A cruiser halfway out of the portal flipped violently over. It veered, crashing into a nearby plague ship. Beyond them, another cruiser unleashed its battery of black-mana guns on a flock of angels. In the topsy-turvy field, though, the muck spattered a nearby squadron of dagger-ships. They cascaded into the sky. Even plague spores, even the dead, did not fall toward the ground.
"It's interesting what difference a single inversion can make," Teferi noted blandly. He cocked an eye at Urza. "It's a benefit of having a sense of humor-I'm used to thinking of what things look like when they're flipped over. Funny, mostly. In this case, flipping stuff over makes it look really lovely." He gazed at the cyclone of wrecked ships heading skyward.
Barrin sighed. "I think he's right-"
"I have a sense of humor," Urza interrupted testily.
"No, not about that," Barrin soothed. "I think he's right that he doesn't need us-"
"That's not what I said," Teferi broke in. "It's a simple spell, but a draining one. Eventually one of those ships will crash on Zhalfir and contaminate it. I need your help to shut down the portal."
"At last-reason!" fumed Urza Planeswalker.
"What do you suggest?" Barrin asked.
"It's a simple enough principle. We planeswalk into the portal-"
"Won't work," Urza growled. "Rath is warded against us."
"We don't planeswalk to Rath. We planeswalk into the portal and then back out again. We repeat the process until the spatial-temporal fluxes melt the thing down."
"The backlash will kill us," Urza said. "It'll kill us and everything in a hundred-mile radius."
"I've worked out a spell to draw off the energies. A most impressive spell. I can personally vouch for the safety of my people. Oh, and you'll survive too, Urza."
"I thought you said you needed me for this operation?" Barrin reminded him.
Teferi's smile was the brightest so far. "I need you to shame him into it."
Eyes blazing and face as red as a campfire, Urza barked, "Let's 'walk, pupil."
The two planeswalkers traded looks. Something of Urza's solemnity entered Teferi's features, and something of Teferi's cockiness infused Urza. Abruptly, they were both gone. Only the dry weeds remained. The pair flashed again into being, and simultaneously out. It was as though they were mere boys, racing for the water hole. A capricious light shone in their eyes when next they appeared.
Above, Barrin could see why. The portal seemed to be boiling. The energies in that black space crisscrossed and reversed, warring against each other. Surges of black energy tore into coils of red power. White sparks and blue-green shafts of force battled for predominance. Grinding teeth of magic chewed an emerging cruiser to shreds. It belched smoke downward and rained ruin up.
Faster they flashed, and faster. Their grins only deepened.
Barrin shook his head, smiling also.
A light awoke-a blinding thing. A new sun was born above Dominaria. It flashed, casting the fleet's shadows on the plains below. Whatever ship still labored in air ceased its struggles, plunging upward like ash on the heat of a fire.
Barrin winced back. The whole hillside and all Zhalfir could be consumed by that sudden blaze.
Then, it was done. Neither blinding fire nor black portal shone in the sky. Neither Phyrexian fleet nor phoenix flocks circled there. The sorcerers of the Zhalfir Mage Corps stood on the plain, eyes lifted heavenward and hands applauding. It was as though they had just watched a fireworks show.
"What happened?" Barrin wondered aloud.
"Come," said Teferi simply, appearing out of nowhere to grasp Barrin's arm and drag him away in a spontaneous planeswalk.
The world folded around Barrin, spinning into chaos. As quickly as Zhalfir had flashed away, it returned, though now a mile below. Barrin floated in blue skies beside Urza Planeswalker and Teferi of Zhalfir.
"Very impressive," Barrin rasped. "Very, very impressive."
"Where did you put the energy?" Urza asked suspiciously.
Teferi shrugged. "I put it away for another spell."
Urza cleared his throat-exactly the sound he had made as Teferi's headmaster. "Well, now that we have helped you save Zhalfir, you must help us save the world."
"Save Zhalfir?" the dark-skinned man echoed. "You think closing a single portal makes Zhalfir safe in this worldwide conflagration?"
"Safer than most places," Urza replied evenly, "but safety isn't the issue. Defeat of the Phyrexians is."
Teferi nodded. All the joking had gone from his face. "This is where you and I differ, Master. Safety is the issue. You've never wanted to save your people. You've only wanted to defeat your foes-Mishra, Gix, K'rrik, and now Yawgmoth himself. You would sacrifice us all if you knew it would doom him."
"I am willing to sacrifice myself to defeat Yawgmoth," Urza replied solemnly. "I have neither sympathy nor patience for others who are not."
The old, cocky Teferi had returned. "As I said, Master, this is where we differ."
"You can't save your people, not single-handed," Urza said.
"Oh, I do not do it single-handed. I've had the aid of thousands and the consent of millions. You yourself helped me harness the final measure of power to complete the spell. It is triggering even now below us."
Below, Zhalfir shuddered. Something passed over it- not over it, but through it. The same energies that had boiled through the doomed portal now shot through the land. Every rill was lined in scarlet ribbons of energy. Every field was sketched in shimmering white. The shorelines flashed waves of blue fire, and the veins of every woodland leaf glowed green. Then all was subsumed in a great colorless grid, as though the land and the plants, the animals and the people, were being caught in a vast blueprint.
"If spells can make ideas into reality, they can make reality into ideas," Teferi said quietly.
The transformation picked out every mote of Zhalfir. Lines fused. Grids merged. For one dazzling moment, all the colors combined into a blinding radiance. With a flash, Zhalfir was gone. Where it had been, only a red afterimage remained in Barrin's eyes. Then came a boom like a hundred thousand thunderbolts in synchrony.
Barrin blinked, struggling to see. Winds tore past him, but Teferi's magic held him in place. The red glow where Zhalfir had been faded to black-a black wound the size of the great land mass. It was bedrock. Teferi had taken the whole peninsula, a mile of air above it, and a mile of rock beneath.
The ocean stood for a moment in astonished walls all around. Then its green rim turned white. Water cascaded into the deep gash. The belly of the ocean slumped. The first gush smashed to bedrock and churned eagerly out across dry stone. The head of the flood was overtopped by new waves, which crowded the shoulders of the slumping water and poured into the cauldron.
Urza gazed in silent consternation at the churning sea.
Barrin gaped. "What did you do?"
"I saved my people. They dwell now in immutable ideas," explained Teferi.
"Y-you killed them!" Barrin stammered.
"No. They will return when the world is safe again. For them, not a moment will have passed."
"There will be tidal waves," Urza said darkly. "Thousands will die."
"Millions have been saved," Teferi replied. "This is how I save my people. This is how you and I differ."
"Yes," Urza replied. "This is how we differ."
Chapter 10
Gerrard had deep misgivings about this plot. His Benalish commander's uniform fit poorly. He'd not donned the garb since leaving his division half a year ago. The quilted sleeves constricted his biceps. The maroon waistcoat and bandoleers bulged across his pectorals. The linchpin in this contraption of doom was the official orders being forged even then by a blind man.
The blind seer sat at Hanna's navigation desk. He pinned a hunk of parchment beneath one hand. His other clutched a quill.