Lynn Abbey - Planeswalker

"How does ... Urza know when you ... need him?"

"He doesn't," Xantcha answered. "When we were dodging Phyrexians we stayed close, but the rest of the time, I never gave much thought to needing Urza, and he certainly never needed me."

"Never? Three thousand years ... and you never ... needed each other?"

"Never."

Ratepe sighed and curled around his knees. He began to shiver, a bad sign considering how warm the Sea of Laments was in the summer. Xantcha tucked their blankets around him, then, because she'd worked up a sweat herself, and stripped off her outer tunic. It got tangled in her hair and in the thong of a pendant she'd worn so long she'd forgotten why she wore it.

"You can hit me now," she said, breaking the thong.

"What?"

"I said, you can hit me now ... or you can wait until after we find out if this thing still works."

"What?"

"A long time ago-and I mean a long time ago-Urza did make me an artifact that would get his attention. I used something like it just once, before Urza invaded Phyrexia. I have to break it."

That time Xantcha had crushed the little crystal between two rocks. This time she tried biting it and broke a tooth before it cracked. Waste not, want not. At least she'd been farsighted enough to use her back teeth which grew back quicker than the front ones.

That time, between the rocks, there'd been a small flash of light as whatever power or sorcery Urza had sealed within the crystal was released. This time Xantcha neither saw nor felt anything, and when she examined the broken pieces, they were lined with a sooty residue that didn't look promising.

"How long?" Ratepe asked.

"A day before he got there with his dragon."

Ratepe groaned, "Too long."

Xantcha was inclined to agree. Urza must have come back to the forest before he went after the dragon. He wouldn't have taken the chance that the Phyrexians might get away,

and after he'd finished with the diggers, he'd known where the ambulator was. If Urza was going to haul them out of the Sea of Laments, they'd be on dry land before moonrise. If the crystal hadn't lost its power. If Urza recognized its signal and remembered what it meant.

Those were worries Xantcha kept to herself. The stars came out. Xantcha began to fear the worst, at least about Urza, and for Ratepe. They had enough food and water for two more days. Taking advantage of her newt's resilience, Xantcha could get to land either way. She wasn't sure about Ratepe.

It would be a stupid way for anyone to die, but the same could be said about most deaths.

Ratepe fell asleep. His breathing steadied, his skin grew warmer and drier. He might be over his seasickness by morning; he had adapted to soaring, and there was nothing to be gained by premature despair. Xantcha settled in around him. It was remarkable that two bodies could be more comfortable curled around each other than either was alone. She closed her eyes.

Xantcha woke up with a stabbing pain in her gut, water sloshing against her armpits, and Urza shouting in her ear:

"What misbegotten scheme put you in the middle of an ocean!" He had her by the nape of the neck, like a cat carrying a kitten, and held Ratepe the same way. The sphere was burst, obviously. Xantcha knew she should yawn out the armor, but Urza moved too fast. They were a split instant between-worlds, a heartbeat longer in the wintry winds of a nearby world, then back through the between-worlds to the cottage. Xantcha was gasping, mostly because Urza dropped her before turning his attention to Ratepe who'd turned blue during the three-stride 'walk. She knew his color because they'd traveled west and the sun wasn't close to setting behind the Ohran Ridge.

A bit of healing and a few sips from a green bottle off Urza's shelves brought Ratepe around.

"Change your clothes, Brother," Urza commanded in a tone that had surely started battles in their long-ago nursery. "Wash. Get something to eat. Xantcha and I need to talk."

Mishra, of course, stood his ground. "Don't blame Xantcha, and don't think you can ignore me ... again. I'm the one who wanted to see Koilos."

Ratepe pronounced the word in the old-fashioned way. Xantcha dared a glance at Urza's eyes, thinking her lover was getting advice from the Weakstone. Both of Urza's eyes were glossy black from lid to lid. She hadn't seen them like that since they'd left Phyrexia, which made her think of Oix and the Thran and a score of other things she quickly stifled. Xantcha tried to catch Ratepe's eye and pass him a warning to tread cautiously, if he couldn't figure that for himself.

With his bold remark, Ratepe had effectively changed the landscape of recrimination. If Xantcha could have seized control of the argument at that moment, she could have guaranteed there'd be no revelations about the fate of the Thran. If she could have seized control. She didn't catch Ratepe's eye, and Urza had lost interest in her as well.

"Koilos is dead. There's nothing left. We took it all,

Brother. Us and the Phyrexians," Urza said, leaving Xantcha to wonder if he'd visited the cave since his return to Dominaria.

"I needed to see it with my own eyes," Ratepe replied, a comment that, considering the circumstances, could have many layers of meaning. "You told me to go away for a while, so I did."

"I never meant you to go to Koilos. If it was Koilos you wanted, we could have gone together."

"That was never a good idea, Urza," Ratepe said with finality as he walked out the open door, following the near-orders Urza had already given.

"You should have stopped him," Urza hissed at Xantcha when they were alone. "My brother is ... fragile. Koilos could have torn him apart."

"It's just another place, Urza," Xantcha countered, resisting the urge to add that Ratepe was just another man. Neither statement was true. After a year on the Ohran Ridge, Ratepe might not be Mishra, but he'd become more than a willful, onetime slave.

" 'Just another place,' " Urza mocked her. "For one like you, yes, I suppose it would be. What would you see? A cave, some ruins? What did my brother see? He isn't quite himself yet. The next one will be better, stronger. I expected it would be several Mishras before I'd take one back to Koilos."

"There won't be another Mishra, Urza."

Urza turned away. He puttered at his worktable, scraping up residues and dumping them in a bucket. He'd been working on something when the crystal struck his mind. Xantcha's anger, always quick to flare, was also quick to fade.

"Thank you for picking us out of the ocean."

"I didn't know at first. It took me a moment to remember what it was that I was hearing. I made that crystal for you so long ago, when I still thought I could invade and destroy Phyrexia. My ambitions have grown smaller. Since Equilor, it's all I can do to protect Dominaria from them. I'll make you another."

"Make it easier to break. I lost a tooth on this one. Make one for Ratepe, too."

"Ratepe?" Urza looked up, puzzled, then nodded. "When this is over, when I've exposed the sleepers and put Phyrexia on notice that Dominaria is prepared to fight them, it will be time to talk about the future. I've thought about it while you were gone. This cottage isn't big enough. I've begun to envision permanent defenses for all Dominaria, for Old Terisiare and all the other great islands. Artifacts on a scale to dwarf any that I've made before. I'll build them in place, and when I've finished one of my new sentries, I'll move on to the next. I'll need assistants, of course-"

"Other than me and ... ?" Xantcha left her thought dangling.

"What I've planned will take a generation, maybe ten before it is complete. And the assistants I have in mind will become the guardians of my sentries. They'll become the patriarchs and matriarchs of permanent communities. You understand that can't include you. As for him, he is mortal, not like you or me. We are what the Phyrexians made