through the ring at the top of Mug's cage. "Also, we've had a malfunction. The dingbats are fused to the rhomboids, and I can't land the Jenny at all..."
"Not true!" shouted Mug. "No such thing as a dingbat and a rhomboid is a poorly-drawn square! You will not lower me down, Mistress!"
Mug's vines shot through the bottom of his cage and pressed themselves tight against the Jenny's wood hull.
"I'm rooted, Mistress," said Mug. "If you insist on flying this thing to your doom, well, I'm going too."
"Mug, let go this instant."
"Mage, I'm ordering you, put that boat down right here, right now, or I'll fetch a rope and a hook and climb up there myself!"
"He'll do it, too, Mistress," said Mug. "Oh look. I'm finally seeing battery drain. Did I mention I wasn't turning loose? Because I'm not, and if you go I go, and do you know anyone with sharper eyes than mine?"
"Mage, this is a signed order, from the King! To refuse it is treason!"
"Blast," said Meralda. She finished tying the end of the rope through Mug's cage, tied the other end to her waist, and sent the Jenny falling up into the windy, battered sky.
* * *
The first rule of flying, thought Meralda, is bring a heavy coat.
She hunched shivering in her makeshift pilot's seat, her hands freezing in her thin black gloves. The wind whipped and stung and howled past, clawing and tearing at her hair and her skin and especially her nose as it raced past.
"Eighteen thousand feet," announced Mug. The dandyleaf plant had curled himself into a tight green ball at fifteen thousand feet, and was extending his eyes a dozen at a time and withdrawing them when they grew cold. "Eighteen thousand feet, and one hundred and sixty miles an hour."
"Wonderful," said Meralda. The wind caught her word and swept it away as she spoke.
Ahead, the storm that had ravaged Tirlin boiled and curled and flashed, swallowing half the sky, reaching from the heavens above to the ground below. The newly-risen sun lit one face of it, revealing a black, hurtling mass of wind and cloud that churned as though stirred by some vast, angry hand.
Meralda briefly caught sight of a single airship, far below and many miles north, its fans straining to pull away from the storm's deadly grip. The airship, a bright red Alon craft, managed to put her nose to the south and pull away, just as Meralda lost sight of the craft beneath a rushing swath of clouds.
Lightning played continuously through the thunderheads, seldom reaching the ground, but arcing from cloud to cloud in a never-faltering show of flares and blasts and glows. The sound of the thing, even above the roar of the wind, was a monstrous, grumbling rumble that grew louder with every second the Jenny sped toward it.
They're in there, thought Meralda. Two children, an injured man, a desperate woman. Caught somewhere inside a monster that blots out half the sky.
"I'm not seeing anything," shouted Mug. "I didn't realize the clouds would be so thick."
Meralda didn't bother to reply.
"Are we going inside it?"
"We are," shouted Meralda. "We're going to pull right alongside the Sammi."
Mug's reply, if any, was lost to the wind.
Meralda fumbled in her pocket, terrified for a moment that the rush of air had robbed her of the only means of locating the wreck of the Sammi. But then her hands closed about the toy soldier that Mrs. Ghote dropped with her letter, and the hastily-assembled arrangement of free-spinning metal rings in which the soldier hung.
Please work, intoned Meralda silently as she grasped the rings.
Mug aimed a trio of eyes at her hand as Meralda withdrew the toy soldier.
The painted soldier spun and wheeled inside his metal bands, caught in the blast of wind. Meralda frowned -- should have enclosed it all in a glass globe, she thought. If I'd only had time, and hadn't been hiding it from the Captain and Mug. But they'd have known I meant to pilot the Jenny the instant I climbed aboard with this. Now, a painted tin soldier is my only
"Not true!" shouted Mug. "No such thing as a dingbat and a rhomboid is a poorly-drawn square! You will not lower me down, Mistress!"
Mug's vines shot through the bottom of his cage and pressed themselves tight against the Jenny's wood hull.
"I'm rooted, Mistress," said Mug. "If you insist on flying this thing to your doom, well, I'm going too."
"Mug, let go this instant."
"Mage, I'm ordering you, put that boat down right here, right now, or I'll fetch a rope and a hook and climb up there myself!"
"He'll do it, too, Mistress," said Mug. "Oh look. I'm finally seeing battery drain. Did I mention I wasn't turning loose? Because I'm not, and if you go I go, and do you know anyone with sharper eyes than mine?"
"Mage, this is a signed order, from the King! To refuse it is treason!"
"Blast," said Meralda. She finished tying the end of the rope through Mug's cage, tied the other end to her waist, and sent the Jenny falling up into the windy, battered sky.
* * *
The first rule of flying, thought Meralda, is bring a heavy coat.
She hunched shivering in her makeshift pilot's seat, her hands freezing in her thin black gloves. The wind whipped and stung and howled past, clawing and tearing at her hair and her skin and especially her nose as it raced past.
"Eighteen thousand feet," announced Mug. The dandyleaf plant had curled himself into a tight green ball at fifteen thousand feet, and was extending his eyes a dozen at a time and withdrawing them when they grew cold. "Eighteen thousand feet, and one hundred and sixty miles an hour."
"Wonderful," said Meralda. The wind caught her word and swept it away as she spoke.
Ahead, the storm that had ravaged Tirlin boiled and curled and flashed, swallowing half the sky, reaching from the heavens above to the ground below. The newly-risen sun lit one face of it, revealing a black, hurtling mass of wind and cloud that churned as though stirred by some vast, angry hand.
Meralda briefly caught sight of a single airship, far below and many miles north, its fans straining to pull away from the storm's deadly grip. The airship, a bright red Alon craft, managed to put her nose to the south and pull away, just as Meralda lost sight of the craft beneath a rushing swath of clouds.
Lightning played continuously through the thunderheads, seldom reaching the ground, but arcing from cloud to cloud in a never-faltering show of flares and blasts and glows. The sound of the thing, even above the roar of the wind, was a monstrous, grumbling rumble that grew louder with every second the Jenny sped toward it.
They're in there, thought Meralda. Two children, an injured man, a desperate woman. Caught somewhere inside a monster that blots out half the sky.
"I'm not seeing anything," shouted Mug. "I didn't realize the clouds would be so thick."
Meralda didn't bother to reply.
"Are we going inside it?"
"We are," shouted Meralda. "We're going to pull right alongside the Sammi."
Mug's reply, if any, was lost to the wind.
Meralda fumbled in her pocket, terrified for a moment that the rush of air had robbed her of the only means of locating the wreck of the Sammi. But then her hands closed about the toy soldier that Mrs. Ghote dropped with her letter, and the hastily-assembled arrangement of free-spinning metal rings in which the soldier hung.
Please work, intoned Meralda silently as she grasped the rings.
Mug aimed a trio of eyes at her hand as Meralda withdrew the toy soldier.
The painted soldier spun and wheeled inside his metal bands, caught in the blast of wind. Meralda frowned -- should have enclosed it all in a glass globe, she thought. If I'd only had time, and hadn't been hiding it from the Captain and Mug. But they'd have known I meant to pilot the Jenny the instant I climbed aboard with this. Now, a painted tin soldier is my only
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