'What else can you see?' demanded Risala hurriedly. 'How soon can we leave?'

'Feathercloak's taking his chest ashore.' Dev twisted the ring of the spyglass to get a clearer view. 'Young Lizardskin's along to carry it. Now who do you suppose they're going to give it to?'

'Their leader?' Risala suggested, tense. 'The man Chazen Saril will need to kill?'

'For a poet you seem very interested in strategy.' Dev didn't take his eye away from the spyglass 'Well now, who's this?'

'Who?' Frustration brought Risala on to her knees before caution forced her back again.

'Feathercloak and Lizardskin are on their faces before him, so he must be important. He looks much the same as the rest, tall, skinny, hair all stuck together with coloured paint. But he's wearing an incredible cloak.' Dev leaned forward in an unconscious effort to see more clearly.

'How so?' Risala tried in vain to see what he meant but they were too far away.

'It's scales, like our friend in the lizard skin but there's just no comparison,' Dev breathed. 'It's red and polished or lacquered or something, it must be, to shine like that.'

Risala looked at the unbroken blanket of cloud up above. 'How can it be shining with no sun?'

Dev realised the ruby sheen on the rippling hide was magelight. The cloak was a full half circle cut from the belly skin of some massive beast, soft carnelian scales a finger's length or so. Dev swallowed the lump of disbelief in his throat. 'I think it's dragon hide.'

The new mage walked slowly towards Feathercloak and Lizardskin, who were still prostrate, hands outstretched. Rain falling anywhere near vanished into steam suffused with raw elemental fire.

'It can't be,' Risala objected. 'You only find dragons in poems.'

'And the frozen mountains of the unbroken lands,' countered Dev. 'I still say it's dragon hide. Hush, he's looking in the chest.'

'Can you see what they brought him?' Risala edged closer.

'No.' Dev shook his head in disgust and thrust the spyglass at her. 'You try, if you're so keen to see.'

A little confused, Risala nevertheless took the spyglass and turned it eagerly on the encampment on the shore. Dev looked for a puddle. All this rain had to be good for something. A hollow in a rock shone with moisture and Dev shuffled unobtrusively over for a clear view of the water's surface.

'See anything?' he demanded of Risala.

'No, not yet,' she said slowly.

'Try harder,' he told her curtly. He concentrated all his elemental affinity on the water, suppressing every hint of magelight in the scrying. An image floated on the surface like an instant of reflection caught in a sloshing cup and vanished. Dev took a deep breath.

'Fire!' Risala started so violently that she knocked Dev's arm. 'A flash like flames anyway. Some magic, or something.' She cowered as low behind the rock as she could without losing sight of the distant beach.

Ready to mock Risala for panicking at a newly lit cook fire, Dev's sarcasm died on his tongue with a taste like old ashes. In the mirror of the watery hollow, he saw the mage in the dragon hide raise his arms, the ruby iridescence of the cloak growing ever brighter. Magelight flickered in scarlet flames around his upturned hands. Even at this distance, the untamed power buffeted Dev's wizard senses. He gasped as he felt that power sent questing out over land and sea.

'Run!' He sprang to his feet and raced for the little boat. He didn't wait to answer Risala's incoherent questions, barely slowing as a stone sliding away beneath his feet wrenched at his ankle and he barked his shin on a vicious outcrop.

The boulder Dev had rested his elbows on exploded. Gobbets of molten rock shot overhead to fall hissing into the sea or splinter the stones as they landed. The ground shifted and buckled and Dev looked back to see a burning crack gaping where they had crouched on the headland. As he watched, a bright arrowhead of blazing magelight cut rapidly through the ground towards him, a fiery fissure widening behind it.

Risala whimpered frantically as she hauled at the little boat. Dev seized the nearest handhold. Between them they threw the shallow craft into the water, setting it rocking perilously as they leaped inside.

'Put your back into it,' rasped Dev. He thrust them off from a rock with his own paddle.

The magical rift pursuing them reached the water's edge and halted in a cloud of steam. Dev caught his breath on an instant of relief before the sea all around their boat began to seethe and bubble.

Risala snatched her paddle out of the water. 'We're going to be boiled alive,' she wailed.

Dev threw his paddle away and thrust his hands forward, emerald magelight swirling around them. Ignoring Risala's horror-struck face, he gripped the sides of the boat. The green radiance crawled outwards to form a lattice over the surface of the wood. As his magic touched the water, Dev realised there wasn't any fire magic beneath their hull. The water wasn't boiling; something was stirring it up. A roiling confusion of earth and water enchantments was rising beneath them.

Risala screamed as a glaucous grey tentacle slapped across the boat in front of her. Another came up on her other side and the two began twining together. She hammered at the writhing knot with her paddle blade but more tendrils came to join it. 'Dev!' Her panic rose to a tearing shriek as more tentacles poured over the side of the boat and began curling around her legs. Thick slime glistened on her feet, pooling in the bottom of the boat. She wrenched at a slippery grey feeler trying to coil around her wrist, freeing herself with an audible ripping sound. Livid sucker marks marred her skin.

Dev sat motionless, feeling this enchantment, whatever it was, leeching the magic from his own working, sucking at the elemental power he had summoned from the water. This unknown sorcery wasn't only leaving him powerless, it was using the stolen magic to feed the abomination attacking them. He looked over the side of the boat into the foaming sea where countless pallid, boneless limbs were emerging from the depths. Wherever the blind greedy fingers touched his magic, the green light faded to nothingness. Thrusting his hands to the air he summoned the fire that had always been the foundation of his power, flames dancing on his palms. A moment later, the scarlet light vanished, mercilessly snuffed.

A cracking sound silenced Risala's frantic screams. The little boat shuddered as the soft tentacles suddenly stuck fast to the solid wood. They pulled and cracks appeared between Dev's feet. Sea water flooded the narrow hull, trails of slime floating free.

'Give me your hand!' As Dev reached for Risala, the tentacles quivered and ripped the boat to splinters with a mighty convulsion. He fell into the water, struggling to keep his head out of the spume and slime, lashing out at the loathsome touch of the grey tendrils on his arms and legs. Risala's despairing sob ended in a gurgle as something pulled her below the waves.

Dev kicked out madly at the smooth slipperiness curling around his feet, pushing in all directions to keep from being entangled. Taking a breath as best he could, he dived down, fighting his way through the water. The treacherous tendrils slid away before curling back to try winding around his arms. His fist hit something solid. He grabbed for it. Not wood, nor sea monster, it was firm yet flesh. It had to be Risala. Inheld breath burning in his chest, Dev looked upwards and turned every inborn instinct of magic within him to the sky.

They hit the deck of the Amigal with a thud that left him gasping. Risala sprawled beside him, her face invisible beneath the clinging mass of her sodden hair. Dev dragged himself to his knees and rolled the girl over on to her front, scraping the hair away.

'Breathe, curse you,' he rasped. Seizing her around the waist, he raised her hips. A spasm of coughing racked her and she began vomiting water and slime. Dev used one of the mast ropes to haul himself upright. This was no time for subtlety. He scattered the branches that had hidden the little ship with sweeps of sapphire magic, all the while hurrying to rig the sail.