He created amind link and looked at her spirit aura, which was glowing like asmall sun. He couldn’t believe how much magic she held. Her passionwas feeding off some magic source. No wonder she had knocked himunconscious when she kissed him before. He was suddenly afraid shemight get power narcosis again.
‘Controlyourself Mandy! You’ll harm us.’ he said.
‘I don’t wantto. I just want you!’ she replied dreamily.
‘Allalanllea,Miranda’s overloaded with magic essence. Why?’ yelled Aquitain.
‘Damn I shouldhave guessed this might happen.’ she replied and she went behindMiranda placed her hands on her shoulders and whispered in her earand Miranda went to sleep.
‘What do youknow about sorcerers Aquitain?’ asked Allalanllea.
‘The ones Ihave met have been arrogant and temperamental; they have fewpowers, usually elemental which they often get spontaneously. Thepowers they have are variable and often very powerful. They seem toabsorb magic essence freely from the environment and they generallydie young as they can’t control their magic?’
‘That is areasonable summary however what you call temperament can also becalled passion. Sorcerers use passion to force magic to their willsin a similar way that you use your mind. Their spirits soak upmagic essence like a sponge soaks water so they can be a danger tothemselves as well as others.’
‘Do you knowmost Llanlleans are sorcerers? When Miranda was young we discoveredshe had the abilities to be a powerful sorcerer but Snowbelle hatesall wizards and sorcerers and refused to let her daughter be asorcerer. She forced her instead to be a druid. Miranda’s spiritstill soaks up magic essence even though she has little use for itas she uses divine powers derived from the Lady.’
‘One of thefunctions of her magic tattoo was to burn excess magic limiting heruptake of magic essence. When she became a priestess of the Ladythe tattoo was modified by the Lady and it was her passion for theLady that allowed her a measure of control. I suspect that herpassion for you and the fact that we are in a magic node hasclearly upset the balance.’
‘She loves youdearly but is terrified that if the tattoo is removed she will harmyou. Should you remove the tattoo you will need to continuallybleed off her power as it could become dangerous to both of you.The problem has kept me awake for countless nights. Perhaps yourknowledge of magic items might allow you to fashion an item thatshe could wear that would safely limit her uptake. Perhaps you knowof another way to solve the problem. She has chosen you and youher. It is now your problem.’
‘Hmm. Thank youAllalanllea that explains an awful lot, I will look after her,’replied Aquitain as he created a power link to her mind and beganbleeding off her excess power into his source and when it was fullto overflowing he created an air shield in the shape of a couch andlaid her upon it then woke her.
‘What happened,Tain?’ she asked groggily.
‘We pledged toeach other then you kissed me and fainted. I think this magic nodeoverloaded your body with excess magic. I’ve bled it off. Youshould be okay now.’
Miranda lookedat Allalanllea.
‘You toldhim?’
‘Yes he neededto know my child. He is your chosen now. There should be no secretsbetween you.’
‘I’m so sorryTain. I wanted to tell you but I was afraid you wouldn’t love meanymore.’ she cried.
‘Mandy, ifhaving too much power is your worst problem, then we will have noworries together. I’ve spent most of my life with too little power.I’m sure that we can find plenty of ways to use it. Also, given abit of time and the right equipment I’m sure that I can make anamulet that will solve the problem. In the mean time we’ll justhave to bleed off your power a little before we kiss as they’rerather potent.’
She smiledradiantly and whispered adoringly ‘You’re so wonderful.’
‘Just for youMandy.’ he whispered back, kissed her and then continued in a moreserious tone.
‘We’ve got someserious decisions to make. The question is what do we do from nowon? There are a lot of crazy things happening on Mudrun at present.Whether we like it or not it’s unlikely to stop so we need to findout who and what’s behind it. We need to find my father, as he mayknow what is happening. We need to find Zephira, Alpha and yourfather. Neither of us has a job with the Druid’s Council anymore sowe are free to follow any lead.’
‘The mostlikely lead is the Moonmist champion’s sceptre that has beenstolen. The indication is that it was stolen by someone fromMoonmist and may be heading back there. However, to get therethey’ll need to go through the southern gateway or possibly throughthis new gateway found by the Wolf people.’
‘To complicatethe issue, I talked with Squalash while you were away. He told mehe came from a meeting with others of his kind on the othercontinent. He said the magic tastes different over there. Theythink it is causing the normally neutral elementals to becomechaotic or lawful and fight amongst each other.’
‘This would bea handy chance to find out exactly who, or what, is causing some ofthe problems, as I’m obviously not the cause of the trouble overthere. Do we run and hide or try to help Featherdown unravelwhether the Time of Chaos is really upon us or whether there issome great deception being fed to the people?’
Miranda satthinking for a minute then spoke with a cultured accent.
‘Mother told methat a Queen should always look after her people. If I am to beyour Queen then I guess we gain no advantage by running and hiding.It is a large world and if we keep on the move then it will be hardto track us down. If we try to solve a few of their problems thenwe will have the backing of the people.’
In HighGalactic Command speech she said.
‘I will go tothe Wolf people and find out
