The trouble's been felt in the sea too. Out here we've been having quakes on the sea floor much more often than we should be having them—severe ones. And some other old problems have been getting worse. The dirt they throw into the water from the High and Dry, especially: there's more of it than ever—" " The High and Dry'?" "The place with all the high things on it." "Oh," Kit said. "New York City. Manhattan, actually." "The water close to it is getting so foul, the fish can't breathe it for many thousands of lengths out. Those that can are mostly sick. And many more of the boats-that-eat-whales have been out here recently. The past few months, there's been a great slaughter—" Nita frowned at the thought of other creatures suffering what S'reee had been through. She had heard all the stories about the hungry people in Japan, but at the moment she found herself thinking that there had to be something else to eat. "Things have not been good," S'reee said. "I know less about the troubles on land, but the Sea tells us that the land wizards have been troubled of late, that there was some great strife of powers on the High and Dry. We saw the Moon go out one night—" "So did we," Kit said. There was fear in his eyes at the memory, and pride in his voice. "We were in Manhattan when it happened." "We were part of it," Nita said. She still didn't know all of how she felt about what had happened. But she would never forget reading from the book that kept the world as it should be, the Book of Night with Moon, while around her and Kit the buildings of Manhattan wavered like a dream about to break—and beyond a barrier of trees brought to life, and battling statues, the personification of all darkness and fear, the Lone Power, fought to get at toem and destroy them. S'reee looked at them somberly from one eye. "It's true then what Ae mhnuu used to tell me, that there are no accidents. You've met the Power that created death in the beginning and was cast out for it. All these things— toe lost Moon, that night, and the