It was raining the day Nyal and Elora left Hav. He was drenched the second he walked out the door, the rain pelting his bare skin. Maureen and the girls didn't want to come out to say goodbye, they didn't want to get soaked by the painfully hard rain. Instead they parted ways in the foyer of the house.

The girls clung to his sides, grinning and chattering about anything and everything. He laughed at them, ruffling Mikayla's hair. He would miss them. Even though he hadn't been able to see them while he was working, he had missed them quite a but and it had been good to see them again.

"Promise you'll visit us!" the younger girl cried.

"Yes, of course I'll visit you," he replied with a smile, "Once I'm done with this mission, I'll come right back, I promise."

"I'll have to hold you to that, Nyal," Maureen laughed, "You wouldn't want to make my girls sad, now would you?"

"Of course not, my Lady," Nyal answered, moving away from the girls and towards their mother. She hugged him tightly, laughing merrily. Nyal's wide grin quickly turned into a deep frown as his mind drifted towards terrible thoughts, thinking about what would happen to these happy people if he didn't find the Key and the dragon.

"Don't you disappear either," Maureen said to Elora as she pulled away from Nyal, "Any friend of Nyal's is a friend of mine, dear."

"Thank you, my Lady," Elora replied humbly, smiling at the three of them.

"And stop with the 'my Lady'. My name is Maureen and that is how you will address me," Maureen said with a smile, shaking her head at the pair of them, "Now get going, whatever it is your doing has to be important."

That's an understatement, Nyal thought. With a final goodbye, Nyal and Elora left the house and hopped onto their horses. While he was packing, Amelia and Mikayla had decided to name his horse Chocolate, because of her dark brown colour. They had argued about Elora's horse but eventually settled on Snow because of the white in her coat.

Snow neighed and galloped off, Elora giving the three girls standing in the door way one final wave before she was gone. "She's a very strange woman, Nyal," Maureen called up to him, "But she looks like a good person."

"She is," Nyal replied.

"Bye, Sir Belthorne!" Amelia yelled over the sound of the rain, waving at him.

"Goodbye Amelia, goodbye Milkayla," Nyal said back, laughing. He pulled on the reins, and Chocolate began to trot away. "Goodbye, Maureen!" He galloped away from the waving trio, quickly catching up to his black clad companion.

"Are you actually going to visit them?" Elora asked when he finally caught up. The pounding rain made her hood stick to her face and her cloak cling tightly to the rest of her clothing. Her wavy hair had straightened out, barely visibly under the soaked hood.

Nyal's clothing was in much the same state. His white shirt was now transparent, and his coat was sticking to his arms uncomfortably. His hair was flat against his head, stuck to his skin. "Of course, why wouldn't I?" he answered, a frown on his face.

"Because you didn't last time," she told him, turning her head slightly to look at him, an eyebrow raised at him once again. It seemed to be an almost permanent expression on her face.

"That was because I was hired by the Guild not long after I left," Nyal defended, "I was going to come back, but they never sent me to Hav."

"So, what did you do?" Elora asked.

"You ask a lot of questions for someone who won't answer any," Nyal answered with a sneer. In his head, he was regretting his words. He thought back to her reaction to Silas's anger back in Dreeva and winced, ready for whatever backlash he was about to face.

Elora didn't say anything, didn't look at him, didn't do anything except look at the dirt road ahead of her and adjusting her position on her horse. Nyal toyed with the possibility that he had hurt her feelings, a strange concept when compared to her nonchalant demeanor.

He had to admit, she was a strange woman. She barely knew how to talk to Maureen and her girls the day before. She lied and kept things from people. She was supposed to be an all powerful demigod, and yet, she couldn't even talk to people properly.

"I haven't talked to a child since the war," Elora muttered, shocking him from his thoughts. "I forgot how cheerful they were."

Nyal's mouth opened in shock and his eyebrows furrowed, making him look like an angry fish. The war against the Ancient Ones had been thousands of years ago. "Why?" Nyal asked incredulously.

"Yararanje asked me to look after the Gate, as it was my creation," Elora started, "It was my duty. I had to do it."

"Even though it didn't allow you to talk to people?"

"Yes," Elora answered, "It was my duty to the realm. I saved them, and would continue to do so, and I will save them now."

"With my help," Nyal replied, sceptical.

"Of course, I needed help the last time I did this, and I need help this time," the Gate Keeper told him, moving her hood to the side to look at him.

"Corpius Ringwild, yes?" Nyal asked, smacking his hand against the now soaked bag the book was in. He hoped it was alright, he had remembered to wrap it in anything he could get his hands on before he left.

"Yes, and many others," Elora answered, turning away from him, her head down. He heard her take a deep breath, before she looked back at him.

"Are you alright?" he asked.

"I'm fine," was the answer, "Do you have any other questions you want answered?" Even though it probably should have, the sentence didn't sound rude, it sounded like Elora just wanted a chance to open up. At least, that's how Nyal saw it.

He thought for a minute. Now, he didn't see the point in asking where they were going, he would find out when they got there. But there were more important questions he had that needed answering. "Why did you create the Gate? Why not find another way to get rid of the Ancient Ones?"

He adjusted his position once again on his saddle, Chocolate neighing at him while he did. It was starting to get painful, and he would most likely have saddle sores by the time they reached their destination. It didn't help that it was raining either, he could barely hear himself think over the sound, he had to yell at Elora to make sure she heard him.

Chocolate splashed through a puddle, spraying muddy water up her flank and onto Nyal's pants. He grimaced, feeling the mud and water seep into his skin.

Next to him Elora sighed, bringing Nyal back to reality. She always took a while to answer her questions, like she was taking the time to think through every single word she was going to say. Then again, Nyal did ask some pretty big questions.

"There was no other way we could find," she started, "The war went for years, you know, and there was just nothing we could do. Corpius and I searched for a way to end it peacefully, or to kill all the Zlohiel, anything. No matter what we tried, nothing seemed to work," she paused, not looking at him, instead she looked up at the sky, despite the pounding rain. Her hood fell back, revealing soaked hair and closed eyes. She opened her mouth slightly as she took deep breaths, looking calm in the angry weather. "Yararanje would not help, he said it was my duty to protect this realm and to fix everything, it was the reason I was created.

"Corpius came up with the idea for the Gate, he was always the smarter one. He figured out that if we put enough of our energy into the Gate that he built, we could create. Yararanje was not pleased that someone was trying to mimic him, however."

"If he didn't want that to happen, he shouldn't have given you the power to do so," Nyal argued. The more he heard, the more he disliked his god, his own creator. Elora tipped her head towards him, the smallest of smirks on her face.

"He didn't want us to do it, but we had no other choice, there was nothing else we could do. So, we gathered all the warlocks we could find, which weren't that many, and built the Gate from scratch. It didn't take us long to do, I don't really remember how long any more. As soon as it was done, we began what you might call a ritual. We put our magic and our energy into the Gate, and after a few days, we did it. We created another realm.

"The Zlohiel attacked not long after that, we barely had time to test out that other realm. We never even named it. We wheeled it out onto the battlefield, and... I don't remember what happened. Not really. All I know is, we opened the Gate, and it seemed like all the energy we had put into it directed itself at the Zlohiel, and... Sucked them in, from all over the realm, it took hours.

"The Gate closed itself when they were all gone, so hard that a piece of it broke off. A little experimentation told us that it would open the Gate if it was put back into place, this was the Key."

The story was much like the ones he had heard growing up, just with a lot more detail, and a lot more questions answered. By just looking at the range of powers that warlocks had, it seemed almost impossible that they could create something like the Gate, but it made sense now.

Placing a warlock's energy in something was more like placing their magic. They fill the desired object with their affinity, earth, fire, water, or air, until they feel it is done. It was a tradition among warlocks heading into battle, they would take a treasured item and put their energy into it, before giving it to their loved ones as a final form of protection. Objects like this were said to have minute powers similar to that of the warlock that created it and would use them when the receiver was in danger.

It made sense that the same kind of magic would be used on the Gate. The energy put in would target the ones doing harm, and in that case, it would have been the Zlohiel. A mix of all warlock powers and a demigods would have the effect that the Gate did. At least, that's what Nyal assumed.

"I-I think that's the most I've ever heard you say," he finally said, looking at his companion incredulously. Elora turned to face him, her hair shooting sideways, flicking water into the air.

"That's what you have to say?" she exclaimed, shaking her head at him.

He laughed, "It was the only thing I could think of," he replied, "Although, now that I think about it. If you got all the Ancient Ones through the Gate, how is there a dragon on the loose?"

Elora frowned, her forehead creased. The rain picked up then, pounding against Nyal's skin so hard that it hurt, he squinted through the barrage of water at the woman.

"I don't know," she told him, "It makes no sense, and he can't be anything else but a Zlohiel, there isn't a species like his that exists now. And I can't think of any reason besides the fact that he is a Zlohiel as to why he took the Key in the first place."

"I can't understand it," Nyal agreed, "I also can't understand why he waited so long to take it."

"Hmm, I can't see a reason either," Elora said, "If I was that powerful, I would have taken it years ago."

"How long is the life cycle of a dragon?" Nyal asked suddenly. If the dragon had somehow survived being pulled into the Gate, then it would be centuries old, which sounded almost impossible.

"They can survive for millennia," Elora explained, "So, one could still be alive from the time of the war."

"Then I have to restate my earlier question, why wait so long?" Nyal replied, confused. Distractedly, he patted Chocolates mane, trying to find an answer to his question, but nothing came to mind.

"I don't know," Elora muttered next to him, looking down at Snow.

They went on in relative silence for many hours, the both of them pondering over the dragon and the Gate. The rain eventually died down to a slow patter, but the pair were still soaked to the bone. It was getting close to sun set when they reached the next town on the road.

Klista was a much larger town than Hav, slowly becoming more and more spread out. People from the East had migrated there as the war raged on, adding on to the size and population of the town. It was coming close to becoming a small city.

People bustled about despite the poor weather as the pair trotted through the main market place. Nyal had never come this far east, so he was pretty sure no one here would know him, like they had back in Hav and Dreeva.

It didn't take long for them to agree that they wouldn't be staying the night in Klista, they were getting close to the eastern border, and there would be other towns coming up. They did decide to spend an hour at the local inn, having a drink and warming up a bit, drying their clothes.

They bought more food for their journey, as most of it got soaked in the rain. They left not long after, bellies full and clothes mostly dry. Someone was feeding their horses when they got back to the stable that was attached to the inn. Chocolate neighed when he came near, nuzzling his hand when he patted her.

It was dark when they finally crossed the border to the East. There wasn't much of a change, as far as Nyal could see, the grass was a bit longer, up to Chocolate's stomach, but that was about it.

He hoped it would be different the further in they went. Whenever Nyal pictured the east, it was lush and beautiful and green, not drab and grey and dull. Not like Skodur.

He heard a whisper next to him, and looked to Elora, who was sitting up straight on Snow. "Did you say something?" he asked, confused.

"No, why?" Elora answered.

"I thought I heard something. Doesn't matter," he said with a shake of his head.

"Hands up, now!" a voice cried, "And get off the horses!" Nyal heard Elora gasp next to him. He looked around wildly, trying to pin point where the voice came from. As he looked, five or so men wandered out of the tall grass, swords and daggers at the ready.

"I said, get off your horses, now!"

A.N: Merry Christmas! My laptop is dead and I'm waiting for it to get fixed. It will take 2-8 weeks, so it's going to be a while. I will still be updating, just not as regularly because I have to borrow someone else's laptop to write