Элейн Каннингем - The Floodgate

She caught sight of the formidable gray warrior who stood over the mouth of a spring, watching the two men battle and awaiting Matteo's death with eager eyes. A soft cry escaped Tzigone. The gray woman glanced in her direction. Tzigone dived behind a jagged pile of rocks. After a moment, the Crinti turned her attention back to the two men.

Tzigone peered between two rocks, not at all certain of the battle's outcome. Matteo and Andris were both superbly fit and trained. They fought together as skillfully as dance partners, as attuned to each other's movements as source and shadow. Tzigone sensed that the bonds connecting them were strong. Andris seemed to be fighting to sunder them. No less desperately did Matteo battle to keep his friend from slipping away.

Tzigone clung to the rock as if to hope itself. "Let him go, Matteo," she whispered.

So intent was she on the battle that she did not notice the approach of the Crinti. Suddenly a score of them slipped into the clearing and formed a ring around the fighters.

Tzigone's heart plummeted to her boots. The Crinti would not let Matteo leave this place whether he won or lost. There was nothing she could do for him but watch him die.

Or was there?

Dhamari claimed the song of the Unseelie folk was enough to put the Crinti to flight. She hoped he spoke the truth.

Tzigone edged away from the valley and scuttled up a rocky wall to the top of a small cliff so that her song might dance between the mountains and confound her hiding place. Her perch gave her a view of Matteo's battle, as well as the larger conflict in the valley below.

She glanced at the main battlefield. Three of the sky-ships lay in smoking ruins on the valley floor. The bodies of the slain were so numerous that the remaining fighters could barely move among them. It seemed to her that most of the survivors were Crinti. A few magical missiles fell from the airborne skyships now that the fighting was not so close, but most of the wizards were still hesitant to fire upon Halruaans who might yet be alive.

Still more Crinti emerged from the caves and passes, converging upon the dying army. She could make them flee. All she had to do was cast the spell and pray she still had the strength to banish the dark fairies once the deed was done.

Tzigone crouched down and began to sing the spell. All around her, the mountains echoed as Unseelie voices echoed her song. The Crinti in the valley below began to flee, but the circle that formed around the two jordaini held firm.

"Loyal, but not very smart," said a voice at her elbow. "The gate is thinnest there."

Tzigone whirled to face Dhamari Exchelsor, and her voice hitched in surprise. "Keep singing," he admonished her, "but hold off on the final gestures. Your friend's life depends upon it."

The wizard rose. Light poured from him like a lighthouse beacon. "Crinti!" he called in an unexpectedly clear, ringing voice.

The shadow amazons turned toward this new threat. "Behind you," he said, sweeping one hand in a dramatic gesture.

Tzigone, still singing, following the direction. A shimmering veil was taking shape in the clearing. Beyond it, going back and back into some unfathomable depth, crouched a sea of shadowy forms with glowing black eyes. Dhamari took her arm and pulled her toward the veil.

"Let the jordain go, and we will hold back the dark fairies," Dhamari said as he and Tzigone moved to within a pace of the veil. "Kill him, and we will release them." As if to illustrate the point, he seized Tzigone's outstretched hand and held it close to the veil.

"Tzigone, don't!" Matteo pleaded, speaking between ringing blows. "No good can come from an alliance with evil!"

Dhamari threw his weight against her, pushing her forward so that her hand touched the veil in the final spell gesture.

Magic pulsed through her. Tzigone's vision went dark. Against the blackness she glimpsed a vivid, agonized image of herself, her body nearly as transparent as the crystal ghosts in Akhlaur's swamp. Her bones glowed blue, and the blood in her veins was black ice.

The moment passed as her natural defenses slammed back into place, but the damage was done. The veil began to become more translucent. The song of the Unseelie folk grew louder, triumphant, a chorus of evil punctuated by the percussion of the jordaini's swords. The Crinti fled, disappearing into the mountains like gray smoke. From the corner of her eye, Tzigone noticed a copper and jade elf, moving toward the spring with the stealth of a hunting cat.

The spring!

Magic rose from the water, tingling over Tzigone's sensitive skin like the bubbles from sparkling wine. Understanding came to her in a sudden, horrified instant.

Kiva had returned to the floodgate.

What her purpose was, Tzigone could not say, but one thing she knew: If the elf woman had her way, Matteo would die and Halruaa with him. Desperate but determined, Tzigone kept singing, but this time her song spoke of banishment, of dark enchantments broken and gates closed. Her voice rose over the Unseelie song like the battle cry of an unlikely paladin, and the two spells struggled for supremacy like the two battling jordaini.

Magic built in power, shaking the mountains and sending rocks tumbling down into the valley. Dhamari tried to pull away, but Tzigone held him firm. When the veil opened, she threw herself into it, dragging the wizard behind.

Her song twined with the magic spilling from the Unseelie court-a meeting of fire and oil. An explosion shook the mountains and tossed aside the only two people left standing in the clearing.

Akhlaur stood by the coral obelisk, gazing past the glowing structure to the invisible gate beyond. By his reckoning, the moon would rise full over Halruaa. It was a time of power, when spells were more puissant and hungers ran dark and deep.

A rumble of distant magic echoed through the water. Akhlaur threw back his head and inhaled deeply, like a sailor testing the wind for a coming storm. His senses, made preternaturally acute by his years in the Plane of Water, perceived the whirl of a distant, rapidly descending waterspout. Exhilaration rose in him like long-forgotten lust.

The spinning magic came to him with unerring instincts. Bubbles spun off and dissipated, revealing a small, slender elf woman. She dropped to one knee and held out both palms, one resting upon another. In her top hand she cradled an enormous, perfect emerald, a gem worth the fortunes of a dozen kings-and the lives of a hundred elves.

His lips thinned in puzzlement as he regarded the creature kneeling before him. This was not what he had expected. The elf woman had every reason for vengeance, but she did him proper homage, and she offered him not a weapon but the long-desired key to his freedom.

"What is this, little elf?" he demanded.

Kiva raised her amber eyes to his. "The land is in disarray, Lord Akhlaur. The Lady's Mirror has been plundered, the Crinti invade the northlands in large numbers, and the Unseelie folk have found a way to pass through their hollow hills. Armies of the Mulhorandi march on the eastern borders. Even the queen turns against her people, unleashing metal monsters upon them."

Akhlaur bit back a chuckle of delight. "All this is very interesting, of course, but what has it to do with me?"

The elf still held the gem out. "I can take us both back to Halruaa. The need is great, my lord. The land will be destroyed, and all in it." As she spoke, her tone changed to gloating, and the light of madness touched her catlike eyes.

The necromancer was beginning to see the light of day. "And who better to urge this destruction along than your old master."

"Will you come with me?"

Akhlaur studied her. "What will you do with this chaos? Revel in it, like some moon-mad Azuthan dancing amid wild magic? Or is there a shape and purpose to your actions?"