'How will we know when?' Risala looked at him. 'What if he can't do it, what if Lizardskin kills him?'
'We'll just have to try shooting the most dangerous wizards.' Kheda shrugged helplessly. 'Perhaps they won't be expecting arrows. We might get a few of them.' He risked a quick survey of the seaward side of the ditch and found the savage with the grotesque necklace of loal hands. He was watching intently, his followers levelling their spears to claim a half circle of empty sand for their master.
'There's Catskin.' Risala pointed a discreet finger. 'And Palm Crown.'
The savages' deference was making both men comparatively easy targets. Kheda nodded slowly, still searching for the one with the butterfly breastplate. 'Can you make that kind of shot?'
'I can try for either,' Risala responded wryly.
'We've got more than one arrow for each of them.' Kheda assessed the steepness of the brush-choked slope beneath them and the utter confusion now swirling around the beach below the ditch.
Seeing us is one thing; they've got to reach us and that's no easy climb. We might get half our arrows off and still have a chance to run before they reach us. It had better be the arrows with the paste on. But where have the other mages gone? How are we supposed to pick them out of that horde? And it's not just spears we have to fear. If a wizard can see us, surely he can kill us. What hope then?
A flash of golden light wrenched his eyes back to Dev. A surge of dust was flowing across the ground. It rose like mist, sparkling and swirling. The Yora Hawk looked as if it were wading in mud, the Winged Snake's lashing coils were slowly being stilled and the Mirror Bird was struggling like a sea bird caught in a slick of filth.
Risala gasped as the fiery apparitions disintegrated, her cry as one with the rush of fearful triumph spreading through the massed savages. Kheda watched, breath held, as Dev's scattered magic drew itself back into a wall of flame that held back the rising, stifling dust. The flames rose higher, unnatural crimson painfully bright, hiding Dev from sight. The dust subsided and its colour faded from a sunlit gold to a darker, amber hue. The radiance slowly sank into the ground. Dev's wall of fire remained impenetrable.
'If he doesn't get on with this, there's going to be no light for shooting,' Kheda muttered apprehensively, glancing towards the west.
'Look!' Risala urged in shocked wonder.
The solid ground around Dev was turning to powder. The savages encircling the northern mage were scrambling backwards, the slower among them already stumbling, knee deep in sand. The landward edge of the ditch crumbled, stakes falling this way and that, earth flowing to fill the trench. The bottom of Dev's ring of fire hung in the air, unsupported.
The flames subsided, shrinking to waist level then to knee height, then disappearing altogether to reveal the wizard standing on a solid circle of untouched ground. Dev's hands were on his hips, his whole stance one of challenge and mockery.
Kheda tensed.
Lizardskin raised his hands and the dust surged upwards all around Dev. Dev gave a careless wave and a surge of blue light drove the choking cloud sideways straight across the ditch to send the savages there stumbling backwards, coughing and pawing at their eyes. Even as Lizardskin raised his hands intending some new attack, Dev snapped his fingers and sent a ball of scarlet fire straight as an arrow for the savage mage's head. Lizardskin batted it away with a shaft of blue light but another was already on its way, and another. As fast as the savage mage waved one ball of flame away, Dev sent two or three more arcing towards him. Lizardskin began ducking and weaving, successive fiery missiles getting closer and closer before they were abruptly quenched.
Kheda heard the feather-cloaked mage's shout at the same time as everyone else. A paralysed hush seized the entire shore. The feather-cloaked mage strode down the beach, waving his arms, his heavy mantle of iridescent plumes sweeping around him. A full-throated roar burst from the savages and raising their weapons, they charged as one man at Dev.
Dev raised his hands and every thrusting spear burst into flames. The hafts of stone-studded clubs split into smoking splinters and the stones themselves exploded into vicious shards. The savages fell back in confusion to cower among the huts of the village and hide behind the piles of plunder. Some clutched bloodied heads, others stumbled and crawled, hands groping, eyes blinded. Kheda saw the vicious wounds to their arms and chests were seared black or swollen with weeping blisters.
The wild warriors weren't the only ones confused. Even as every weapon was turned against its wielder, Dev flung a final handful of fire at Lizardskin. This time the savage wizard was an instant too slow and the ball of scarlet flame dodged past the skein of blue light that Lizardskin cast out to catch it. The sorcerous fire caught him full in the chest. He staggered backwards, shrieking, clawing at the clinging magic. Fire ringed his torso with a brilliance painful to behold. Lizardskin threw back his head and screamed, falling to his knees. He toppled backwards, dead before he hit the ground. The flames vanished. Beneath the lizard's skull, his face was unmarked, frozen in a rictus of agony. His legs and feet were similarly untouched Between his shoulders and his waist, there was nothing left but a few dark knots of charred bone and a stench of burning carried on the breeze.
Feathercloak's howl of fury rose above the stifled pain of the injured savages and the fearful commotion among those on the seaward side of the stake-filled ditch. A spear of lightning arced down from the cloudless sky. The ground where Dev was standing exploded with an ear-splitting crack.
Kheda and Risala both jumped, startled beyond words.
'Is he dead?' quaked Risala.
'No.' Kheda pointed. 'There.'
Incredibly, Dev was now standing well clear of the seared sand.
Feathercloak gestured and more lightning seared through the air. Dev raised an out-turned palm and knocked the blast aside with a blue-white streak of his own magic.
This can't be lightning. We couldn't see it if it was. It would be too fast.
Feathercloak was sending spear after spear of the unnatural lightning at Dev. The northern wizard knocked each one awry with a shattering shaft of his own. Shards of azure light showered down on the huts and heaps of booty. Palm thatch started to smoulder damply.
A wind arose from nowhere, swirling with sapphire radiance. Gathering into a narrow spiral, a whirlwind danced along the shore towards Dev. The northern mage continued trading magic with Feathercloak, ignoring the swaying, bending spiral of destruction sweeping his way. The magical whirlwind darkened as it sucked up debris from the ground, now the smoky blue of a storm sky. Smouldering leaves on a nearby roof burst into open flame, fanned by the breezes drawn into the vortex. Pouncing like a jungle cat, the whirlwind doubled over and enveloped Dev in a funnel of livid, clouded light.
'Where did he go now?' wondered Kheda aloud. This time the wizard was nowhere to be seen when the whirlwind halted on the broken lip of the ditch. It slowed, magical radiance fading, debris falling from it. Feathercloak shouted harsh rebuke at his terrified minions hiding among the huts and piles of plunder. He gestured and a few reluctantly edged towards the spot where Dev had been standing.
Risala clutched Kheda's arm. 'Dragonhide!'
The mage in the blood-red cloak had emerged from the shadow of the doorway where he'd stood to watch the contest. A wail like the cry of a pack of whipped dogs went up as the wild men fell away before him, bowing low, arms outstretched in supplication. Dragonhide called out to Feathercloak with an impatient jerk of his head. Feathercloak turned to reply, hands spread in bemusement.