third eye. And beyond, a swirl of colors,
energy everywhere I looked.
Step down, Anders, and then open your eyes.
I looked down and saw with closed eyes that the glowing
forms of Kalle and Kara were already below me on what must be the ground. I
stepped down, and stood among them.
“Open your eyes, Anders.”
The bright sun blinded me for a moment. I blinked a few
times.
Kara was smiling. Her teeth were dazzlingly bright. I would
have done anything to make her smile again, like that. She came up to me and
hugged me.
“We made it,” she said. “Can you believe it? I can’t believe
it’s remained undiscovered all this time.”
Her smell was intoxicating. I just wanted to melt into her.
It was a relief when she let me go, smiling wickedly at me. She must have
sensed what I was thinking. I hadn’t yet learned to shield my private thoughts.
I stood there in a daze, staring at the second gate. It was
covered with runes. They called out to us somehow, but their meaning was lost
to me. Still they had to mean something important. I wanted to trace all the
runes with my finger and make them glow, but I felt if I did that, something
would happen.
I wasn’t sure if it was something good or bad but it would
be something big.
On both sides of the gateway there was a high wall that
seemed to rise up forever, and curve inward. I could feel the power that ran
through it. The wall was covered with vegetation but my inner eye saw the glow
of runes through the vines.
Kara touched my shoulder. “Should we go in, do you think?”
Kalle cleared his throat. “We need to find a place to rest,
Princess. We need real food and clean water. Let’s explore this city and see
what we can find.”
I felt suddenly weary. Maybe Kara’s spell was wearing off.
Maybe the energy ride had drained me. In any case, I needed to rest, to sit, to
eat, to drink and to sleep. But something was nagging at me.
“I think there’s something about this gate,” I said. “These
symbols mean something, but I can’t figure it out.”
Kalle examined it.
“They are in an ancient tongue that we once knew, maybe, but
that’s been lost. If we could hear these words, we might understand them with
our sense memory. As it is, they mean nothing to me. Kara?”
She shook her head. “I looked at them at the other gate, and
didn’t understand them there, either.”
Kalle took a step, towards the gate. “I will enter.”
I shook my head.
There was something very wrong.
I couldn’t explain it. I just knew, deep inside that there
was something very important I had to do first. The problem was, I was so tired
I couldn’t think or even see straight. If I could only figure out what those
symbols meant. They were a key somehow, to something. I knew that much.
Kara nodded. “Then let us enter.”
I was still shaking my head like an idiot, but they either
didn’t notice, or they ignored me.
Kalle walked through the gate.
Except he never made it through.
It was as if he was suddenly flipped around. He walked in,
and then he walked out on the same side he had entered. He stood there, looking
confused, staring at us.
Suddenly the sun, that had felt hot on my neck, went away. I
looked up, and saw dark clouds. There was thunder in the distance.
I looked warily at the clouds, then at the gate, and the
wall that surrounded it. Was there something different about the gate, now?
Something slightly menacing, questioning?
A streak of lightning lit up the sky and struck the ground.
Close. Too close. Not even ten feet from where we stood.
I was thrown from my feet and landed on the ground.
I got up shakily. Rain poured down my face. I looked around.
Kalle was getting up to his feet.
But Kara.
I gasped.
She must have been closer to the blast, because she was
still on the ground, and something about the way she lay there sent a tremor
through me.
I ran over to her, trying to shake the tiredness out of my
head.
There was another streak of lightning, not as
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