'We will discuss these threats now,' Caid insisted at the same time.

'We can consult all available portents to divine our best course before we act,' agreed Redigal Coron cautiously. Behind his shoulder, the white-haired slave was watchful.

'As you wish.' Safar shrugged his massive shoulders and settled himself once more on his cushions. 'Now, Daish Kheda, just what do you think you saw on some scrubby Chazen beach?'

Safar's slave had caught the lizard and was making a clumsy attempt to return it to its cage. Kheda looked down and counted four white trumpet flowers and five blue logen blooms woven into the carpet before the creature was caged and removed. He looked up.

'I don't think I saw anything. I know I saw monsters wrought of foul enchantment leaving my people and Chazen Saril's dead and injured. But that was not the start of it, nor the worst.'

It seems almost unreal, like some poet's recital of imagined horrors, yet it is so very real, so brutally true. You have to believe me.

He took a breath and detailed the first alarms rousing the Daish compound before continuing through every aspect of the punishing voyage south and the grief of discovering Olkai Chazen's suffering. Seeing Safar about to interrupt, Kheda gave him no chance, pressing on to explain their unexpected initial successes in the south so rapidly followed by the horrifying setback of the monstrous whip lizards' attack. Telling of Atoun's death prompted a grating shift from Telouet behind him and Kheda saw the Redigal zamorin watching the slave thoughtfully. Clearing his throat, he concluded his stark recital of the events that had sent terror rippling through the southern reaches.

'For now, Chazen Saril holds a small group of swampy islands on the easternmost fringe of his domain. He is seeking to learn exactly where these invaders are gathered and in what strengths, as well as how many wizards they have to call on. I am keeping him supplied with message birds so he can send word of every new discovery to Rekha Daish. Sirket will alert us to any significant developments while we are here.'

'You trust the boy to judge what's significant?' Safar's amusement was just short of disbelief.

'I do, and he has Rekha Daish to advise him.' Kheda replied with determined calm.

Try casting aspersions on my second wife's wisdom, Safar, when everyone here knows how emphatically your own women always find themselves on the wrong side of the balance in their dealings with her.

'Now you've heard with your own ears what Kheda sent us in sealed and ciphered messages days ago,' said Caid tersely, 'let's not waste any more time going over old ground. We must act!'

'I see no need for me to act.' Safar smiled with genial unconcern. 'This is no concern of mine. The Chazen domain is many days' passage away even by the fastest trireme.'

'It'll be your concern all too soon if these magicians come north,' retorted Caid.

'Unless I mistake Daish Kheda, they show no signs of coming north?' Safar looked at him with polite query. 'They don't even seem to have attacked Chazen Saril again?'

'Not as yet,' said Kheda tersely. 'I imagine they realise that the imminent storms will make any voyaging too hazardous. I have every expectation that they will come north in strength as soon as the rains have passed, maybe even as soon as the first break in the squalls.'

Unless they can master water as well as fire and simply ignore the weather. In which case we're all in more trouble than we can imagine. But you can't imagine, can you, any of you? You haven't seen what I have seen.

Redigal Coron's slave whispered something to him. Coron cleared his throat. 'It would be as well to decide what we might do, should they come north once the rains have passed.'

'Since your domain and mine will be the first to be invaded,' Kheda agreed with uncompromising harshness.

'That would certainly give me cause for concern,' Safar assured Coron. The Redigal warlord didn't look convinced.

More importantly neither does that slave of his.

'It'll be a little late to be concerned when they're landing on our beaches,' said Caid with biting precision. 'Let's stop them now, before they even think of attacking the Daish or Redigal domains.'

'But who are they?' pleaded Coron. 'What do they want?'

'They must want something, whoever they are.' Safar looked more alert. 'What are they seeking from Chazen?'

'I have no idea.' Kheda didn't mind letting the others see his frustration.

'I don't see we need to know that, not to fight them,' said Caid robustly.

'While they fight us with magic,' retorted Safar. 'How do we fight that?'

Anxious, Coron nodded. 'We don't have enough talismans to turn magic aside from one in ten of our warriors. If we look to other domains to trade for the relevant gems, they'll simply strip us of everything we could offer.'

Those are Ulla Safar's words in your mouth, aren't they?

'I doubt it.' Kheda set his jaw. 'Not when we're stopping this flood of malice before it reaches their shores.'

'You think they'll credit our claims of magic blowing up from the southern ocean like some whirlwind out of season?' Safar shook his head. 'Do you want to try convincing Tule Nar, Viselis Us, even Endit Fels? There's no record of magic in any of our islands within time of memory.'

'It's the northernmost domains are plagued by wizards, not us.' Coron glanced back over his shoulder to seek his slave's confirmation.

'I still find it hard to believe myself.' Safar's tone turned sceptical. 'Are you sure this wasn't some delusion, some drug in your drinking water, some dreamsmoke blown across your sleeping ships?'

'Believe it,' Kheda said coldly. 'Before the roofs of your own fortress run with sorcerous fire.'

'Are you sure this isn't all some deception, some trickery?' Coron pleaded.

Kheda looked straight at him, unblinking. 'No delusion ripped Atoun's face off and showered me in his life's blood. No smoke burned Olkai's hand to a charred claw and left her dying through days of unconscionable suffering. We can summon Chazen Itrac to tell us of her experiences if you choose not to believe me, though I should warn you, Janne Daish will not be pleased to see her put through such an ordeal.'

He turned his gaze on Safar. 'Who would make such a pretence, that his domain was being invaded and polluted by magic? Chazen Saril? What could he possibly hope to gain?'

'Who knows, indeed?' Safar stared back at him with level indifference. 'I suggest you go back to your islands and prepare to meet this threat. I shall make ready to deal with it as and when it touches my domain. It may be that they find whatever they seek among the people of Chazen and don't even bother us.'

'But how do we deal with magic if they do come north?' Coron was definitely agitated on that score, even ignoring his attendant slave, who plainly wanted to whisper something.

'I don't imagine a magician is any more proof against an arrow through the eye or a sword in the throat than any other man.' Safar shrugged. 'How many could he kill before one of ours got through and ended his evil? I have plenty of men to throw at him.'

'I'm glad to hear it,' said Kheda. 'They will all be needed in the south.'

'How do you know these magic wielders are not proof against swords and arrows?' Redigal Coron looked nauseated. 'Ancient lore tells of magic making men impervious to iron and slingshot, fire and drowning.'

'Then let us search that same lore for any clue as to how such magic was defeated,' Caid suggested forcefully.

'It is the question of magic's taint that worries me,' said Safar silkily. 'I owe my people a duty of care to keep them safe from any such contamination.'

'I have always believed in the innocence of those unwillingly touched by magic,' Kheda said firmly.