It was cold but clear. The snow in the city park was coated with a blanket of fallen branches and swirls of hair-like green moss. The snow on the trees was slowly melting and falling in clumps, leaving pockmarks on the rolling surface of snow. Felix marched along a trail that the geomancers had cut through the park. Two enlisted men stood guard where the trees opened up into the encampment, one from the Air Force, and one from the Third Army. Shane's Light Elemental floated at his side, but Felix could not feel Shane's storm sorcery at all.

"General Felix!" one of the soldiers said. "Your Light Elemental looks different today!"

"I never asked her why she looks the way she does," Felix said. That was technically true.

"Enjoy the airshow, sir!" the soldier beamed.

Shane asks why there are soldiers from the Third here, the Light Elemental asked. Her voice was very slightly different from his own Light Elemental, but still high-pitched and delicate.

"The Third has really taken a liking to flying helicopters," Felix whispered. "This is a joint event designed to demonstrate collaboration between the Air Force and the Third."

Shane wants to know what a helicopter is.

"A rotor-wing aircraft, it specializes in vertical takeoff and landing. These things are horribly unsafe, in my opinion. I won't let my pilots near them."

Shane wants to see one of these helicopters. He is interested in knowing why you think they are unsafe.

"For one thing, you can't jump out and use storm sorcery," Felix said. "Most likely you would lose your head to the propeller disk. Also, if the pilot makes a mistake with the engine, the craft just sort of falls like a rock. It does not glide. Finally, and perhaps worst of all, it is very difficult to manage the collective and the throttle."

Shane wants to know about the collective and the throttle.

"It would be best to see it for yourself."

Felix navigated through the wooden shacks and makeshift hangars of the Air Force camp to where the Third Army was camped. Three helicopters sat in a small clearing between the flimsy tents, exposed to the weather. The ugly box-like aircraft were constructed from wood, with a central shaft made of metal and a long boom on the rear which ended in a wooden empennage. A few nearby soldiers in the drab olive uniform of the Third Army saw him, or perhaps Shane's Elemental. The lone officer approached suspiciously.

"General Felix, is something wrong?" the officer asked.

Felix shrugged. "Are you going to take off soon?"

The officer nodded. "In just a few minutes, we are going to demonstrate the helicopter with air support tactics."

"Do you mind if I fly as a passenger?" Felix asked. "I would like to see my soldiers fly from up there."

He pointed up at the sky.

"Without them knowing I'm watching."

"Absolutely," the officer replied. "I'll be happy to have you on board."

"Do you mind if I inspect the aircraft?"

"Help yourself."

Shane says he will not be inside the aircraft. He will use storm sorcery to stay nearby. He also says that he will destroy the propellers if something goes wrong, and take you and the other soldiers to safety.

Felix nodded silently.

He came upon the first craft, and walked over toward the left seat. Unlike an airplane, the helicopter had room for two pilots up front, though they were somewhat cramped. The seats were thin planks of wood padded with thin leather cushions. The whole cabin was open to the air, without any doors or insulation.

Shane thinks it's a piece of junk.

The soldiers of the Third lingered out of earshot.

"I tend to agree," Felix whispered. "The soldiers of the third mock the Air Force. They say we are the 'spoiled daughters' of the Lord Paladin. This is no doubt a reference to the fact that our Lieutenant General is a woman. However, the spoiled part is mostly true. The Third prides itself on austerity, and I want the Air Force to pride itself on quality airplanes."

Shane thinks the soldiers will freeze to death in those thin tents.

"If they did, I wouldn't know." He pointed to a lever on the left side of the left seat. "This lever here is called the collective. But the pilot can twist the knob at the end to control the throttle as well. The collective controls the pitch of all the blades at the same time. You pull up on the collective to increase the pitch, and push down to flatten the blades into a disk. However, at high pitch angles, the blades create more drag, meaning that it can slow the engine. The helicopter needs a constant propeller speed to function properly, so the pilot needs to open the throttle as they increase the collective."

Shane says that there are two controls with two states and therefore four possible states total.

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"That's exactly the problem," Felix said. "What happens if you pull up on the collective and the throttle is already too high? It takes a lot of practice to learn how to fly this thing."

Shane wants to know what the stick and rudder are used for.

"They don't call them the stick and rudder. They are called the cyclic and the anti-torque pedals. The cyclic is used to control the pitches of the individual blades on each point of the cycle. For example, if a blade has a high pitch as it cycles across the front of the craft, but a low pitch as it cycles across the rear of the craft, then..."

Shane says that the aircraft will pitch up.

"That's right."

Shane says that it must pitch and roll like an airplane.

"And the anti-torque pedals control the pitch of the vertical propeller on the empennage. It sort of acts like a rudder."

Shane wants to know about the planks on the tail. He says they look inefficient.

"I said the same thing." Felix walked along the metal boom to the empennage. The anti-torque propeller was housed in a wooden ring, and on either side of the tail fin there were wing-like struts ending in two planks of wood that were angled outward in the front. "At high speeds, the wind is forced between the planks like a funnel, which holds the tail steady, even if the anti-torque propeller fails."

Shane wants to know if the aircraft can stall like an airplane.

"The propeller always rotates in the same direction. Therefore, there is an advancing and a retreating blade at any given point in time. The advancing blade will generally have enough airspeed to create lift, but I personally fear that the retreating blade might not have enough airspeed. If that happens, then one entire side of the helicopter might stall and then the thing will flop out of the sky. It is my belief that this problem gets worse as the aircraft flies faster."

Shane says there must exist some threshold speed beyond which no helicopter can ever fly.

"That's exactly right," Felix said. "For example, if the helicopter was flying exactly as fast as the retreating propeller blade was spinning, then the retreating blade would have no airspeed at all."

"We are ready to head out."

Felix turned to see a somewhat familiar face. It was General Hans, the young General Officer of the Third Army. His drab olive uniform was mostly undecorated, and he carried a saber at his hip and a crossbow in his hands. "You'll be flying with me, Felix. Hop in the back."

Two officers arrived and took seats in the front. Felix sat in the back with Hans, along with a wind mage and two other soldiers from the Third. They strapped themselves in using thick cloth belts, and then waited on the ground for a long time. Shane's Light Elemental floated outside the range of the rotor blades, her long golden wings outstretched, and Felix assumed that Shane was using storm sorcery to float somewhere nearby. None of the soldiers in the Third questioned him about the Elemental.

Felix could easily feel the First Officer connect to the Realm of Wind and begin channeling a stream of air through the turbine. The rotor blades very slowly began to rotate. Once they were spinning, the First Officer connected to the Realm of Fire and the Realm of Lightning. The engine ignited with a hiss, but the wind mage in the rear cabin began to dampen the noise. Soon the rotor blades began to blend together into a vague blur.

A voice, amplified by wind magic, boomed in the distance: "The enemy is here! The Rilnese are attacking this airfield!"

The ground began to drop away.

The helicopter flew very low over the treetops. Even through the dampening wind magic, Felix could clearly hear the beating-whirring sound of the rotor blades. The other two helicopters flew on either side, trailing slightly. The helicopter began to yaw to the left, and the airshow came into view. The dirt airstrip was lined on one side with bleachers packed with spectators. Dozens of soldiers from the Third Army stood at the far end of the airfield, marching forward with spears. They were disguised with uniforms taken from the dead soldiers after the Battle of the Teeth, and their heads were covered with wigs made from actual Rilnese hair.

"From the east, three rotor-wing aircraft piloted by officers of the Third Army!" the voice continued. "The brave soldiers of the Third will protect this airfield from the southern savages! The pilots of the Air Force approach from the south, ready to provide air support!"

Above, the Crimson Eagles were flying in a tight formation. The propellers screamed as they descended, and then blasted the ground with draconic flame. It was an illusion of sorts. From the bleachers, it would appear that the airplanes scored direct hits against the "Rilnese" soldiers. Felix could see that the flames clearly missed their targets, but half of the soldiers flopped over on the ground in mock death.

The ground began to rise rapidly, and Felix felt some apprehension at the approach. Suddenly the descent stopped just before the skids hit the ground. General Hans and his soldiers leapt out onto the airstrip and began to march forward with their crossbows trained on the enemy. They mocked the recoil of the crossbows firing, and more enemies mocked being struck. Only the most discerning eyes in the crowd would be able to see that the crossbows were not loaded at all. The Third soldiers drew their sabers and advanced. After a carefully choreographed sword fight, all of the Rilnese soldiers were dead on the ground.

"The Rilnese are vanquished, and the airfield is safe! Thanks to the combined efforts of the Third Army and the Air Force!"

General Hans led his soldiers to the edge of the airstrip, where they all menacingly aimed their crossbows at the crowd.

"These fine soldiers embody the professionalism and excellence of the Third Army!"

This brought a cheer from the crowd. The soldiers marched in single file as they returned to the helicopter. The ground began to drop away even before the last soldier was on board, but the other soldiers reached out and hauled him up into the cabin.

When the helicopter returned to the Third Army camp, Felix made his excuses and left. Back in the Air Force camp, dozens of enlisted men were using ropes to drag a large aircraft out of one of the hangars. High-wing, strut-braced, with two engines mounted on pylons on the wings. Felix had designed the craft to look similar to the metal machine he once flew beside Ingrid.

Shane wants to know what it is.

"It can transport cargo," Felix said. "Also it is designed to be comfortable, so that the Lord Paladin can fly as a passenger. Finally, it is used to tow gliders into the sky."

Shane wants to know what a glider is.

Felix pointed to a small wooden aircraft that was being dragged out of a tent. It had no engine. The wings were very thin and very long, and the empennage was shaped like a T, with the horizontal stabilizer raised up above the rudder.

"We have reached the limit. The Elemental in the Realm of Fire is no longer accepting new apprentices. We have about five hundred pilots that can use sorcery, including helicopter pilots and the pilots in the air mail service. So we decided to create these gliders to make it easier to train new pilots even if they can't use sorcery yet. If we got really desperate, we could send the gliders deep into Riln to attack supply lines."

Shane says that he will reinforce the supply lines to guard against this type of attack.

"I don't really think it matters," Felix said. "The helicopters don't matter. The Third doesn't matter. And these gliders don't really matter. Only the airplanes matter. If the airplanes are lost, nothing is going to save the people on the ground."