The field at the foot of an Arrandar cliff was empty except for one man when Kaisen, Saren, and Kalda entered it. This one man was sitting on a tree stump, meditating. He had long, silver hair that flowed to his shoulders, and he wore a set of teal robes and glittering spectacles. His aged eyes opened as they approached, and his wrinkled face broke into a smile.
"Good work, Kaisen," Zharoun said. "I was watching. Quite ingenious way to conquer your foe."
"Thank you. As you requested, we have found an obsidian fire talisman and a shard of elf crystal."
"Yes, yes. And, as promised, I will now lift the curse on the dragon egg."
The egg shivered, and Kaisen warmed it. "You don't know how relieving that is to hear."
Zharoun smiled wryly. "I have an idea."
He looked up to a cave high in the cliff face. The opening was high up, and there were no handholds or paths. "Up there," he continued, "is my cave. We need to go fetch Zorrath before we return to Keldagrim."
"How are we going to get up there?" Kaisen inquired. "We can't climb this cliff face."
"We teleport."
"Teleport? But you can only teleport to the marked locations in the teleport matrix."
"That is a new invention. Long ago, mages could warp wherever they pleased. Some can still do that today, the ones that can unearth the ancient secrets."
Zharoun closed his eyes, and he vanished. "See what I mean?" he said. He was behind them. "You can warp up there as well. I can take one person with me at a time, and since we have Kaisen as well, we can all get up there in one trip." He turned to Kaisen. "Just close your eyes, and let your magic carry you where you want to go."
29-Mar-2007 05:17:45