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  The o’rant scowled. “The porridge has lumps in it.”

  “My porridge is fine.”

  Kale lifted her eyes to look at the food before the men. The merchant had no bowl of porridge before him, but the architect seemed oblivious. He turned the subject to the different types of food he’d experienced in his travels.

  Kale looked at Bardon, who cocked an eyebrow.

  “What does Tieto say?” he asked.

  Kale listened to the minor dragon. “The o’rant’s aura is fine. The tumanhofer’s contains several dents and a hole.” She looked her husband in the eye. “What’s going on, Bardon?”

  “A group of people who call themselves Followers are slipping in dangerous ideas while they pretend to be espousing Paladin’s teaching.”

  “It shouldn’t be Paladin’s teaching at all. It should always be Wulder’s.”

  “Exactly.” Bardon shifted his chair in order to stand. “I wish to talk to Sir Dar about this and see if I can persuade him to come with us on the quest.”

  Kale squeezed his arm. “That would be wonderful. I’d go with you to convince him, but I have a meeting with Wizard Namee and the others.”

  “Having him on the quest would make you happy, wouldn’t it?”

  She nodded.

  “Then I’ll be very persuasive when I talk to Sir Dar.”

  Laughing, Kale stood. “And I’ll go see about this mysterious new weave of a gateway.”

  Bardon winked at her. “Oh, you are going to like this new contrivance derived from two brilliant wizard minds.”

  11

  THE NEW GATEWAY

  As soon as Kale entered the chamber where the wizards gathered, she heard talk of capturing sound. That didn’t surprise her because Namee was a talented sound wizard. And according to Bardon, Regidor collaborated. Kale had long ago decided that Regidor had no distinctive trait to his wizardry, but his talent encompassed them all. She had no doubt he had developed skills that would put her light wizard ability in the shade.

  She looked around the room, hoping this protégé of hers was present. It would be like him to make an unannounced appearance. The room held only four wizards—Cam, herself, and two others she knew slightly.

  “Of what use will it be?” asked Sora, a plains wizard. She stood with her back to Kale, deeply involved in her debate with another wizard. “If he’s captured sound, then does he let it go later?”

  “Now, Sora,” said Vog. “Namee is, above anything else, a sensible wizard. I’m sure there is some practical value to this new gateway.”

  Sora huffed. “Yes, but that fellow Regidor was involved in these shenanigans, and I’ve never trusted the meech wizard. Why isn’t he off with his own kind?”

  Vog looked over Sora’s shoulder and nodded. “Welcome, Kale Allerion.”

  Sora jerked and turned abruptly. A quick smile took the place of a confused expression. “Oh, call me an ill-mannered wretch. I’m afraid my foot is in my mouth. I’m sorry, my dear. I don’t know your meech friend. I’m just a prejudiced old fool.”

  “She is, at that,” said Vog. “She’s always rattling on about how things don’t suit her. It’s all those years with the wind whistling about her ears.”

  Sora gave Vog a disgusted look, but before she could toss back an answer, Namee entered the room.

  “Good, we’re all here. Take a seat, take a seat.” He stood at the side of the room where an empty fireplace provided a backdrop. “Make sure you can see. Get comfortable. This will take a couple of hours.”

  Kale heard Sora mutter but didn’t catch the words. She grinned as she deduced the wizard didn’t care to be detained long enough to observe sound being captured.

  “First, we’ll have a demonstration with a gateway that has already been constructed.”

  The wizards glanced around the room.

  Kale saw nothing unusual. She concentrated harder. Gateways usually could be detected without too much trouble, especially ones freshly made or frequently used. She found nothing. Observing the other wizards’ expressions, she realized they were equally puzzled.

  Namee chuckled. “I’m carrying it.”

  Kale leaned forward, her interest caught.

  The sound wizard reached into his robe and pulled a round object from a hollow. The sphere had one flat side and was no bigger than his hand. He set it on the table.

  “This isn’t the gateway but a receptacle for containing the portal while traveling. The small portal is fragile.” He touched the top of the sphere and two sides fell away. With thumb and forefinger he pulled out a shimmering cord circlet. The item stretched and opened to a circle two feet in diameter. “This is the gateway.”

  “It’s too small to go through unless you’re a kimen,” observed Sora.

  “You can’t go through this gateway.”

  “Then what use is it?” asked Vog.

  “You deposit something in it. That something travels to another gateway made like this one.”

  Sora sat forward. “Could you send a letter through? That would be useful.”

  Vog nodded. “A tool or an ingredient you want to share with someone.”

  “No, no, no.” Namee looked pleased. “You’ve heard the rumors, haven’t you? It’s sound. Mostly. An image too if you construct the thing just right.”

  “But—” Sora stopped short in response to Namee’s upheld hand.

  “I’ll show you.”

  Kale watched as Namee carefully maneuvered the strands of the gateway. At first she thought he was adding to the weave, but then she saw he was opening the portal. The air rippled within the circle. Rainbow colors shimmered across the surface from the center to the outside, then disappeared. Kale gasped as a face became clear. Regidor!

  He blinked and smiled. “Hello, you probably think I am talking to you, but I am not actually speaking at this time. I inscribed this message before I departed from Namee’s castle. My voice and image have been stored in the gateway. Namee and I will try another experiment soon, and you shall be the witnesses. Hopefully it will work, and Namee and I won’t look like nincompoops.”

  The image disappeared. The center returned to an undisturbed calm. Kale could see right through to the blackened bricks in the fireplace wall.

  “In answer to your first question,” said Namee before anyone could speak, “yes, I can make that same image appear over and over should I want to.”

  He clapped his hands together and rubbed vigorously. The sound amplified with his enthusiasm.

  Sora’s face twisted at the harsh, grating noise. “Tone it down, Namee. You’re going to have us all running from the room with our hands over our ears.”

  Namee ceased sliding one palm against the other. “Oh, sorry. Now look at this.” He moved one strand making up the gateway and then another.

  The center shifted and rippled. Kale no longer saw through to the other side. In a moment Regidor appeared again, wearing his black cape and the round-brimmed black hat he favored.

  “If you are seeing this, the second part of our experimentation has been successful. Again, I am not really speaking to you. Instead, I have stored this message in the gateway, leaving it for Namee to unravel. At the time of this deposit into the portal, Gilda and I were in a small hostel in the city of Kory. I spoke to my gateway this morning and have since left on my journey. I can leave a message at any time in the gateway, directing it to another portal. It will remain until that gateway is opened.”

  Regidor shifted position to reveal the view behind him. Gilda pulled away a curtain over a floor-to-ceiling window, unveiling a large lake dotted with sailboats.

  Regidor addressed the portal once more. “Kale, tell Bardon to hurry. Gilda and I are traveling north on the east side of the Morchain Mountains. This incredible weave has allowed you to know of my intentions, even though we are too far away to communicate. Namee will now show you a message left at another gateway. I hope you are enjoying our little device. Namee and I had a great deal of pleasure in putting th
eory into practice. Wizardry, what a superb occupation!”

  Regidor flashed his toothy grin, and the image disappeared.

  “Yes, yes, quite!” Namee rubbed his hands together again, remembering to keep the volume at a reasonable level. He fingered the weave of the gateway, and this time Kale understood a little bit more of what he was doing. He didn’t open the portal clear to the other side but merely inched the interior wall backward, creating a shallow space in front. With her eyes trained on Namee’s fingers as they worked at the edge of the weave, she missed the appearance of her mother and father in the portal’s center.

  “Morning, Kale.” Her father’s voice made her jump.

  Framed by the circling weave, her mother and father peered out. Kale recognized her own sitting room in the background.

  “Hello, Namee.” Her father looked around as if he could peer right into the room. “Cam, Sora, and Vog. No, I can’t see you. Namee told us who would be invited to this unveiling of the new gateway. Handy, wouldn’t you say? Kale, this is how I can keep tabs on both my castle and yours. Hurry and construct your own portals, friends. We can communicate daily—hourly—if we want to.”

  The depiction faded.

  Sora stood up. “Me first! I must have one of these.”

  Vog chortled. “You want to capture sound, Sora?”

  “Sound, images, details, history, and even gossip.” She put her hands on her hips and glared at Vog, who had bent over laughing. “Gossip can be very useful.”

  Lake Wizard Cam looked down at a puddle around his feet. “Oh, bother! I’ve sat too long.” He stood up and shook droplets from his sodden slippers. “Only if you’re discerning,” he said, glancing up at the plains wizard. “Otherwise, gossip can be a trap.” He raised his hand as Sora sputtered an objection. “And we all know our Sora is discerning.”

  Namee called them to gather around a table he had set up at the back of the room. The first steps of drawing dimensional threads from the air mimicked the beginning of building a conventional gateway. But Kale soon had to give all her attention to the intricacies of weaving a portal so much smaller than those she easily made. These new gateways also required the detail of layering from front to back.

  Several hours later, she left a message for her parents in her own version of the gateway. Then Namee showed her how to fold it, and he gave her a cylinder in which to keep her new toy.

  Wizard Cam lifted his sphere in the air and examined it. “We should give these gadgets a name. It’s awkward saying, ‘The new gateway invented by Namee and Regidor.’”

  Sora held hers up. “The Nagidor? The Regimee? The Meedor?”

  “I like the Meedor,” said Vog.

  “Humph,” said Cam. “That’s a rather silly name. I was thinking more on the lines of the message portal.”

  “How dull,” said Sora.

  “Descriptive,” said Cam.

  “We could shorten it to MP,” suggested Vog.

  “MP?” Sora scowled. “Mounted Patrol. Male Parrots. Magnificent Pottery. More Potatoes. I don’t like MP at all. MP could be almost anything. Massive Pimples.”

  Namee took a step toward the plains wizard. “You’ve proved your point, Sora.”

  “Monkey Poop.”

  “Sora!”

  She squinted her eyes and glared at Namee. “Mean People.”

  Namee sneered. “Missing Propriety.”

  “Silence,” bellowed Cam. Water sprayed from his arms and shoulders, dousing the disputing wizards.

  He glared at Sora as she opened her mouth. She pressed her lips together in a firm line.

  “We shall call it, if Regidor and Namee concur, the talking gateway.” He moved his pointing finger around the room as he scanned the faces of the other wizards. “Are there any objections?”

  The four other wizards shook their heads.

  Cam lowered his arm. “Fine. Let us take these talking gateways out into Amara and share them with our fellow wizards. I foresee they shall be a great convenience.”

  12

  BUZZ

  The clamor of nine minor dragons in full alarm woke Kale with a start. She threw aside her blankets and jumped to her feet, grabbing her sword. The empty campground didn’t give her a clue. When they left Namee’s castle, Toopka had gone with Sir Dar to find Sittiponder. They’d meet up again farther along on the quest. Bardon was nowhere in sight, but he’d stirred up the fire in preparation for cooking. She glanced at the stream and surmised he’d gone fishing.

  Greer and Celisse still grazed in the meadow some distance away. As she watched, they lifted their heads and stared off toward the mountains.

  Kale tried to decipher the urgent calls from her dragons, but the noise would not separate into distinct words or images. The best she could envision from their thoughts was a swarm of big bees. She lowered her weapon. Her sword would be of little use swatting insects.

  The minor dragons fell silent. Kale heard the drone of the approaching horde and gave the command, “Fly.”

  She dove under the blanket and made sure none of her skin was exposed. At first her covering muffled the sound of the swarm, but then she heard the buzz distinctly. The slam of what felt like a rock against her leg surprised her completely. Kale jerked but remembered in time to keep herself swathed in the blanket. She was pelted again and again. Some of the hits stung and some burned. She rolled away from the campsite, hoping to reach the stream.

  Kale tuned in to the commotion outside her cloth shell and recognized that her dragons had engaged this enemy in battle. She heard Bardon’s battle cry and knew he had joined them. The smell of smoke alerted her to another danger. She realized the strikes that felt like burns were exactly that. Bits of fire dotted the blanket. She quit rolling and struggled to free herself from the tangled cocoon.

  A sudden calm enveloped her as her mind connected to her fighting husband. He swung his sword with practiced ease and batted small flying creatures from the air. She knew he had fought these black dragon-things before, and recently.

  Dragon? These things are dragons? How—? Where—? Putting aside the questions that bombarded her, she tore away the last of the shroud and rose to her feet, expecting to fight beside her husband. The black dragons abandoned their squabbles with the other dragons and Bardon, changed focus in unison, and dive-bombed the Dragon Keeper.

  Kale shrieked as a dozen flying missiles battered her arms, back, and legs. A score more of the creatures flew by, hurling tiny jets of flame at her hair. She held her arms straight in front of her, crossed them at the wrists, and lowered her hands so that her outstretched fingers pointed down to the earth. Quickly, she built an energy charge.

  Protect your eyes! she warned, then flung her arms in a circle above her head.

  Heeding the warning, Bardon and her fighting dragons turned their heads as soon as they saw what she was going to do. A blast of light issued from her body.

  The black dragons had no forewarning. The explosion bounced the closest ones backward. They fell to the ground, lifeless. Others were tossed away, stunned. The remaining veered off and circled above.

  Kale brought her arms down in front of her and again gathered energy. Some of the dazed dragons recovered quickly enough to join another onslaught. The black beasts gathered in the air, then plummeted downward. Kale’s minor dragons flew above the cloud of attackers and spit. Their caustic saliva knocked several dozen out of their formation, and Crispin’s spit fried the wings of others, causing them to drop out. But the majority of the black dragons continued their assault as if nothing had happened to their comrades.

  Out of the corner of her eye, Kale saw Bardon pick up the blanket and race toward the center of the fight. She let off her blast of light right before he tackled her. She fell to the ground enveloped once again by a thick, scorched layer of cloth. Inexplicably, her husband slapped her head through the protection.

  “What are you doing?” she screamed.

  “Your hair is on fire.”

  The muffle
d reply startled her. She felt hot. What little air she could pull into her lungs stank. But burning?

  “Let me out!” She thrashed against the shroud once more.

  Bardon released his wife, then gently lifted her to her feet and took her to the stream. “Bend over.”

  She knelt beside the water, and he cupped his hand to splash the spots that still smoldered.

  “Where are they?” she asked.

  Bardon paused to look around. “Gone.”

  “What were they?”

  “Tiny black fire dragons.”

  Kale sat back on her heels. Water streamed down her shoulders from her wet hair. She glared at what was their campsite, but now looked like a battleground.

  The minor dragons lined up on a fallen log, all silently watching her. They didn’t look any worse for the battle. Greer and Celisse stood nearby with char marks on their scales. She hadn’t seen them join the fight. Her husband had red welts on his face and neck. He held one hand with the other as if to protect an injury. She felt the first prickles of pain on her scalp and her arms and legs. She’d been burned repeatedly.

  “I’m a Dragon Keeper,” she said. “There are horrid black dragons I know nothing about, and they attacked me. They left fighting all of you and attacked me.” Her voice broke, and she shuddered. “What’s going on? And why do you know about these beasts? Why haven’t I been informed?”

  Celisse stretched her long neck across the campsite and picked up the moonbeam cape from where Kale had used it as a pillow. She laid it in front of Kale. Gymn and Metta dove into the hollows and pulled out small brown jars of ointment.

  Kale sniffed. “Let me see your hand.”

  “The stings on my face hurt more than my hand.”

  “I can see the welts. I want to see the hand.” She took hold of his wrist and pulled. “Oh, Bardon, you got burned helping me.”

  He moved to sit closer to her as she relaxed into a more comfortable position. “It’s nothing.” His eyes examined her scalp. “Like I said, the stings are worse.”

  She grabbed a jar, read the label, and picked up another. After looking at several, she found the one she wanted. “Here, this will help.”