Pat was right. The Family mages would be godlike, and if they weren’t quite scrupulous about keeping their word to Danny, he’d be busy dealing with them. He wouldn’t have time to work with his drowther friends to find out just how permanent their drowtherhood might be.

Well, he hadn’t told the Families exactly when he’d make this Great Gate he was promising. Obviously he couldn’t delay forever. If they became impatient, there was a Great Gate in existence, one that was not in Danny’s control.

And that night, as Danny was undressing for bed, he couldn’t stop himself from playing through in his mind a not-terribly-unlikely scenario in which he delayed far too long, angering the Families, which then united against him and attacked the Silvermans in order to show their displeasure.

Powerful as Marion and Leslie now were, because of their passage through a Great Gate, they could not stand against the united Families. Perhaps not even against one Family in a concerted assault. Yes, Leslie could detach all the beastmages from their heartbeasts. Yes, Marion could break up the earth under them.

But there would be threats they couldn’t see. There would be winds and water that they couldn’t stop. There would be fire.

And even if the whole farm in Yellow Springs was burned to the ground, there that public Wild Gate would be, waiting. As the victorious enemies gloated, walking over the burnt-out ruin of the Silvermans’ farm, their refuge, their lives, someone would accidentally step through the Great Gate. Wouldn’t that be the kind of prank that spacetime looked for?

No, Danny could not delay forever. But if he took his drowther friends through a new Great Gate right away, perhaps there would be time enough to train them a little. Maybe they would have latent mageries that bloomed into sudden life. Maybe …

Maybe pigs could eat with knives and forks. Even powerful mages born in Families took years of training in order to master their abilities. What fantasy was this, that Danny could bestow on his friends what his Family had as their inheritance?

I am not all-powerful. I may have the most useful magery in the world right now, the one that can change everything. I may have other people at my mercy. But I can’t even control a Great Gate that I made. I didn’t know the consequence of weaving into it the lingering outselves of long-dead rage-filled mages—but the fact that I’m not to blame doesn’t mean that I’m not compelled to live with the consequences of my foolishness.

How much more foolishness will I have to bring about because of the things that I don’t know? It isn’t my drowther friends who need training. It’s me. But the only person in either world who can possibly help me is my most dangerous enemy. The Gate Thief.