T Lain - Plague of Ice

“Be on guard,” said Sonja as they drew near. “From what Savanak said, this is the dragon’s lair. Even if it’s not, there’s something strange about this.” She paused a moment, giving the others a chance to test their skills of observation.

“I think I know,” said Lidda. She held up her hand, her palm open against the wind. “Where we’re standing,” she explained, “the wind is blowing directly at us, from the direction of the towers. But look over there.” She pointed to the side. “Watch the snow. It’s not going in the same direction at all. It seems to be blowing directly away from these towers, too.”

“That’s it,” said Sonja. “Unless I miss my guess, that means that our portal is someplace in the center.”

“Great!” said Hennet. “Now let’s get in there and seal it before our dragon friend pays us a third visit.”

“Something feels wrong,” Sonja confessed as they approached the closest tower. “No guards. Nothing defending the portal. And what are these towers?”

When they reached the closest one, sheltered from the wind behind it, Regdar ran a gloved hand and scraped off the white coating of ice. Underneath, it was smooth and pitch black.

“It looks like basalt,” ventured Lidda. “This is really some tower.”

Regdar and Hennet brushed off more of the ice as Sonja turned to regard the strange terraces among the towers.

“You see what this is?” she said. “It’s a city. Or maybe something smaller, like a military outpost.” She took a few steps. Her footsteps showed evidence of stone, not ground, beneath the ice. With a gesture, she cast a spell and removed a large area of ice, revealing a solid gray surface beneath, a perfectly flat and featureless granite walkway. It was not made of slabs laid through manual labor but created whole, apparently through wizardry.

“Mages,” she concluded. “Many mages must have lived here.”

Hennet concurred. “Who else would live in so many towers?”

Sonja took another step forward, then gave a shriek of surprise. “What is it?” asked Hennet.

“Come over here,” she said. The others joined her and instantly understood what she was reacting to. Past a certain spot, the wind stopped. Or rather the wind ceased to exist—it just wasn’t present. Like the eye of the hurricane, this was the calm at the center of this whole magical ice storm. To the party, badly windburned and tired of being pelted with snow and ice over the past few days, this came as a considerable relief.

“We really are at the core,” said Regdar. “Then the portal—”

“No one move,” blurted Sonja. “The portal could be invisible. You could walk right into it and pass through to another plane by accident.”

Sonja closed her eyes for a moment and cast another spell, one that would reveal the auras of magic around them. As she did, some of the party’s clothes and weapons lit up with a serene, blue glow, but that was barely noticed amid the blue light that streaked over the entire field. The color that denoted the presence of magic was so strong there that it shone all across the frozen city, draping the whole place in azure tones that flickered and glimmered. Even the faces of the party were painted blue now. The source of this magic was what looked like a large, vertical slit in the air near the center of the frozen city, as tall as Regdar. It was a tear in space out of which energy coursed and flowed, pulsing and seething as it gushed magic.

“So that’s what a portal looks like?” Lidda asked. “I’ve often wondered.”

“We not actually seeing the portal,” Sonja explained, “but the magic it generates. That’s what we’re looking at. Seeing it, I now realize it’s not a true portal but rather a rift.”

“What’s the difference,” said Regdar.

“A portal is like a door,” Sonja explained, “something calculated and measured that was designed to be somewhere. A rift is more like a break or a hole in a wall, a crude, makeshift rip between the worlds. It comes about through violence, not planning.”

“Does that mean that it’s accidental?” asked Regdar.

“No,” explained Sonja, “not necessarily accidental… maybe just crude. If you can’t find a door and you really need to get across, you might just a tear a hole in the wall.”

Regdar nodded.

“Unless I miss my guess…” Sonja led them around the rift, keeping a cautious distance from it until she reached the opposite side. From there, it couldn’t be seen. Only a vague, blue emanation of magic remained.

“It’s gone!” said Lidda.

“This is difficult to understand,” Sonja explained. “As I said, I don’t know that much about cosmology.” She bent over and made a snowball and tossed it through the rift from behind. It landed with a plop on the far side, as if nothing whatsoever obstructed it. “It only faces one direction,” the druid explained.

“Why is there no wind here?” asked Hennet. “I mean, we’re right on top of it, so shouldn’t the wind be stronger?”

Sonja made another snowball and flung it up into the air. It flew straight up about fifteen feet, but never came down. At that height it was caught and scattered by a ferocious wind blowing outward.

“This is a kind of safe area,” Sonja said. “It was probably designed this way to allow the rift to be crossed easily. If this rift was meant for an army to march through, for instance, it wouldn’t pay to have them blown away the instant they stepped through.”

“You mean,” asked Lidda, “that we could step into that… and step out in the Plane of Ice?” She was intrigued by the thought.

“If it’s all the same, Lidda,” said Sonja, “I’d rather dispel it instead. You’ll have to satisfy your curiosity some other time, but I strongly advise against it.”

If all went well, their mission would end here and now.

Sonja stepped forward, staring intensely at the rift between worlds. She raised her right hand, where she wore the silver ring of dispelling given her in Atupal and silently activated it. For what felt like an eternity she peered into the blue, shimmering oval, waging silent war on the rift, the force of her mind and magic against its unfeeling, guileless power.

Doubt wormed its way into her spirit. This rift fought back. She felt it powerfully at the center of the effect, and she still felt it, weaker but definite, at the edges when she shifted tacks and tried to fold the opening in on itself. Every time Sonja’s magic pushed forward, the rift’s magic pushed back.

Everyone’s attention was focused so intently on Sonja and her efforts that no one noticed a white form scuttling down one of the towers, descending the smooth surface with ease. Partway down it launched itself off and cut its way through the snowy sky, gliding in a graceful arc toward the intruders despite the buffeting wind. The blue light emanating from the rift struck the dragon’s pearly scales and dabbed them in deep shades of turquoise.

As it closed in, the dragon opened its elongated jaw and let out a shriek. Instantly Lidda, Hennet, and Regdar covered their ears. Sonja, however, was locked in concentration and barely heard the screech. Regdar grabbed her by the arm and yanked, shattering her carefully laid spell. She didn’t make a sound or protest but merely collapsed where she stood. Regdar lifted her in his strong arms and ran across the terraced surface of the strange, frozen city.

The hole in the little dragon’s wing was still visible, and sticky threads, remnants of Hennet’s web spell, still dangled across its face. As if it recognized its tormentor, the dragon swooped directly at Hennet. The sorcerer was caught in an outstretched claw and lifted several feet off the ground before being tossed against the frosted side of a tower. Hennet slid to the ground, moaning and grasping his head, and the dragon managed a reptilian approximation of a laugh as it swooped away.