Maggie Furey - Sword of Flames

Aurian rested a little, for the singing of the high, plaintive whalesong had drained her both physically and emotionally. Then she began again, starting all over at the beginning of the lengthy cycle of song—and this time, about halfway through the pattern, she received an answer.

The distant call was so faint that as yet she could hear it only with her mind, and not her ears. Aurian waited for the singer to come nearer, changing her own song now to one of welcome. Soon, the dimly heard voice became more distinct:

“Mage? O Mage?” It was Ithalasa.

“Ithalasa! Oh, how glad I am to hear you again!” Aurian cried joyfully. “How incredibly fortunate that it should be you.”

“Not fortunate, Mage—but it explains our long delay in answering you,” the Leviathan replied. “A pod of my sisters heard your song far out in the ocean and decided that, once again, I should be the one to represent our kind, for I had talked with you before. They called me—and I came.”

Within minutes he was with her, surfacing briefly to blow and then take another mighty breath before diving back down to her. His massive, streamlined body hung motionless in the current save for the sweeping motion of his curving flukes. His vast bulk dwarfed the Mage as she swam, holding herself in position as he did, beneath the gaze of a deep, wise, twinkling eye.

“Now,” said Ithalasa, with great good humor, “what is your need this time, Little One? I see no shipwreck here.”

“You wouldn’t—I swam out from the Xandim coast to find you,” Aurian explained.

“Did you so? And in this storm!” The Leviathan’s tones were tinged with surprise—and not a little respect. “Then your need must be pressing indeed.”

“It certainly is—but more immediately pressing is my need to get out of the water before I perish with cold,” Aurian told him. She could only see him now through her Mage’s vision, for already the waters had darkened with the onset of night. Her extremities were numb and white, and she could feel her thought processes growing gradually more sluggish. “I don’t think I can stay here much longer, Ithalasa. Would you mind taking me back to the shore, so I can talk to you from there?”

“It will be my pleasure. It will be good to swim with you again, Little One.” Helpfully, the Leviathan extended a great, curved fluke. “Can you climb up on my back, as you used to do?”

Numb and weakened by the cold as she was, Aurian would have found it a struggle to do what once she had accomplished so easily, had it not been for the buoyancy of the water. Pushing herself off from the extended fluke, she swam upward until she saw his broad, gray back beneath her. The Leviathan swam slowly toward the surface, pushing her up with him, making a slow ascent so that her body could become accustomed to the change in pressure. At last he broke through into the open air, and the Mage found herself lying limply on his back, choking, retching, and coughing out water as her lungs made the change back to breathing air.

Now I know what a drowned rat must feel like, Aurian thought. She lay there limply, lacking the energy to move, gasping and shivering; for in the cold wind she felt no warmer than she had in the sea. Waves broke over her as Ithalasa forged his powerful way back to land through the heaving waters, and time and again she almost found herself washed back into the ocean, for on his expanse of mottled, barnacle-covered back there was little to hold on to save for the slight ridge of his dorsal fin, which was so pronounced in other clans of the Leviathan race.

Out of consideration for her wretched state, Ithalasa refrained from asking the Mage any questions as he took her to shore, though she could feel the undercurrents of avid curiosity bubbling beneath the calmness of his surface thoughts. Soon—though she could have wished it had been sooner—a vivid sheet of lightning lit up the sea for miles around, and Aurian could make out the dark smudge of the Xandim coastline in stark relief on the horizon. When the next flash came, the land had grown very much closer.

The water was deep enough to allow Ithalasa to come partway into the inlet, and Aurian had only a few yards to swim to reach the outthrust reef from which she had started. She was glad it was no farther. Anvar, waiting at the end of the rocks, reached down a strong hand to grasp her arm and pull her out of the water. She was glad of that, for without his help she never would have managed. Dimly, she heard his voice in her mind as he greeted the Leviathan—then she became aware of a blissful warmth as he wrapped her cloak around her. He picked her up and carried her safely across the slippery, sharp-edged rocks, back to the safety of the beach, where she saw Shia, Chiamh—and, to her great delight, a massive driftwood bonfire that blazed bravely in the teeth of the storm, kept alight through Anvar’s magic.

Anvar put her down beside the fire and began to towel her roughly with the cloak, restoring circulation to her bloodless limbs before wrapping his own, dryer cloak around her. Aurian’s joy became complete when the Windeye handed her a mug of his steaming herb tea, lavishly laced with honey and strong, rough Xandim spirits. Anvar steadied it in her shaking hands while she forced the mug between her chattering teeth and took a swallow, feeling the warmth spreading all the way down through her chilled body. Within a few minutes she was feeling very much better, although she felt very drowsy, and she wondered if she would ever truly be warm again.

Sleep, however, would have to wait, for the patient Leviathan had been neglected long enough. With Anvar’s help she struggled back into her clothes, not resisting when his assistance turned into a quick embrace. “I’m so glad to see you again,” she murmured—“and I’m glad you resisted telling me you’d warned me this would happen.”

“Well, I did—but at least you succeeded, so I’ll let you off this time.” He grinned at her. “Feeling better now?”

Aurian nodded. “It’s time we went to talk to Ithalasa.”

“ I am glad to see that you found your mate again, after all your quarrels and mishaps in the south,” was the Leviathan’s opening comment to Aurian. He listened to their tale of how they had found each other, and showed no surprise whatsoever to learn that Anvar was also a Mage. Ithalasa rejoiced to hear of the safe delivery of the Mage’s child, who was currently back in the fishing settlement with his lupine guardians. (Sangra had been left to keep an eye on them, muttering darkly all the while that she was a warrior, not a bloody nursemaid.)

Since both Shia and Chiamh were adept at mental talk, the Mages were able to introduce their companions to the Leviathan, and he greeted them graciously, and with a great deal of curiosity—especially as to the unusual nature of the Windeye’s powers. But when Aurian and Anvar, standing together out on the storm-lashed rocks, told him how they had won the Staff of Earth and Harp of Winds, all other concerns were forgotten. They could feel Ithalasa’s growing excitement, tinged nonetheless with an undercurrent of concern, beating strongly in their minds.

“ I thought I could feel the power of High Magic!” he exclaimed. “And what of the Sword of Flame?”

“That’s why we need your help.” Quickly, Aurian explained their predicament.

“I see,” Ithalasa mused. “So you must get a message to your friends across the northern ocean, and then they can send ships to fetch you?”

“That’s right,” Anvar said. “You couldn’t take all of us—not the cats and the Xandim, too. And Wolf is far too small to attempt such a journey.”

“But how can I convey a message? I can only communicate with you Magefolk.”

“Well,” said Aurian, “we hoped that you might take one or two of us to Wyvernesse so they could tell the Nightrunners.” Immediately she felt the Leviathan’s hesitation, and her heart sank, although she’d been expecting something of the kind.