Johnis knew the moment his skin hit the cool liquid that they had found gold. The waters of Elyon reached into his flesh, burning it like a hot iron for one terrible moment. It was no wonder the Horde feared water. He thought he could actually hear a hiss as the power spread through his skin, vaporizing the disease until the pain was gone entirely.

He sank below the surface, hardly able to contain his joy. And there, under the water, he trembled with relief.

Johnis burst from the pond, fist raised high. “Ha! What did I tell you? What did I tell you?”

“Ha!” a white Roush cried on the shore, wing jutting high like Johnis’s fist.

“Gabil!”

“Johnis!”

“You’re here!”

“You’re here!”

The white bat shook its fur, spraying him with water.

The water parted as first Silvie, then Darsal, emerged facing Johnis with glowing, tanned skin and wearing impossibly wide smiles. They stared at him for a moment, then all three began to speak at once.

Johnis: “I’m sorry this happened like . . .”

Darsal: “You were right, Scrapper . . .”

Silvie: “You’ve yet to be wrong . . .”

They laughed like children, lost in relief and life, and for the moment they were ecstatic. Above them the sun shone in a blue sky. Below, in this oasis of living water, leafy palms swayed in a gentle breeze. Even the cacti bristling with thorns looked at peace among the gray boulders. They’d found a pocket of Elyon’s power in the desert of death.

“I guess this settles it,” Silvie said.

“The Horde must not get this far out,” Darsal said. “If they knew this pond existed, they would have filled it in long ago.”

Silvie scooped up a palmful of the water and let it dribble through her fingers. “I thought Elyon’s water could only be found in the forests.”

Behind her Gabil was rocking back and forth, grinning from ear to ear, bursting at the seams with an eagerness to be noticed.

“You believe me now,” Johnis said. “That’s what’s important.”

Darsal frowned, but her eyes were bright. “Do we have a choice?”

“I believe you, Johnis,” Silvie said. “We’re the fools, not you.”

“Then maybe you should turn around and tell me what you see.”

They looked over their shoulders, then jumped back as one.

Gabil crossed one wing over his chest and snapped his spindly legs together like a soldier reporting for duty. “Master Roush—defeater of the slimy, snake-eyed, putrid-breathed beasts—reporting. Otherwise known as Gabil.”

“You . . . you’re a Roush,” Silvie stammered. Then to Johnis, “They really do exist?”

Darsal blinked. “You’re a ghost?”

“Do I look like a ghost to you?” Gabil demanded.

“No. Well, you are as white as a ghost.”