‘I’m sorry, Miranda. Your passion swept me away. I couldn’tkeep concentrating.’ he said.
‘It’s the nature of this body. It will only stay solid while Iconcentrate on it staying solid. If anything breaks myconcentration then poof I’m a cloud of mist again.’
‘Aquitain. I can’t believe this is happening. You’re sayingthat you can finally be a Newman again, but if I get you excitedyou’ll explode.’
‘Yes my sweet. We can probably hold hands, but anything elseis out at the moment. I will, of course, work on my concentrationtechnique.’
Miranda threwher scimitar to the ground.
‘I don’t believe this. I just don’t believe it. All I’ve everwanted is some nice guy to love and I get you. Why can’t you benormal like everyone else at least for a while?’
She dropped toher knees.
‘Lady why are you tormenting me this way? I’ve always beenyour faithful servant. Can you please help him to benormal?’
Aquitainchanged back to his young male Newman form again and with tearsrunning down his cheeks he said.
‘I love you Miranda. I’m sorry. One day I’ll be able to make anew body for myself and we’ll be able to cuddle and kiss and do allthe things that normal people can do. I promise.’
She stood upand her heart melted. She cuddled into him.
‘I’m sorry my love. It must be just as hard for you as it isfor me. We’ll get through this and by the Lady when we do, we’llmake up for all the lost time.’
They stoodthere for a few minutes just content to hold each other, until hesuddenly popped into a mist cloud again.
‘We better get going.’ he said.
Miranda pickedup the green figurine and Yllandril and then joined by Aquitain inhis Newman form walked the full length of the tunnel where therewas another open gateway without turning into mist.
Aquitainqueried the gate and found that it went to Moonmist as they hadexpected. Miranda wanted to pass through the gate to find out whereon Moonmist it went but Aquitain felt it was more important to findBellen. From what Bellen had said there was a secret doorway in thetunnel leading to the lair of the sentient book and it was thisthat they had to find.
Aquitain closedand sealed the gateway portal to ensure no other surprises camethrough and they returned to the gate at the palace end where theyhad entered and passed through. They decided that Miranda shouldwear her armour again as it would be too difficult for Aquitain tohold the mind clay armour together if they were attacked. Afterdonning her armour they once more set out to find the secret wayinto the sentient book’s lair.
This time,Aquitain turned himself into a Logicon slime form. He felt he coulduse his Logicon taste ability to track Bellen. It seemed to work.He followed the Trixie’s scent about a third the way along thetunnel then it disappeared. He popped back to his mist cloud formto think about the next step.
‘There’s got to be a loose tile or something similar heresomewhere and it has to be low enough for Bellen totouch.’
He turned intoa cloud of eyes and floated close to the wall checking every tilefor five paces on either side of where Bellen’s scent haddisappeared, but with no luck. He returned to his cloud shape formore thinking.
He askedMiranda to press her thumb against one of the tiles then adjustedthe colour of the light given off by her scimitar through a wholespectrum of colours until he found a deep purple that allowed himto see the tile marked by the sweat on her thumb then he searchedthe walls again but with no success.
‘Maybe he used the wand.’ said Miranda.
‘Perhaps you’re right. I would have expected a mechanicaldevice as all these tiles will resist magic, but it’s possible thewand could have some type of power built in that would open adoor.’
Aquitainthought for a couple more minutes on how he would do it thenreturned to his Newman male form and said.
‘I think I know what they’ve done. Give me the dispel magicwand and wait here.’ and he went back to the gateway at the palaceend and cast a dispel magic at the black tiles holding the gaterunes. Nothing happened at the gateway as he expected, becausegates are much too powerful to dispel, but Miranda yelledexcitedly.
‘Aquitain whatever you did worked. A circle of runes justappeared on the ground near me.’
Aquitain camerunning back smiling.
‘This is the ultimate in secret entrances, a displacedteleport ring and on top of magic resistant tiles as well. Theseguys went to a lot of trouble to keep us out of where we’re going.Are you ready my lovely; it’s time to fight.’
Chapter 28 Twice theConfusion
They held hands andstepped onto the teleport circle and appeared in a totally darkroom. Aquitain immediately used the dispel magic wand to eliminatethe magic darkness and the light from Miranda’s scimitar lit up thearea. They were in one half of a hexagonal shaped room about eightpaces in width, which was divided across the centre by a blackwall. To the left and right of them and facing them were two brassconstructs.
‘Well, well what have we here?’ said a mindspeak voice intheir minds. The mind wizard, Aquitain, his little spider friendYllandril and a Zenostruct. Since Zenostructs are very rare andquite difficult to make you have probably found a way to capturethe one in pathway three. I salute you, that was no mean feat. Youalso managed to find your way here, another excellent bit of work.The question that interests us both is whether you can survive nowthat you’re here.’
Instantly therewas a loud piercing sound that made it difficult to think let aloneconcentrate and the two brass constructs began moving towards them.Aquitain popped into his misty form and yelled to Miranda.
‘Sing loudly.’
Miranda brokeinto a beautiful prayer to the Lady to bless them and Aquitainconcentrated on her words to block out the other hideous sound andcreated a sphere of silence around them. That would allow him toconcentrate but unfortunately also block any prayers, which Mirandamight want to use. The second priority was to neutralize the twobrass constructs. He looked closely
