Elven Star – The Death Gate Cycle 2. Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman

Wheeling Dragon Wing around, Haplo made another pass. Elven archers on a boat in the middle of the gulf lifted their bows, turned their arrows on the ship. The Patryn ignored them, soared low to get a better view. The runes protecting his ship would protect them against the puny weapons of this world.

“There! There! Turn! Turn!” The old man clutched at Haplo, almost dragging him off his feet. Zifnab pointed into a densely wooded area, not far from the shoreline where the crowds of people were massed. The Patryn steered the ship in the direction indicated.

“I can’t see a thing, old man.”

“Yes! Yes!” Zifnab was hopping up and down in anxiety. The dog, sensing the excitement, leapt about the deck, barking frantically.

“The grove, down there! Not much room to land, but you can make it.”

Not much room. Haplo bit back the words he would have liked to use to describe his opinion of their landing site-a small clearing, barely visible beneath a tangle of trees and vines. He was about to tell the wizard that it would be impossible to set his ship down, when a closer, grudging look revealed that-if he altered the magic and pulled the wings in tight-there might be a chance.

“What do we do once we get down there, old man?”

“Pick up Paithan, the two humans, and the dwarf.”

“You still haven’t told me what’s going on.”

Zifnab turned his head, regarded Haplo with a shrewd look. “You must see for yourself, my boy. Otherwise, you wouldn’t believe.”

At least that’s what Haplo thought he said. He couldn’t be sure, over the dog’s barking. Undoubtedly I’m about to put my ship down in the middle of a raging battle. Coming in low, he could see the small group in the clearing, see their faces staring up at him.

“Hold on!” he shouted to the dog . . . and the old man, if he was listening. “It’s going to be rough!”

The ship smashed through the tops of the trees. Limbs dragged at them, snapped and broke apart. The view out the window was obscured by a mass of green, the ship lurched and pitched. Zifnab fell forward, ended up straddle-legged against the glass. Haplo hung on to the steering stone. The dog spread its legs, fighting for purchase on the canting deck.

A grinding crash, and they broke through, swooping into the clearing. Wrestling with the ship, Haplo caught a glimpse of the mensch he was going to rescue, huddled together at one edge of the jungle, apparently uncertain if this was salvation or more trouble.

“Go get them, old man!” Haplo told the wizard. “Dog, stay.”

The animal had been about to bound gleefully after Zifnab, who had unpeeled himself from the window and was tottering toward the ladder leading to the upper deck.

The dog obediently sank back down, gazing upward with intense eagerness, tail wagging. Haplo silently cursed himself and this crazy situation. He would have to keep his hands bare to fly and was wondering how he would explain the sigla tattooed on his skin when a sudden blow against the hull sent a shudder through the ship.

Haplo almost lost his footing. “No,” he muttered to himself. ‘It couldn’t be.”

Holding his breath, every sense alert, the Patryn held perfectly still and waited.

The blow came again, stronger, more powerful. The hull shivered, the vibrations tore into the magic, tore into the wood, tore into Haplo.

The rune structure was unraveling.

Haplo turned in upon himself, centered himself, body reacting instinctively to a danger his mind told him was impossible. On the deck above, he could hear feet pounding, the old man’s shrill voice, screeching, yelling something.

Another blow shook the ship. Haplo heard the old man cry out for help, but ignored his pleas. The Patryn was tasting, smelling, listening, stretching out with all his senses. The rune’s magic was being unraveled, slowly, surely. The blows hadn’t hurt his ship, not yet. But they had weakened his magic. The next strike or the one after would break through, deal damage, destroy.

The only magic strong enough, powerful enough to oppose his own was the rune-magic of the Sartan.

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