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DISCOVERY

“Ouch!” Bardon jerked away from the sharp pain on his chin. He opened his eyes to see a small rodent, sitting on its haunches and watching him.

Where am I? Stone floor. Dungeon. Cropper’s lower levels. Not a dungeon. But not a good place, either.

He looked around, surprised that his neck had some mobility.

They’ve left me alone.

His eyes went back to the beady-eyed rodent.

Not completely alone.

“Shoo!”

The little animal didn’t move.

I suppose this is one of Cropper’s mutants. Unafraid of people and designed to inflict pain.

The beastie put his front paws down and took a tentative step forward.

Oh, no you don’t.

Bardon forced his muscles to move. He rolled.

Ah, not quite as incapacitated as Cropper thought.

He tested his arms and legs. Some movement. Not much, but some.

I’ve got to stand.

He surveyed the room and decided the stairs going down presented his best option. He managed to get his arms in front of him and then raised up on his forearms to pull himself across the floor. He reached the doorway to the stairs and took a great deal of time to shift his body so his legs would go down first. With his concentration on reaching the steps, he hadn’t paid attention to the rodent. He glanced its way and moaned.

So you have friends, do you? Lots of friends.

One rodent had become at least a hundred. They mingled in their pack, not seeming to be interested in him. He scootched back until his whole body lay on the hard stone stairs. He bent his knees so that he knelt. Then he placed his hands on the step beneath his shoulders and pushed. After a tremendous struggle, he stood, sweat dripping off his brow and breathing as if he’d run a race. He leaned against the stairwell wall to recover.

When he opened his eyes, the horde of rodents had moved to the top of the stairs.

Why are you so interested in me?

The rodents stared. The fact that they all stared, all sat on their haunches, and all had ceased any squeaking made Bardon nervous.

It would be most convenient if you rodents turned out to be minnekens sent to rescue me. But, pardon me for thinking this, none of you look intelligent.

Bardon eased down to the step behind him. Without hesitation, the rodents poured over the edge until the next step held no more room.

I don’t like this.

He took another step down. The rodents advanced one more step. Bardon sucked in a breath. The number of rodents seemed to be increasing. The micelike creatures still filled the doorway to the stairs, yet at least a hundred had moved down.

I don’t think I could outrun these creepy little monsters, but I’m sure going to try to get away.

As if they understood Bardon’s decision, the rodents surged down the stairs and surrounded him. They clawed and chewed his pant legs. He felt them gnawing on his boots.

Bardon tried to go up and discovered his knee would not bend enough to manage the step. He moved down, knocking rodents away and stepping on a few. Bardon shivered. The image of the beasties crawling up his legs sent a tremor of panic through his body.

Steady, Sir Bardon. This is no time to lose your discipline. “Think clearly. Act rationally. Wulder has given you a choice as to how you behave. Choose well and you will prosper.”

He continued down the stairs. He reached a landing and made the turn. At the bottom of this flight, he saw that a heavy wooden door blocked whatever level he approached.

Wulder, I need that door to be unlocked.

He continued down, one painstaking step at a time, trying not to let the rodents trip him, not caring how many he injured in his clumsy descent.

When he reached the door, he lifted the latch and pulled it open. With speed generated by fear, he jerked his body around the door’s edge and slammed it shut. At his feet were a fraction of the rodents that had come down the stairs with him. The hem of his pant legs hung in tatters. Sharp, tiny teeth had scarred the leather of his boots. The rodents still plagued his feet, and he didn’t have enough suppleness in his legs to shake them off.

He examined his surroundings. On either side of the small platform where he stood, two doors stretched from the floor to low ceiling. He tried each one, but the locks held fast. If an escape route existed behind one of the doors, he wasn’t going to be able to use it. He hobbled across the square of stone floor and started down another flight of stairs.

With each step down he injured several of the rodents, but the tenacious beasts still harried his feet and lower legs. The boots kept him safe from their gnawing teeth. At the bottom of this set of stairs, he found an unlocked door that provided a way to diminish the number of beasties plaguing him. He stepped through and faced two frustrating doors, locked and unyielding. And another stretch of steps led downward.

Bardon sighed and started down again. He looked at the two dozen or so mice still trying desperately to demolish his boots. They’d chewed his pant legs until the fabric was higher than the distance they could leap. He chortled and caught the anxious edge in the tone of his own laughter.

Oh, Wulder, this would be funny if I were not so exhausted, hungry, and full of aches. I have been chased by a horde of ineffectual monster mice. Did Crim Cropper ever develop a truly functional beast? Yet, I’m glad these creatures are horrendous at their appointed task.

He came to another door and slipped through. He’d become more adept at getting on the other side and leaving behind the rodents. Now he could count the rodents that remained after he slammed the door. With his eyes downward as he looked to see how many had been eliminated, Bardon sensed the space around him was different.

He stood at the edge of a great hall. Scattered around the room, large globes rested on pedestals. The ivory columns were uniform in width but of different heights. The orbs atop each one varied from the size of a head to the very large spheres that could not possibly roll through the door. Bardon wondered briefly how Crim Cropper had managed to get these inside the room. Within each translucent glass sphere, small shards of lightning crackled. An uneven rhythm of pops, sputters, and hisses emanated from each large ball. He ambled around the room with his awkward gait, examining the different sizes of the globes and colors of the encapsulated energy.

I know these instruments. I’ve seen them in Kale’s rooms in our own home. I’ve seen them when we visited other wizards and in the books Kale reads. I wonder what Cropper does with all of these. If Kale were here, she could discern their uses and fill me in. As it is, I can only make guesses.

Bardon yelped as a sharp tooth met his toe. One of the rodents had finally pierced the leather of his boot. Bardon stumbled and knocked against a pedestal. The sphere toppled and hit the floor with a crash. Holding on to the rocking pillar, Bardon regained his balance. He looked down at the shattered glass and then at the pesky rodents. They had lost interest in him. They scuttled around the floor, whiskers twitching and tails dragging like ordinary mice.

A door on one of the side walls crashed open.

The stubby servant Prattack rushed in. “What are you doing here? You can’t be in here! What have you done? Master Cropper will be furious.” He shuffled to a closet and grabbed a broom and dustpan.

“What do these globes do, Prattack?”

The servant bustled over to the broken glass and began cleaning up. “Nothing important. Nothing you’d be interested in. It’s the master’s business, not yours. These are important to him, not you.”

Bardon deliberately knocked another globe to the floor.

It shattered, and Prattack came scurrying over with his broom. “Look what you’ve done. The master will be so annoyed when he sees his creatures aren’t obeying him. I’m telling him you did it. He’s going to be angry, and I won’t take the blame.”

Bardon pushed two more to the ground. Prattack turned to him with tears in his eyes. “You might as well do them all, and then shatter me as well.”

“I have a better idea. Why don’t we both knock them over, and we’ll escape together?”

“Oh, I couldn’t do that.” Prattack fixed his eyes on a globe that sparkled with green and blue lightning. “I can’t defy the master.”

Bardon hobbled across the room and picked up the sphere that held Prattack’s attention. The little man gasped. Bardon threw it to the stone floor. Prattack’s eyes grew big, and his face turned purple.

“Breathe, Prattack,” Bardon commanded and shambled over to thump the man’s back with his hand.

The servant took a deep breath and charged forward. He hit one pedestal after another, smashing all the remaining globes.

He turned to Bardon with a gleam in his eye. “Where do you want to go, sir? There’s gateways to anyplace in the world!”