have no idea what you are saying! Your mother is a great warrior. Do not cast insults simply because you are too young to have seen her in action! She has spent the last century populating the world with dragons and raising up a new brood of warriors!”
Roxil flapped her wings and lifted slowly into the sky. She circled him once and dipped her head in a solemn bow. “Good-bye, Father.”
A tear dripped from Makaidos’s eye and fell to the ground. Roxil strayed from her path for a moment before zooming toward the other dragons as they disappeared in the growing haze.
Clasping her hand on her chest, Mara breathed a sigh. “You startled me.”
Sympathy tinged Morgan’s voice. “I apologize, but I wanted to comfort you.”
Mara drooped her head. “How can I be comforted? My first visit to the land above was a disaster! King Nimrod got so mad at me, I thought he would kill me, and he kept talking about needing blood, so it seemed for a minute like he was going to sacrifice a baby. But then dragons came and destroyed the tower, and everything in it burned. Mardon said all the world’s knowledge lay in the first floor, and now it’s gone forever!”
Morgan caressed her cheek. “You have had a frightful experience, but not all is lost.” She curled her finger. “Come with me.”
Morgan walked toward a narrow opening at the side of the cavern opposite the one they had entered. Mara rose slowly, and, as she followed, Morgan spoke in haunting tones. “I know a great disaster has befallen the upper world. Tell me, Mara, what did you see?”
As they passed into the tunnel, darkness enfolded them. Mara slowed, but the floor seemed smooth enough. “I saw dragons. Lots of them. And they breathed fire at the tower until it burned.”
“I see.” Now in total darkness, Morgan’s voice sounded like a sad song, like the dirge Naamah taught the girls to sing when one of them died in the chasm. “Did the fire spin like a whirlpool as it consumed Nimrod’s tower?”
“It did! How did you guess?”
“And did the tower sink into the ground like a rock in a pool?”
“Part of it sank, but more than half of it started tipping over. It was so tall, I was afraid it would fall on me, so I went through the portal before it fell.” A strange tingle crawled along Mara’s skin. “How did you know?”
The tunnel brightened slightly, enough for her to see Morgan’s eyes directly in front of her own. Sudden fear froze Mara in place. She held her breath, unable to move a muscle.
Morgan’s face showed no emotion. “You fancy yourself a scientist, a lover of knowledge. Do you not?”
Mara pressed her lips together and gave her a quick nod.
Morgan swept her arm toward the source of light, another cavern that lay just beyond the end of the tunnel. “Then allow me to show you how I knew.” She strode into the cavern, her black dress flowing in a swirling draft.
Feeling surged back into Mara’s legs, and she rushed to catch up. When she entered the cavern, she stopped and leaned back, barely able to take in the amazing sights. The ceiling reached higher than any of the trees in the upper world, so high that she could see only a vague grayness in the upper reaches. Spinning to the side, she located the source of light, a blazing column that stretched to the ceiling’s highest point. The energy in the column rotated, casting off blue eddies of light that twirled in dancing pirouettes until they fizzled into nothingness.
Morgan stood at the center of the cavern next to a massive circular building that stretched from one side of the seemingly endless chamber to the other. A set of broken, charred doors lay open, leading to the building’s anteroom. A ring of statues surrounded something in the center, their arms raised as if saluting it with hailing praises.
Mara gasped. “The . . . the tower?”
Morgan pushed on one of the doors. It toppled over, smashing to the floor at her feet. She jumped back and waved away the dust, coughing. “What’s left of it.”
Mara ran to the doorway and peered into the anteroom. Now close enough to the statues, she finally recognized what the robed men and women were saluting. “A tree?”
Morgan strutted inside and motioned for Mara to follow. “Yes, a very special tree. I’m sure you read about it in Mardon’s library. Adam and