Kennit was probably furious with him.

He stood, cradling his sore arm, and watched the tide spilling up over the slope of the beach. It was coming fast. He had no control at all over that one factor. If he stayed, he was going to be trapped here. As it was, he was going to get wet wading around the headland.

He'd have to leave. He'd done all he could.

He heard a sound from within the fissure, a metal bar rolling on stone. Frowning, he stepped back within, and then gasped at what he saw.

It had heaved itself out of the pool and flung itself at the walls of its prison. Its head, turned sideways, was wedged in the opening he had created. Its dwarfed and twisted body was still powerful as it lashed and thrust against the confines of the pool. “No, go back!” he cried futilely. “It's too small! There's no water yet!”

It could not understand him. The animal lunged again against the bars, but only succeeded in wedging itself more tightly. It screamed its frustration, the starburst around its neck standing out as it raged. It tried to jerk its head back through the bars, but could not. It was stuck.

With a sinking heart, he realized he was stuck as well. Wintrow could not leave it like that. Its gills worked as frantically as its gasping jaws. He did not know how long it could survive with its head out of the water. There was already an air of desperation to the lashing tail. If he could just loosen one more bar, perhaps it could slip back into the pool. It wouldn't be free, but it wouldn't be dead.

If he hurried, he might live, too.

He approached it gingerly to see which bar would be best to work on. Its wedged struggles had actually loosened one of the blocks. It had also coated it with slime. That wasn't going to make lifting it any easier. He took up one of the bars he had worked loose. It was horribly long, but at least he wouldn't have to touch it. Any trapped animal might bite, and if one that size bit, not much would be left of him.

He shoved the freed bar between two of the remaining bars and used it as a lever. Unfortunately, this meant pushing the bar even tighter against the creature. It roared, but surprisingly it did not strike at him. The block of stone that secured the bar at the base grated against its fellows as it shifted. Wintrow immediately repositioned his lever in the widened crack between the blocks. The pole was too damn long. It jammed against the walls of the fissure. But finally it worked, shoving the stone over a bit. Now for the bar.

“Don't hurt me!” he cautioned the creature as he approached it, and for a wonder it seemed to understand his intention if not his words. It stilled, gills working heavily. Or perhaps it was simply collapsing as it died. He couldn't think about that, nor about the passing time. He seized the bar in his hands and lifted it up.

He screamed.

His hands burned and froze to the slime-coated metal. But the agony on his skin was as nothing compared to the agony of knowing. He knew her pain, and he grasped suddenly the torment of a sentient creature imprisoned for time past his ability to imagine. With her, he breathed the scalding air. His tender skin cracked and stung in the dryness, while he knew with terror that soon it would be too late. She must escape now, or it would soon be too late for all of them.

He convulsed away from the bar. The strength of his body's rejection of the pain flung him to the floor of the prison. He lay there panting. Nothing in his life had ever prepared him for that blast of sharing. Even the bond he had with the liveship was a clumsy and insensitive bridge compared to that joining. For a brief moment, he had been unable to distinguish between himself and the creature.

No. Not creature, not unless he too was to be considered a creature.

She was no less than he was; as he considered all he had experienced, he wondered if she was more.

An instant later, he was on his feet. He tore his shirt off, wrapped it about his hands and approached the bar again. This time he had to recognize the intelligence that was fading in the great gold eyes. He seized the bar in his muffled grip and lifted. It was difficult, for whatever coated the bar made it slippery. He heaved up on it twice before he lifted it from its deep bed in the stone. The moment it had cleared the lip of the block, the sea serpent surged against it. Her greater bulk pushed it aside as if it were a straw. Wintrow went with it, not only flung forcefully aside by her passage but also brushed with the slick coating of her scaled hide. It seared him where it touched his flesh. He cried out as he saw even his heavy canvas trousers fraying away like crumbling ashes. He knew her determined intent. It appalled him.

“No water below!” He conveyed the information with voice and thought as forcefully as he was able. “Rocks. Only rocks. You'll die.”