The Unreached Duchy

Chapter 19

Turning to the rest of the Trirmeme officers that were at the Caserma site with him to help supervise the excavating work that was being done. Namtao started to yell at them “Get the Merfolk into the MerWay, the Yilbegans into the air, and everyone else moving on the ground to the interior of the island! NOW!!”

The other Hoplites appeared to go from standing completely still or barely moving to moving at the same speed as the fast approaching storm. It seemed that the Trirmeme officers, Namtao included, naturally broke off into small patrols of two or three Hoplites to get the citizens moving into the direction they needed to.

“Merfolk into the MerWay! Head to the interior of the island and stay in the deepest water you can find!” Namtao shouted above the growing roar of the storm as he started ushering Merfolk into the MerWay and moving toward the water filled caves near the middle of the island. Above him, Namtao could hear more Hoplites ordering Yilbegans into the air and to take as many willing flightless people with them. Several humans were not happy with the idea of being flown to safety by a dragon-born giant while others seemed quite open to the idea of flying to safety more so than not being killed in a storm.

There were two Hoplites trying to motivate an Antero Vipunen named Kahaku to leave his tools. By the sounds of things that Namtao could make out, Kahaku had just arrived at the work site before all of the animals decided to start their own evacuations and was not willing to leave his tools at the work site. Namtao could not blame him, from the looks of the giant’s chest, the tools were able to do serious damage to someone who was not a giant in these winds. Namtao gathered that the Antero Vipunen was quite concerned about the safety of others around his tools because apparently the wind was strong enough to pick up his masons blades.

“Tell the Antero Vipunen to take his tools with him but he needs to keep up!” bellowed Namtao to the other Hoplites. The one Hoplite had heard him over the wind and gave Namtao a thumbs up showing that he had understood. Namtao was slightly relieved to see that his message was completely understood because Kahaku listened to something the Hoplite who had given the thumbs up said, promptly picked his chest of tools up, and proceeded to follow the other workers to the island’s interior as fast as he could travel; all the while, being careful of his chest not hitting anyone else along the way and even helping others up who had lost their footing in their haste.

Namtao had not seen anything like it before. The two Hoplites then promptly took their leave, as they were the only people remaining at the work site with Namtao. One took to the air since he was a Yilbegan and the other jumped into the MerWay with Namtao to head for the island’s inner water pools.

Along the way, Namtao and the other Hoplites came across some empty rafts; the Trirmeme unit of Merfolk decided to attach ropes to the rafts and have the slower moving people get on the rafts so they could be pulled in the water.

“Hopefully, this will allow them to keep from falling behind as much as some of them have been.” Namtao had heard some of the other Trirmeme saying to each other, he was not sure if they were complaining or concerned.

Namtao could not help but wonder if Rusalka and Senara had stayed in town like they were ordered to do since they were not part of the rescue efforts. Namtao had not seen either of them since shortly after the Catharina shipwreck.

“Hoplite Namtao, why is there a water serpent around your Trident?” asked one of the Trirmeme soldiers. Namtao did not realize that he had started to completely ignore the others around him working on the rafts.

“That is my Colo colo named Titian.” Namtao responded, “Titian, come! Bring the Trident with you,” he ordered Titian without even looking up from the raft he was tying together. Namtao suddenly realized that he had forgotten all about his Trident that had fallen on the ground when he got back in the MerWay to start ushering people inland.

In response, Titan swam right up to Namtao in his water serpent form with his lower half of the body wrapped around the Trident. “Good boy,” Namtao said reaching down to take his Trident from Titian and putting it on the raft he just finished working on, “now continue to be a good boy for me.” As Namtao picked Titian up and put him on the raft, as the scared Colo colo turned into his natural hybrid form.

“Get the sick along with the elderly loaded onto the rafts and get the railings up to keep them safe.” Namtao ordered as he started tying railings onto rafts. “We have to hurry if we’re going to make it inland before the storm gets here.”

Rope lines were tossed up to the Hoplites in the air to help keep the rafts anchored while the Hoplites in the MerWay used their bodies to brace the rafts to keep them steady so the Hoplites still on the land could carefully help people onto the rafts. Once a raft was loaded with as many people that could be safely transported, the Hoplites in the air pulled the raft but the ropes while the Hoplites in the MerWay pushed the raft in the water.

When the last raft was loaded, Namtao ordered the Hoplites on the land to catch up to the rest of the group that had kept going and help anyone who had fallen behind. Turning his attention to the task at hand, Namtao started to assist the other Hoplites in the MerWay pushing the last raft towards the island’s interior.