The insectoid creatures that awaited him on shore had hardly moved an inch since they seized the six gnomes and cut the rope. Teldin counted about three dozen of them, many armed with long bows. Each creature was striped and sported in a peculiar pattern of gray and green, which Teldin realized made them hard to spot against forested backgrounds. Crossing the chest of each eight-legged being were various straps and bandoliers, including a long quiver of arrows and numerous long-handled daggers. Only a few of the creatures held land weapons, long scimitars and pole axes, and these troops were clustered around the group of wet, frightened gnomes they had captured.

When he was only twenty feet from the shore, Teldin remembered that the lake water was supposed to be antimagical. That meant his cloak… he stopped paddling, almost paralyzed with fear at his next thought. Would his cloak's powers even work? It was too late now. He didn't even want to try to take the necklace off, for fear it would fall into the lake and be lost. Slowly, he resumed his progress toward shore, his heart sinking inside him. When he was close enough, he carefully slid off the raft and stood in the algae-thick water up to his knees, pulling the raft behind him until he could lay one end of it on the sand and rock bank. That done, he rose and faced the creatures, standing erect with his hands open at his sides. Cold water dripped from his soaked trousers and spilled out of his boots.

One of the insect-beings flipped its saber behind it, neatly dropping it into a broad sheath. It moved through the ranks of its fellow soldiers until it stood about ten feet before Teldin, looking him over with many-faceted black eyes as broad as the span of a man's hand. The head of the insect-centaur resembled that of an ant, with two huge antennae that twisted to and fro on its head, and a pair of dark mandibles larger than any animal's claws. It made a come-hither motion, and Teldin carefully stepped closer, away from the shoreline.

"Ship you sail sky?" the creature asked. Its voice was not unpleasant, almost like a chirping song. It gestured with one long, clawed hand toward the Perilous Halibut.

Teldin couldn't be sure if the creature was really speaking the Common tongue, as it seemed to be, or if the cloak was translating its words. "Yes," he said simply. "We came down and landed in the lake. We wish to rest." He canceled the idea of telling the insect folk that the ship wouldn't fly yet.

The creature regarded the Perilous Halibut without expression. "You no sail sky now? Ship you no sail lake? Home you here find?"

Teldin hesitated, not sure what the creature meant. "Ship fly… Our ship flies, yes. We just want to rest here, then leave. We will not bother you." He looked in the direction of the gnomes. "Please release our crew. They meant no harm."

In answer, the creature called out in an incomprehensible singsong language over its shoulder. There was some motion near the gnomes, then another insect-centaur appeared from the rest, holding, a gnome aloft under the armpits. The gnome, his face as white as his beard, appeared frozen with terror, but the insect-centaur merely deposited him on the ground in the long, flat grass near Teldin. With a push from behind, the creature sent the gnome in Teldin's direction.

Teldin felt the urge to reach down and snatch up the gnome as he would a returned child, but he resisted it. He did crouch and force a smile as the gnome walked nervously to him, looking over his shoulders every few seconds at the insect people. "Are you hurt?" Teldin asked.

The gnome shook his head, rubbing his chest where the insect being's claws had held him. "Fine," the gnome said-the shortest phrase Teldin recalled ever hearing from a gnome. He recalled this particular gnome was named Druushi.

Teldin clasped a hand on the gnome's shoulder with false bravado, then stood again. "Thank you for returning him," he said, feeling only slightly more confident. "We want the rest of our crew, too. I give you our word we will not bother you. We wish only to rest, then leave and, urn, sail the sky."

"Trade," said the insect being. "You trade talk. We trade crew. You trade true talk. Ship you no sail sky. Lake no sail. Home here you find?"

"No, we are not making our home here," Teldin said. He judged that these beings knew the lake water was antimagical, and he further had the impression that they were not evil. It was only a hunch, but he had nothing else, so he plunged ahead. "We didn't know the lake would stop our ship from flying-sailing the sky, I mean. We had to land, and we will leave again as soon as we get our ship out of the lake."

The insect-centaur turned and repeated its earlier gesture. Another insect warrior left the group surrounding the remaining gnomes, another frightened gnome clutched in its clawed hands. This gnome, too, was sent on his way toward Teldin, and Druushi welcomed him briefly, if anxiously.

That leaves four gnomes left, Teldin thought. Was he going to have to talk all the rest of them out of captivity? "I don't know what else I can tell you," Teldin said finally. "Will you allow us to come to shore?"

The insect being considered this. Within moments, Teldin felt a change in the atmosphere. Several of the insect beings close to the speaker lowered their bows. Moments later, large numbers of them followed suit, appearing to relax as they stood. Several even put their bows away, shoving them back into leathery sheaths strapped to their long tail sections. Teldin felt his nose twitch. He was going to sneeze.

He fought the impulse as long as he could. "If you want to trade talk," he said, "we can tell you some of our stories. True stories. You seem to know we can fly-sail, whatever. We can tell you where we've been. We can tell you about the…" He sneezed then, violently, four times in a row. Eyes watering, he forced himself to stop and looked up, then waved a hand to encompass the entire sky. "We can tell you about the universe, the worlds beyond the sky, if you let our crew go."

Huge black eyes gleamed as they looked Teldin over again. "You say true?" it chirped-sang.

"On my word of honor," Teldin answered, his nose starting to run. What in the Abyss was happening? Was he allergic to something in the air? "I say true."

For a moment, nothing happened. Then, to Teldin's astonishment, all of the insect folk put away their weapons and relaxed their postures. They moved away from the gnomes, who hesitantly began side-stepping toward Teldin and their two compatriots. When it was obvious the insect beings did not care, the gnomes broke into a run and collided, arms out, into drawn-out hugs with their friends. "What's that odd smell?" he heard one of the gnomes ask another.

Teldin felt his knees grow weak with relief. He started to say "Thank you" to the insect being when he was seized with an uncontrollable urge to sneeze. He could barely do anything else, and the sneezing went on and on.

"You say ship crew, all good," said the insect being, out of Teldin's sight. "We and you pull ship. Trade talk and talk. You and crew rest." The creature hesitated, then looked curiously at Teldin, who was also being regarded with some concern by the gnomes.

I… I can't… stop!" Teldin gasped, then sneezed again twice. "I… can't. .. stop!"

*****

"Of course, I did tell you that medical matters were not in my central curriculum when I was at the university of Lirak's Cube," said Dyffed, examining Teldin's red, swollen face. "I was in engineering-none of this tinkering with the insides of dead things or trying to make trees grow watermelons or crossbreeding dragons with giant hamsters. No, I had the clean feel of the slide rule, the virgin expanses of fresh paper, the thrill of multiple equations, the afterglow of a correct sum. I was young then, only fifty, young and foolish, eager to yield myself to the temptations of differential mathematics and spell-jamming theory. Some fools called it infatuation, but they wouldn't have known verifiable ardor even if it chose to affix its incisors on their ischial tuberosities." He sighed and looked off into space. "Ah, it was an exciting time to be alive."