Diana watched, amazed, as Alaeric was galvanized into action. One moment he was sitting, leaning weakly against his cousin’s arm. The next instant, he had sprung to his feet to wield his sword and face the two strangers who had emerged from the woods behind them.

Lauren also rose up quickly to arm herself, but when she realized who had spoken, she dropped the sword and slowly sank to her knees, her head bowed low. “M-My King,” she gasped.

Alaeric knelt as well but held his sword upright between his hands. "Tarq..."

“Get up, both of you,” Tarq growled. “What are you doing here?"

“Maybe we should be asking you that..." Alaeric challenged as he and Lauren stood back up. He still held the sword tightly. "what business could you possibly have with Mark and Lisa?"

Tarq's flickered. "And...who are Mark and Lisa?"

Lauren came forward between the two and cleared her throat. "The Harrison children. The maelstrom brought them here, and we followed the brother and sister of our companion here." She took Diana's hand. "May I present to you, Diana Harrison. Diana, this is King Tarq of the Kingdom of Dal Ryeas and Lady Carr, First Minister of the Crown."

Diana bowed in respect, having never met royalty before. Tarq was quite tall, with long blonde hair and dark-blue, almost black, eyes.  "Y-Your majesty."

Lauren looked around them in puzzlement. "Where is here, anyway?"

"You’re on Dal Ryeas,” the King replied. "You remember. Where you're not supposed to be right now?"

“How is that possible?" asked Alaeric, “Where on Dal Ryeas are we? I do not recognize this place.”

“The empty lands beyond the Pyram Sea,” replied the enchantress Carr, from behind the King. She was much the same as when Alaeric had last seen her. Tall and slender with chocolate brown skin, large luminous brown eyes, and short curly brown hair highlighted with red glints. She appeared to be about thirty years old, which was many years less than her actual age. Her attention focused on the blood-stained bandage covering Alaeric’s arm, and so she never saw his frown as she approached him.

“Prince Alaeric, I see you are hurt. May I help?”

“No need, Lady Carr,” Alaeric replied coolly, “Lauren and Diana have been excellent doctors.”

“I am certain they are,” Carr replied, “but if you’ll pardon my saying so, you look like you're going to fall over. So, at least sit down.” She gently pushed him, and he fell, sitting down heavily in the grass. "That's better." A light blue glow emanated from her hand as she tended to his arm. She cleared her throat and addressed Tarq. "Your Majesty...there are things we must discuss concerning this new situation.”

Alaeric winced as Carr worked on his wound. "Like why you brought us here and the whereabouts of our companions. And where is my wife?"

"I'm speaking more about her presence here..." the enchantress pointed at Lauren. “Why did she break her exile?”

“Look, Carr,” Alaeric snapped back, “it takes a first-rate talent to create an opening the size that swept our friends onto the path we saw. So what did you do with the pair you inadvertently grabbed? Was this a deliberate attempt to get Lauren into-?”

"Enough, Alaeric," Lauren interrupted him gently as she approached Tarq. "How did you find us?"

"I was brought here by fluctuations I saw in the Tal. You were brought here by force?"

"No, not us. We were in pursuit of the Harrison children when they were brought here. But...why would they be sent to Dal Ryeas...?"

Before Tarq could speculate, Alaeric demanded again, "Where's Tayaela?"

"She left two years after you,” Tarq replied. “She left a letter stating that she was going to try and find you among the paths. She felt that she betrayed you by not going with you and that she needed to find you and get your forgiveness.”

"Why? I never blamed her for your stupidity.”

Tarq was unruffled. "I know, but she blamed herself for not trying harder to stop me or getting more clans ministers on your side. I've searched everywhere for her. But you know she has the skills to hide in the paths, or on the cores or edgeworlds. She even hid herself from the Tal.” His voice became softer as he caught Alaeric’s look. "Don't worry, we'll find her. Come on, let's go to our camp and try to decide what to do about...everything.”

As they walked back to the royal camp, Alaeric explained what had happened the night before while leaning on Tarq's strong arm for support. Diana thought they seemed like best friends again.

"First, we must find these missing children. We will send out scouts to search. Alaeric, once Carr has your arm healed, will you organize it?”

The prince was surprised. "I would be honored."

The King escorted the bemused party to his tent. It was large, roomy, and comfortable although sparsely furnished. Alaeric was led to a bed in the far corner behind a curtain where Carr attended to his wounds.

"Is he all right?” Lauren called out worriedly.

"He has a little infection, and he needs rest,” came the terse reply from behind the curtain.

"You know," the King said as they sat down at a table filled with papers and maps, "I don't want to be an alarmist but, I begin to suspect the long-fingered hands of Sindelar are responsible for your presence here. Maybe he thought to distract me from his real aims if he lured you back.”

"Well, it worked..." muttered Lauren.

"What?"

"Nothing. Go on."

"We think he has an invasion plan ready, and I'm afraid of what that implies. He must be stronger than we realized.” He pounded his fist on the table, and numerous papers dropped to the ground.

"Um...I have been absent for five years. What do you mean?"

Tarq explained patiently, "Ever since the rebellion, strange creatures have been marauding throughout Dal Ryeas. While we've been able to capture or kill many of the worst, there always seem to be more. And there's so many, in fact, that the Tal is clouded. Sometimes even from path manipulation and the energies that it creates so that we can't see beyond our borders at times.”

"Why do you suspect Sindelar?" Lauren asked.

Carr joined them from behind the curtain. "Sindelar's talents combined very high-level sorcery with unmatched crystal manipulation of maelstroms and traveling the paths. Only a holder of a Tal is greater or more focused. Sindelar may be on the wrong side, but he is brilliant and incredibly skilled. My own powers dim beside his.”

"After Tayaela left," Tarq continued, "there was an immediate increase in path activity. We thought that because she was agitated and upset, she was inadvertently using her skills as a pathforger and opened too many paths at once from here during her search, or that she was tapping into the Tal to find other pathlines to Alaeric. We knew she was searching the worlds for him, and when she vanished, we thought that she had found you, and the creatures were debris from her forging.”

"Then, these monsters began to manifest. For three-and-a-half years my fighters and I have battled them. It's now even worse than it was in the earlier surges. The new ones are harder to destroy. We've driven most of them off, but we know that they're still in the wastelands and the mountains. Then, it stopped for a year: no new monsters, no new activity, Nothing.

“About six months ago, while I was trying to enhance a spell for a University sorcerer, there was an incredible power surge in the Tal. I was holding it, and someone tried to grab it from me. Since it was in my hand, the attempt failed. As soon as I pulled it back into my control, I got the image of Sindelar with Killia. After that, we've been monitoring every flux and shift in the world openings, the Tal, and various spells. We need to determine their scope and purpose. We know they want me dead, and the throne returned to Tadiak, but it’s how they are going about doing this that has us worried.”

"Which is how you found us, I suppose," Lauren sighed. "Our entrance here must have triggered a warning."

"Actually, it was the event two nights ago that summoned us. There was a tremendous maelstrom focused here. The energies it displayed were similar to other disturbances that I've seen recently in the Tal. We were nearly here, so we could pinpoint the area in which it occurred and set up the Tal to analyze any others. The only difference in the shift was that we sensed an anchor that led us here."

Lauren nodded. "Alaeric used a blood anchor to track the children through the maelstrom."

Carr frowned. "Well, that would explain his wound. What were you thinking?"

"I was thinking of the safety of two innocent children! Besides, it was Alaeric's idea. I tried to talk him out of it."

"Maybe you should have tried harder."

"Look, Carr, if you want-"

Tarq raised his hand, and both women stopped speaking and looked sullenly at each other. "Anyway, a few weeks ago, we saw too much energy gathered around here, in what should be an empty place. The Tal could not penetrate these energies, so we decided to investigate in person. We have some troops and advisors along with us, as many as Carr could transport without draining herself.”

Diana finally spoke up, meekly, "Your Majesty, are...I mean...can your people help find my brother and sister? I-I'm really quite worried about them. I fear we're behind them by at least a day."

Tarq smiled at the girl. "Your timeline would make sense. Carr and I searched for the whirlwind's radius from two days ago when we found you all. We were trying to figure out which way the path to Sindelar was heading. However, something or someone is preventing me from seeing clearly with the Tal.”

"What is this Tal?" Diana asked.

“It is our world talisman,” replied Lauren, “the protection given by Divine Wisdom. I told you about that, remember?"

Diana looked away. "And I thought it was all a myth..."

Lauren smiled. "Well, now, you know better. A Tal in the hand of the ruler possesses great power and greater responsibility. Every world has one." She fell silent and looked at Tarq, who was now avoiding her eyes.

"Ah,” said the King before the silence became awkward, "here comes supper. Let's eat and think how to find your brother and sister. I am sure they must be frantic by now”.

He smiled and surprisingly reached over to take Diana's hand. "I have some of my finest trackers here, so not to worry, we will find them. In fact, we'll send out a second set tomorrow, and Prince Alaeric will lead them. We should have you home in no time!"

Diana felt comforted by the King's words. Things seemed so much better than this morning.