Tossing hospitality aside, the baron leaped at the mage’s offer. “Of course!” he agreed before she could change her mind and say that, actually, she would like a chance to rest and maybe eat something after a long journey. “See to it, Anasius.”

When the seneschal bowed, a tuft of reddish-brown feathers at the nape of his neck stuck straight up. Huh. Now that I looked more closely, the front of his tunic was the same rich chestnut as a whistling duck’s belly, while its back bore ebony-and-chestnut stripes like the duck’s wings. Aha. Now the baron’s blind eye to duck demon banditry made more sense.

In a courteous voice, the duck demons’ kinsman inquired, “Will you require anything from us, honored mage? Any supplies – seal paste, perhaps – or assistance?”

She jerked her head in a brusque, almost offended shake. “I have everything.”

He dipped his own head, making the feathers stick up again. (I felt an unreasonable, uncontrollable urge to pluck them.) “This way, please.”

As he escorted her out of the castle courtyard, he moved exactly like a duck in water: While his legs took short, rapid steps, everything above his waist glided along serenely.

News of the mage’s arrival had raced through town, and heads were poking out of windows and around corners to watch for her. Humans and spirits had clumped up on the road, swapping rumors. She’d been sent by the duke – naw, she was just a traveling mage – no, I heard she was sent by the queen herself in her infinite benevolence!

Meanwhile, the mage strode down the center of the main street with her head held high, scanning the crowds but never making eye contact.

In an alley, a group of human children and cat spirits were playing scotch-hopper on a grid they’d scratched into the earth with a sharp rock. The girl in the middle of the grid teetered on one foot as she twisted around to gawk at the mage, and one of the cats jumped onto her head for a better view. The girl wobbled, flailed, and dropped her other foot onto a line.

“You lose!” crowed one of her human friends.

“You stepped on a line,” meowed the cat on her head.

“Nuh-uh!” she protested, trying to bat at it and lift her foot at the same time. “Did not!”

In another bound, the cat leaped onto a roof and sat tidily, curling its tail around its legs, as it stared at the mage. Abandoning their game, the children and other cats scampered to the end of the alley. The mage’s eyes noted them, rejected them as a threat or a power that needed impressing, and moved on.

“Honored mage!” came a shout. A stout, flour-dusted woman elbowed past her neighbors and thrust a lumpy bundle of cloth at the mage. “Thank you for coming! Please bring us rain!”

Pausing, the mage accepted the gift as graciously as a queen and passed to the seneschal. “I will bring you rain,” she assured the baker and everyone else within earshot. “That is what I have come for.”

That seemed…oddly confident, to say the least. I cocked my head up at the dragon. Can she really do that? I thought only dragons could bring rain.

He was shifting and squirming on his throne, his scales scraping against the wood, as if he just could not find a comfortable spot. “She can’t,” he replied curtly, too distracted for babytalk. “But she can make life very unpleasant for me in an attempt to force me to.”

“Only if she’s strong enough,” Nagi corrected at once. Her tongue flicked in and out, in and out as she appraised the mage. “Which I doubt she is.”

“Nah, of course not. That’s just another two-bit traveling mage,” sniggered Captain Carpio. “Just look at her.”

A traveling mage? I asked, puzzled. I’d heard of traveling merchants, of course, but never traveling mages. This must be another new fashion. Like the tunics. I disapproved.

“A travelling mage is a second-rate mage who couldn’t find a permanent position at a royal or ducal court,” Nagi explained with a sniff.

“They travel around picking up odd jobs,” Captain Carpio added scornfully. “The carrion-eating crabs!” Indignant, some of the crab servants danced side-to-side, but he didn’t notice. Puffing up as far as he could, he flung his fins wide and declared, “Your Majesty, I’ll lead out our forces! Show her she can’t push us around!”

“We should hear what she has to say first,” objected Nagi. “We may be able to convince her to leave peacefully.”

“Hmph! These mages never do anything peacefully! What they need is a proper drubbing!”

While he and Nagi bickered and the dragon kept one eye on them and one on the vision, the mage and seneschal approached the river. By this point, they were trailing a horde of onlookers: artisans, apprentices, and servants who’d decided to snatch a spontaneous holiday. (Their masters were probably in the crowd too.) As much as it dismayed me, I had to agree with Captain Carpio: There was no way the mage could back down now – not with such a big audience. Still, a pretense at negotiation would be better for our image.

Clicking my fin to get the dragon’s attention, I seconded Nagi, I think we should talk to her first.

The snake glanced at me and wrestled briefly over whether taking advantage of my support now would weaken her position later. Without acknowledging me, she told the dragon, “Let’s keep the violence in reserve and hear her out first.”

We outvoted the captain, two to one. That decided the dragon. “All right. Nagi will speak to her, backed up by Captain Carpio and his guards. I’ll monitor the situation from here. Call for me if you need help.”

Thwarted, the captain clenched his jaw and flapped his tail, but he bowed.

“Go assemble a mix of shrimp and frog guards,” Nagi ordered. “No need to rush. Whoever heard of a dragon king’s emissaries waiting on a mage!”

With another sullen thrash of his tail, the captain swam off, probably to collect the most quarrelsome, belligerent guards he could find.

While he and Nagi were organizing their welcoming committee at the slow, stately pace that befitted a dragon king, the mage reached the riverbank. Leaving the seneschal behind, she strode straight down to the water’s edge. The ground was so dry that she didn’t even have to hitch up her tunic to keep its hem out of the mud. She made a show of pacing back and forth until she located the optimum spot – the onlookers watched with bated breath – and then she planted her boots, drew a battered wooden box out of her pocket, and slid back its top. Inside was a chipped ceramic dish with a blob of seal paste. Holding it to the side so her body wouldn’t block anyone’s view, she seized her seal, flourished it to make the bronze glint, and slammed it into the seal paste. With a squelch, she pulled it free and raised it overhead, letting everyone see the sticky red goop that now coated the runes on the bottom.

Excited whispers ran through the crowd, humans and spirits trying to guess what amazing spell she was about to perform.

Coiled on his throne, stiff all over, the dragon waited for her play.

As for me, I cocked my whole body to a side, curious what spell could possibly require such drama.

The mage sucked in a deep breath, shut her eyes, and flung her head back. Then, with a dancer-like sweep of her arm, she brought the seal down on her exposed throat and pressed it against her flesh. After she lifted it, she held the pose a moment longer, allowing her audience full view of the stamp glowing on her skin.

There were gasps and a smattering of applause – but most onlookers were too focused to react.

Showoff, I muttered. No theatrics were essential to spellwork, only the mage’s will and the stamp to anchor it. Plus her spell was so weak that it had only caused the faintest twist in the world around us. The Green Frog should hire her for his troupe. She could probably earn more as an actor than a mage.

Right on cue, she struck a heroic pose, chin up so everyone could see the stamp and outstretched right hand pointing imperiously at the center of the river (which was not the direction of the water court). “Dragon King of Black Sand Creek!” boomed her voice. “On behalf of Baron Claymouth of the Claymouth Barony, I summon you for a parley!”

All that fuss – for a sound-amplification spell? Cassius’ Imperial Mages would barely have needed to brush themselves with a seal for that. But the onlookers were pumping their fists and stamping their feet and cheering themselves hoarse.

Nagi looked at the dragon, who nodded back. “Now,” she commanded Captain Carpio.

“Fall in!” he bellowed at the guards. “Make a show of force! Protect the Prime Minister!”

They formed a messy box around her, with Captain Carpio in front, and straggled out of the audience chamber.

Behind them, the dragon tapped his pearl absently, and the river split and peeled apart to form a dry path angling from the mage’s feet to the water court’s gateway. Shouts of awe came from the riverbank.

The mage’s eyes widened. She inhaled sharply, then caught herself and nodded in satisfaction, pretending that she’d planned this all along. Lifting her hem, she took a single step onto the riverbed.

The seneschal had let out a wheezy yelp when the water started to move, but now he steeled himself and pattered forward. “Honored mage,” he called, “is this wise?”

She rotated until she could study him and be seen studying him, looking him up and down as if assessing his courage and finding it wanting. “You are under no obligation to accompany me into the river,” she declared for her audience. “You may stay here and wait for me.”

He winced. “Honored mage,” he tried again, no doubt wondering what the baron would do to him if he let the mage drown before she brought rain. “Honored mage, if His Majesty the Dragon King grows angry, this may be dangerous….”

Ha, sure. Was that what he’d told the duck demons in a pretense of dissuading them from robbing us? It certainly hadn’t stopped him from enriching the barony off our pearl mussels.

The mage froze him with a hard stare. “Nothing about a mage’s life is safe, seneschal.”

That, at least, was true.

Meanwhile, our welcoming committee had reached the gateway. They halted there, with Captain Carpio bellowing the shrimp and frogs into two ranks across the opening just inside the water. Nagi hung back in the shadows, where human eyes could make out only a long, sinuous form that might or might not be a dragon. From the minuscule twist that I’d felt earlier, I doubted the mage’s spell extended to sharpening her vision.

The mage waited for everyone to get a good look at these fearsome water spirits waiting for her before she strode down the riverbed, box of seal paste balanced on one upturned palm, seal swinging jauntily at her side.

Do you think she trained as a dancer when she was young? I asked idly.

“She’s a mage, Mooncloud,” scolded the dragon. “They spend decades honing their craft.”

Yes, well, the one didn’t necessarily preclude the other. Especially if the mage in question weren’t a very good one.

When she was halfway to the gate, Captain Carpio roared, “Halt, human! State your name and business!”

She kept walking, showing that she would not be intimidated by this fierce spirit. “I am Mage Floridiana!” she proclaimed in a ringing tone calibrated to send a thrill through her audience. “Trained by the great Domitilla herself!”

I’d never heard of either of them, but that was unsurprising. Mages could prolong their lifespans magically, but unless they lived long enough to awaken, they were still mortal. And it had been centuries since I walked among humans.

“As for my business, I have already stated that I am here to parley with the Dragon King of Black Sand Creek on behalf of Baron Claymouth!”

Captain Carpio bristled, but I thought it was a fair rebuke.

“About what, human?” he demanded. “The Dragon King is busy. He has no time to waste on two-bit magic users.”

She stiffened and drew herself up straight, right hand going to her seal. On the riverbank, the seneschal shifted unhappily from foot to foot as the onlookers booed.

Into this tense atmosphere slithered Nagi. “Thank you, Captain Carpio. I will take it from here.”

He bowed, somewhat reluctantly, and backed away to let her pass.

“Mage.” Nagi inclined her head, the gesture conveying more arrogance than humility or hospitality. “I am Nagi, water snake spirit and Prime Minister of Black Sand Creek. Be welcome.”

Is she going to invite her in? I asked the dragon, excited. It would be so much more fun to watch the negotiations in person.

“No. That would do her too much honor.”

And indeed, Nagi was saying, “So, on what matter did you wish to petition His Majesty?”

Floridiana rasped out a humorless chuckle. “I think you know exactly why I’m here, spirit.”

Nagi rose to the tip of her tail to tower over the human. “Do enlighten me.”

Turning to show her audience her heroic profile, the mage swept an arm in a dramatic half-circle, encompassing everyone on the riverbank and the parched earth itself. “The drought, spirit! The drought! Can you not feel the groans of the land as it bakes and shatters? Can you not hear the cries of the people as they watch their crops wither and die? Do you not see the smoke of funerary incense and the tears of the bereaved painted across these merciless skies?”

Well, no. The skies were bright blue and cloudless. That was both the problem and the point. Also, no one had starved to death yet. That would come this winter. Ugh, poets – I’d always hated them. If I were in charge, it would be time for another round of censorship.

Nagi was similarly unmoved by Floridiana’s language. “Rain is allotted by Heaven. If you have an issue with that, I suggest you pray.”

The mage flung her arms wide. “As the people of this barony have been doing for the entire Lotus Moon! It is you who failed to secure more rain for them at the Meeting of the Dragon Host! Do not blame the innocent for your own failure!”

Shouts of assent rose from the crowd, although no one seemed inclined to charge into the river to back up their champion.

Leaning forward, Floridiana stabbed a finger through the water, right into Nagi’s face. “The failing is yours, spirit. Yours – and your king’s. It is for you to redress this failing and bring rain to these people.”

And to provide a thesaurus?

Nagi’s eyes moved deliberately from the mage’s finger to her face. Then the snake’s mouth peeled back to bare her fangs. “Remove your hand, human.”

But of course Floridiana couldn’t back down, not in front of so many people. Waggling the finger under Nagi’s nostrils, she proclaimed, “I, Mage Floridiana, have come to force you to save the people of this barony!”

Off to the side, Captain Carpio had been puffing up with rage as he watched, and now he exploded. “You two-bit – You carrion-eating – !” Sputtering, he waved his fin at the frogs. “Attack!”