opened it and admitted the Rangers and their large escort. When they had ridden down the wide pathway that led from the street to the front of the mansion, the column halted and the officer disappeared inside the mansion. Within a few moments, the officer reappeared followed by an older officer with short, gray hair cut in a military fashion. The man was distinguished looking, but sported a thin scar running from his temple to behind his ear, probably a sword scar. The man was obviously the General and Garth smiled when he recognized him.
“General Fernandez,” Garth greeted, “your hair has grayed since we last met.”
The General stopped and focused his piercing eyes on Garth and it took a few moments before his eyes lit up with recognition. “Colonel!” General Fernandez announced. “I never expected to lay eyes on you again. Dismount so I don’t have to break my neck looking up at you, and I’ve told you before that you can call me Julio.”
“As you wish, Julio,” Garth smiled, “and you can call me Garth. I am no longer a Colonel.”
The General switched his gaze to the rest of Garth’s party with a suspicious look as Garth was dismounting. He turned to the officer and said, “Keep a close eye on the rest of them while I talk privately with this man.”
The General turned and walked into the mansion with Garth on his heels. The General did not break his military stride until he reached an office with two guards posted outside. He opened the door and entered the office, allowing Garth entry before he closed the door, and then sat at his desk, waving Garth to a chair.
“The years have not been bad to you,” General Fernandez smiled.
“The color of your hair appears to be the only change you have suffered,” Garth smiled back. “I assume that you are the control behind Kantor these days?”
“There was no one else I could trust,” laughed Julio. “Speaking of trust, I notice that you do not trust your own party. Are they a threat here in Kantor?”
“They are not a threat to you or me,” Garth answered. “Your men can safely stand down.”
“Then why do you hide things from them?” quizzed Julio.
“Habit, mostly,” Garth admitted. “The years since we last met have not been peaceful ones for Kalina and myself. We have been hunted for years and I am sure the hunt still continues today. It is safer this way.”
General Fernandez shouted for his door guard and the door opened to admit one of the men. “Sergeant,” Julio ordered, “bring me the papers we found on the Black Devil last week. Also, dismiss the escort and invite our guests into the sitting room where they will be more comfortable and see to their horses.”
The Sergeant disappeared and returned almost immediately. He handed some papers to the General and closed the door behind him as he left. Julio rifled through the papers and withdrew two that he handed to Garth. Garth accepted the papers and looked at them. His eyes widened, as he looked at pictures of Kalina and himself, complete with physical descriptions and notations about Arik and Tedi. The description of the boys was incomplete, as if made by someone who had heard about them but had never seen them. The Dark Rider, Klarg, immediately came to mind.
“What else did you find on this Black Devil?” Garth asked.
The General passed over the rest of the papers and Garth flipped through them. Most of them meant nothing to Garth, but he stopped at one sheet that mentioned Lord Wason. Reading the sheet thoroughly, Garth picked out the descriptions of the five Children as they had appeared in Tagaret, including Niki’s red dress, which she had worn only during the prison break in Tagaret. Oddly, there was no mention about General Gregor or Sergeant Trank, which led Garth to believe that someone in the Royal Palace was serving two masters.
“You always were good at gathering intelligence,” complimented Garth. “I can see now that Garth Shado will have to disappear.”
The General took the papers back and looked at the one, which had interested Garth. “This does appear to be your party,” noticed General Fernandez. “You have been traveling a great deal. Why have you come to Kantor?”
“We are on a fool’s mission,” sighed Garth. “There is an artifact which was in the Presidential Palace when Oscar Dalek got married. I need to recover it.”
“A fool’s mission, indeed,” agreed General Fernandez. “What is the artifact?”
“It is called the Crown of Light,” Garth answered. “It is a crown small enough to be a ring on a woman’s finger. It belongs to the fairies and has been missing for hundreds of years at least.”
“I doubt that you have become a jewelry merchant since we last met,” Julio stated. “Why do you need this crown?”
“Julio,” Garth admitted, “the Ancient Prophecy has begun. I do not know if you are aware of the Prophecy, but it foretells of the death of the Dark One. The Crown of Light is needed to help fulfill that Prophecy. I need to find it even if I have to take the mountain apart grain by grain.”
The General nodded and stared out the window at the mountain for a period. “I have read about the Ancient Prophecy,” declared the General. “Of course, I am not sure if I believe it. I suppose that the young men you have with you are the Children of the Prophecy?”
“Yes,” confided Garth. “We also have the Sword of Heavens which will be used to kill Sarac. The Prophecy is true, Julio, and it has fallen to me to see that these Children succeed.”
“There is a chance, Colonel,” General Fernandez suggested. “Most of the Palace no longer exists, but there is a section of the ground floor still accessible. More importantly, the section contains the library and the treasure room. The library has been gutted and the contents removed, but the treasure room has been inaccessible because no one could enter it. If President Suarez kept this crown in the treasure room, you have a chance. If not, you will have to dismantle the mountain and you will not live that long.”
“How is it possible that the treasure room survived and yet has never been opened?” Garth inquired.
“It is amazing,” granted the General. “I watched the mountain appear myself. It didn’t grow or fall into place; it sort of materialized from nothing. One corner of the Palace was left sticking out. When we went to search for survivors, we found that it extended into the mountain like a cave. In fact, that is what we think it is. Wherever the mountain came from, the cave was already in it and so was a dragon. I watched the dragon fly out of the cone of the mountain. I suppose the cave may have been his other entrance and that is why he never returned. You may be able to get in through the cone.”
“Has no one ever tried before?” Garth asked.
“Oh, yes, some have tried,” sighed Julio. “And they died trying. No one has gone into the cone and come out alive. Treasure does you no good when you are dead.”
“Is the treasure vault accessible from this cave?” Garth queried.
“If my theory about the cave meeting the cone is valid, it must be,” Julio suggested. “The problem with that approach is that the vault was built of solid stone many feet thick. A bunch of dwarf miners would take years to get through it.”
“I haven’t given my people any lessons in mountain climbing yet,” confided Garth. “It looks like I will have to go in alone.”
“We don’t train for mountain terrain in Kantor,” admitted the General. “With the exception of this one mountain, Kantor is as flat as a calm sea. Let me host your group for this evening and I will take you into the cave tomorrow so you can see for yourself.”
General Fernandez escorted Garth into the sitting room and was introduced to the Alcea Rangers. After General Fernandez explained the situation, the Rangers discussed the various approaches. After a lengthy discussion, they decided that General Fernandez would escort them into the cave in the morning so that they could assess the possibility of using magic to break through the stonewall. At the same time, Midge would fly into the cone and see if there was an opening through the center of the mountain. By the time the discussions were done, the hour had grown quite late and the Rangers opted to retire. Garth stayed up with General Fernandez for several additional hours discussing the events of the last seventeen years.
In the morning, the group assembled for the trip to the cave. Niki professed to not feeling well and decided to stay in town. Actually, Niki was depressed again. If the Rangers were going to use magic to open the vault, it would be either Kalina or Fredrik that would wield the magic. They certainly would not need to heal the cave, so Niki felt useless once again. Everyone else was too excited about gaining the Crown of Light to worry about Niki’s feelings.
Midge was sent on his way and the rest of the group proceeded to the cave entrance. After they left, Niki decided to leave the mansion and do some shopping in the city. The General’s men had been told that Garth’s party were guests, so no one stopped Niki from leaving the mansion. Niki changed into a red dress and donned her
