The Keeper turned, alert. A short magical pulse passed through the walls.

  “It’s time,” he said and removed a heavy medallion from his neck.

  Veronica stepped closer. She turned the pendant in her palm: the dark half-heart pressed with weight, silver lines sinking deep into the metal, forming an indecipherable sign.

  “It looks very much like Moranda’s amulet,” she said thoughtfully. “The one she wore on the clearing.”

  The Keeper nodded.

  “It is its half,” he said. “The Eclipse Amulet caught distortions in magic: cracks, traces of foreign power, places where reality thinned. For you it will become a compass, if it accepts you.”

  Andrew tensed.

  “So you were connected with her?”

  The Keeper lowered his head.

  “We chose each other long before we chose sides.”

  Pain flickered in his eyes, a kind not shared with mere allies.

  With a slow movement the Keeper slipped the chain with the pendant around Veronica’s neck. The girl flinched. Warmth unfolded from within the medallion, as if it did not warm her, but recognised her. For a moment she felt peace.

  The amulet stilled.

  Only now Veronica realised it was breathing.

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  “So… there was something more between you?” The words came uneven. Veronica felt more than she could express.

  The Keeper passed a hand over his face, as if wiping away a vision.

  “Our union ended the day Moranda first used the Eclipse Amulet to ‘correct’ a magical storm. She did not soften it; she cut it from reality, leaving an empty, motionless place.”

  Andrew’s mouth went dry. In his mind mages argued with spells, not at the cost of worlds.

  “And you didn’t try to stop her?” the words escaped him.

  The old man’s shoulders sagged slightly.

  “You ask why she was not stopped?” He looked at the children. “Believe me, I tried, and for that attempt I had to face the Guardians of the Horizon. They showed me: my interference could have broken the balance.”

  The Keeper fell silent. When he spoke again, his voice was quieter.

  “We Keepers can point the way, but we cannot walk it for the one it is meant for.”

  “And who is it meant for?” Andrew asked.

  “For those unbound by oaths, whose hearts are still free to choose.”

  Veronica instinctively tightened her grip on the amulet. She suddenly felt sorry for this strange old man who had carried his guilt through centuries. Andrew stood silent, but in his eyes grew new understanding. He saw not an all-powerful mage, but a man who had once erred and now tried to correct the past with other hands.

  The Keeper walked to the empty wall and raised his hands. Stones slid apart, forming an arch filled with swirling silver mist. The air howled in a long wail.

  “Now it has changed,” Veronica whispered.

  The Keeper held his breath.

  “The portal will open only for an instant,” he shouted. “Look for traces. Listen to the amulet and trust each other.”

  “Go!” his voice broke through the rising roar.

  Andrew seized Veronica’s hand, and they stepped forward. Light burned but did not blind; it passed through eyelids straight into the soul. The last thing Veronica felt was the boundary between their palms vanishing.

  The silver mist dissolved. The wall closed. The Keeper stood watching where the children had been a second before.

  “I kept my promise, Ora…” he whispered, closing his eyes. “Forgive me that they will go further than we ever should have.”

  His figure froze; golden waves ran across his robe. Then his body began to fade slowly, turning into pale mist.

  Sparks of the fracture hung in the air, then drifted slowly toward where they were already awaited.