“What an amazing bunch of people!” said Dennis, still shaking his head in amazement as they left Noklin Valley behind. “I’ve never known anyone like them!”

     “We passed through Pastora once,” said Thomas. “The homeland of the western nomes, and we never experienced anything like that. The Pastorans just ignored us for the most part.”

     “Well, it wasn’t really the same,” pointed out Shaun. “In Pastora, we were part of a large merchant caravan, and so isolated from the common nomes for the most part, and the nomes that live along the trade route see enough foreigners that they’re used to them. I bet that if we’d been alone, though, and passing through another part of Pastora, we’d have gotten the same kind of reception as we did back there.”

     “With hospitality like that, there must be a temptation for people of other races to settle down among them,” said Dennis. “Why leave, if they’re going to treat you like that?”

     “So long as they work for a living, outsiders are welcome to settle among us,” said Teasel, walking beside him. “But you’re talking about freeloaders, aren’t you?”

     “Yes,” agreed Dennis. “Parasites who want to spend the rest of their lives living off your hospitality. You must get them.”

     “Now and then, yes,” agreed the nome with a smile. “But we have our ways of dealing with them.”

     “How?” asked Naomi, intrigued.

     The nome’s smile broadened. “You may have heard about our sense of humour.”

     They stared at her for a moment, and then Dennis burst out in laughter. “Of course!” he said when he could finally speak again, wiping tears from his eyes. “I should have realised! By the Gods! Hospitality and a fondness for practical jokes! What a combination!” He chuckled over the idea for the rest of the day, with the occasional glance at Teasel as if to remind himself of what they were leaving behind and shaking his head in wonder that such a race of people could possibly exist.

     Noklin Valley was about eighty miles from Grad Cannelof, the last major landmark they had to pass on their way to the Ruby Keep, but the route the teamsters had to follow to get there was more like two hundred miles long and it was a full ten days before the teamsters finally arrived to stare up in wonder at the towering bulk of the mountain, standing all alone in the middle of a wide plain between the southernmost of the range’s tallest peaks to the north and the lower and rounder foothills to the south.

     “Well, here we are,” said Shaun, looking around curiously. “That must be the valley we want over there.” He pointed north towards a wide gap between jagged mountain peaks.

     The others were all tingling with excitement, knowing that they were finally getting close to their destination. “Well, what are we waiting for?” said Thomas eagerly. “Let’s go!”

     “Hey, wait a minute!” said Shaun however, grabbing his arm. “Let’s move cautiously here. That valley may well be the home of an immensely powerful being. A being powerful enough to give orders to the Emerald Oracle. Let’s find out what we’re getting ourselves into before we go blundering in like blind fools.”

     The wizard scowled at being called a fool, but calmed down when he realised the soldier was right. “Yeah, good idea,” he said. “What we need is a spy to go in and scout around a bit.” He looked at Naomi. “I understand there are pumas in these mountains. No-one would take notice of a wildcat prowling around in there.”

     The black girl grinned showing her pearly white teeth, and went off behind a straggly looking birch tree, its branches permanently stretched out to the east by the howling gales that swept between the tall mountainous ridges. A moment later a black puma emerged, its slitted green eyes shining in the morning sunlight.

     The wizard knelt down beside it, stroking the sleek, silky soft fur of its shoulders. “Now don’t take any chances. Okay? Just go in, have a look around and come back, and if you see anything that looks the least bit dangerous, get out of there at once.” He looked up at Shaun, who nodded. “Take care,” he said.

     The big cat nodded its head and bounded off towards the valley, disappearing from sight after a few minutes amongst the tangly, scrubby vegetation. “I hope she’s all right,” said Teasel anxiously. “We don’t know what’s in there.”

     “That’s the whole point,” replied Shaun. “We’ve got to find out. Don’t worry, she’ll be fine. She’s not going to take any risks.”

     “I’m not so sure,” said Dennis though. “She’s got a habit of jumping in with both feet, er, all four feet. It was her idea to follow you to the Emerald Oracle.”

     An awkward silence fell over the group, in which Shaun and Thomas glanced at each other. “She’ll be all right,” said Thomas, now looking a little unhappy. “Of course she will.”

     “Let’s hope so,” said Teasel, sitting down at the base of the tree.

     They were all immensely relieved, therefore, when the big cat returned as the yellow sun was sinking behind the mountains to the west. She was tremendously excited about something, so excited that she changed back into human form as soon as she reached them, forgetting about her tiger skin. It was the first time they’d seen her actually undergoing the transformation, and they stared in astonishment as her glossy black fur was sucked back into her smooth dark skin. Her legs lengthened, growing fingers and toes, and she rose to stand upright. Her head swelled out into a large braincase whose covering of hair lengthened to hang down her back, and most of her nipples vanished, leaving only the topmost pair which swelled out into a shapely pair of breasts.

     “It’s incredible!” she gasped as soon as her throat was human enough to permit speech. “There’s a huge castle in there! All made out of ruby, just like the Oracle building was made of emerald. They must have been made by the same people. The Gem Lords.”

     “Incredible,” agreed Thomas, trying to keep his eyes off her body. Shaun and Dennis made no such attempt, though, simply staring in frank adoration until Diana, blushing slightly, handed her her tiger skin. The black girl took it and shrugged it over her head absent mindedly, still babbling about the wonders she’d seen. Shaun looked disappointed as her body was hidden once more, and the cleric gave him a hard punch on the arm, making him look around in surprise. Diana scowled at him and Shaun finally got the message, hanging his head in shame. “Er, I didn’t mean to stare...” he muttered apologetically.

     Naomi seemed totally unaware of the effect she’d had on the men, though, and gave him a puzzled look before going on. “It had towers and battlements, a moat around the outside, and this enormous drawbridge reaching across to a smaller keep on the other side.” Her brilliant green eyes shone with excitement. “It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen!” Then she frowned. "It's strange, though. The valley's all rough and rocky, uneven, but the castle's standing on a circular patch of smooth ground. There're sheer edges where the circular patch of smooth ground is higher or lower than the rough ground around it. It's like someone cut a castle out of the ground somewhere and plonked it into a hole they'd cut here."

     “Was it up on the side of the Valley?” asked Dennis.

     “No, right in the middle. In the lowest point.”

     “That's a crazy place to put a castle. The worst possible place, in fact.”

     “Did you see any sign of occupancy?” asked Arroc, who'd been unimpressed by the black girl’s nudity. He preferred his girls shorter and more wrinkly.

     Naomi frowned, thinking back. “No, I didn’t,” she said. “I didn’t see anyone at all. Not in the castle itself or anywhere else in the Valley. I don’t think it was really a castle at all. Just something in the shape of a castle."

     “More evidence that it's the home of a powerful magical being,” said Thomas. “I think it should be safe enough to go in, especially if it really was created by the same people who created the Emerald Oracle. The Oracle wasn’t an evil being. Getting in to see it was tough and dangerous, but we all survived and it let us go afterwards. Maybe the Ruby Keep will be the same.”

     “So you think it’ll be tough and dangerous?” said Dennis.

     “Hell, I don’t know!” said the wizard with a sigh. “I’m just guessing! Shall we go find out or what?”

     “We’ll go in the morning,” said Shaun, looking up at the darkening sky. “Might as well spend the night here, go in bright and rested tomorrow."

     The others agreed, and so they turned their rest stop into an overnight camp.

☆☆☆

     The next morning they were up bright and early, eager to be off to see the fabulous Ruby Keep that Naomi had described.

     As they were packing away their belongings, Shaun looked up and saw Kronos racing across the sky above them. I wonder if they can see us, he wondered, and thought about waving up at the watchers in the observatory. Then he laughed aloud, imagining the report that the watcher would have to give to his superior. “Sir, there’s a man down there waving up at us...”

     He laughed again, and shook his head to drive out such silly thoughts. “What are you laughing at?” said a voice just behind him. He spun around to find Naomi standing there, her brilliant, emerald green eyes staring at him curiously. “Something funny?”

     “Just a silly thought,” replied the soldier, backing away and continuing his packing. “Nothing important.”

     “Was it about Kronos?” asked the black girl, and the soldier gave a guilty start. “Aha!” cried Naomi triumphantly. “It was! I saw you looking up at it. In fact, you’ve been staring at it a lot ever since we left Redhill. Why this fascination with the smallest moon?”

     “Just, er, just thinking about some stories an aunt of mine used to tell me when I was a kid,” said Shaun, thinking furiously. “Moon tigers, moon monkeys, that sort of thing. There’s no-one could spin a yarn like my old aunt Tabitha.”

     The black girl stared suspiciously at him. “More secrets,” she said in annoyance. “You still don’t trust me, do you?”

     “Naomi...”

     The black girl laughed, however. Then she grabbed him and gave him a firm, friendly kiss on the mouth. “It’s all right, I understand,” she said hugging up against him, and Shaun cursed the breastplate that prevented him from feeling the warm softness of her body. “There’re some things you’re not allowed to tell me. But don’t worry, maybe I’ll be able to wheedle them out of you later.”

     She looked around to make sure no-one else was close enough to see or hear, then took Shaun’s hand and slipped it inside her tiger skin. Shaun gasped with surprise, suddenly feeling the soft curve of her breast under his fingers, then recovered and gave it a squeeze while the black girl smiled seductively. “Tonight,” she whispered into his ear. “We’ll slip away together, tell the others we’re going to scout around...”

     Then Thomas called over that they were ready to leave, and Shaun removed his hand as casually as he could, gently pushing the black girl away from him. His face felt hot. He must be blushing! he thought, and his steel crotch guard had suddenly become very uncomfortable.

     “By the Gods,” he whispered as Naomi waltzed away with another seductive smile and a wink. Had Diana seen? What would she think if she had? Nobody acted in the least bit differently as they pulled their backpacks onto their shoulders, though, and the soldier whispered a prayer of gratitude as they set off for the mysterious, deserted valley.

☆☆☆

     An hour or so later, they all saw the fabulous building that Naomi had described the day before. It was even more glorious and beautiful than they’d expected. The morning sunlight gleamed and sparkled on its many faceted ruby walls and towers, and pennants fluttered on the end of long poles reaching out over the battlements. The design on the pennants was that of two legless dragons facing each other, almost touching at the nose and wingtip, and Thomas gasped at the sight of them. “The emblem of the Gem Lords,” he said, almost reverently.

     “I didn’t see the pennants yesterday,” said Naomi. “They must have been raised since then, which means someone’s home after all.”

     “Well, let’s go and introduce ourselves,” said Shaun.

     They began walking closer while keeping a wary eye all around. Not just on the castle itself but on the high walls of the valley as well, in case enemies suddenly appeared and charged down at them. They were still five hundred yards from the Ruby Keep, though, when there was a disturbance in the air ahead of them and they all stiffened in fear, expecting an attack from the powerful and enigmatic Gem Lords. A shimmering in the air resolved itself into the form of Resalintas, however. A programmed image that had to have been left behind by the priest himself, and each of the team members later claimed that the powerful and imposing figure had been glaring right at them, as if they, personally, had been the one to arouse his anger.

     “It’s all right,” said Thomas, who was himself quaking with fear. “It’s just a magic spell. Priest magic. He’s left a message for us.”

     “But...” began Shaun, but he was cut off as the figure opened its mouth and began to speak.

     “This is a message for Centaur wolf pack from Captain Resalintas. We received your message, attached to the carpet, and came to investigate. As you can see there is nothing here, and we are not pleased to have had our time wasted in this fashion. You are therefore instructed to go straight to the Beltharan garrison at the Vale of Thorns, where arrangements will be made for your return to Redhill. Then I will decide what is to be done with you. Don’t test my patience any more than you have already by keeping us waiting.” The figure then vanished, leaving no sign that it had ever been there.

     “Nothing here?” said Dennis, staring at the Ruby Keep in confusion.

     “Maybe it was hidden by an illusion spell when they were here,” suggested Shaun. “Like the Oracle, you know?” He looked at Thomas.

     “I don’t know,” said the wizard, though. “I can’t imagine Resalintas being taken in by a simple illusion. Maybe... No.”

     “Maybe what?” prompted Shaun.

     Thomas hesitated before speaking. “Well, maybe the castle simply wasn’t here when they were here. They didn’t find anything for the simple reason that there was nothing here to find.”

     “That’s silly!” protested Teasel. “Buildings don’t just grow legs and walk about!”

     “Some do,” said the wizard. “Lexandria University used to be in the Endless Plains, not far from the Loris Heights. During the bad days of the fall of Agglemon, though, it was threatened by all kinds of factions, each of which wanted to use it to further their own ambitions, so the wizards used their power to move it, lock, stock and barrel, including the buildings themselves, to its present location in the Blue Mountains. And Lexandria consists of dozens of buildings, some of them much larger than that castle there. If we could do that, then people as powerful as the Gem Lords could move the Ruby Keep around easily.”

     They stared at the castle in silence for a while. “So it came here, now, just for our benefit?” said Shaun fearfully.

     “Not necessarily,” replied Thomas. “Maybe the Emerald Oracle has inside knowledge of the Keep’s movements and directed us to the place it knew it would be by the time it took us to get here. Or something like that.”

     His tone of voice suggested he didn’t really believe this, though. He kept remembering that the Emerald Oracle had refused to answer his first question, forcing them to look for the scrolls themselves instead of simply telling them what was on them. And then Resalintas’s farspeaking spell had blown up in his face, preventing the old priest from ordering them to return as soon as they’d reported the location of the scrolls. And on top of that the Oracle had let Naomi’s group through the maze quickly enough for them to return to the mainland before they lost their flying carpets. Any one of those things, or even any two, might just be coincidence, but all three together... Thomas was now more certain than ever that the Gem Lords wanted them to come to the Ruby Keep personally. Them and no-one else. Wanted it so badly that they were willing to go to any lengths in order to leave them no other choice. It was more than a little worrying, to say the least.

     “So, what are we going to do?” asked Dennis. “We’ve got a cast iron excuse for not going in there. We’ve been ordered back by Captain Resalintas himself. We don’t have to take a single step closer to that Gods cursed place.”

     “True,” agreed Thomas, still staring intently at the castle. “We could simply walk away. No-one could blame us.”

     Shaun and Diana glanced at each other, both of them grinning. The look of insatiable curiosity on the wizard’s face was one they’d gotten well used to, and they knew exactly what he was going to do. They’d have to weigh him down with chains to stop him from going in.

     “Maybe some of us ought to go in while the rest wait outside,” suggested Arroc. “Then if anything happens to those who’ve gone in, the rest of us will be able to...”

     “What?” asked Dennis, laughing. “Rescue them? Storm the castle and carry them out?”

     The trog glared at him, but said nothing. Dennis was right, they all knew. There’d be no rescuing anyone imprisoned by the Gem Lords.

     “We might as well all go in then,” said Teasel. “Come on, who are we kidding? We know we’re going in! We’re not going to just turn around now that we’re so close.”

     “She’s right,” agreed Thomas, trembling with excitement. “What are we waiting for? A red carpet?”

     “Right,” agreed Shaun with a sigh. “Come on then.” And with that they began to walk slowly and apprehensively towards the fabulous Ruby Keep.

     They reached the smaller keep on their side of the moat a few minutes later and found the large double gates standing open, an open invitation to enter. Like the rest of the castle they were made of solid ruby, glittering in the sunlight and partially transparent for a few inches into their depths. Shaun tried tapping one of them with the point of his sword, but it was much harder than ordinary ruby and he couldn’t make a mark on it.

     “Magically strengthened,” said Thomas thoughtfully. “This castle may well be indestructible.”

     They walked through the smaller keep until they came to the drawbridge, also made of solid ruby, lowered across the moat. As they took their first steps across, though, Thomas felt a strange tingling sensation all through his body; the first stirrings of the magic sense possessed by all older wizards to one extent or another that allowed them to sense the presence of nearby magical fields. At his young age, though, Thomas’s magic sense was still poorly developed, which meant that the magic field they’d just entered would have to be tremendously powerful for him to be able to sense it.

     He mentioned it to the others, and they nodded, unsurprised. “Keep us informed,” said Shaun as they continued their cautious way across.

     A few steps further on, though, the feeling stopped, and the wizard guessed that they’d crossed a threshold of some kind. We're in their power now, he thought nervously. They could keep us here by force if they wanted to. He almost turned back, just to see whether he could, to see whether the inhabitants of the castle would let them leave, but the others were walking on and he quickened his step to keep up with them.