Echoes of the Fourth Magic by R. A. Salvatore Read Free Book Online Page B

blaming that area for its agony. The storm raced in, pulling the helpless sub along, and tore through the barrier.
    The men’s knuckles whitened under a grip of terror. Up and up they went, spinning and swirling. Up to a world that had once been their home.
    But not anymore.

Chapter 5

The Wrath of an Angry God
    T HE MINUTES PASSED slowly as the
Unicorn
spun and bounced through the five-mile trip to the surface. Up and up she went, and then, as suddenly as it had started, the violent thrashing stopped.
    The
Unicorn
righted herself and sat calm, but the seven men did not release their grips on the belts. “We’ve stopped going up,” Del dared to whisper at length.
    “The surface,” Corbin added. “And we must have broken clear of the storm.” Wide smiles curled upon every lip.
    But even as the seven men began freeing themselves from the straps, the lights went out. And in the blackness an ominous sound became evident, a sound that every seagoing man hears in his worst nightmares. Somewhere toward the back of the
Unicorn
the ocean had again found its way in.
    “We’re taking on water!” Billy cried. As if to confirm his statement, the
Unicorn
tilted to starboard.
    “She’s going to roll!” Mitchell shouted. “Get out!”
    Cool-headed Ray Corbin proved the hero this time. At the first sign of danger, when the lights went out, he had wisely groped his way to the base of the conning tower. “I’m at the ladder,” he said calmly. “Follow my voice.”
    Mitchell found him first, and with the captain in position to guide the others, Corbin stated loudly enough for all to hear, “I’m going out with the raft.”
    Little light entered when the first officer opened the outer hatch; the sky above was starless and pitch-black. Undaunted, he threw out the raft, designed to hold twenty men, and blindly scrambled onto it as it inflated.
    Reinheiser was next up the ladder, then Doc Brady.
    “Hurry up!” Mitchell urged as the sub listed farther to starboard.
    But Del had a problem: Thompson was frozen in terror, refusing to move despite Del’s pleas. As time seeped away, anger replaced diplomacy, and Del finally grabbed Thompson’s shirt and hauled the man up the incline.
    “Help me!” he yelled to Mitchell. The captain latched on to the terrified seaman’s shirt and heaved him up the ladder, where Billy Shank was waiting.
    But just as they got Thompson safely onto the raft, the
Unicorn
listed again. Mitchell was braced by the ladder, but Del lost his footing and skidded away into the darkness.
    “DelGiudice!” Mitchell cried.
    “I’m okay,” Del replied, rubbing a new bruise on his shoulder. Unmercifully, the
Unicorn
assumed an even steeper angle. “I’ll make it,” he assured Mitchell. “Go ahead up.”
    Mitchell shook his head, not so certain that Del could get back to the ladder. But the captain had no way to help, no ropes, or even wires, close at hand that he might throw to the distant man. He moved out of the sub.
    Del heard his companions calling as he groped around on all fours. Even for those moments that he managed the steep incline, he could not find the ladder. Then the sub rolled some more, practically on its side, and the ocean streamed in through the open hatch, hungry to claim its prize.
    “She’s on her side!” came Billy’s distant cry as the raft drifted away. “She’s going over! Del!”
    Del slumped back against the now vertical floor, resigned to his fate. He didn’t even notice that the water pouring in was strangely warm.
    Suddenly he felt himself rising, and not with the water;it wasn’t deep enough to buoy him. His eyes darted around. What sort of delirium gripped him? He was floating in the air! And then, miraculously, he was at the ladder!
    “How?” Del asked aloud, but he didn’t wait for any answers. He fought his way out the hatch, plunged into the warm ocean and swam toward the dim outline of the raft and her six passengers.
    They hauled Del aboard silently and