He knew the yellow sky was wrong and that he must be dreaming. In the easy way of dreaming he decided to visit the king and found himself in the palace. All the courtiers and ladies looked askance at him, but there was still that regal elf at his side, protecting him, so he strode forward without concern. The king was there in person, heir to the line of Silvanos, a golden visage surrounded by the reflected light of a thousand mirrors. His blessing fell upon the tall elf and spilled off of his shoulders, cascaded down to envelop Kerrick as well.

With terrifying quickness, darkness closed in, an awful, suffocating darkness that tried to drown him but did not have the mercy to let him die. His efforts to cry out were muted by a cottony thickness in his throat, and his attempts to thrash and kick were defeated by the weariness that left him limp, drained of all energy. The darkness was a smothering blanket and for a while it seemed an eternal funeral shroud. All the goodness and light was gone, except for one imagined pinprick, a perfect circle of gold.

Very slowly the cloak lifted, and with desperate, straining gasps he filled his lungs and breathed and fell into fitful sleep. He dreamed fitfully, with tantalizingly brief glimpses into a Silvanesti pure, clean, and warm. For a precious time, he felt weightless, careless, and content.

Inevitably the dream was broken, and the nightmare of despair and longing once more dragged him down. Sometimes he saw the golden ring, just out of reach, a taunting reminder of his anguish, his need. The precious magic was available if only he could touch it, could draw upon it. He knew that power would cure him-it was the only thing that could possibly soothe his hurts.

If he had known where the ring was, he would have clawed his way out of bed, crawled across the floor, anything to obtain it. But the ring was gone, and there was no antidote to the pain and despair, so he lay wretched and shaking, sweating and crying, until at last the darkness began to lighten and, once more, he returned to the real world.

He awoke to a grayness that made him think the summer had passed in Icereach. Someone sat beside his bed, and he asked for a candle. The person replied in a woman’s voice that sunlight was pouring in the window and a candle would cast no noticeable light.

So the grayness rested in his own eyes, then. The window was near his bed and yes, he could detect the brightness, angled rays from the sun that never climbed very high into the sky over the Icereach. But the sun was high enough-Kerrick knew that it was still summertime. Slowly, other physical details came to him: stone walls… heavy timbers in the ceiling… bedsheets. He guessed that he was in Brackenrock, probably lying in a small bedchamber somewhere in the fortress, high enough to catch the sunlight streaming over the walls. The person watching over him, that gentle woman, was still there.

“Feathertail?” He finally made out the shy smile of the pretty girl sitting near the bed. She was looking at him hopefully, and when he lifted his hand she reached out to take it.

“Kerrick! You’re going to be all right, aren’t you? I knew it, and Dinekki knew it-she asked me to keep an eye on you, so that you didn’t hurt yourself. You…” Her eyes dropped. “Sometimes it seemed as if you were suffering terribly.”

The elf felt a chill of longing, a hollow void that he could never fill, but he shook his head stubbornly and tightened his grip on her fingers. “That’s all in the past. It’s over. Tell me, what happened.” He strained to recall. “The last thing I knew I was fighting at the gate with Randall and a few dozen of his men, but the ogres had us outnumbered. They came in a tight formation! I… I put on the ring….”

At least that part was a vivid memory, slipping his finger through the golden ring, feeling the magic suffuse his flesh in a sensuous rush. He clenched his teeth. Everything after was a blank. “We won? The ogres were turned away?”

“You fought like a madman!” Feathertail exclaimed, her cheeks flushed. “Even Randall stood back and let you carry the charge. You slew a dozen ogres in as many minutes. You even struck down their king-we raised a great cheer, when we saw that from the walls. When Bruni charged out with the ogre axe, and it started on fire, the ogres fell back.

“That’s when you raced out to the catapult and turned it around,” she continued. “The catapult shot the golden orb down the mountainside. It blew up one of the galleys on the shore.” She drew a breath, suddenly very somber. “Surely it would have blown up all of Bracken-rock if it had come down inside the walls.”

“A brilliant flash of light.” Kerrick vaguely remembered now. “How long ago was that?”

“You’ve been… sleeping, for eight days,” the young woman replied softly.

“What of the ogres? Is the king dead?” The elf turned his head, tightened his grip on her hand.

Feathertail shook her head. “I don’t think so-they got him back on the ship, and we saw him stand up before they rowed away. That is, some of them marched away-Mouse counted about three hundred. They headed south, across the Whitemoor.”

Kerrick winced. “There must be twenty or thirty villages in that direction!”

“Yes. We sent runners to warn them, as much as possible. A few days ago, after they made the citadel as safe as they could, Strongwind Whalebone and Mouse left with five hundred men to try and catch up with them.”

“The galley that rowed away-did it turn back to the White Bear Sea?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think so. It sailed off to the west. That’s the last time anyone saw them.”

A chilling thought struck him, as he recalled the blast of magical fire and the sight of the gatehouse tower teetering, crumbling. “Moreen? Is she… where is she?”

Again Feathertail cast her eyes downward, and Kerrick saw tears glistening.

“She lives! Tell me she lives!” he cried, lurching upward, reaching toward her with both hands.

“Yes, she lives,” said the lass, clutching both of the elf’s fists in her own. “But she was grievously injured. She lost one eye. Dinekki says that we can only pray that she will be able to see out of the other one, when the bandage is removed.”

“Take me to her!” Kerrick declared, throwing back the covers. His muscles were weak, his nerves shaky, but he felt he must do something. “Please, Feather-give me my trousers and tunic.”

“Can you even walk? You’ve been so weak,” she demurred. “You should have something to eat, start to get your strength back.”

“I need to go now,” he said impatiently, determined to see the chiefwoman.

It took several minutes to get him dressed, which didn’t encourage a fretful Feathertail. “I’ll take you to her room, but it’ll be up to Dinekki if you can see her or not.”

They followed a sun-washed corridor, great arching open-air windows on one side and a wall of black slate on the other. He felt a rubbery weakness in his knees and had to be supported by Feathertail. The stones had been soaking up heat through the early weeks of the nightless summer, and now they radiated a comforting warmth.

Kerrick stopped halfway so that he could lean against one of the windowsills and catch his breath. They were high in the keep, with a commanding view of the courtyard. The first thing he noticed was the absence of the gatehouse tower. There was a gaping hole in the wall and shattered stones stained with blood all around the gate area.

Beyond, he saw the Courrain Ocean, blue and pristine, extending to the north. The lower terraces could be glimpsed, and Kerrick sadly noted the trampled fields, burned houses, and wrecked buildings dotting the view.

Another dozen steps brought them to Moreen’s room. Feathertail knocked quietly and led the elf into the comfortable anteroom. Dinekki was sitting at a table, mixing something brown and gooey in a large bowl. The elder shaman looked up from her poultice, uttering a snort of surprise when she spotted Kerrick. “I wondered when you’d be comin’ round here,” she remarked curtly. “Finally got those shivers out of your system, did you?”