Chapter Five

As the king stepped up to his throne the next morning, a page hurried up to him. "My liege! Lady Lana is missing!" Hearing that, Thom whirled and ran towards her quarters. Seeing her rooms deserted, he called for a team of the best trackers. After letting them into Lana's room, he went to Michael's. The tall man was still asleep, but woke with a start at the king's footsteps.

"What's wrong?" he asked as he saw the look on Thom's face. The king explained, and Michael jumped out of his room and ran to those of the sorceror general. Thom followed, and winced as he saw the door that Michael had stopped at.

He pounded on the door, and when there was no response, backed up and silently asked the king if he could be pardoned for what he was about to do, and Thom nodded. Michael took a running leap, and kicking the door in, fell to the ground in a crouch in the entrance to the suite.

The king held back the guards who came rushing over, by his command, and Michael glanced through the rooms, probed with his magic, and whispered one word when he came out. "Gone."

Thom ran into the rooms to look for himself as Michael felt for Lana in his mind. She was alive, that much he knew without any trouble, but where was she? He could just barely feel her thoughts, and they seemed to be fading.

He hurried toward the remaining shreds of thought, pushing ahead of him with his magic. Though there were no signs of a struggle in either room, he felt small traces of passively-used magic in both, meaning both were probably kidnapped.

That wasn't what he had expected. Of course, Naboril could have set up the spells himself, but somehow, Michael knew this wasn't what had happened. He would have felt traces of Naboril in the magic, which he most certainly didn't.

In fact, that was the trouble. He should have been able to feel someone under the spell, but he hadn't. It was as if a machine had worked it, and that messed up the spell he usually used to track.

He had never been that good at tracking, and with this problem, it might take him quite a long time to find Lana. He let his mind focus on Lana's trail as he traveled towards her location.

Even as he left the palace grounds, he lost his sense of Lana's mind. He cast around for it for a few moments, and when he didn't find it, he headed back inside to wait. 'After all,' he thought, 'it's better to wait than to get killed because I was acting stupid.'

So, the search continued, and days rolled by. Lana knew not, however, that anyone was looking for her. All she knew was that she was stuck in someone's dungeon with Naboril. She scowled furiously at the sorceror as he swore under his breath, uselessly shaking his wrists, trying to get his chains off.

"Stop that, you useless man. You'll never get anything done that way!" she called in exasperation, even as pain hit her in waves. Apparently, talking hadn't been a good idea.

She held out long enough to send a beacon to Michael with her mind, and then her eyes shut as she gave in to the pain.