vessels to the limits of their moorings and then passed onward out to sea.
As the floodtide passed the bridge it spread over the lower lands below. Spray
and fragments of wood were still being tossed up by the billows, but through the
confusion Lalo thought he saw something like an oily black bubble lift from
beyond the warehouses and wobble through the air toward the hills.
But that was only a momentary distraction. It was Gilla he was grasping, Gilla
whose warmth he felt through her wet garments, as if she were fueled by a tiny,
unquenchable sun. Through the mud he felt earth solid beneath him. She rooted
him against the buffets of water and wind.
They paid no attention to the babble of questions around them as they clung
together, bedraggled and ridiculous, grinning into the wind.
Then Gilla’s face changed. She tightened her grip and shouted into Lalo’s ear.
“Where are the children?”
“At the Palace with Vanda,” he shouted back. “They’re safe-“
“In this?” Gilla frowned at the sky. “I should be with them. Come on!”
Lalo nodded. He had done his part here, and he could see that the fury of the
river was already abating. But there was still chaos in the heavens, and
abruptly he caught Gilla’s urgency. With Wedemir close behind them, they picked
their way around the lake that had been Caravan Square and slogged past the
deserted stalls of the Bazaar.
By the time Lalo and Gilla reached the Palace Gate the terrified tantrums of two
two-year-old incipient Storm Gods were bidding to do more damage to the heart of