The air was cool and moist, but Haplo assumed that there must be more to a world of water than high humidity, and he again paced the length of the deck, trying to figure out where he was and where he was headed.
A world of water. He sought to envision it, although he was forced to admit that he’d failed in his attempts to envision the previous three worlds he’d visited. He imagined islands, floating on an endless sea. And once he’d imagined that, he couldn’t very well picture anything else. Nothing else made sense.
But, if so, where were the islands? Was he, perhaps, in the air above them? But, if that was true, where was the vast expanse of water, glistening in the sun?
Haplo returned below decks to try to sort out the problem, see if perhaps the runes of the steering stone offered some clue.
But, at that moment, he found out what Chelestra was like. His ship slammed into a wall of water.
The force of the impact sent Haplo toppling over backward. The steering stone jolted from its mountings and went rolling about the deck. Haplo started to regain his feet, froze, listened in astounded horror to a crack and a booming sound, like thunder. The main mast had snapped, broken.
Haplo ran to the window, stared out to see what was attacking his ship.
Nothing. He couldn’t see any enemy, only water.
Something fell over the window, blocking his view. He recognized it as part of the dragon’s-wing sail that helped guide the vessel. Now it flapped and fluttered helplessly in the water like a drowning bird.
Other crashes, occurring amidships, and the sudden trickling of small streams of water onto the bridge brought an unwelcome revelation. He wasn’t under attack.
“The damn ship’s breaking apart!” Haplo swore, stared about in disbelief.
It was impossible. Every plank, every beam, every mast andsail, every splinter of this ship, was protected by rune-magic. Nothing could harm it.
The Dragon Wing had sailed without injury through the suns of Pryan. It had survived the Maelstrom of Arianus, floated unscathed on the molten lava sea of Abarrach. A powerful Sartan necromancer had tried unsuccessfully to break its spell. The dread lazar had sought to unravel its magic. Dragon Wing and its pilot had survived them all. But water, ordinary water, was causing it to shatter like flawed pottery.
The ship was wallowing sluggishly, timbers creaking and groaning, straining to survive, then giving way. Dragon Wing was breaking apart slowly; it hadn’t been crushed, but it shouldn’t be breaking apart at all.
Haplo still couldn’t believe it, refused to believe it. He stood up with difficulty, fighting to balance himself on the listing deck. Water sloshed over his ankles.
He turned to look for the steering stone, wondering briefly as he searched why it should have been knocked loose. It, too, was covered with runes, protected by sigla that guided the ship. If he could retrieve the stone, replace it, he could steer his vessel out of the water and back to what he now concluded must have been some sort of air pocket.
Haplo located the steering stone; it had rolled up against the bulkheads. Its rounded top was barely visible above the rising water. He waded toward it, reached down to pick it up. His hand paused. He stared at the stone.
It was smooth, round, and completely blank. The sigla were gone.
Another crash. The water level was rising rapidly.
This must be a trick of his mind, a panicked reaction to what was happening. The sigla on the steering stone were inscribed deeply, magically, in the rock. They could not, by any possible means, be washed away. Haplo plunged his hands into the water in an effort to retrieve the stone. He drew it out, speaking the runes that should have caused its magic to activate.
Nothing happened. He might have been holding a rock dug from his lord’s garden. And then, glaring at the stone in baffled, angry frustration, Haplo’s gaze shifted to his hands.
Water dripped from his fingers, his wrists, his lower arms, ran from skin that was smooth and unblemished, as blank and bare as the rock.