"You have more power than I ever will," Alexi confessed. "You'd have a greater range."
"If I thought you could juggle several spells at once I would switch places. Now get up with the pilot before some other disaster happens." Barrin's words came out all at once, as if he couldn't spare the time or energy to sustain a longer conversation. The old mage locked his arms to the side of the cabin, bracing himself for a long fight and against the gyrations of the blimp in the storm.
Alexi went forward. The pilot was empty, and his stomach contractions brought up nothing as the violence seemed to increase. Now each surge of wind induced storms of cursing as the pilot wrestled with the controls. The water jumped closer, and then the engines fought their way up.
"There!" the pilot shouted as a ship appeared less than a hundred yards away.
Alexi closed her eyes and let fly her attack. She formed her spell just outside the blimp. Her surge of power shattered the gondola's windows as energy speared the enemy ship. The concussion reverberated throughout the cabin. Alexi's strike split the masts on the Keldon raider and crushed many of the sailors fighting to keep it afloat.
The pilot tried to climb, but deafened and confused, he turned the craft and caught the wind. The Avenging Cloud began to retreat at a high speed, but not high enough to escape a counterattack. Alexi dumbly wondered how they kept the ammunition for the catapult ready in such heavy seas as a fire streamer covered the blimp. Fire ran like water over the envelope. The crew waited for the explosion, but Barrin powered the blimp's defenses against fire, and the Keldon flames washed over the gondola into the sea. Alexi sealed the shattered window with planes of magic glass, but she hissed in agony as a stray lick of flame played over her skin.
All of Barrin's energy focused on keeping the blimp whole, and the magical storm began to break up. Three battered enemy ships lay revealed less than a thousand yards away. Mysteriously, the Keldons didn't fire, and then Barrin heard the communications man shouting behind him.
"It's the Hunter!" he yelled. "They finally made it here!"
Teferi's blimp was thousands of feet up and behind the Keldon fleet. Even as Barrin watched warriors running to load catapults, the Hunter dropped four large objects that accelerated sharply and seemed to fly down to an enemy ship. Explosions smashed the Keldons to pieces, and the ship instantly sank beneath the waves.
Barrin could feel Teferi aboard the other craft creating walls of protective energy over the League supply fleet. A desperate attack from a Keldon caster hit Teferi's spell as a ribbon of flame, but it transformed into an explosion of cinders drifting down into the ocean. Barrin latched onto the dissipating storm and spun it into another of the Keldon ships. A twist of wind dipped into the sea and formed a great waterspout that moved over the ship and tore it apart. Flames from enemy spells filled the watery column and were sucked up into the clouds, exploding into sheet lightning. The concussion weakened the storm, and Barrin's blimp rose as the pilot aimed for a clearing sky. The final Keldon ship tried to withdraw, its casters throwing a huge display of fiery streams and cloaking smoke into the air. Barrin felt the planeswalker turn the smoke into an acidic rain that fell onto the fleeing Keldon ship. The liquid ate through the sailors and into the holds.
Barrin expanded the blimp defenses against fire, and the last few streamers sputtered and lost momentum long before they closed with the blimp. Alexi's bloodthirst demanded satisfaction, and she hurled exploding crystalline lances of energy at the retreating ship.
"Die, die, die!" she screamed as her attack penetrated below decks and started fires. The raider had fought heavy seas all day and was stressed beyond endurance. The sharp detonations of Alexi's lances began to break up the ship. It was already doomed when a great whirlpool called by Teferi dragged it beneath the waves.
The airbase would be completed within days. After the supply fleet docked, the final pieces of the tufa refinery were quickly set into place. The warehouses behind protective berms were now filled with munitions. While Willum oversaw the final touches before transferring back to the west, Barrin and Teferi retreated to discuss where to direct the League's growing strength.
It was hours later that an aide interrupted them at the map table. Teferi frowned with annoyance as the aide handed him a note and withdrew. The planeswalker suddenly grinned and rose from his chair.
"Come on, Barrin. Your reinforcements from home are arriving at the landing field. You should be on hand to meet them. In fact, you better carry the welcome." Teferi snatched up wine and a fruit bowl and shoved them to Barrin. The wizard rose slowly but did not protest. Anything that lightened Teferi's mood was welcome.
The passengers began to disembark, and Shalanda, aide to Barrin's wife Rayne, was the first to touch ground. She was tall and garbed in rough clothing. Her skin was a deep brown and her features were weathered by exposure to the elements. Her hazel eyes widened in recognition, and she walked toward Barrin with her hands outstretched. The old wizard saw the woman behind her and handed Shalanda the food and drink as he walked by.
Rayne embraced Barrin, and they held each other as the rest of the passengers flowed around them. Barrin hugged his wife fiercely, nuzzling her dark hair. He felt younger as he looked at her. Appearing only in her thirties, Barrin wondered at the decades of love they had shared and the centuries that would be theirs. When they finally turned their eyes from each other, only Teferi still stood on the field. The planeswalker looked envious for just an instant before he stepped forward to clasp Rayne's offered hand.
"I am happy to see you, Rayne," Teferi said as he let go of her hand and gestured that they should enter the offices.
"You should have come to Tolaria more often, Teferi," Rayne replied as she grasped Barrin's hand.
"You know that I prefer to take Urza in small doses if possible," Teferi replied as they arrived at the strategy room.
"Urza is rarely there, Teferi," Barrin explained. "My wife and I manage Tolaria. In fact, this is the longest I have been off the island since we battled the Phyrexians for it." Barrin pulled out a chair for his wife. He stood behind her with his hands on her shoulders. He could feel the tenseness in her muscles from hours in flight, and he massaged them. Rayne trembled slightly at the touch of his hands but reluctantly considered the maps and unit markers on the table.
"Barrin and I have been discussing a land campaign to the east," Teferi explained. "A counter invasion, so to speak. Barrin tells me that you will be ferrying equipment to support a Tolarian army in the field. When can we expect the first wave of forces?"
"We should see them arriving within the week." Rayne was oddly evasive, her eyes looking at the forces displayed and the long lines of advance that the two men had penciled in.
"We will have some difficulty integrating with League forces. As you can see, it will take weeks to concentrate the army on the frontier." Barrin reached for the list of towns and garrisons that would house the forward units even as he wondered what Rayne was hiding.
"Just what forces are you bringing?" Teferi asked.
"Two great dirigibles will be landing here. One with a cargo of light runners, the other with a load of power crystal and parts to help feed your own artificers. That's all." She seemed embarrassed to say it, and Barrin was stunned.
"Surely you mean that this is only the first flight, my dear?" Barrin asked. He thought of the tens of thousands of war machines stored on Tolaria and the terrible weapons that he had helped construct.
"There may be a few ornithopter flights of students, but the two loads of materials are all for now. The dirigibles will withdraw for a season, so you won't have them for transport," Rayne answered quietly and began to move a few unit markers on the board to represent the Tolarian forces.