For himself, he would enjoy getting rid of Stryker and then come back for Aaron.

  Sawdi couldn’t admit to himself that it was possible that coming back for Aaron was not what the ring wanted. But he hoped that once he put the two items together, things would be better.

  Perhaps wearing the pendant and the ring would give him all the power he had ever wanted. He could rule from his cabin without anyone knowing it was him.

  He could manipulate the hearts and minds of the people across all of Thamon, without leaving home. The silent ruler. That’s what he wanted. He hoped that was what the ring, and perhaps the pendant, had in mind for him.

  “No,” Sawdi said, finally answering Aaron’s question, “I don’t want you to do anything. At all. I’ll be back, and we’ll talk then.”

  Aaron stood as Sawdi walked out of the room. He didn’t look back. If he had, he would have seen Aaron collapse back down into his throne. The Warrior Monk in the corner shivered, and Aaron knew that if that thing could feel, it shivered with happiness.

  Aaron shivered too. But not from happiness. His ruse with Sawdi hadn’t worked.

  Baywolf walked into the throne room and saw Aaron slumped with worry. He knew that Aaron would feel more than worry if he knew who had arrived on Thamon.

  Aaron looked up as Baywolf bowed and said, “My lord, what would you have me do?”

  For the first time since he was at school with Sawdi and Stryker, Aaron didn’t know what to say. At the moment, he had no idea what he needed Baywolf to do, so he said nothing.

  Baywolf sat down in the chair that Sawdi had just vacated. Both of them were waiting to decide what to do next. Both of them unaware of the other’s plans.

  Forty-One

  Stryker returned to his room after speaking to the Preacher at the Temple, if you could call that dinky building a Temple.

  Stryker had thought he had recognized the man, but as he talked with him, Stryker realized that he didn’t. The Preacher must remind me of someone else, he thought.

  He was glad he didn’t know him. That he hadn’t been the one to teach him, because he didn’t think he had been trained very well. For one thing, although he was subservient enough, there was something about him that put Stryker’s teeth on edge.

  When he had complained about the smallness of the Temple, the Preacher had smiled and said there weren’t many people in Yeal Thalor. But all of them were of one mind.

  One mind? What did he mean by that, Stryker asked himself. Must mean everyone had been converted to Aaron-Lem because he had seen the people bow to Aaron at the sound of the bell. Yes, Stryker mused, I think I will keep that practice alive once I am ruler.

  Still, Stryker couldn’t let go of his dislike for that Preacher and decided that once everything was in place, he would come back and eliminate him.

  Stryker’s mind was still on the Preacher when he glanced over at the table where he had left the open map and noticed that there was something on it.

  Zonk, how did I miss that? How long had it been there? Stryker thought. He had lost time.

  But then Stryker calmed himself down. He was the only one with a map. No one knew where he was. No one could stop him. It was only his excitement about getting closer to having the whole pendant that was making him anxious.

  He had time. It was night. He could rest and start in the morning. Besides, he needed supplies. And he required guides. He had no idea what Turva was like having never been before. And if he was reading the map correctly, it was telling him to go up the mountain.

  He had seen the mountain. It was massive. It loomed over the town. It looked close, but Stryker knew that it was probably much further away than it looked. And there must be a path that the locals would know about that would save him time.

  Yes, he needed a guide or two. He’d go into town and ask for referrals. It didn’t matter if they saw him find the pendant. They wouldn’t have any idea what it was about or what would happen when he found it. Besides, he would be all-powerful by then. He could do whatever he wanted with anyone.

  The next morning Stryker woke feeling almost as excited as he did that day when he was seven and followed the arrows that led him to the map. Stryker gathered the few belongings that he had and headed out into that stupid little town. He had seen men gathering in the tiny cafe. He’d go there.

  For once, Stryker was pleased that no one knew who he was. They didn’t know he had been the orchestrator of all the violence that happened on Thamon to convert everyone to Aaron-Lem. If they did, he might be in trouble. He had no backup.

  The Preacher said he was without a Kai-Via since this was such a small town. And Stryker’s only real skill was in manipulating how people thought so that they did his bidding.

  But that was all Stryker needed right now. It would get him guides, and then it wouldn’t be long before he had what he had come to Turva for.

  After that, no one would be able to stop him.

  *******

  The Preacher watched Stryker leave the boarding house and head to the cafe. Ian knew that Stryker wasn’t so stupid as to start out without supplies and a guide.

  Last night’s reunion with his family was still filling Ian with happiness. But their job on Turva had just begun, and he couldn’t let his joy at seeing his family after all these years take away his focus.

  If they succeeded in this, they would have the rest of their lifetimes to celebrate. If they didn’t, there would be no other lifetimes. That was what the prophecies had said, and he believed them.

  He and his brothers had believed them when he sent the rest of their families away to the Sanctuary, and then let the rest of the world think that they had all died. Except for Udore. He wanted to be captured and taken to the center of Aaron-Lem. Udore’s job was to gather the resistance in Edes and wait for the arrival of two women from another planet.

  Now that Ian had met Meg and Suzanne, he knew the time was coming when the world would either explode or heal. How either one of those two scenarios happened, Ian didn’t know.

  He supposed that would have been too easy if they had all the information. All they would have had to do was follow the prophecies. But what fun would the two bored brothers have had with that?

  Yes, he and Suzanne discussed the bored brothers, and he knew the story that she had told him was true. The brothers were the source of writings and the pendant and the ring. No, they weren’t gods. Far from it. But they were from an advanced civilization, so they had the tools to do what they had done, delighting in their experiments and checking the results.

  Suzanne had told Ian about what had happened on Erda. The brothers had been taken away, or gone away, after that. They would not be back to help or hinder in this situation.

  Ian doubted that they had ever returned to Thamon to check what they had done. They probably never had time considering how many planets they had played with.

  No, they were on their own for better or worse. Ian was sure it was for the better. He had men in place at the cafe, ready to volunteer to guide Stryker. Ian told the truth when he had told Stryker that the entire town of Yeal Thalor was of one mind.

  But not the mind of Aaron-Lem. They were united as one in overthrowing the reign of Aaron-Lem, and returning the freedom of choice and thought to the people.

  Joseph and Fionn were waiting for Ian in the back room. They had asked to return to the village with him. Udore thought that Ian could use more protection, and his daughter and nephew had agreed.

  He had said yes to the security, as long as his daughter Rose came back with him. There was no point in all of them trudging up the mountain.

  Besides, Rose would be of help once Sawdi arrived. Sawdi would never recognize her, having never visited the women of the Blessed Ones. But Rose knew of Sawdi, and she wanted to be part of the plan for stopping him.

  How they would do that, none of them knew. Yet. Stopping Stryker would be easy compared to Sawdi. Ian bowed his head to his God, Ophey, the God of light, and asked for the wisdom to know what to do, and the courage to do it.

  Forty-Two

  The seven of them had been walking for hours, and they had yet to reach the base of the mountain. They could see it looming above them. Meg couldn’t see how they would ever get up it. It looked more like a series of cliffs with some straggly trees on it than the kind of mountains that were on Erda where she and Suzanne had lived.

  But Wren had flown ahead and said that there were a series of switchbacks that they could take. Meg envied Wren’s ability to fly ahead of them, or even to be able to fly back to town and check on Stryker’s movements. When she thought about it, she realized that perhaps she was the only one who had to walk.

  Suzanne could shift to being a dragon and easily make it up the mountain, and Udore and Tarek, as wizards, could go anywhere they wanted with the blink of an eye. Silke could fly ahead or ride on shoulders. Meg was the only one stuck walking. So why didn’t the rest go ahead of her?

  She was useless. Again.

  A few seconds later, Karn came up beside her, huffing slightly now that the path had begun to rise.

  “Not just you,” Karn said.

  “What?” Meg asked, turning to look at the man walking beside her. Everyone else was spread out on the path, walking at their own speed. Almost everyone was ahead of them.

  “I have to walk too, Meg,” Karn said.

  “Oh,” Meg said. “I forgot. But you gave up your powers on purpose and for such a good reason, to help the resistance. I didn’t. I didn’t choose to give up my abilities. They disappeared on their own.”

  Karn stopped, and Meg walked a few steps ahead of him before realizing what had happened. She turned around and said, “What?”

  “You know what, Meg. You’re being a brat again. Every once in a while, I see that ridiculous bratty child you must have been, and I feel quite sorry for Suzanne.”

  “Well,” Meg spat back. “You should talk. I heard how you abandoned Wren. She thought you were quite selfish, too.”

  Karn stepped forward and grabbed Meg’s hand, stood calmly looking at her, and then said, “Are you done now?”

  Meg nodded. “I’m sorry. It’s just that sometimes I feel so stupid and useless. Who I was is gone, and I keep hearing about the prophecies and my part in it, but no one will tell me what it is. So I either get mad, and then afraid because I might sprout fire again, or discouraged and irritated.”

  Karn put his arm around Meg, and the two of them started back up the path together.

  “Will I know what my purpose is, Karn?” Meg asked, after they walked a little way together.

  “Absolutely. I know you will. In fact, you are doing it now.”

  At Meg’s incredulous look, Karn added, “I know it doesn’t feel like it. But you are. You don’t really believe that you and Suzanne are here by accident do you?”

  Meg sighed and shook her head. “I don’t because none of you do. But even though I feel as if I didn’t choose to lose my shapeshifter abilities, if I had to choose now, I would let them go to have all of you as friends.”

  Karn saw her looking up the path to where Udore and Tarek were walking together, father and son looking so much alike, their lean bodies moving in harmony together, with Silke flitting back and forth between the two of them.

  “Karn,” Meg asked, “Did Silke know that Udore was still alive? And if she did, why didn’t she go to him? Isn’t she bound to him for his lifetime?”

  “You should ask her, Meg. But she and Udore decided that she would go with Tarek before Udore was captured, so she might not have known. On the other hand, perhaps she did, but she couldn’t have stayed in prison with Udore.”

  “But if she did know, how did she keep that secret from Tarek? And now that they are both here, will she go back to Udore?”

  “No,” Karn answered, smiling at Meg. “She’ll stay with Tarek. She had already transferred to Tarek. She might have chosen to not bind herself to another wizard after him, but now that you are in the picture, she will stay and wait for your children.”

  Meg didn’t have time to ask Karn what he was talking about because there was a rustling in the trees, and Falcon swooped down and landed on Karn’s shoulder.

  Karn shouted at the others to stop, and then he had a silent conversation—to Meg—with Falcon. Meg could only guess at what Falcon was telling by watching Karn’s face. It seemed to her that the ability to hear what a bird was saying was not only a beautiful gift but was very useful.

  “First,” Karn said, “Falcon says that he is not a bird, he is a man turned into a Falcon.”

  “Oh, sorry,” Meg whispered back.

  By then, the rest of the group had gathered around. Meg watched everyone’s face and realized she was the only one not hearing what Falcon was saying.

  Udore glanced over at Meg who was looking very left out and said, “You can hear him too. Would you like to?”

  Meg nodded, and a second later, she heard him speaking. “Thank you,” Meg whispered.

  Falcon was reporting on both the Palace and Stryker. Meg realized that she had missed a large part of what he had said, but she did hear that Stryker had hired guides and would be coming up the mountain too. But the long way. The guides would make sure he struggled. They would have time to get to the pendant first.

  After reporting, Falcon flew back down into the woods, saying he needed to rest before returning to the Palace. Traveling out of time was exhausting.

  It was Tarek who turned to the group and said, “How can we avoid Sawdi?”

  Seeing Meg’s face, he added, “That’s the part you missed. Sawdi is coming.”

  “With the Warrior Monks?” Meg gasped. “What are we going to do?”

  Forty-Three

  “Getting past the Warrior Monks is going to be the hardest part,” Bolong pushed into the minds of the three humans and four dragons that sat around him.

  After dropping Sawdi off at the Palace, Bolong had come straight to the cave. Because of Baywolf’s warning, he wasn’t surprised to see people there, sleeping against the rock, including someone he knew.

  Bolong couldn’t believe how happy he was to see Dax. They had barely known each other at Stryker’s training camp, but seeing each again under these new circumstances closed the distance between them.

  Bolong and Dax were so delighted to see each other that they had done their best to hug. Not technically possible with a dragon, but they tried, dancing around the outside of the cave a bit before settling down.

  Wren and Ruth watched them and tried not to laugh, but eventually, they gave up and broke down laughing. Their laughter triggered everyone else, including the dragons.

  Dragon laughing is a cross between spitting steam and fire and trembling from head to toe, so Dax, Wren, and Ruth did their best to stay out of the way, dodging dragon tails and steam, which should have been frightening, but made them laugh all the harder.

  Finally, the laughter died down, and the reality of the situation took over again. Bolong had told them that Sawdi was leaving for Turva the next day. That would leave Ruth, Roar, and Dax free to get to Aaron.

  “Did he tell you that he was taking all of you?” Ruth asked.

  “No,” Bolong replied. “But he usually does. He uses us to destroy everything. He likes doing it, it’s not always necessary, but he does it anyway. For fun, I suppose.

  “Of course, Sawdi doesn’t know that we avoid hurting people. We produce lots of fire and smoke, but we miss hitting the people. On the other hand, this time, if the person he wants us to eliminate is Stryker, we will obey him. But after that, we will turn on Sawdi.”

  Bolong looked back at his friends, and they all nodded their massive heads in agreement.

  “But, won’t that keep you in dragon form for the rest of your lives?” Ruth asked.

  “Probably. However, we have decided that it will be worth it if it means we can save Thamon from that ring.”

  “Ring?” Dax asked. “What ring?”

  Bolong explained that they believed that it was the ring that Sawdi wore that was controlling him. Of course, he was already doing bad things before the ring, but Sawdi no longer seemed in control, and Bolong had seen the ring glow and send out streaks of light. He could also tell that Sawdi was in pain, and that had to be the ring.

  “Who else knows about the ring?” Roar asked.

  “Not sure if anyone does,” Bolong answered.

  “But you are sure it’s where his power is coming from?” Dax asked. “You are willing to bet your life on it?”

  “We are,” answered Bolong, and the four dragons behind him snorted steam once again in agreement.

  “Alright,” Ruth said. “You are all willing to deal with Sawdi and stop him. We need to stop Aaron. Again, do you have any ideas on how we can get past the Warrior Monks?”

  “I heard that one of you arrived as a dragon?” Bolong asked.

  Roar nodded and said, “I did. But Ruth and I can be anything, so we could slip into the Palace as something that the Monks don’t see. But what about Dax?”

  Ruth said, “I can change his features for a bit if that would help.

  “What if after Sawdi leaves with all of you, I make Roar look like you, Bolong, and make Dax look like Sawdi. Would it fool the Warrior Monks? Would they think that Sawdi had returned?”

  Bolong thought for a while. “When they see Sawdi, the Monks start howling. Is it that they are seeing him, or feeling the ring? If it’s the ring, it won’t work, unless you find a way to make them believe that the man on the dragon is wearing that ring.”

  Dax felt hope well up inside of him. He could do it.

  “If what they are feeling is a powerful projection of evil, I can do that. Inside of me, that evil is so strong sometimes it feels as if it is going to eat me up. I think I can send that out into the Warrior Monks for the few seconds that it takes to get past them,” Dax said.