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  “Look,” Max said, trying to understand. “I’m not sure what you’re getting at, but I’d like to know what you want.”

  “An arrangement,” Obsikar answered. “I will take you back to your time and you will kill a sorcerer.”

  “We’re not going to just kill somebody because you ask us to,” Sarah said. “That’s not who we are.”

  “Speak for yourself,” Dwight said.

  “As I’ve said, I am the last of my kind,” Obsikar continued. “I am the king of dragons. Long ago, the sorcerer Rezormoor Dreadbringer began hunting and killing us, simply to possess a scale called the Serpent’s Escutcheon. It fits over our breast and is impervious to both magic and steel. Rezormoor sought to collect enough of these to construct a suit of armor—one unlike any the world has ever seen. Such armor would make the wearer invulnerable.”

  “But hasn’t he already done this?” Sarah asked. “This all happened in the past, right?”

  “The Serpent’s Escutcheon is too hard to be smithed by normal means. That is why he sent the unicorn after the Codex—only it has the power to transform this precious scale into what the sorcerer desires. I suspect that with the armor and the Codex of Infinite Knowability, Rezormoor Dreadbringer could subjugate the whole of the three realms completely. Perhaps overthrowing the Maelshadow himself.”

  “So this sorcerer sent the unicorn to hunt us?” Max asked, trying to catch up. “Everything that’s happened is because of him? This Rezormoor Dreadbringer?”

  “Yes.”

  “But why do you need us now?” Sarah continued. “Everything’s done. This Rezormoor is long dead—what does it matter?”

  “It matters because no race should ever die out. Look at us here, the last members of the humans, the dwarfs, and the dragons. Is it meant that we should all disappear because of the actions of one man? We sit at the end of our history, but it doesn’t have to be that way. I have spent centuries looking for a way back.”

  “You make it sound noble, but it feels like revenge,” Sarah said.

  “Aye,” Dwight added, “that it does—not that there’s anything wrong with that.”

  “And suppose I do want revenge,” Obsikar admitted. “Does it lessen the importance of preserving our species?”

  “Just think of it,” Dirk jumped in. “This Rezormoor guy has been hunting us from the very start. We go back and he has no idea that we know about him. He’s looking for Max, but he doesn’t know we’d be looking for him.”

  “But I don’t have the Codex,” Max said, “so I don’t know how I’m supposed to take on some powerful sorcerer.”

  “You and the Codex are bound. I believe if you go back to your time the Codex will find you.”

  “Let’s assume what you’ve said is true,” Sarah asked, still trying to understand it all. “Why can’t you go back and deal with this sorcerer yourself?”

  “A fair question,” Obsikar replied. “Let me simply say that if I could, it would tear me from the fabric of existence. I did not simply jump to this time as you did—I came to it by a different route.”

  “Bummer, dude,” Dirk replied. When the others looked at him Dirk shrugged. “Nobody likes getting torn from the fabric of existence—I’m just saying.”

  “So you’re not like a wizard?” Max asked.

  “I’ve been hibernating and waiting. Once a year I wake and look for signs of your arrival. With the destruction of Machine City, you made your presence fairly obvious. But as to my powers, they are drawn from the Shadrus, and, if you agree to go back to your time, the umbraverse as well.”

  Dwight clapped his hands, looking around. “Well, I think I’ve heard enough. You send us back to our time, we kill this sorcerer, and all’s good. Sounds like a fair deal to me—let’s get going.”

  Obsikar turned to Max. “So many years waiting to find you, Max. So many years working on a way to send you back in time and fix the things that have gone wrong. Will you do as I ask? Will you save the dragons, and by doing so, save yourselves?”

  “I don’t know,” Max said, looking at Sarah and Dirk. “Maybe I should just keep looking for the Codex. I mean, you seem nice enough and all, but you’re just some guy in a cave. How do I really know anything you’ve said is true? I mean, you don’t look like a dragon any more than Dirk does.”

  “Hey!” Dirk exclaimed.

  Obsikar nodded. “I understand, Max. Perhaps this will help.” The man suddenly ran past the group, moving as a blur and leaping from the mouth of the cave and over the cliff beyond. There was an inhuman shriek followed by the sound of beating wings. Max and his friends ran to the cliff’s edge in time to see a dragon slowly rise in the air before them. He was a fantastic creature, with shiny black scales running along his shoulders and body, while gold scales ran from below his neck, down over his chest and across his belly. Long, armored spikes rose from his shoulder and leg joints, running the length of his tail to end finally in a deadly barb. The dragon’s eyes glowed with a color that matched the gold of his scales, and the wind produced by his beating wings drove Max and his friends back toward the cave.

  “See me for what I am and know that I speak the truth!” Obsikar bellowed. “I am the king of the dragons, spawn of demons, and avenger of my kind. I swear you to an oath that you will save the dragons. Swear it!” The voice came like a blow, pushing them farther back into the cave. The sheer power and majesty of the creature hovering in the air sent chills down Max’s spine.

  “I swear!” Max shouted.

  “As do I!”

  “And me!”

  “I swear, too!”

  Obsikar hovered there for a moment. The sky began to turn a deep crimson as clouds stretched and thickened at impossible speeds. A stronger wind began to rise, stronger even than the beating of Obsikar’s wings. Suddenly the sun dropped from its place on the horizon and darkness fell. Bright stars could be seen poking through clouds above.

  “What’s happening?” Sarah shouted.

  “Through the umbraverse!” Obsikar shouted. “Return now to your own time!”

  The group grabbed hold of the sides of the cave, bracing against the howling winds.

  Obsikar opened his mouth and blew a dark mist that began to swirl around them. Then the world shifted. The black mist closed in on them, the circles of the stars raced in giant glowing rings across the sky, and night and day followed each other as quickly as a beating heart.

  “Awwwesooooome!” Dirk shouted as he clung to the cave wall.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  HOMECOMING?

  (THE MAGRUS—PRESENT)

  Max heard a familiar voice in his head. Welcome home.

  “Home? I’m really home?”

  Yes, came the answer, the voice sounding more distant. At long last. Everything happens for a reason, Max. Remember that.

  Max opened his eyes.

  He was hanging upside down from a tree limb. Below him a large orc woman kept burning her hands as she tried to adjust an iron pot on a bed of coals. Hanging next to him were Sarah, Dirk, and Dwight, but they seemed to be sleeping and oblivious to what was going on. Seeing that Max was awake, the orc woman wiped her hands on her apron and approached, leaning down to get a good look at him. She walked with a strange limp and something was wrong with her hands, but Max’s eyes were still adjusting.

  “You tailor?” she asked, a bead of sweat running down her greenish cheeks.

  Max tried to speak, but his throat was incredibly dry. “I’m Max,” he managed to squeak out.

  “Not name, stupid. Me need tailor to make mittens.” The orc motioned to Max’s backpack that had been spilled out on the ground. “You craftsmen? Maybe trade orc mittens for friends?”

  To Max’s great relief he saw the Codex of Infinite Knowability lying on the ground near Glenn and his other belongings. “Orc mittens,” he repeated, remembering the Codex. “I think I might be able to help.”

  shares his first name with the midwestern Platte River, which he’s been told mean
s “wide and shallow.” Despite that, he was able to find a woman to marry and produce seven offspring with. Platte graduated from college cum laude, with a BS in philosophy and an MS in English, and currently lives with his family in Utah.

  JACKET DESIGNED BY JESSICA HANDELMAN

  JACKET ILLUSTRATION COPYRIGHT © 2013 BY JOHN HENDRIX

  ALADDIN

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  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

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  ISBN 978-1-4424-5012-7

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