Storm Warning

by Mercedes Lackey

  Rolls of paper were carefully inserted into waterproof cases; Cloaks were collected, and Karal found himself once again leading a group of men who otherwise would never have given him a second glance out into the teeth of a storm.

  This physical storm was indeed much worse than the ones that had followed the last two waves. "This alone ought to show your mages that we're right!" Master Levy shouted over the thunder. "That An'desha showed us how unshielded magic-power can affect the weather, and if this isn't an example of just that, I'll eat my map case!"

  Karal didn't think that the case was in any danger of becoming an entree, given the severity of the storm. He just hoped that the others were still where he had left them. The little parade struggled against wind and rain all the way to the Palace, despite the sheltering effects of the buildings on either side of the street. Several times Karal was afraid they'd be blown off their feet, but it never actually happened.

  Kerowyn must have given the guards a fairly severe lecture; some time was consumed in verifying that everyone was who he said he was, but it was time that Karal didn't begrudge. Master Levy did, though; he stormed up the path to the Palace, grumbling under his breath, and Karal trailed in his wake, followed by the other two Masters. Norten and Bret were too busy trying to keep their cloaks around them to say anything, which didn't make Karal feel any too comfortable.

  But once they reached the doors of the Palace, Master Levy allowed him to take the lead again, even though the Master's expression was as stormy as the night outside. It was just fortunate that the gryphons' quarters were not very far; Karal feared that another delay might well cause the temperamental Master to explode.

  But maybe it isn't just temper; maybe it's worry. Worry and fear made people sometimes act in ways that you wouldn't expect. Ulrich just got more clever when he was worried. Maybe Master Levy had fits of bad temper when he was concerned about something.

  Never mind, he told himself, as he reached up to knock on the door to the gryphons' rooms. Temper-fits are hardly our worst problems at the moment.

  As the door opened, Karal recognized the voice just beyond as belonging to Elspeth, which meant that the single most important person they needed to convince was still here. He waved the others inside first, and wondered for a moment if he just might possibly be able to get away and let the Masters do all the explaining.

  No, he told himself sternly. That would be cowardice. And, reluctantly, he followed them inside.

  Karal listened to Master Levy speak about mathematics and theory with great envy for Natoli, who had such a good teacher. If he'd had teachers as good as this man, he might have had more understanding of and love for mathematics. Instead, math was as arcane a subject for him as magic, and he remembered his mathematics lessons as being ordeals.

  "...so you see," Master Levy said, with a certain grim satisfaction, "by using this mathematical model, I was able to predict the size and location of all of the areas of disturbance from this last wave. We will have parties out in the countryside verifying my predictions, of course, but the ones we were able to reach before darkness fell were all where I predicted they would be and the size I expected they would be."

  "So these storms are really waves; they act like real waves?" Elspeth asked, weariness warring with the need to understand, both emotions mirrored in the set of her mouth and the tense lines around her eyes. Darkwind looked over her shoulder at the charts and maps, his brow creased with exhaustion and anxiety.

  "In many ways," Master Levy told her and raised a sardonic eyebrow. "I take it that I have convinced you?"

  "Just by virtue of the animal you found. I've seen the creatures in the Uncleansed Lands for myself," she replied. "This rabbit-thing you found sounds much too like them for me to disbelieve you."

  "And I must agree, at least that the waves are growing stronger, not weaker," Firesong said with extreme reluctance. "They must be growing stronger to have had the effect of warping an animal in such a manner. But—still—mathematical models? Magic does not work that way!"

  To Karal's surprise, the look that Master Levy bestowed on Firesong was one of understanding and sympathy. "Sir, I comprehend your feelings. Yours is an intuitive nature, and your understanding so deep that you intuit the formulas and laws. So must an artist feel when he picks up a shell, paints a sunflower or creates an image of a snowstorm—yet I can reproduce that sunflower in precise mathematical terms, and every snowflake is a mathematically exact shape. If I show you in such a way that you can understand me, will you believe that your magic does answer to predictable laws?"

  Numbly, Firesong nodded. Master Levy had a force of personality—when he cared to exert it—that was easily the equal of Firesong's. This must have been a rare experience for the Hawkbrother Adept, to find someone who was his equal in personality and intellect.

  "Look. This was your original Cataclysm," Master Levy said, pulling out a clean sheet of paper and a pen and drawing concentric circles on it. Karal marveled at that—there were not many people in his experience who could draw an even circle without the use of tools. Master Levy must be something of an artist in his own right.

  "There were two centers of disruption," the mathematician continued. "One here, where the Dhorisha Plains are now, and one here, where Lake Evendim is. The force spread outward, in waves—each of these circles represents the apex of the wave—you see where they meet and touch as they spread outward? That is where your points of extreme disturbance are, where the apexes of two waves meet."

  "So why were the areas of change so great in the original Cataclysm?" Firesong asked stubbornly. "They weren't little circles of devastation, they were huge swaths, reaching from Lake Evendim to beyond where the eastern border of Hardorn is now!"

  Master Levy smiled patiently. "The very first waves had a period—a 'width,' if you will—that was enormous—roughly the equivalent of several countries. In areas of the apex of the wave, disturbance was powerful enough that there was no need for waves to interfere with each other to distort the real world, the wave itself was what did the initial damage, and created what we call the Pelagir Hills and what you call the Uncleansed Lands—and yet, entire nations who happened to be in the trough of the wave remained relatively unscathed. I suspect that you would find that where the apexes of the first two great waves met, you would find areas of such damage that nothing lived through it."

  Firesong bit his lip, as if Master Levy had triggered a memory of something, but he remained silent.

  "Now—this is another guess, but I believe that the first wave of shock, the one from the initial destruction of the two centers, was followed by waves of successively shorter period and lesser strength." He cocked his head at Firesong, as if-to ask if Firesong understood.

  "Perhaps—" Firesong murmured reluctantly.

  Master Levy flashed Karal a conspiratorial glance. "Now look; I am drawing the circles closer together, for a reason. The next waves had a period that was shorter, and the next, shorter still. The areas of overlap were correspondingly more frequent, and smaller, until the last of the waves of disturbance passed. As the waves grew weaker, and the period smaller, the disruptions were confined to the places where the wave-apexes intersected. That is why we are finding little circles of disturbance at regular intervals; the intervals represent a combination of the period of the two sets of waves. And the periods presumably lessen due to effects analogous to how the troughs of waves in deep water reduce when they 'drag' the floor of the body of water. Expenditure of energy."

  Firesong studied the rough diagram and nodded slowly, then began twisting a lock of his long silver hair in an uncharacteristically nervous gesture.

  Firesong! Nervous! The sun will surely rise in the west tomorrow!

  "Now, if what I believe turns out to be the truth, these waves of disturbance are returning through time, in a mirror image of how they occurred in the first place." Master Levy waited, like the teacher he was, for someone to volunteer the next piece of the puzzle.
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  "Do you mean that they are beginning small and weak, and will end enormous and enormously powerful?" Darkwind hazarded.

  "I do," Master Levy replied, nodding at Darkwind as if the mage was a particularly good student. "And I also mean that they are traveling in the opposite direction; instead of radiating out from the Plains and Lake Evendim, they are converging on the Plains and Lake Evendim. Which means that all their force, in the end, will be concentrated in those two spots."

  "Oh." Elspeth held her knuckles to her mouth in stunned silence.

  "And as the waves increase in strength, the areas of disturbance will no longer be confined to the points of intersection, but will be as wide as—" Master Levy paused for a moment, "—at a guess, I would say roughly a third of the wave's period. Once again, that could be an area the size of a country, or larger."

  Firesong sat down slowly. "You have convinced me, mathematician," he said, his face blank. "Your proofs are too good. And you have told me that my people are doomed, mine and the Shin'a'in. They lie directly in the area that will be affected the worst. No shields can ever withstand the force of the kind that is mounting against them."

  "Feh!" snorted Master Norten into the heavy pause that followed. He was a short, squat fellow who had remained silent during all of this. His exclamation pierced the ponderous silence, making all of them start.

  "What?" Elspeth faltered.

  "I said, begging your pardon, Feh. No one is doomed, young man." Master Norten favored Firesong with a sharp glare, as if he had caught Firesong being impossibly dense. "We have enough information to predict the period of the next waves! We have enough information to know what the strength will be, and where the intersection points are! Right now, the danger is only at the intersection points; we can keep people and animals out of them; we can destroy the plants inside them. But haven't you been paying attention? We have a temporary solution, enough to buy us time to find a real solution!"

  "You have?" Elspeth gasped.

  "We have?" Master Levy gaped.

  Master Norten took the cane with which he had been supporting his bulk and rapped Master Levy with it. "Of course we have, you dolt! All you ever see are your damned mathematical models! Think, man! You're the one who pointed out that these spurts of magic are acting in a way we recognize! Can't you understand that these—these magic-waves—are acting exactly like waves of water? And can't we protect harbors and anchorages from real waves with breakwaters? So why can't these mages come up with magical breakwaters to protect important places, places like cities and those nodes of theirs and all?" He glared at all of them, as if he could not believe they had not seen what to him was so obvious. "Hell and damnation! Why can't they just build a magical breakwater to protect every country in the Alliance?"

  "This is why I am a mathematician and not an engineer," Master Levy replied, with chagrin. Master Norton snorted again, and looked very pleased with himself.

  "I—I suppose it ought to be possible," murmured Darkwind, his brows knotted as he thought.

  "Well, then, you ought to damn well do it, boy!" Master Norten retorted. "We can surely give you the dates and times and interference points. We can calculate the strength and period if you help us establish scales. With all that, I don't see why you can't do the rest, instead of sitting on your behinds, whining about being 'doomed'!"

  "But magic doesn't work that way," Firesong whispered—except that it sounded more like a plea than a statement of fact.

  "I'm sorry, Firesong," Karal replied, not at all sorry to see Firesong at last convinced that he was not the greatest expert in all things. "It does." He handed Firesong a set of all of the tables for the last two waves, his own copies that he had been keeping with him. In the face of all the neat rows of dispassionate, logical figures and formulas, finally even Firesong had to concede defeat. "All right," the Healing Adept said at last. "It does. And I promise that I will learn how to use all of this. How long do we have before the real mage-storm breaks?"

  "We haven't calculated it yet," Master Levy responded instantly. "We only now have enough information to predict how much stronger the next waves will be from the ones preceding them. It would help if we had an idea how strong the original waves were, and what their period was."

  "Farrr enough that the Kaled'a'in werrre engulfed in the rrresultsss of the Cataclysssm, dessspite the grrreat distancsse they had gone frrrom Urrrtho'sss Towerrr," Treyvan rumbled. "Howeverrr—we alssso trrraveled to a point outssside that, beforrre we finally found a placsse wherrre the land wasss clean. Therrre we ssstopped. Perrrhaps we can give you an essstimate."

  "An estimate will do," Master Levy told the gryphon. He had started when Treyvan first spoke, but he seemed to have accepted the fact that the gryphons could speak with intelligence.

  "I can send a mage-message," Firesong volunteered instantly. "And—wasn't there something in that history Rris recited about how long the original—ah, I suppose we could call them 'aftershocks'—lasted?"

  "It was fairly vague," Karal replied after a moment, checking his notes from that first meeting. "I've got it here. He just said, 'many moons.' That's not much help."

  Firesong blinked, as if he had forgotten that Karal had taken notes for all their meetings.

  "Except that we know we have at least a few months to figure something out before the monster comes upon us," Master Norten was quick to point out. Then he yawned hugely and looked surprised. "Gods and demons, it must be late, or I wouldn't be yawning! Look, none of us are fresh enough to do any good right now. What if we three meet with you mages in the morning, and we'll see what we can work out from here?"

  "That—would be good." Firesong bowed his head. "I hope you will forgive me. I am not used to being wrong. It sticks like a barb in my crop."

  "I can understand that." Master Norten favored him with a sardonic smile. "I'm not used to being wrong, either, and I hate it like poison when I am."

  "So we understand each other." Firesong gingerly took the Master's hand as Elspeth and Darkwind watched, the former with approval, the latter with amusement. "Tomorrow, then?"

  "Tomorrow." Master Norten favored Karal with his stiletto glance now. "I trust you'll be there, with nimble fingers and sharp pens? I want notes on everything, even if at the time we think we've gone down a dead end. It might be useful."

  Karal sighed. It was going to be a very long day.

  "Yes, sir," he promised. That made yet another group he was taking notes for. At this rate, his fingers would be worn to the bone! It was just a good thing he had glass pens now, instead of the old quills or metal; the glass hadn't worn out yet.

  Well, I did volunteer. And with luck, maybe Natoli will be impressed with all this diligence. I get the feeling that nothing impresses her quite like competence.

  Only after he was well on his way down the corridor, walking next to his master, did he wonder why he'd had that particular thought....

  Grand Duke Tremane listened to the tales of woe from his commanders with a blank expression and a churning gut. They had all ridden here—ridden, as if this was some barbarian army rather than the proud Army of the Empire. Most of them hadn't ridden any distance in years, but with all the Gates down—again—there was no other way for them to reach him.

  It was very clear to everyone that the Imperial forces were in a state of barely-controlled panic. No sooner did the mages manage to fix all the things that had gone wrong, than another wave of disruption came along and knocked everything magical flat again. There wasn't even time to set up shielding around things! This was the third time, and it was worse than the last two; shields that had held through the first two waves had broken before this third onslaught.

  Not one of his commanders cared a bean about gaining more ground in Hardorn anymore. All they wanted was for things to get back to normal! Even the weather-workers were having problems; they couldn't even begin to control the storms and were just trying to keep the worst effects off the camps themselves.

  Add t
o that the panic and the disruption in services of all those terrible storms that dumped purely physical chaos down on the camps, and you had a recipe for disaster if he didn't do something to increase the troops' confidence. Rumors running through the camp right now were enough to cause even hardened campaigners to worry; new recruits were often panicking, and had to be restrained by their more experienced fellows. There were tales that Hardorn had bought the services of the Black Kings in the south, stories that some mage in the Empire itself had caused this by accident, rumors that Valdemar was unleashing the hidden powers of their Heralds and white horses. No one knew, but everyone had a theory. Most of those theories painted a grim picture of the first defeat that the Imperial Army was likely to face in centuries, if Tremane didn't pull some answer out of his sleeve.

  The only trouble was, he hadn't the foggiest notion how to do that.

  I pledge you a tonne of incense and a gross of candles each, he silently told the forty little gods, if you will just grant me some inspiration on what to do in this situation!

  But inspiration and intervention, divine or otherwise, was clearly in short supply at the moment. None of the forty vouchsafed him a reply.

  "We have to do something," General Harde said, at last. "No matter what your orders are, you have to order us to do something, or the troops will assume you've lost your nerve and we've lost the situation."

  "Consolidate," he said finally. "Everyone pull your men in, and consolidate our forces around this keep. To the coldest hell with the battle plans—I want every soldier right here where we can stay in contact by runners if we have to. With all the men we'll have here, we can build purely physical fortifications. Abandon the front line; the Emperor is hardly in a position to find out what we're doing right now, anyway."