That's assuming it is actually water we are talking about...
EDIT:
To somewhat hijack the thread:
Riven, whose water contained those heat-phobic microbes, was "scrapbooked" by Gehn. In this case it was ordinary water, just carried along by the lifeforms that lived in it - you still floated in it and Atrus, who entered from below, indeed nearly drowned. I must say that if some writer decided he could imagine up some similar bacteria, that would in some sort of symbiotic way split water molecules for us, while we negotiate the bottom of a lake, I wouldn't protest too vigorously. :7 That's not even accounting for other liquids, or maybe just dense air, with a lighter gas on top.
It's not that other writers COULDN'T do anything Katherine or Yeesha does, but that they WOULDN'T. They were following strict rules, many of which were no doubt drawn up for good reasons -- I am very curious about the concensus Yeesha and Calam reached in the end.
Guild of Writers
