Xaymar laughed. "He fears me, blue man. I read it in his brain as he sat there in my crypt. And I learned more: this weapon of his you call a cymosynthesizer is useless once he's in the air. So he'll leave it on the ground and then stay with it for the sake of the protection that it offers, instead of risking his own fat neck in one of the ships he sends against me."
The ships on the screen were looming ever larger now. Streaks of silver light set against dullness, they hurtled closer ... closer....
Forcing casualness into his voice, Haral gestured to them. "And what will you do when at last they reach us?" He touched what appeared to be some sort of triangulation finder. "At the rate they're moving, they should be here within another minute."
Turning, not answering, Xaymar stepped to a huge switch-box set in the center of the bubble's floor and threw a lever. An eerie, whining sound rose, and with it a faint smell of ozone.
The woman threw a second lever. A third. A fourth.
The whining grew louder, the odor stronger.
Xaymar moved back to the control board. Almost idly, she said: "They call me queen of storms."
Haral stayed silent. But of a sudden his heart was pounding.
"Do you know the power of the lightning, blue man? Can you vision the force that lies locked within it?"