Darolio 10, 1277. Never ask a question unless you’re ready for the answer…

    “You knew, didn’t you?”

    We had stopped outside the Tirak ruins deep in the plains, just like I asked. The moment I stepped off the Sheldrake’s ramp, five sentries from the Bluescale kobold tribe, covered in dust and brown cloaks, popped right up out of the ground. Three of them ran over to give me a gleeful group hug. It was nice to be remembered.

    A short ride down a hidden wooden lift brought me to Bluescale town below ground, inside the ruins. Sun orbs hung on the walls lit the way along sandstone hallways to where I wanted to go. It wasn’t long before I stood in the same room not so long ago, where a friend saved me from a magical poison.

    Quietly, I fumed at that friend from across the low, rough-hewn worktable. Odro sat on a blue floor cushion, calmly grinding something in a gray-white stone bowl. I didn’t know what it was, other than green.

    I dropped the baron’s crystal shard on the table. It clattered against the polished ancient wood, then lay still. Light from nearby sun orbs glittered merrily over its facets. A happy lie if I ever saw one.

    “Really. You knew, didn’t you?” I asked again.

    Odro gave the crystal a dark, sideways look before he glanced at me. The amused twinkle in his eye, and a grin that tugged at his kobold snout, told me everything I needed to know.

    “Damn it, you knew!” I threw up my hands in exasperation while I snarled at the ceiling.

    “No, not really,” Odro replied with a dry chuckle. “But I had a good guess based on everything you’d told me, and what magic had been used on you.”

    “Odro! You could have warned me!”

    All I got for that was another dry chuckle.

    “Over a vague guess?” Odro shook his head. “Certainly not! Tela, you weren’t in any shape to believe me. I’m a healer, among other things. It was much more important to make sure you didn’t die. After that, it was more important to make sure you knew how to say alive, given what you were facing.”

    He swirled the green powder around in the bowl, then picked up an empty jar. Carefully, he poured the powder from bowl to jar while he gave me a wry look.

    “So, why would I warn you about some faint guess that I desperately hoped was wrong? You had enough to worry about, Tela. I wasn’t about to pile on more.”

    I rubbed my face before I let out a wordless, frustrated snarl. Then I paced twice beside the worktable, as if that might cool me down. It didn’t. I flopped onto a nearby saffron-colored floor cushion next to Odro.

    “You still should have said something.” I drew a long, deep breath. “But, I understand. All right, for the sake of argument, what was this guess you hoped was wrong?”

    Odro paused in his pouring, then set the bowl down beside the jar before he folded his hands in his lap.

    “That a group called the Gatekeeper Society might have been involved and was after the Automatic Crystal of the Eclipse.”

    A quartet of small kobold children ran into the workshop and surrounded me in a disorganized mob of bouncing giggles. They proudly presented me with a bracelet of small, round blue and white stone beads on a cord with a single, tiny ivory figure of a kobold.

    “Win’āut,” I said in my best Belari-scal to thank them. The mob of giggles ran out of the room.

    I squinted at Odro while I put the bracelet on. “The who?”

    “The Gatekeeper Society,” he repeated.

    I grimaced.

    “Ew. Really? They actually picked that name on their own?”

    Odro nodded with a deep laugh before he returned to pouring powder into the jar.

    “Yes, they did. Really, I’m not surprised even a Windtracer doesn’t know about them. I doubt even the Archivists Guild does, either. Gatekeepers try hard to work from the shadows, and not draw attention to themselves.”

    He paused, frowned, then returned to his pouring.

    “What little I know is that the Gatekeeper Society was formed over a thousand years ago, not long before the Great Collapse. They thought the Ancient Order had lost its way. Gone astray from its ‘true values’, and they were sure they could ‘fix’ it. Remake it into how they thought it should work, using magic, of course, to force people if necessary.”

    “Of course,” I said dryly.

    Odro arched an eyebrow ridge at me.

    “But their plans never worked. The Ancient Order’s society never changed. It didn’t matter who they twisted with magic, or what part of society they warped. Eventually, the Keepers thought they needed more magic to bend the Order to their will. To make society see things their way, no matter who wanted what.”

    Ki’s words from the other day came back to me.

    “Just spin out enough magic threads,” I said softly, rubbing my eyes. “Weave just a few more. Then a little more after that. It never stops, because it’s never enough.”

    Odro gave me a wizened grin. “Ah, exactly. I knew you’d understand.”

    I pursed my lips while I tried to wrap my head around it all. This implied a lot, and I didn’t like any of it. Busy sounds of life and conversation reached me from the rest of the kobold town. The calm, normal sounds made my thoughts wander, turning around in my mind what Odro had said. I chewed on my lower lip a little while I stared at nothing.

    “Baron Marius was one of them, wasn’t he? He talked a lot about ‘restoring the Order’ and ‘remaking history’.”

    The kobold healer poured the last of his green powder into the jar, then brushed his scaled hands clean.

    “Oh, yes. From what you’ve told me, I believe he is,” Odro gestured to the goggles around my neck, then to then my eyes. “All of what he tried to do to you? As I understand it, that’s typical for Keepers. Bring change, even if by force, even if you need to kill.”

    I toyed with the beads of my new bracelet while my frown deepened.

    “Marius was a lich. So they’re all a kind of lich then?” I couldn’t quite keep a low growl out of my voice. Pent up anger is a rough bag to carry.

    Odro folded his hands in his lap again, then shrugged. “Who can say? But given what little I’ve read, I think they are. Especially after you dropped that on my worktable.” He gestured to the stone. “It’s the baron’s, isn’t it?”

    I gave that stone my own sideways glance.

    “He sent any spell he wove right through it to make it more potent.”

    Odro quietly stared at the stone for a few seconds. Then he coughed and slowly shook his head.

    “Of course he did. Tela, did you look into it? I mean really look deep into it? Use your gift? Your sight?”

    I squirmed a little on the floor cushion.

    “How did you…” I stammered.

    The healer waved a hand at me. “Did you?”

    “Sort of,” I replied warily. “There’s something in it. A dark and cloudy thing that acted like it was trapped.”

    “Yes,” Odro pointed a finger at me. “You saw Baron Marius. The real Baron Marius. His true self that suffers all the pain and death for him so he lives forever. A magical portrait frozen in a crystal. It’s very possible he was weaving spells and using his own life force to make them more powerful. A type of twisted necromancy. Since his curse doesn’t let him die, it’s a never-ending supply of power that the curse replenishes, so long as he abuses himself.”

    The air turned thick with anxiety until I thought I would drown. I remembered the magic storms and its wild magic tearing into the baron before he vanished.

    “He’s not gone.” My voice was a hoarse whisper. “That’s why you keep talking like he’s still around.”

    “I’m sorry, Tela,” Odro looked at me sadly. “No, he’s not. Not even after all that you did and went through. Marius isn’t destroyed. He’ll be back, and he’ll want that stone. Then he’ll come for you.”

    I let out a frustrated snarl while I slapped the worktable hard enough it jumped.

    “Aile Shavat! Fine. Hammer!”

    I jumped to my feet and looked around. There was a set of metal hammers on a small table next to the door. I stormed over, then snatched up the largest one with a bloody snarl.

    “I’ll smash the damn thing. Crystal goes smash, baron does dead for real. Easy!”

    Odro darted up from his cushion, then into my path before I could try my idea.

    “Tela, no. Please don’t break my workshop,” he asked with his hands out. “It takes more than a hammer or even a spell to shatter that kind of crystal. Also, don’t think you can just toss it into a magic storm, or whatever volcano you stumble across. It’s not that easy.”

    I rolled my eyes, then threw the hammer onto the worktable.

    “Hells and high water,” I snapped. “All right, how do you break it?”

    Odro dropped his hands, then quickly walked across the room to a small, weathered bookcase tucked away in a corner. I remembered seeing it the last time I was there. The wooden shelves were heavy with old books and scrolls, and had a small vine engraving along its edge. After a bit of rummaging, Odro pulled out a stained blue canvas journal.

    “Ah ha, this one!” he exclaimed while he walked back over and handed it to me.

    The weathered book had seen better days. But inside, its pages were filled with description and diagrams about a wildly complex device. A small, table-sized thing with a tiny barrel and small, sharp knives attached to long arms. Odro tapped that page with a claw.

    “The Ancient Order had a way to carve and even melt down crystals, usually to mix them in with other things. This device is what you need.”

    I nodded while I looked over the design. The diagram came to life in my mind, turning and whittling down magic crystals as quick as you please. The remains would sift out into the small barrel.

    “I’ll find it, then toss the baron’s crystal in.”

    Odro sat back down on his cushion, then scowled at me.

    “Just be careful. Carrying a corrupted crystal can slowly corrupt the holder.” He shook a finger at me. “Don’t ever use it, and make sure no one else does.”

    Mikasi’s complaint that the crystal bothered him suddenly made all too much sense. I grimaced like I ate a lemon.

    “So, there’s no way to protect yourself from it?”

    “I only know of one way. Mind magic.” Odro shrugged. “The only magic that the Gatekeepers supposedly never understood. I’m sure some of them learned to protect themselves against it, but to spin the threads and weave it? Not that I ever read.”

    All the baron’s twisted plans ran back through my mind in lurid detail. I slid a thumb slowly over the aged pages of the stained journal.

    “That really was why the baron wanted the Automatic Crystal. To get at mind magic and it use on people,” I said slowly. “I was right.”

    Odro let out another dry chuckle. “It’s also why he wanted you, and you know it. Even if you’re too stubborn to admit it, even now.”

    I blinked at that. “Sure, I can spin puzzle pieces of history around in my head, then figure out how they go together. That’s why he tried to twist me inside out with that spell.”

    “No,” Odro said as he held up a finger at me. “Though I’m sure that encouraged him. The baron recognized someone with natural talent in mind magic when he saw it. Just like I did. Through you, he could have gotten control over the Automatic Crystal. Connected you to it like some single twisted, dark device serving him. Used your natural talent to control the Crystal, and then others.”

    I snapped the canvas journal closed.

    “Don’t even go there,” I warned him. “The high tides will freeze over before I cast anything more than a fishing line from now on. Anything.” I growled.

    The healer shook his head. “Tela, it’s your choice, not mine. You do need to train, to practice. Yes, I can help you since I’m one of the last few who knows how. The more trained you are, the better off you’ll be against the Gatekeepers. But if you don’t want to,” Ordo sighed, “then you don’t have to. If you ever change your mind, you know where I am.”

    Frustrated, I ran a hand over my braids, then glared at the floor. The complex gently swayed on its suspension ropes, like a houseboat in water. Life wasn’t easy, and I never expected it to be. But damn, it would be nice if life played fair, just once.

    “This is a lot to take in, Odro,” I muttered. “Let me think this through.”

    “Of course,” he warmly replied. The old kobold healer reached out, gently clasping my arm with a smile. “Take all the time you need. The Gatekeepers now know about you, but as I’m sure you’ve noticed, they’re terrible at finding things… or people.”

    I shot a stubborn look at Odro, then blew out a long breath.

    When I returned to the Sheldrake, my thoughts were churning like a whirlpool. Odro had given me a lot to think about. I paced the common room but got nowhere, so I tossed my shoulder bag to the floor, then sat on the wooden bench by my favorite window to think.

    “What do I do?” I mumbled to the prairie outside.

    The prairie didn’t seem to care much, since it didn’t bother to reply. In fact, the prairie was silent on the whole matter. So, I fell back on what I was used to.

    I pulled out my weathered journal and pencil from my shoulder bag, opened to a blank page, and wrote.

    "Summer, 1277, deep in the rain forest of the Chivit Continent

    It wasn’t my best day…”