Kazic, Nicole and Lyra hiked through high altitude mountains. None of them carried a pack, though they were dressed in rugged clothes suitable for the conditions, including heavy denim trousers and warm coats for the cold, mountain air. They were below both the tree and snow lines, but the wind blowing past the nearest peak occasionally felt like it had daggers of ice in it. Kazic had an ax strapped to his back, while Lyra had a sword on one hip and a blaster pistol on the other. Nicole, on the other hand, had dual short swords on her hips and lower down on her thighs, she’d strapped on her grandfather’s blaster pistols. She found the extra weight burdensome, but didn’t care to be without magic. Ustrina was currently on her shoulder, eagerly taking in the sights of nature.

  As he crested a hill, just ahead of Nicole, Kazic commented, “This isn’t exactly what me had in mind for our first date, but the view is nice.”

  They’d arrived in the mountain range via shuttle, but due to the altitude, they’d spent the better part of two days inside, slowly adjusting the air pressure down until they’d gotten used to how thin it was on the mountain. They would have used a teleporter, but the pressure difference made that an extremely dangerous proposition. Lyra’s house, in her own mountain range, was actually just close enough to the altitude of Heart Forge that the difference in air pressure just led to momentary discomfort, but teleporting from the city to the mountain they were on would have resulted in instant altitude sickness.

  Weeks had passed since she’d been hospitalized and Nicole still felt a little tired, but she’d mostly recovered and in fact, was doing better than her doctor had projected.

  Still, she just couldn’t keep up with Kazic; he and the other dwarves easily adjusted to high altitude, probably due to generation upon generation of miners climbing mountains, in search of valuable minerals.

  After a brief rest halfway up the hill, she joined him and nodded agreement, “You’re right about that.”

  The hill was the highest point they were going to reach and from it she could see a series of mountain valleys, the farthest of which was their goal. Most of the valleys were already dark, because the sun was low on the horizon and dusk had begun, but she could just make out the view of the closest and highest of the valleys, which was bathed in golden-orange light. It was a spectacular view, with a small river winding through the valley, which almost shined like silver. The air was fresh and clean, so unlike the city, with the smell of pine trees drifting on the wind.

  Without warning, Ustrina launched herself from Nicole’s shoulder and took flight; the fresh air of the mountain range had apparently inspired the little dragon to stretch her wings. She’d been taking longer and longer flights as they hiked, only pausing to rest. Nicole had been relieved to discover flying was instinctual to a dragon, because she’d actually been worried she’d somehow have to teach the reptile.

  At Ustrina’s current, small size, she wasn’t even using any levitation magic, though Nicole had sensed the latent potential for it within the creature; the bigger a dragon got, the more magic was required just to lift them off the ground, but as a mere hatchling, Ustrina was free to soar like a bird, flapping her wings for extra lift. In time, she would slowly transition to flying more like a high-performance aircraft and then, finally, a blimp, using magic for propulsion and her wings as control surfaces.

  Lyra was next to crest the hill. From that vantage point, she pulled a satellite photo from her coat pocket and spread it on the ground, comparing it to the view.

  After a moment’s work, she declared, “We’re about half a mile from our first camp site, so if we want to get there before we lose the light, we need to hurry.”

  Kazic nodded and started down the hill, roughly mirroring the path Ustrina had taken, with Lyra right behind. Nicole took a moment to rub her face and then started down the hill after them, while the human envoy from the city and his two scowling dwarf guards got to the top of the hill. None of them carried packs, but the human had a leather satchel bag filled with documents he insisted couldn’t leave his possession.

  Nicole was still mildly sick, but at least she moved faster than Peares. She had no idea where the city council found the fellow, but she gathered he was a lawyer, linguist and an amateur archaeologist who studied the ancient writing of the Ulkun. He was almost as young as Nicole, with brown hair and a stick-thin body. During the shuttle ride and the time in decompression, he’d been friendly and even enjoyable to play a game of chess with, but as soon as they’d set out that morning, he’d become insufferable, complaining about the mosquitoes, how sweaty he’d become, how thin and cold the air was and how much his new boots made his feet ache.

  After he fell into a bush that gave him an itchy rash that dramatically increased his whining, Kazic quietly suggested a little distance and Nicole had been quick to nod agreement, with Lyra silently keeping up. For most of the day, they’d taken to staying so far ahead they couldn’t hear him complain anymore.

  When they got to the bottom of the hill and the valley opened up in front of them, Nicole whistled as loudly as she could and held her arm out like a perch, almost like one would do with a trained bird of prey. Quickly responding to the call, Ustrina dove from the sky and landed on Nicole’s forearm. The dragon wasn’t gentle about how she landed and slapped Nicole in the face with one of her wings, while simultaneously digging a talon into Nicole’s arm.

  “Ow!” Nicole indicated her complaint to the dragon in an overly-dramatic fashion, since she’d found the reptile responded well to such exaggerations.

  Ustrina adjusted her grip with a sheepish look of embarrassment on her face and removed her talon from Nicole’s fresh wound, which quickly healed. The dragon was about to clamber up to her shoulder, but when Nicole used a wordless tone of disapproval, she stopped. Nicole removed a handkerchief from her pocket and wiped the blood from Ustrina’s claws, then nodded approval for the dragon to climb up to her usual perch.

  Kazic looked on, in wonder, “Ye’ve got the little one trained quite well. She comes when ye call and seems to know what ye want.”

  Nicole nodded, “It’s odd, because I haven’t trained her at all. I’ve just been treating her like a small child and she seems to figure out what I want, almost as if she knows what I’m thinking.” She grinned, “Heaven only knows what will happen when she reaches the teenage rebellion phase.”

  “Yeah, but the trouble is, you’re the only one she listens to.” Lyra grumbled, “I’m getting a little tired of her breathing fire to extort food out of me every time you’re asleep.” On seeing Nicole’s exasperated expression, Lyra laughed, making it obvious she didn’t actually care and she’d only brought it up as a joke.

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  Kazic grinned and pointed out, “Well, then ye just have to stop being afraid of fire.”

  “True,” Lyra nodded, “but that’s a pretty deep instinct for trolls. I’ve spent a lifetime working on it. I still feel nervous every time I look into a cooking flame, but then I make dinner anyway.”

  They soon reached the river and an area wide enough for their purposes, with an extra large clearing, just as the light of sunset faded.

  Kazic appeared nervous as he looked to Nicole, “Ye ready to open that thing ye’ve got?”

  Nicole slipped the small, hexagonal coin out of her pocket and smiled at Kazic’s expression, teasing, “What’s wrong?”

  “Me still don’t like it,” he stared at the coin, in distrust, “but me has to admit, it’s handy.”

  “True enough.” Nicole examined the area and knelt to set the coin down, while giving it a quick sideways pull with both hands.

  All three of them retreated to a safe distance as the coin expanded to become a collection of seven hexagons, each about seven yards across. Since the ground wasn’t level, stilt-like legs on wide feet lowered from the bottom until the whole structure was perfectly level. With a solid foundation laid out, a building rose upward over the course of a few seconds.

  At the same time that she watched the process, Nicole paid attention to her magical senses, picking up seriously powerful spatial magic, indicating the entire structure had actually been shrunken and stored inside the coin for the duration it was closed and the metal only appeared to melt and flow, but the real truth was that it was all based on the coin manipulating its own structure through high-quality space-twisting effects.

  The result was a brassy, hive-like building of the familiar design Nicole had seen in her dreams, with the door facing them. Since night was starting, there were exterior lights on top and the overhang of the door bore a series of recessed lights, outlining the door in a soft, white glow.

  The presence of the Kurg segment in Nicole’s pocket was the reason they carried only very basic supplies, because she’d stocked the building with six months of food.

  As Nicole opened the door, she looked on the silvery insect-like shape of the shuttle, which had a bubble-like cockpit for a head and six robotic legs for landing in just about any kind of terrain. Nicole was grateful the foyer was large enough to store it, which was quite handy. Passing the shuttle’s backside, they entered the center of the hive.

  Before them was a warm and cheery hearth that always burned without fuel and responded to the desires of those that were nearby, keeping the room comfortable. The hearth was six-sided, with a range-like cooking surface on top and downward-sliding doors on the sides, which revealed compartments that could be used like ovens, with enough room for six cooks to work at the same time. Her only complaint was a matter of how awkwardly high the cooking surfaces were, which had forced Nicole to install a set of wood platforms around the hearth, because the place clearly hadn’t been designed with humans, dwarves or trolls in mind.

  To either side were a pair of doors that led to the rooms the three dwarves and the envoy had claimed, while at the back was a room with a large, wall-hugging stairwell leading to the upper floor, two rooms of which Lyra and Nicole had claimed, while the area underneath the stairs was big enough to be used as a storage area and pantry.

  It was strange, but each upper bedroom had a rather large combination shower/wash room complete with a what turned out to be a matter-disintegrating toilet-like appliance with an awfully hard seat, but according to Lyra, they hadn’t been there when she’d gone up the stairs alone, ahead of Nicole. She simply assumed Lyra had somehow overlooked them, and the showers had turned out to be quite wonderful, quickly adjusting the temperature of the magically-created water for maximum comfort and then, as soon as the shower was over, the water returned to nothingness, leaving the user dry and all the dirt that had been carried away by the water was left loose on the floor, allowing it to be easily swept up with a broom. Similarly, there was a tub large enough for a bath which would instantly fill with water, as desired, though it also looked suitable for washing clothes.

  Everything was lit from overhead by magical light fixtures that almost looked like modern electric lights, aside from the fact the glowing surfaces were just metal tubes. Nicole couldn’t help but admire the design, however, since like the hearth, the lights intuitively responded to the desires of those that were present and the more time they spent in the building, the more intuitive it became, as if the building were slowly learning human speech, mannerisms and just possibly thought.

  Spread around the hearth was a set of wooden furniture with a dark varnish that looked rather nice next to the brass-like metal of the walls, floor and ceiling. To one side was a large dining table, suitable for up to ten to eat at, while on the other side, there was an area set aside for relaxation, complete with a table that had been prepared for a variety of games.

  Nicole had chosen the furniture and Lyra insisted on paying for everything; Nicole’s grandfather had become rich beyond the wildest dreams of even the most greedy dwarf, due to having shared knowledge of technology with the dwarves of Heart Forge. Since his only child, Levi, was gone, Lyra had inherited it all. She cared little for riches and only spent what she needed in order to buy food and maintain the property she owned. Thus, it was no burden for her to buy supplies for Nicole.

  Lyra headed for the hearth, saying, “I’ll cook something for everyone.”

  “Thank ye, ma’am.” Kazic nodded as he sat down, to relax.

  Feeling tired, Nicole laid down on one of the couches and Ustrina curled up on her belly.

  It wasn’t long before Peares and his guards arrived, with Peares slumped, unconscious, on the shoulder of one of them.

  “Ye’d think the little man had never walked a day in his life.” The guard carrying him complained.

  “Aye.” The second agreed, “All day long, non-stop complaining. If complaining was a sport, little Peares would be the world champion.”

  The stick-thin man was unceremoniously dumped on a couch, with his satchel of important documents dumped on his legs and the grumbling guards each headed for their own rooms, clearly wanting a door between themselves and their charge.

  Kazic asked, “What happened to him?”

  “The little turd stopped walking and said he couldn’t go on, even though we could see this place from where he gave up. He just laid down and fell asleep right after.”

  Nicole sat up, set Ustrina on the couch and walked over to Peares. Putting a hand on his head, she found he was a bit over-warm, as if he was running a fever. Next, she checked the rash on his hand, finding it worse than ever. She unbuttoned his shirt sleeve and noted, with great surprise, that it had spread all the way up his arm. She quickly pulled back the neck of his shirt to expose his chest, revealing the rash was also there.

  Knowing that his ailment was more serious than anyone realized and the plan was to turn back if any serious injury or illness became a problem, she decided to quietly heal him, because she definitely didn’t want to go home, empty-handed.

  She switched off the nullifier and hugged the little man, while humming a song her aunt taught her, which was designed to extend a troll’s regenerative powers outside their own body.

  “Oh, so now ye’re hugging other men in front of me?” Kazic joked, “Are ye trying to make me jealous?”

  Nicole finished and took another look. Peares’ rash was completely gone.

  Turning to Kazic, she smiled as she switched the nullifier back on, “Just healing the fool, so we don’t have to turn back. I don’t care about his mission, but we can’t continue without him and I really do need help.”

  “Ye think those odd creatures ye met in yer dream are real and will help ye?”

  “I don’t have any other hope.” Nicole reluctantly admitted, “I don’t know what they can do, but they promised to do all they could.”

  As she laid back down, Kazic nodded, “Well, me hopes it works out for ye.”

  Nicole yawned and muttered to herself, “Me too.”

  She picked up Ustrina and the two of them curled up on the couch, together, looking into each other’s eyes as they fell asleep, while Kazic smiled at how close they were.