text: Dor woke fairly well refreshed. Evidently Grundy had located a suitable balm, for the scraped skin was largely healed. His head was pillowed on something soft; after a moment he realized it was Irene's lap. Irene was asleep with her back against an ash tree, and a fine coating of ashes now powdered her hair. She was lovely in that unconscious pose.
  
  He seemed to be wearing new clothing, too. They must have located a flannel plant, or maybe Irene had grown one from seed. As he considered that, he heard a faint bleat in the distance and was sure; newly shorn flannel plants did protest for a while. He decided not to dwell on how she might have measured or fitted him for the clothing she had made. Obviously she was not entirely naive about such things. In fact, Irene was shaping up as a pretty competent girl.
  
  Dor sat up. Immediately Irene woke. "Well, someone had to keep you from thrashing about in the sand until you healed," she said, embarrassed.
  
  He had liked her better without the explanation. "Thank you. I'm better now."
  
  Chet and Smash had gathered red and blue berries from colorberry bushes and tapped a winekeg tree for liquid. They got pleasantly high on breakfast while they discussed the exigencies of the day. "I don't think we had better try to walk by that wyverns' nest," Chet said. "But our most feasible alternative carries a penalty."
  
  "The curse," Grundy said.
  
  "Beware the air," Smash agreed.
  
  Dor scratched his head. "What are you talking about?"
  
  "The salve," Chet explained. "To walk on clouds."
  
  "I don't want to perform some dastardly deed," Irene said. "But I don't want to get chewed up by wyverns either."
  
  Now a shape loomed on the ocean horizon. "What's that?" Dor asked the sea.
  
  "A big sea serpent," the water answered. "She comes by here every morning to clean off the beaches."
  
  Now Dor noticed how clean this beach was. The sand gleamed as white-ly as bone.
  
  "I think our decision has just been made for us," Chet said. "Let's risk the curse and walk the vapors."
  
  "But the clouds are way out of reach," Irene protested.
  
  "Light a fire," Grundy said. "We can walk up the smoke."
  
  "That ought to work," Chet agreed.
  
  Hurriedly they gathered dry wood from the interior of the island while Irene grew a flame-vine. Soon the vine was blazing, and they set the wood about it, forming a bonfire. Several fine bons puffed into the sky, looking like burning bones; then smoke billowed up, roiling its way slantwise to the west. It seemed thick enough; but was it high enough?
  
  The sea monster was looming close, attracted by the fire. "Let's move it!" Grundy cried. "Where's the salve?"
  
  Dor produced the salve, and the golem smeared it on his little feet. Then he made a running leap for the smoke—and flipped over and rolled on the ground. "Lift me up to the top of it," he cried, unhurt. "I need to get it firmly under me, I think."
  
  Smash lifted him up. Yes, the ogre was definitely taller than he had been at the start of their trip.
  
  Now the golem found his footing. "Hey—it's hot!" he cried, dancing. He ran up the column—but the smoke was moving, making his footing uncertain, and in a moment he stumbled, fell—and plummeted through the smoke toward the ground.
  
  Smash caught him before he struck. The golem disappeared entirely inside the ogre's brute hand. "Small fall," Smash commented.
  
  "How about putting it on his hands, too?' Irene asked.
  
  Dor did so, dabbing it on the golem with the tip of his little finger. They put Grundy up again. This time when the golem stumbled, he was able to catch himself by grabbing handfuls of smoke. "Come on up," he cried. "The vapor's fine!"
  
  The sea monster was almost upon them. The others put salve on their hands and feet and scrambled onto the smoke. Chet, with four feet, balanced on the shifting surface fairly handily, but Smash, Irene, and Dor had trouble. Finally they scrambled on hands and feet, getting from the hot lower smoke to the cooler higher smoke. This was less dense, but the footing remained adequate.
  
  The surface was spongy, to Dor's sensation, like a soft balloon that was constantly changing its shape. The smoke seemed solid to their soles and palms, but it remained gaseous in nature, with its own whorls and eddies. They could not stand still on it. Dor had to keep shifting his weight to maintain balance. It was a challenge—and became fun.
  
  Now the sea monster arrived. She sniffed the beach, then followed her nose up to the smoke and the creatures on it. The wind was extending the smoke on an almost level course at this elevation, not quite beyond reach of the monster. The creature spied Irene up there, did a double take, then snapped at the girl—who screamed and jumped off the smoke.
  
  For an instant Dor saw her there in midair, as if she were frozen, her shriek descending with her. He knew he could not reach her or help her. The fool girl!
  
  Then a loop of rope snagged her and drew her back to the smoke. Chet had saved his rope, the one used to draw Dor up from the hole, and now had used it to rescue Irene from her folly. Dor's heart dropped back into place.
  
  The sea monster, deprived of her morsel, emitted an angry honk and lunged again. But this time Irene had the wit to scramble away, and the huge snout bit into the smoke and passed through it harmlessly. The teeth made an audible clash as they closed on nothing.
  
  However, the passage of the monster's head through the smoke disturbed the column, and Dor and Smash were caught on the side nearer the fire. They could not rejoin the others until the column mended itself.
  
  Now the monster concentrated on the two of them, since they were closest to the ground. They could not move off the smoke, so she had a good shot at them. Her huge ugly snout oriented on Dor and lunged forward.
  
  Dor had had enough of monsters. He danced aside and whipped out his magic sword. The weapon moved dazzlingly in his hand, slicing through the soft tissue of the monster's left nostril. The creature honked with pain and rage.
  
  "Oooo, that's not ladylike!" Grundy called from up-smoke.
  
  "Depends on the lady," Irene remarked.
  
  Now the sea monster opened her ponderous and mottled jaws and advanced agape. Dor had to retreat, for the mouth was too big for him to handle; it could take him in with one chomp. The monsters of the ocean grew larger than those of the lakes!
  
  But, stepping back, he stumbled over a fresh roil of smoke and sat down hard—on nothing solid. His seat passed right through, and he had to snatch madly with both hands to save himself. He was caught as if in a tub, supported only by his feet and hands.
  
  The monster hissed in glee and moved in to take him in, bottom-first. But Smash stepped into her mouth, hamfists bashing into the giant teeth with loud clashing sounds, knocking chips from them. Startled, the monster paused, mouth still open. The ogre stomped on her tongue and jumped back to the smoke.
  
  By the time Dor had regained his feet, the monster had retreated, and Smash was bellowing some rhyming imprecation at her. But the monster was not one of the shy little creatures of the inland lakes that gobbled careless swimmers; she was a denizen of the larger puddle. She had been balked, not defeated; she was really angry now.
  
  The monster honked. "I have not yet begun to bite!" Grundy translated. She cast about for some better way to get at the smokeborne morsels—and spied the fire on the beach.
  
  The monster was not stupid for her kind. The tiny wheels rotated almost visibly in her huge ugly head as she contemplated the blaze. Then she dropped her head down, gathered herself, and with her flippers swept a huge wash of water onto the beach.
  
  The fire hissed and sent up a violent protest of steam, then ignominiously capitulated and died. The smoke stopped billowing up.
  
  Dor and his friends were left standing on dissipating smoke. Soon they would be left with no visible means of support.
  
  The remaining cloud of smoke coalesced somewhat as it shrank. Dor and Smash rejoined the other three. Now all were balancing on a diffusing mass; soon they would fall into the ocean, where the sea monster slavered eagerly.
  
  "Well, do something!" Irene screamed at Dor.
  
  Dor's performance under pressure had been spotty. Now his brain percolated more efficiently. "We must make more smoke," he said. "Irene, do you have any more flammable plants in your bag?"
  
  "Just some torchflowers," she replied. "I lost so many good seeds to the eclectic eel! But where can I grow them? They need solid ground."
  
  "Smear magic salve on the roots," Dor told her. "Let a torch grow in this smoke."
  
  Her mouth opened in a cute O of surprise. "That just might work!" She took out a seed, smeared it in the salve Dor held out, and ordered it to grow.
  
  It worked. The torch developed and matured, guttering into flame and smoke. The wind carried the smoke west in a thin, dark brown stream.
  
  Irene looked at it with dismay. "I expected it to spread out more. It will take a balancing act to walk on that!"
  
  "In addition to which," Chet said, "the smoke in which the torch is rooted is rapidly dwindling. When it falls into the ocean—"
  
  "We'll have to root it in its own smoke," Dor said. "Then it will never fall."
  
  "Can't," she protested. "The smoke won't curl down, and anyway it's always moving; the thing would go into a tailspin."
  
  "It also smacks of paradox," Chet said. "This is a problematical concept when magic is involved; nevertheless—"
  
  "Better do something," Grundy warned. "That sea monster's waiting open-mouthed beneath this cloud."
  
  "Have you another torch-seed?" Dor asked.
  
  "Yes, one more," Irene said. "But I don't see—"
  
  "Grow it in smoke from this one. Then we'll play leapfrog."
  
  "Are you sure that makes sense?"
  
  "No."
  
  She proceeded. Soon the second torch was blazing, rooted in the smoke of the first, and its own trail of smoke ran above and parallel to the first. "But we still can't balance on those thin lines," Chet said.
  
  "Yes, we can. Put one foot on each."
  
  Dubiously, Chet tried it. It worked; he was able to brace against the two columns, careful not to fall between them, and walk slowly forward. Irene followed, more awkwardly, for the twin columns were at slightly different elevations and varied in separation.
  
  There was a honking chuckle from below. Irene colored. "That monster is looking up my skirt!" she exclaimed, furious.
  
  "Don't worry," Grundy said. "It's a female monster."
  
  "You can be sure your legs are the first it will chomp if it gets the chance," Dor snapped. He had little patience with her vanity at this moment.
  
  Smash went out on the columns next, balancing easily; the ogre was not nearly as clumsy as he looked.
  
  "Go on, Grundy," Dor said. "I'll move the first torch."
  
  "How can you move it?" the golem demanded. "You can't balance on one column."
  
  "I'll manage somehow," Dor said, though this was a complication he hadn't worked out. Once the first torch was moved, there would be no smoke from it for him to walk on.
  
  "You're so busy trying to be a hero, you're going to wind up monster food," Grundy said. "Where is Xanth, if you go the way of King Trent?"
  
  "I don't know," Dor admitted. "Maybe the Zombie Master will discover he likes politics after all."
  
  "That dourpuss? Ha!"
  
  "But those torches have to be moved."
  
  "I'll move them," Grundy said. "I'm small enough to walk on one column. You go ahead."
  
  Dor hesitated, but saw no better alternative. "Very well. But be careful."
  
  Dor straddled the two columns. This felt more precarious than it had looked, but was far better than dropping to the water and monster below. When he had progressed a fair distance, he braced himself and looked back.
  
  Grundy was laboring at the first torch. But the thing was about as big as the golem, and was firmly rooted in the remaining cloud of smoke from the erstwhile beach fire; the tiny man could not get it loose. The sea monster, perceiving the problem, was bracing herself for one good snap at the whole situation.
  
  "Grundy, get out of there!" Dor cried. "Leave the torch!"
  
  Too late. The monster's head launched forward as her flippers thrust the body out of the water. Grundy cried out with terror and leaped straight up as the snout intersected the cloud.
  
  The monster's teeth closed on the torch—and the golem landed on the massive snout. The saucer-eyes peered cross-eyed at Grundy, who was no bigger than a mote that might irritate one of those orbs, while smoke from the torch drifted from the great nostrils. The effect was anomalous, since no sea monster had natural fire. Fire was the perquisite of dragons.
  
  Then the sea monster's body sank back into the ocean. Grundy scrambled up along the wispy trail of smoke from the nostrils and managed to recover his perch on the original smoke cloud. But the torch was gone.
  
  "Run up the other column!" Dor shouted. "Save yourself!"
  
  For a moment Grundy stood looking down at the monster. "I blew it," he said. "I ruined it all."
  
  "We'll figure out something!" Dor cried, realizing that everything could fall apart right here if every person did not keep scrambling. "Get over here now."
  
  Numbly the golem obeyed, walking along the widening but thinning column. Dor saw that their problems were still mounting, for the smoke that supported the second torch was now dissipating. Soon the second column, too, would be lost.
  
  "Chet!" Dor called. "Smear salve on your rope and hook it over one smoke column. Tie yourself to the ends and grab the others!"
  
  "You have the salve," the centaur reminded him.
  
  "Catch it!" Dor cried. He hefted the small jar in his right hand, made a mental prayer to the guiding spirit of Xanth, and hurled the jar toward the centaur.
  
  The tiny missile arched through the air. Had his aim been good? At first its course seemed too high; then it seemed to drop too rapidly; then it became clear the missile was off to the side. He had indeed missed; the jar was passing well beyond Chet's reach. Dor, too, had blown his chance.
  
  Then Chet's rope flung out, and the loop closed neatly about the jar. The centaur, expert in the manner of his kind, had lassoed it. Dor's relief was so great he almost sat down—which would have been suicidal.
  
  "But this rope's not long enough," Chet said, analyzing the job he had to do with it.
  
  "Have Irene grow it longer," Dor called.
  
  "I can only grow live plants," she protested.
  
  "Those vine-ropes live a long time," Dor replied. "They can root after months of separation from their parent-plants, even when they look dead. Try it." But as he spoke, he remembered that the rope had spoken to him when it came for him down the hole. That meant that it was indeed dead.
  
  Dubiously, Irene tried it. "Grow," she called.
  
  They all waited tensely. Then the rope grew. One end of it had been dormant; it must have been the other end that had been dead. Once more Dor's relief was overwhelming. They were skirting about as close to the brink of disaster as they could without falling in.
  
  Once the rope started, it grew beautifully. Not only did it lengthen, it branched, becoming a full-fledged rope-vine. Soon Chet had enough to weave into a large basket. He smeared magic salve all over it and suspended it from the smoke column. Chet himself got into it, and Irene joined him, then Smash. It was a big basket, and strong; it had to be, to support both centaur and ogre. The two massive creatures clapped each other's hands together in victory; they liked each other.
  
  Now the second torch lost footing and started to fall. Dor charged back along the two columns, dived down, reached out, and grabbed it. But his balance on one column was precarious. He windmilled his arms, but could not quite regain equilibrium.
  
  Then another loop of rope flung out. Dor was caught under the arms just as he slipped off the column.
  
  Chet hauled him in as he fell, so that he described an arc toward the water. The sea monster pursued him eagerly. Dor's feet barely brushed the waves; then he swung up on the far side of the arc.
  
  "Sword!" Grundy cried, perched on smoke far above.
  
  Dazedly, Dor transferred the torch to his left hand and drew his sword. Now he swung back toward the grinning head of the monster.
  
  Chet heaved, lifting Dor up a body length. As a result, instead of swinging into the opening mouth, he smacked into the upper lip, just below the flaring nostrils. Dor shoved his feet forward, mashing that lip against the upper teeth. Then he stabbed forward with the sword, spearing the tender left nostril. "How's that feel, garlic-snoot?" he asked.
  
  The snoot blasted out an angry gale of breath that was indeed redolent of garlic and worse. Creatures with the most objectionable qualities were often the ones with the most sensitive feelings about them. Dor was blown back out over the ocean, still rising as Chet hauled him up.
  
  But now the smoke supporting the rope and basket was dissipating. Soon they would all fall—and the monster was well aware of this fact. All the pinpricks and taps on teeth and snout she had suffered would be avenged. She hung back for the moment, avoiding Dor's sword, awaiting the inevitable with hungry eagerness.
  
  "The smoke!" Grundy cried.
  
  Dor realized that the torch he held was pouring its smoke up slantingly. The breeze had diminished, allowing a steeper angle. "Yes! Use this smoke to support the rope!" he ordered.
  
  Chet, catching on, rocked the rope-basket and set it swinging. As the smoke angled up, the basket swung across to intersect it. But that caused Dor to swing also, moving his torch and its smoke.
  
  "Grow a beanpole!" he told Irene.
  
  "Gotcha," Irene said. Soon another seed was sprouting: a bean in the form of a pole. Smash wedged this into the basket and bent it down so that Dor could reach the far tip. Dor grabbed it and hung on. Now the pole held him at an angle below the basket. Chet and Smash managed to rotate the whole contraption so that Dor was upwind from them. The smoke poured up and across, passing just under the basket, buoying it up, each wrinkle in the smoke snagging on the woven vines. The rising smoke simply carried the basket up with it.
  
  The sea monster caught on that the situation had changed. It charged forward, snapping at Dor—but Dor was now just out of its reach. Slowly and uncertainly the whole party slid upward, buoyed by the smoke from the torch. The arrangement seemed too fantastic and tenuous to operate even with magic, but somehow it did.
  
  The sea monster, seeing her hard-won meal escape, vented one terrible honk of outrage that caused the smoke to waver. This shook their entire apparatus. The sound reverberated about the welkin, startling pink, green, and blue birds from their island perches and sending sea urchins fleeing in childish tears.
  
  "I can't even translate that," Grundy said, awed.
  
  The honk had one other effect. It attracted the attention of the nest of wyverns. The empty nest flew up, a huge mass of sticks and vines and feathers and scales and bones. "What's this noise?" it demanded.
  
  Oh, no! Dor's talent had to be responsible for this. He had been under such pressure, his magic was manifesting erratically. "The sea monster did it!" he cried, truthfully enough.
  
  "That animated worm?" the nest demanded. "I'll teach it to disturb my repose. I'll squish it!" And it flew fiercely toward the monster.
  
  The sea monster, justifiably astonished, ducked her head and dived under the water. Xanth was the place of many incredible things, but this was beyond incredibility. The nest, pursuing the monster, landed with a great splash, became waterlogged, and sank. "I'm all washed up!" It wailed desparingly as it disappeared.
  
  Dor and the others stared. They had never imagined an event like this. "But where are the wyverns?" Chet asked.
  
  "Probably out hunting," Grundy answered. "We'd better be well away from here when they return and find their nest gone."
  
  They had by this devious route made their escape from the sea monster. As time passed, they left the monster far below. Dor began to relax again— and his torch guttered out. These plants did not burn forever, and this one had expended all its smoke.
  
  "Smoke alert!" Dor cried, waving the defunct torch. They were now so high in the air that a fall would be disastrous even without an angry monster below.
  
  "So close to the clouds!" Chet lamented, pointing to a looming cloudbank. They had almost made it.
  
  "Grow the rope some more," Grundy said. "Make it reach up to those clouds."
  
  Irene complied. A new vine grew up, anchored in the basket. It penetrated the lowest cloud.
  
  "But it has no salve," Chet said. "It can't hold on there."
  
  "Give me the salve," Grundy said. "I'll climb up there."
  
  He did so. Nimbly he mounted the rope-vine. In moments he disappeared into the cloud, a blob of salve stuck to his back.
  
  The supportive smoke column dissipated. The basket sagged, and Dor swung about below it, horrified. But it descended only a little; the rope-vine had been successfully anchored in the cloud, and they were safe.
  
  There was no way the rest of them could climb that rope, though. They had to wait suspended until a vagary of the weather caused a new layer of clouds to form beneath them, hiding the ocean. The new clouds were traveling south, in contrast to the westward-moving higher ones.
  
  When the positioning was right, they stepped out and trod the billowy white masses, jumping over the occasional gaps, until they were safely ensconced in a large cloudbank. In due course this cleared away from the higher clouds, letting the sky open. The winds at different levels of the sky were traveling in different directions, carrying their burdens with them; this wind was bearing south. Since the basket was firmly anchored to the higher cloudbank, they had to unload it quickly so they would not lose their remaining possessions. They watched it depart with mixed emotions; it had served them well.
  
  They sprouted a grapefruit tree and ate the grapes as they ripened. It was sunny and warm here atop the clouds; since this wind was carrying them south, there was no need for the travelers to walk. Their difficult journey had become an easy one.
  
  "Only one thing bothers me," Chet murmured. "When we reach Centaur Isle—how do we get down?"
  
  "Maybe we'll think of something by then," Dor said. He was tired again, mentally as well as physically; he was unable to concentrate on a problem of the future right now, however critical that problem might be.
  
  They smeared salve on their bodies so they could lie down and rest. The cloud surface was resilient and cool, and the travelers were tired; soon they were sleeping.
  
  Dor dreamed pleasantly of exploring in a friendly forest; the action was inconsequential, but the feeling was wonderful. He had half expected more nightmares, but realized they could not reach him up here in the sky. Not unless they got hold of some magic salve for their hooves.
  
  Then in his dream he looked into a deep, dark pool of water, and in its reflection saw the face of King Trent. "Remember the Isle," the King told him. "It is the only way you can reach me. We need your help, Dor."
  
  Dor woke abruptly, to find Irene staring into his face. "For a moment you almost looked like—" she said, perplexed.
  
  "Your father," he finished. "Don't worry; it's only his message, I guess. I must use the Isle to find him."
  
  "How do you spell that?"
  
  Dor scratched his head. "I don't know. I thought—but I'm not sure. Island. Does aisle make sense?"
  
  "A I S L E?" she spelled. "Not much."
  
  "I guess I'm not any better at visions than I am at adventure," he said with resignation.
  
  Her expression changed, becoming softer. "Dor, I just wanted to tell you—you were great with the smoke and everything."
  
  "Me?" he asked, unbelieving. "I barely scrambled through! You and Chet and Grundy did all the—"
  
  "You guided us," she said. "Every time there was a crisis and we froze or fouled up, you called out an order and that got us moving again. You were a leader, Dor. You had what it took when we really had to have it. I guess you don't know it yourself, but you are a leader, Dor. You'll make a decent King, some day."
  
  "I don't want to be King!" he protested.
  
  She leaned down and kissed him on the lips. "I just had to tell you. That's all."
  
  Dor lay there after she moved away, his emotions mixed. The kiss had been excruciatingly sweet, but the words sweeter yet. He tried to review the recent action, to fathom where he might have been heroic, but it was all a nightmare jumble, despite the absence of the nightmares. He had simply done what had to be done on the spur of the moment, sometimes on the very jagged edge of the moment, and had been lucky.
  
  He didn't like depending on luck. It was not to be trusted. Even now, some horrendous unluck could be pursuing them. He almost thought he heard it through the cloudbank, a kind of leathery swishing in the air—
  
  Then a minor kind of hell broke loose. The head of a dragon poked through the cloud, uttering a raucous scream.
  
  Suddenly the entire party was awake and on its feet. "The wyverns!" Chet cried. "The ones whose nest we swamped! They have found us!"
  
  There was no question of avoiding trouble. The wyverns attacked the moment they appeared. In this first contact, it was every person for himself.
  
  Dor's magic sword flashed in his hand, stabbing expertly at the vulnerable spots of the wyvern nearest him. The wyvern was a small dragon, with a barbed tail and only two legs, but it was agile and vicious. The sword went unerringly for the beast's heart, but glanced off the scales of its breast. The dragon was past in a moment; it was flying, while Dor was stationary, and contact was fleeting.
  
  There were a number of the wyverns, and they were expert flyers. Smash was standing his own, as one ogre was more than a match for a dragon of this size, but Chet had to gallop and dodge madly to avoid trouble. He whirled his lasso, trying to snare the wyvern, but so far without success.
  
  Irene was in the most trouble. Dor charged across to her. "Grow a plant!" he cried. "I'll protect you!"
  
  A wyvern oriented on them and zoomed in, its narrow lance of fire shooting out ahead. Cloud evaporated in the path of the flame, leaving a trench; they had to scramble aside. "Some protection!" Irene snorted. Her complexion was turning green; she was afraid.
  
  But Dor's magic sword slashed with the uncanny accuracy inherent in it and lopped off the tip of a dragon's wing. The wyvern squawked in pain and rage and wobbled, partly out of control, and finally disappeared into the cloud. There were sputtering sounds and a trail of smoke fusing with the cloud vapor where the dragon went down.
  
  It was a strange business, with Dor's party standing on the puffy white surface, the dragons passing through it as if it were vapor—which of course it was. The dragons had the advantage of maneuverability and concealment, while the people had the leverage of a firm anchorage. But Dor knew the wyverns could undercut the people's footing by burning out the clouds beneath them; all the dragons needed to do was think of it. Fortunately, wyverns were not very smart; their brains were small, since any expendable weight was sacrificed in the interest of better flight, and what brains they had were kept too hot by the fire to function well. Wyverns were designed for fighting, not thinking.
  
  Irene was growing a plant; evidently she had saved some salve for it. It was a tangler, as fearsome a growth as the kraken seaweed, but one that operated on solid land—or cloud. In moments it was big enough to be a threat to all in its vicinity. "Try to get the tree between you and the dragon," Irene advised, stepping back from the vegetable monster.
  
  Dor did so. When the next wyvern came at him, he scooted around behind the tangler. The dragon, hardly expecting to encounter such a plant in the clouds, did a double take and banked off. But the tangler shot out a tentacle and hooked a wing. It drew the wyvern in, wrapping more tentacles about it, like a spider with a fly.
  
  The dragon screamed, biting and clawing at the plant, but the tangler was too strong for it. The other wyverns heeded the call. They zoomed in toward the tangler. Chet lassoed one as it passed him; the dragon turned ferociously on him, biting into his shoulder, then went on to the plant. Three wyverns swooped at the tangler, jetting their fires at it. There was a loud hissing; foul-smelling steam expanded outward. But a tentacle caught a second dragon and drew it in. No one tangled with a tangler without risk!
  
  "We'd better get out of here," Irene said. "Whoever wins this battle will be after us next."
  
  Dor agreed. He called to Grundy and Smash, and they went to join Chet.
  
  The centaur was in trouble. Bright red blood streamed down his left side, and his arm hung uselessly. "Leave me," he said. "I am now a liability."
  
  "We're all liabilities," Dor said. "Irene, grow some more healing plants."
  
  "I don't have any," she said. "We have to get down to ground and find one; then I can make it grow."
  
  "We can't get down," Chet said. "Not until night, when perhaps fog will form in the lower reaches, and we can walk down that."
  
  "You'll bleed to death by night!" Dor protested. He took off his shirt, the new one Irene had made for him. "I'll try to bandage your wound. Then—we'll see."
  
  "Here, I'll do it," Irene said. "You men aren't any good at this sort of thing. Dor, you question the cloud about a fast way down."
  
  Dor agreed. While she worked on the centaur, he interrogated the cloud they stood on. "Where are we, in relation to the land of Xanth?"
  
  "We have drifted south of the land," the cloud reported.
  
  "South of the land! What about Centaur Isle?"
  
  "South of that, too," the cloud said smugly.
  
  "We've got to get back there!"
  
  "Sorry, I'm going on south. You should have disembarked an hour ago. You must talk to the wind; if it changed—"
  
  Dor knew it was useless to talk to the wind; he had tried that as a child. The wind always went where it wanted and did what it pleased without much regard for the preferences of others. "How can we get down to earth in a hurry?"
  
  "Jump off me. I'm tired of your weight anyway. You'll make a big splash when you get there."
  
  "I mean safely!" It was pointless to get mad at the inanimate, but Dor was doing it.
  
  "What do you need for safely?"
  
  "A tilting ramp of clouds, going to solid land."
  
  "No, none of that here. Closest we have is a storm working up to the east. Its turbulence reaches down to the water."
  
  Dor looked east and saw a looming thunderhead. It looked familiar. He was about to have his third brush with that particular storm. "That will have to do."
  
  "You'll be sor-ree!" the cloud sang. "Those T-heads are mean ones, and that one has a grudge against you. I'm a cumulus humilis myself, the most humble of fleecy clouds, but that one—"
  
  "Enough," Dor said shortly. He was already nervous enough about their situation. The storm had evidently exercised and worked up new vaporous muscle for this occasion. This would be bad—but what choice did they have? They had to get Chet down to land—and to Centaur Isle—quickly.
  
  The party hurried across the cloud surface toward the storm. The thunderhead loomed larger and uglier as they approached; its huge damp vortex eyes glared at them, and its nose dangled downward in the form of a whirling cone. New muscle indeed! But the slanting sunlight caught the fringe, turning it bright silver on the near side.
  
  "A silver lining!" Irene exclaimed. "I'd like to have some of that!"
  
  "Maybe you can catch some on the way down," Dor said gruffly. She had criticized him for saving the gold, after all; now she wanted silver.
  
  A wyvern detached itself from the battle with the tangler and winged toward them. "Look out behind; enemy at six o'clock!" Grundy cried.
  
  Dor turned, wearily drawing his sword. But this dragon was no longer looking for trouble. It was flying weakly, seeming dazed. Before it reached them it sank down under the cloud surface and disappeared. "The tangler must have squeezed it," Grundy said.
  
  "The tangler looks none too healthy itself," Irene pointed out. She was probably the only person in Xanth who would have sympathy for such a growth. Dor looked back; sure enough, the tentacles were wilting. "That was quite a fight!" she concluded.
  
  "But if the tangler is on its last roots," Dor asked, "why did the wyvern fly away from it? It's not like any dragon to quit a fight unfinished."
  
  They had no answer. Then, ahead of them, the wyvern pumped itself above the cloud again, struggling to clear the thunderstorm ahead. But it failed; it could not attain sufficient elevation. It blundered on into the storm.
  
  The storm grabbed the dragon, tossed it about, and caught it in the whirling cone. The wyvern rotated around and around, scales flying out, and got sucked into the impenetrable center of the cloud.
  
  "I hate to see a storm feeding," Grundy muttered.
  
  "That thing's worse than the tangler!" Irene breathed. "It gobbled that dragon just like that!"
  
  "We must try to avoid that cone," Dor said. "There's a lot of vapor outside it; if we can climb down that, near the silver lining—"
  
  "My hooves are sinking in the cloud," Chet said, alarmed.
  
  Now they found that the same was happening to all their feet. The formerly bouncy surface had become mucky. "What's happening?" Irene demanded, her tone rising warningly toward hysteria.
  
  "What's happening?" Dor asked the cloud.
  
  "Your salve is losing its effect, dolt," the thunderhead gusted, sounding blurred.
  
  The salve did have a time limit of a day or so. Quickly they applied more. That helped—but still the cloud surface was tacky. "I don't like this," Grundy said. "Maybe our old salve was wearing off, but the new application isn't much better. I wonder if there's any connection with the wilting tangler and the fleeing wyvern?"
  
  "That's it!" Chet exclaimed, wincing as his own animation shot pain through his shoulder. "We're drifting out of the ambience of magic! That's why magic things are in trouble!"
  
  "That has to be it!" Dor agreed, dismayed. "The clouds are south of Xanth—and beyond Xanth the magic fades. We're on the verge of Mundania!"
  
  For a moment they were silent, shocked. The worst had befallen them.
  
  "We'll fall through the cloud!" Irene cried. "We'll fall into the sea! The horrible Mundane sea!"
  
  "Let's run north," Grundy urged. "Back into magic!"
  
  "Well only come to the edge of the cloud and fall off," Irene wailed. "Dor, do something!"
  
  How he hated to be put on the spot like that! But he already knew his course. "The storm," he said, "We've got to go through it, getting down, before we're out of magic."
  
  "But that storm hates us!"
  
  "That storm will have problems of its own as the magic fades," Dor said.
  
  They ran toward the thunderhead, who glared at them and tried to organize for a devastating strike. But it was indeed losing cohesion as the magic diminished, and could not concentrate properly on them. As they stepped onto its swirling satellite vapors, their feet sank right through, as if the surface were slush. The magic was certainly fading and very little time remained before they lost all support and plummeted.
  
  Yet as they encountered the silver lining, Dor realized there was an unanticipated benefit here. This slow sinking caused by the loss of effect of the salve was allowing them to descend in moderate fashion, and just might bring them safely to ground. They didn't have to depend on the ambience of the storm.
  
  They caught hold of each other's hands, so that no one would be lost as the thickening winds buffeted them. Smash put one arm around Chet's barrel, holding him firm despite the centaur's useless arm. They sank into the swirling fog, feeling it about them like stew. Dor was afraid he would be smothered, but found he could breathe well enough. There was no salve on his mouth; cloud was mere vapor to his head.
  
  "All that silver lining," Irene said. "And I can't have any of it!"
  
  The swirl of wind grew stronger. They were thrown about by the buffets and drawn into the central vortex—but it now had only a fraction of its former strength and could not fling them about as it had the wyvern. They spiraled down through it as the magic continued to dissipate. Dor hung on to the others, hoping the magic would hold out long enough to enable them to land softly. But if they splashed into deep water—
  
  After an interminably brief descent, they did indeed splash into deep water. The rain pelted down on them and monstrous waves surged around them. Dor had to let go of the hands he held, in order to swim and let the others swim. He held his breath, stroked for the surface of the current wave and, when his head broke into the troubled air, he cried, "Help! Spread the word!"
  
  Did any magic remain? Yes—a trifle. "Help!" the wave echoed faintly. "Help!" the next wave repeated. "Help! Help! Help!" the other waves chorused.
  
  A raft appeared. "Someone's drowning!" a voice cried. "Where are you?"
  
  "Here!" Dor gasped. "Five of us—" Then a cruel wash of water smacked into his face, and he was choking. After that, all his waning energies were taken trying to stay afloat in the turbulence, and he was not quite succeeding.
  
  Then strong hands caught him and hauled him onto a broad wooden raft. "The others!" Dor gasped. "Four others—"
  
  "We've got them, King Dor," his rescuer said. "Waterlogged but safe."
  
  "Chet—my friend the centaur—he's wounded—needs healing elixir—"
  
  The rescuer smiled. "He has it, of course. Do you suppose we would neglect our own?"
  
  Dor's vision cleared enough to take in the full nature of his rescuer. It was an adult centaur! "We—we made it—"
  
  "Welcome to the waters of the coast of Centaur Isle, Your Majesty."
  
  "But—" Dor spluttered. "You aren't supposed to know who I am!"
  
  "The Good Magician Humfrey ascertained that you were in trouble and would require assistance when you touched water. The Zombie Master asked us to establish a watch for you in this locale. You are a most important person in your own land, King Dor! It is fortunate we honored their request; we do not ordinarily put to sea during a funnel-storm."
  
  "Oh." Dor was abashed. "Uh, did they tell you what my mission was?"
  
  "Only that you were traveling the Land of Xanth and making a survey of the magic therein. Is there something else we should know?"
  
  "Uh, no, thanks," Dor said. At least that much had been salvaged. The centaurs would not have taken kindly to the notion of a Magician among them—a centaur Magician. Dor did not like deceit, but felt this much was necessary.
  
  Irene appeared, soaked through, bedraggled, and unkempt, but still quite pretty. Somehow she always seemed prettiest to him when she was messed up; perhaps it was because then the artifice was gone. "I guess you did it again, Dor," she said, taking his hand. "You got us down alive."
  
  "But you didn't get your silver lining," he reminded her.
  
  She laughed. "Some other time! After the way that storm treated us, I don't want any of its substance anyway."
  
  Then the centaurs led them into the dry cabin of the raft. Irene continued to hold his hand, and that pleased Dor.