It floated, although the amount of water it was taking on as its weight dragged it down testified that it wouldn't float long. The sahuagin jumping after it from the docks made that time even less. The old bard barely made out the gray streamers of smoke curling up from the small barrels in the back.

In the next instant, though, the barrels detonated one by one. The series of explosions threw up geysers of water, smoke, wood chips, and a wave of force that blew Pacys from his feet.

Live, that you may serve.

The cold, powerful voice filled Jherek's mind, snapping him back from the black void where his senses had fled. He woke in the harbor water, his lungs burning with the need for air and the cold claws of a sahuagin wrapping his neck.

Somehow he'd managed to hang onto his weapons. He let his anger at the disembodied voice that had spoken to him fill his mind. All his life, since he'd been a small boy, that voice had been a part of him. He didn't know where it came from, or from whom, or what he was supposed to serve.

He'd struggled for years to find out, thinking at first that he'd simply imagined it. But he hadn't imagined the dolphins that had saved his life that first time, nor the last time aboard Finaren's Butterfly when the unknown power had set him free from a sahuagin net during battle. Even Madame litaar with her skill at divination and Malorrie with all his book learning and knowledge he'd picked up over the course of his life and death hadn't been able to tell him what it meant.

But there was no doubt how that voice had influenced and shaped his life.

The echoes of the voice and the command were still in his mind when he moved. Despite the water surrounding him he moved quickly, going through it as if it wasn't there to block the sahuagin before the creature could scissor the flesh of his throat. The move would have worked above water but shouldn't have now-only it did, and he guessed that it had to be because the sahuagin was partially stunned by the exploding powder kegs.

Pushing away from his attacker, seeing the evil glint in its oily black eyes, Jlierek shoved his sword into the sahuagin's throat with a quick flick, then twisted. Blood muddied up from the wound.

Jherek glanced up, aware of a number of sahuagin bodies floating limply in the water all around him. Several of them were slowly surfacing. Fire burned on top of the water where the wagon had been, and a spray of bright colors spread across the dark sky. He kicked past the dying sahuagin and stroked for the surface. Once his face was out of the water, he sucked in great breaths. He whipped the hair from his eyes and stared across the harbor.

The explosive force of the barrels had been considerable, greater than he'd expected, but he knew from Malorrie's teachings that water was denser and carried sounds more clearly. That was why a man swimming had to assume that anything in the water he tracked already knew he was there. The trick was to appear harmless. There was no slipping and hiding through the water unnoticed by one who lived there.

Sahuagin and sea creature bodies lay stretched across the harbor water, floating in islands of limp flesh. Some of them had been left conscious, though, and the ones on land hadn't been affected at all. However, those on the land suddenly experienced a lack of reinforcements and the Flaming Fist mercenaries noticed it. A rousing yell broke from the ranks of the citizens and the fighting began again in earnest as they recovered from the blast.

Not all of the concussive force had spread beneath the harbor. Several of the nearby buildings had only remnants of glass shards where windows had once been. Crates lay tumbled and scattered, and small boats used for servicing the cargo ships lay broken, overturned, or tossed out on the docks.

"Damn cure was almost worse than the disease," Sonshal growled from nearby. He gazed upward where the last of the fireworks spent themselves and winked out. "Couldn't resist that last touch. I've always prided myself on the quality of my fireworks."

"Where's Khlinat?" Jherek asked.

Sonshal shook his head. "Don't know, boy. I wasn't keeping track of things any too well there for a minute."

Jherek pushed past the limp body of a ten-foot long snake. He scanned the water hastily.

"Over here, swabbie." Khlinat sounded weak.

Tracking the voice, Jherek spotted the dwarf treading water with his face barely exposed. He swam to the little man. "What's wrong?"

"Can't feel me leg," Khlinat said hoarsely. "Marthammor Duin protect a silly old dwarf who's wandered so far from hearth and home to die alone." He cut his eyes to Jherek. "Swabbie, I think that blast done for me. I can't feel anything below me waist."

Jherek looked down at the water. The fires lighting the docks brought out scarlet highlights that floated on the surface. "What happened?"

"Don't know. Felt a powerful lot of pain after that explosion-then nothing at all." The dwarf's eyes rolled feverishly. "Getting awful cold, swabbie."

Sonshal swam up beside them, "Let's get him to shore."

"I've got him," Jherek said. He thrust his sword through the sash at his waist, then hooked an arm under the dwarfs chin from behind and swam for the docks. Khlinat's ragged pulse beat against his forearm. "Just hold steady, Khlinat. We're not going to let you go."

"Ye may not be given a choice," the dwarf croaked.

Reaching the dock, Jherek was challenged at once by the • Flaming Fist mercenaries who'd established a beachhead and were in the process of beating the sahuagin back. More mercenaries arrived, and still others were putting out into the harbor in small boats and slitting the throats of the helpless sahuagin and other creatures that had been stunned by the blast.

Some of them helped Jherek and Sonshal get Khlinat up onto the dock and laid out. Jherek seized a torch from a nearby man and held it to study the dwarf.

Khlinat held his hands over his lower abdomen. Blood spilled between his fingers. "Got me betwixt wind and water, swabbie. Unless we can get a healer damned quick, I ain't going to live to see the morrow."

Jherek knew it was true. He turned to the Flaming Fist mercenaries. "I need a healer."

A grizzled old warrior with blood soaking up through his right arm and dripping from his bared blade crossed over to them. He looked down at the dwarf and shook his head. "You'd have to be one of Tymora's most favored this night to find one, boy, but I'll put the word out."

" 'Tis no good, swabbie," Khlinat whispered. "Ye did yer best, and there's no complaints about that." He managed a smile that looked terrible against his graying complexion. "We gave them damned sea devils what-for, didn't we?"

"Yes," Sonshal said, kneeling beside the dwarf. He'd seized a cloak from one of the passing mercenaries who still had dry clothes and spread it over the little man. "That was a piece of risky business you did there, friend, and I'll not begrudge the tale in the telling. I'm proud to have been at your side."

"Ah, 'twas ye," Khlinat said. "Ye stood there and lit them fuses while them sahuagin were about climbing yer backside. Takes a brave man to do that."

Gently, Jherek pried the dwarf's hands from his wound, finding it much easier than he'd thought. Tears burned at the back of his eyes for the little man, though he'd known him for only a short time. The innate bravery and honor Khlinat had shown touched him deeply.

The wound was two or three inches across on Khlinat's abdomen, and there was an exit wound on the other side just as large. Khlinat's breathing slowed and grew shallower.

"Looks like he had a spear rammed through him," Sonshal whispered.

"A spear didn't do that," Jherek said. He guessed that it had been a shard from the wagon, ripped loose and propelled through the water by the smoke powder blast. The wound seemed clear. "We need to get the bleeding stopped. That way he'll have a chance of lasting till a healer gets here." He felt panicked and responsible for the dwarfs situation though he didn't know why. He'd been as much at risk as Khlinat had.