“Look,” said Pat, “it’s not our job to sort this out for all time. We’re only responsible for the time we live in, which is now. And here’s the thing. If we decide to move all the Families, all the Great Gate mages, to Westil, and then we realize it was a terrible mistake, we can put them back where they were.”

“Where do we go?” asked Enopp.

Anonoei laughed. “Darling, we can go anywhere we want.”

“That’s the big hole in all these plans,” said Danny. “We’re like Congress. We make huge decisions that wreck things for everybody else, but then we exempt ourselves.”

“Nobody can force us to go anywhere or stay anywhere,” said Eluik. “But apart from that, and healing people, we don’t have all that much power. We do transportation and healing.”

“We’re like emergency medical technicians,” said Enopp.

“We can do harm,” said Pat.

“But this group,” said Danny, “I think we’re all decent people. Anonoei, Eluik, Enopp, you know just how terrible a gatemage’s powers can be. Will you ever do something like that to somebody else?”

“We can’t do it,” said Anonoei. “We don’t make gates, we just go.”

“I’m going to be a gatemage,” said Enopp. “I think I already am one.”

“So here’s how it works,” said Danny. “We use our own power to visit back and forth between worlds as often as we like. But we don’t hurt anybody, and we don’t show off. Nobody knows there are still gatemages on either world. And if Enopp grows up to be an asshole, the Gate Thief takes away his gates.”

“Not if I take his first,” said Enopp.

“Not if I take yours now,” said Loki.

“Whatever kind of mage you grow up to be,” said Pat, “there’s nobody here with even a visible fraction of Danny’s outself. And Danny won’t tolerate anyone using their powers to hurt … regular people.”

Danny buried his face in his hands. “I don’t want to be boss of the world.”

“Too late,” said Anonoei. “But you’re doing fine, and nobody here wants you to stop.”

“Except me,” said Danny.

“Let’s meet here every year or so,” said Anonoei. “So we can size each other up. See how things are going.”

“There’s another danger,” said Pat. “I’m not a gatemage, and neither are Anonoei and Eluik, but we learned how to do this direct movement of our ka. I learned it in Duat, without even realizing it, and Anonoei learned it from Danny getting Bexoi out of her body, and Eluik learned it when I helped him and Enopp disentangle. But Hermia and Veevee learned it just by watching.”

“We were already gatemages,” said Veevee.

“But Eluik wasn’t, and I wasn’t, and Anonoei wasn’t.”

“You’re saying that there’s a danger of this kind of magery propagating,” said Danny.