Legends of the Dragonrealm, Vol II - By Richard A. Knaak Page 0,315

he’s under my father’s protection.”

Dru took a deep breath. Gerrod knew that the worst was yet to come, and he had to admire the elder Zeree’s ability to remain coherent throughout what must surely be an ordeal of the greatest magnitude for him. “I journeyed to the eastern sector of the city, not wanting to believe the patriarch would do something so foolish, but rumors, substantial ones, kept insisting otherwise.” The sorcerer shook his head. “I’ll not go over what I discovered concerning Darkhorse, save that I think he fell to your clan also. His disappearance… total disappearance….”

He touched his temple, indicating that Darkhorse was beyond even his higher senses. Gerrod had already suspected that. He, too, had noted the absence of the creature upon waking that morning. Not knowing any better, he had merely assumed that Darkhorse had departed on some exploration with Sharissa. It would not have been at all surprising. She hated teleportation, and the phantom steed gave her a way of crossing distances in little time.

Gerrod looked up and saw Dru anxiously waiting for him to digest what had already been told. “And what did my father say about all this? I assume he gave you some imperious speech.”

“The sector was empty. They were all gone.”

“What?” In his shock, the warlock knocked over a sheaf of notes, spilling them on the stone floor he had so carefully constructed for this, his latest abode. He ignored the scattered sheets. “What do you mean? Gone? Preposterous!” Yet, despite his words, Gerrod recalled his own past and how swift the clan could be when it desired to move from one location to another. It was one of many aspects of his father’s constant war games, the need to move while the enemy was distracted.

Move over a thousand people during the dead of night? The patriarch would hardly leave his followers behind, not if he was planning a new empire. “Where did they go? East seems likely.”

“I can’t say for certain. Darkhorse’s presence could very well be shielded from me, I suppose.” The elder Zeree was tired, so very tired. Gerrod could sympathize, being just as driven in his own way. If anyone knew of his research and the hope and fear some of it stirred inside him, they might be tempted to put an end to the warlock… or praise him as a hero to his folk. Gerrod had no desire for either destiny. He was not even comfortable with his great discoveries. They promised death as much as they promised life.

“They must have left some trail!” There was something amiss. Something more that the master mage had not yet revealed to him.

He was given the answer almost immediately. “There is a trail, a vague and possibly false one, but I lack the ability to follow it to its conclusion. I told you about my time in the Void and how I finally escaped, didn’t I?”

“You are surely not suggesting…”

“Darkhorse can open… paths… into other realms. He did so for me that once.” Dru’s features relaxed for a moment as his memories surfaced, then, recalling his daughter’s predicament, the sorcerer continued. “I may be crazy, but it explains why I can find no trace. I’ve searched east as far as I dare, but I’ve known from the start that they didn’t head that way. No, I think that perhaps because they held Sharissa, Barakas was able to force Darkhorse to create a path for the Tezerenee to march through—a path I believe must extend, not to anywhere on this continent, but to a domain the patriarch hasn’t been able to forget despite the last fifteen years.”

“The Dragonrealm.” Gerrod said the name his companion could not, the cold tone in his voice much like the tone he might have used greeting his father, the clan master. It was almost too much to accept, but it was so very like the elder Tezerenee to plot such madness and make it work. Paths beyond this world that led to the Dragonrealm. His father, after years of bitter loss, at last having the means by which to build himself a grand empire. The magic of the creature called Darkhorse doing so easily what, to the warlock, was a feat even the Vraad at their most powerful would have had difficulty in performing.

Sharissa stolen.

“Will you help me?” Dru asked in expectation.

“What is it you want of me?”

“A way to follow them. I know you, of anybody, must have some theory. Silesti and I have