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power and pain on the sole of the foot, and a jordain knew them well. Even without the weapon, the precisely placed attack sent icy lightning coursing up Matteo’s leg. He gritted his teeth to hold back a howl of pain.
    “That works,” he conceded in a gritty whisper.
    Andris rose to his feet and extended a hand. Matteo grasped his friend’s wrist and hauled himself up. His leg was numb nearly to the waist, and he hobbled around in small, pained circles as he awaited the return of blood to the offended member.
    “Reminds me of the time I failed to dodge the aura of Vishna’s cone of ice,” Matteo said ruefully. He looked at his friend with great admiration. “You have improved the attack.”
    The tall jordain shrugged. “This tactic would not work for everyone. Speed is needed, and it does not hurt that I am built more like a snake than a bull. A man with more muscle couldn’t halt his momentum quickly enough.”
    “Not without ripping off the wizard’s leg at the hip,” Matteo said dryly. He snapped his fingers and grinned. “There’s an interesting variation. Why couldn’t Themo execute your attack, then use the wizard’s stone leg as a bludgeon?”
    They both smirked at the image this painted of their classmate. Themo was taller even than Andris, and as thick-bodied and strong as the huge, hairy Northmen who occasionally came to the port cities for trade or adventure. At heart, Themo was less a scholar than a warrior, and he’d gotten in trouble more than once for sneaking away to the taverns to provoke battles.
    “He could have used just such a weapon at the Falling Star,” Andris agreed, his eyes twinkling at the memory.
    But Matteo turned sober. “Indeed. Had you not been there to devise a battle tactic, the fool might have died that night, and his friends with him.”
    The jordain gave another diffident shrug. “I cannot match you in feats of memory or debate,” he said frankly. “Strategy is the thing that interests me.”
    “Obsesses you,” his friend corrected him heartily. “Have you made much headway with the Kilmaruu Paradox?”
    It was meant as a rhetorical question. Matteo chose his words to express Andris’s fascination with even the most difficult and obscure military puzzles. He was therefore surprised and intrigued by the light that leaped into his friend’s hazel eyes.
    A studiously casual expression settled over Andris’s face. “It is a classic dilemma,” he said. “The Halruaan navy has been occupied with it for many years. Not only does this question absorb the best minds stationed at the naval base at Zalasuu, but also the two thousand troops who hold the fort beyond.”
    “Not to mention the dozen or so adventurers and wizards who disappear into the swamp each year,” Matteo added. “As the proverb goes, the Swamp of Kilmaruu keeps the numbers of fools in Zalasuu low.”
    “Ah, but therein lies the paradox,” his friend said slyly. “It is written that the mages and adventures who disappear into the swamp only seem to whet the appetite of the undead who haunt it, drawing them out into the surrounding countryside. Massive attacks into the swamp have proven disastrous to the city and its outlying villages. Yet if the military does nothing, the undead will slip into the Bay of Azuth and bedevil the ships. Disaster lies at the end of either course, action or restraint.”
    Matteo nodded. History, particularly military history, had been part of their studies for years. But at the moment, he was more interested in the subtle implication in his friend’s words than in this old puzzle.
    “The paradox has always been understood as the futility of either action or restraint. Your words imply a different interpretation.”
    The tall jordain clasped his hands behind his back, absently watching a winged lizard crawl across the sky as he chose his next words. “Suppose that someone devised a formula for attack. Suppose he researched it extensively, worked out the strategy