it was just someone who had heard of the Kraken’s interest in elder world artefacts and jumped to a fanciful conclusion. It seems they were wrong.”
    “The Kraken is looking for something in the ruins, obviously, but what?”
    “We don’t need to know that,” said Zamara. “All we need to do is stop him getting it.”
    “It would help if we knew what it was,” said Jonas. “It might save us from any more unpleasant surprises.”
    “Join me in my cabin,” said Zamara. “It is obvious there are things we need to talk about.”

    On a war-galley like the Ocean’s Blade, even the captain’s cabin was tiny with room for little more than a bed. It was little more