a rib-cracking hug and beamed at Brannel.
«This welcome storm will convince more doubters than any speeches or caves full of machinery,» Nokias said, coming to join them. «More of these, especially around planting season, and we will have record crops. My fruit trees,» he said proudly, «will bear as never before.»
«Ozran will prosper,» Chaumel said assuredly. «I make these promises to you now, and especially to you, my furry friend: no more amputations, no more poison in the food, no more lofty magi sitting in their mountain fastnesses. We will act like administrators instead of spoiled patricians, eating the food and beating the farmers. We will come down from the heights and assume the mantle of our . . . humanity with honor.»
Brannel was wide-eyed. «I never thought I would live to be talked to as an equal by one of the most important mages in the world.»
«You're important yourself,» Keff said. «You're the most intelligent worker in the world, isn't he, Chaumel?»
«Yes!» Chaumel spat water and wiped his face. «My friend Nokias and I have a proposition for you. Will you hear it?»
Nokias looked dubious for a moment, then silent communion seemed to reassure him. «Yes, we do.»
«I will listen,» Brannel said carefully, glancing at Keff for permission.
«Ozran will need an adviser on conservation. Also, we need one who will liaise between the workers and the administrators. It will be a position almost equal to the mages. There will be much hard work involved, but you'll use your very good mind to the benefit of all your world. Will you take it?»
Brannel looked so pleased he needed two tails to wag. «Oh, yes. Mage Chaumel. I will do it with all my heart.»
«Shall I tell him now?» Plenna whispered in Keff's ear. «He can have my sash and my other things when I come away with you. Tall Eyebrow already has my belt.»
«Um, don't tell him yet, Plenna. Let it be a surprise. Uh-oh, Cari,» Keff subvocalized. «We still have a problem.»
«I'm ready for it, sir knight. Bring her in here.»
«Now, friends,» Nokias said, wringing out one sleeve at a time. «I am enjoying this rain very much, but I am getting very wet. Come back to my stronghold, where we may watch this fine storm and enjoy it from under a roof.» He beckoned to Brannel. «Come with us, fur-face. You have much to learn. Might as well start now.»
Brannel, hardly believing his good fortune, mounted the golden chair's back and prepared to enjoy the ride. Nokias gathered his contingent, including the recalcitrant Potria, and Asedow, who was coming to with all the signs of a near-fatal headache.
«Go on ahead,» Keff said. «We've got some things to take care of here.»
Carialle's Lady Fair image was on the wall as Keff, Plennafrey, Chaumel, and the trio of globe-frogs came into the cabin. At once, she ordered out her servos, one with a heavy-duty sponge-mop, and the other with a shelf-load of towels.
«There, get warmed up,» she said sweetly. «I'm making hot drinks. Whether or not you've forgotten, you were still standing on top of a glacier with wet feet.»
Keff stepped out of his wet boots and went into his sleeping compartment. «Come on, Chaumel. I bet you wear the same size shoes I do. Everybody make themselves at home.»
Plennafrey kissed her hand lovingly to Keff. He kissed his fingers to her and winked.
«Oh, Plenna,» Carialle said with deceptive calm. «I've got some data I wanted to show you.» Keff's crash- couch swung out to her hospitably as the magiwoman approached. «Sit down. I think you need to see these.»
When Keff and Chaumel appeared a few minutes later, freshly shod, Plennafrey was sitting with her head in her hands. The Lady Fair «sat» sympathetically beside her, murmuring in a soothing voice.
«So you see,» Carialle was saying, «with the mutation in your DNA, I couldn't guarantee your safety during prolonged space travel. And Keff couldn't settle here. His job is his whole life.»
Plenna raised a tear-streaked face to the others.
«Oh, Keff, look!» The young woman pointed to the wall screen. «My DNA has changed over a thousand years, Carialle says. And my blood is too thin—I cannot go with you.»
Keff surveyed the DNA charts, trying to make sense of parallel spirals and the data which scrolled up beside them. «Cari, is it true?» he subvocalized.
«I wouldn't lie to her. No one can guarantee anyone's complete safety in space.»
«Thank you, lady dear, you're the soul of tact— How terrible,» he said out loud, kneeling at Plenna's feet. «I'm so sorry, Plenna, but you wouldn't have been happy in space. It's very boring most of the time—when it isn't dangerous. I couldn't ask you to endure a lifetime of it, and truthfully, I wouldn't be happy anywhere else.»
«I am glad this is the case,» Chaumel said, examining the charts and microscopic analysis on Carialle's main screen. From the look in the mage's eye, Keff guessed that perhaps he had been eavesdropping on their private channel. «You cannot take such a treasure as Magess Plennafrey off Ozran.»
Standing before the magiwoman, he took her hand and bowed over it. Plennafrey looked startled, then starry-eyed. She rose, looking up into his eyes tentatively, like an animal that might bolt at any moment. Chaumel spoke softly and put out a gentle hand to smooth the tears from her cheeks.
«I admire your pluck, my dear. You are brave and resourceful as well as beautiful.» He favored her with a most ardent look, and she blushed. «I would be greatly honored if you would agree to be my wife.»
«Your . . . your wife?» Plenna asked, her big, dark eyes going wide. «I'm honored, Chaumel. I . . . of course I will. Oh!» Chaumel raised the hand he was holding to his lips and kissed it. Keff got up off the floor.
«Listen up, sir knight. This fellow could give you some pointers,» Carialle said wickedly. Chaumel aimed a small smile toward Carialle's pillar and returned his entire attention to Plennafrey.
«We will share our power, and together we will teach our fellow Ozrans to adapt to our future. Our society will be reduced in influence, but it will be greater in number and scope. The Ancient Ones can teach us much of what we have forgotten.»
«And one day, perhaps, our children can go into space,» Plenna said, turning to Keff and smiling, «to meet yours.» Leaning over, she gave Keff a sisterly peck on the cheek and moved into the circle of Chaumel's arm.
Over the top of her head, Chaumel winked.
«And now, fair magess,» he said, «I will fly you home, since your own conveyance has come to grief.» Beaming, Plennafrey accompanied her intended down the ramp. He handed her delicately onto his own chariot, and mounted the edge of the back behind her.
«That man never misses a trick,» Carialle said through Keff's implant.
«Thank you, Cari,» Keff said. «Privately, in a comparison between Plenna and you as a lifelong companion, I'd choose you, every time.»
«Why, sir knight, I'm flattered.»
«You should be flattered,» Keff said with a smirk. «Plenna is intelligent, adaptable, beautiful, desirable, but she knows nothing about my interests, and in the long transits between missions we would drive one another crazy. This is the best possible solution.»
Chaumel's well-known gifts for diplomacy and the unexpected treat of the thunderstorm began to bear fruit within the next few days. Mages and magesses began to approach Keff and the globe-frogs in the cavern to ask if there was anything they could do to help speed the miracle to their parts of Ozran. Spy-eyes were everywhere, as everyone wanted to see how the repairs progressed.
The greatest difficulty the repair crew faced was the sheer age of the machinery. Keff and Tall rigged what they could to keep it running, but in the end the Frog Prince ordered a halt.
«We must study more,» Tall said. «Given time, and the printout you have made of the schematic drawings, we will be able to determine what else needs to be done to make all perfect. The repairs we have made will hold,» he added proudly. «There is no need to beg the homeworld for aid. I would sooner approach them as equals.»
