'I'm a soothsayer,' replied Kheda.

'I asked him if he could purify me after being touched by your magic,' Risala said instantly.

'Is that so?' Dev raised a hand and a red haze enveloped Kheda. Enveloped in warmth, he nevertheless froze with shock, his spine a column of ice and dread. Dev snapped his fingers and the mist vanished. 'How will you do that when you're just as tainted?'

Kheda licked his lips and found them dry. In fact, he was entirely dry, clothes, skin, hair and beard, and the bone-deep chill was receding fast. He cleared his throat. 'There's a school of thought that argues an innocent victim of magic is not so deeply mired in it as someone who deliberately seeks out or effects its use.'

'Effects its use?' Dev echoed unpleasantly. 'Do any of these great Archipelagan thinkers know anything about effecting magic's use?'

'I really couldn't say,' Kheda shrugged.

'I really wouldn't think so,' retorted Dev. 'You know nothing, you Aldabreshi with your soothsayers and your stargazers and your books full of lore on what's to be read in a deer's innards.'

'I know I'm chilled half to death.' Risala could barely get the words out, her teeth were chattering so much. 'You can spare some wine to warm me, you bastard.'

'I'll do better than that' With a negligent wave of Dev's hand, the same red glow swirled around her 'A cup of wine isn't a bad notion, mind. Then you can tell me what brings you back to me.' He shot a sideways smirk at Kheda. 'Other than my prowess as a lover.'

Kheda caught the speculative glint in the wizard's eye and kept his face impassive.

I've had better men than you, and worse, try to rile me into indiscretion, you tedious little barbarian.

He smiled at Risala who was shaking out the stiff and crumpled folds of her dry dress. 'I don't suppose this makes your contamination too much worse.'

'Ah, you wouldn't have touched her, not while she was so dirty with magic' Dev turned to choose a bottle from an all but empty basket. 'That's why you're so keen to purify her, so she'll open her thighs out of gratitude? Sorry, friend, she's not worth the bother.'

'Still so keen on the sound of your own voice, Dev.' Risala wasn't rising to the bait either. 'Any chance you'll start speaking sense any time soon?'

'Make yourself useful and find the cups.' Bottle in one hand, lantern in the other, Dev jerked his head towards the miscellaneous storage boxes. 'You, soothsayer, back in there.'

Kheda dutifully returned to the stern cabin, followed by Risala. Dev hung the lantern on its hook and turned to lock the door to the hold. Kheda and Risala shared a glance and he saw his own determination mirrored in her face.

'If you're stained by my magic, I don't suppose the crime of tasting my wine will worry you too much.' Dev grinned genially as he twisted the wax-sealed cork out of the bottle. 'Let's have a drink, girl.' As Risala held out two horn cups, he sloshed dark red wine into them. 'There you go, soothsayer'

Kheda wordlessly accepted a cup.

'Be careful,' Dev warned, sarcastic. 'You can't go back to drinking that goat's piss you people call wine, once you get a taste for this.' With remarkable deftness, he got onto the hammock, found his cup and refilled it, feet swinging.

'Wizard or not, I'd take you for Aldabreshi.' Kheda sat down on the battered chest on the opposite side of the cabin. 'From some northern domain and with barbarian blood, but certainly born in the Archipelago.' He sipped cautiously, blinking rapidly as the powerful perfume of the wine momentarily overwhelmed him. 'Are you one of us?'

'Did you find some way to escape execution once the magic warping you became apparent?' Risala's blue eyes were speculative over the rim of her cup. She sat on the chest beside Kheda, her thigh pressing against his.

'Not me.' Dev took a swig of wine. 'I'm a barbarian, born and bred. None of your soothsayers ever saw that, friend.' He grinned cheerfully.

Kheda studied him. 'What could a barbarian wizard seek in the Archipelago, at the risk of his own hide?'

'That's my business, pal.' Dev scowled as he emptied his cup. 'I'm more interested in yours. This is my ship, so I'll ask the questions. What brings you hunting for a mage? And don't give me any tripe about helping the poor little soiled poet girl. I might believe it if you were looking to lift her skirts but I don't see that.'

'You're an astute man,' observed Kheda.

'I'd be long dead if I wasn't.' Dev saluted him with his cup. 'What really brings you to me? Apart from a glossy trireme all the way from northern waters.' He shook his head at Risala. 'You didn't think I'd let you go, did you, girlie? I've been keeping a wizard's eye on you, just in case you went selling my secret to some bastard who'd come looking to nail my skin to a fortress door.' He refilled his cup as he spoke. 'I was thinking it was a shame I had no one to make a wager with, against you two making it here alive, when I saw you fighting that storm.'

'Would you have done anything about it, if we'd foundered?' Risala stood up and took the bottle from Dev.

'And pollute you further with my filthy magic?' Dev pretended concern.

'There are worse magics than yours abroad in these reaches,' said Kheda curtly. He reached out and took the wine bottle from Risala.

'That interests you, does it?' Dev swung his feet idly but his eyes were alert.

Wizards cloak themselves in lies and twist anything they touch out of true. Can you read my words? Let's see how much truth I can tell you without you seeing the whole.

'Let's get down to business.' Kheda set his empty cup on the floor. 'I've offered counsel to the Daish domain before now and, for reasons I don't propose to share with you, I'm under a great obligation to the lady Janne Daish. I want to repay that debt by finding some means to frustrate this magic that's brought such destruction to the Chazen domain, before it can come north to devastate the Daish islands.' He raised an emphatic finger. 'Not that Janne Daish has any knowledge of my intent. You can't use that against her.'

'You think you can fight back against those savages and their magic? You're an idiot. All you Archipelagans, you're ignorant, magicless fools.' Dev gestured for the wine bottle. 'You cannot fight those with wizardry bred in their very bone.' For the first time, he sounded entirely serious, even without malice.

'You could.' Kheda jerked his head towards Risala beside him. 'She told me as much.'

'I could, true enough.' Dev swung up his feet and lay back in his hammock, tipping the last of the wine into his cup. 'I did, very effectively, I might add. What's that to you, soothsayer? Suborning magic will see you skinned along with me and her head on a spike, just for good measure,' he concluded with happy malice.

Kheda picked up his cup and drank the heady wine slowly before putting into words the furious debate he'd waged with himself, even as he and Risala had fought their way through the storm.

You've come too far, at the cost of too much pain, for you and all those you love to give up now.

'The malice of magic is what stains whatever it touches. These savages, they've proved themselves vicious beyond belief. Would dealing with a wizard to find some way to fight them, if that's the only way to fight them, would that be so very evil?' He looked at Risala, desperate to see some agreement in her eyes.

She looked at him, biting her lip, before shivering suddenly. 'I wouldn't like to stand before any warlord and plead that case for his mercy.'

'I once read an argument where magic was likened to a crystal prism,' Kheda said to her, beseeching. 'Splitting the pure light into broken colours. A second prism can restore the light. Might using a wizard's knowledge to quell magic not be the lesser of the two evils?'