The Floodgate

"At least she took Dhamari with her."

"Yes." Matteo attempted a smile. "I wonder whom he has most reason to fear: Tzigone or the Unseelie folk."

"Indeed."

Again they fell silent. Matteo stared at the ground, forced himself to focus on the task at hand. The invading army was coming into view now. A host of dark-clad soldiers, looking distinctly antlike from this vantage, swarmed through the Halruaan militia. The Halruaans, distinctive in their sea-green uniforms, went down like trod-upon grass.

"Too few," Matteo muttered.

"And too close," the wizard added, his round face furrowed with distress. "I know of no battle spell that will sort through a hand-to-hand melee."

"What is needed are more troops." An odd quirk of memory came to Matteo: Tzigone holding a string of odiferous mushrooms, dressed as a street urchin so that she could seek out mischief to lighten the mundane shopping task assigned her.

"The fagoila mushrooms that Tzigone recently purchased-do you keep the spores aboard ship?"

Basel's eyes focused, then hardened. "Indeed I do, and I have prepared the instant army spell. A good thought, but there is no sign of rain."

"Strew the spores anyway, and then take Avariel above the clouds."

While the ship's mate relayed the orders to the crew, Basel took his place at the helm. Eyes closed, lips moving in a spellcasting frenzy, he clenched both hands around the magic-storing rod that gave the ship lift and momentum.

The skyship began a rapid ascent. Two minor wizards dumped small bags of pungent powder over the rail while the sailors others busied themselves with rope and sail, struggling to maintain the ship against quickening and capricious winds.

It was a dangerous gambit, and everyone aboard knew it. The skyship was not meant for such heights, and Basel stretched both its mundane frame and its magic to the edges of endurance. If they crossed that line, the ship would break up and plummet to the ground like an arrow-shot swam.

The deck pitched and shuddered as Matteo hurried along, hanging on to the rail for support as he showed the skysailors how to seed the clouds with handfuls of sand from the ballast bags. Bereft of this weight, the skyship rose still higher. Swirling winds caught the ship and shook it like an angry dog. Matteo clutched the rail and leaned far out, gazing at clouds below them. To his relief, they were begi

"It's working," Matteo shouted above the rising gale. "We've got to get back down, and fast."

Basel nodded curtly and said something to the bosun, who snatched up a glowing horn, raised it to his lips, and shouted a single word: "Brace!"

As the magical warning resounded over the ship, Matteo dropped to the deck and wrapped his arms around a bolted-down barrel. The skysailors, their feet kept in place by the horn's magic, frantically lowered the sails.

Avariel plummeted though the clouds, spi

Light broke over the ship as they dropped beneath the cloud bank. The storm began almost immediately. Hail pelted Avariel on its way to the battleground beneath, melting as it went. As soon as the droplets touched the ground, Basel's spell took effect.

Armed men, garbed in the pale blue-green of Halruaa's militia, sprang from the ground like mushrooms after a summer rain. Shouts of renewed purpose burst from the beleaguered troops. The dark-clad invaders, suddenly outnumbered and outfought, were pressed back toward their comrades.

Basel nodded with satisfaction. "A small step, but a good one." He reached out to touch the glowing scrying globe mounted near the helm. The light within parted to reveal the caller as King Zalathorm himself.

The face in the globe was almost unrecognizable as the mild man who presided over endless councils. This man had a warrior's fierce eyes and wore battle robes of ancient design, so brightly colored as to be barbaric.

"Well done, Basel! If you've more ideas like that, speak quickly."

"That was not my plan, but Matteo's."

A moment of struggle passed over the king's face and was gone. "Where is the jordain?"

"Aboard Avariel, sire." Basel gestured, and Matteo stepped into the king's line of vision.

The king gave a curt nod. "Send him to me. If his conscience requires dispensation from the use of a transportation spell, tell him that he is not the only one who made hard choices for the good of Halruaa. Basel, I release you from your vows of silence."

The king's visage disappeared from the globe. Matteo turned questioning eyes to the conjurer.

Basel was fumbling in his spellbag for the needed components and did not meet the jordain's eyes. "I'd keep you with me if I could, my son, but the king has need of your counsel. Come to me after the battle, and we will talk."

He closed his eyes and began to chant a spell of teleportation. Matteo stepped into the path of a small, crimson wind tu

Procopio clenched the rail of Starsnake, his personal skyship and the command ship of the Halarahh militia. He gazed at the battle below and sought furiously for something that could turn the battle and ensure Halruaa's victory and his own.

It was not going well. Several legions should have marched north from Halarahh. Apparently the queen's metal army had kept them too busily employed. Basel Indoulur's mushroom army had evened the score somewhat, but such warriors never lasted long enough. Too many warriors had died in the Nath. Three skyships lay in smoking ruins amid the foothills, and at least a score of wizards had fallen with them. Even so, Procopio's campaign was considered a victory, and his ship flew nearly at the head of Zalathorm's fleet.

Like a flight of vengeful dragons, the Halruaan ships soared toward the invaders. They maintained a careful wedge formation to keep a path clear for spells hurled by wizards on every ship. Fireballs and lightning bolts flew like fireworks at a festival-and fizzled out just as harmlessly. The invaders had come well prepared for conventional battle magic.

Unfortunately for Procopio, he had spent years studying just such conventions. Something different was needed, something unexpected!

A high, ringing note soared from a nearby skyship-a metallic clarion call signaling the climax of a mighty spell. On and on the music went, until Procopio clapped his hands to his ears. To the east, two of the highest mountains, still snowcapped even in summer, began to shudder. The ice caps shattered like a goblet broken by a single high, pure note. Snow thundered down the mountains, engulfing the latest wave of Mulhorandi invaders and burying the pass.

But the Mulhorandi were far from finished. Clouds began to rise from the spray of snow and mist, taking the form of a man. A titanic figure etched in blue and white and gray took shape, its feet deep in the snow and its massive fists thrusting high into the sky. In its hand was an ice-colored dagger as long as a ship's mast.

The weapon slashed down, tearing through a skyship's sails and plunging into the deck. The sound of splintering wood disappeared in a sharp explosion as the magical rod that powered the ship snapped free. The skyship listed to port and began a spiraling descent.

"Storm elemental," Procopio muttered, recognizing an obscure Mulhorandi spell.