Can't Look Back (War for Dominance Book 1) by Chris Kennedy Page A

was deep, and was unlike anything John had ever seen. It looked like a cross between Frankenstein’s lab and a corner convenience store. There were all sorts of racks and storage devices on the walls, but while the room might have been neat and orderly at some point, that point was long past. Metal rods were piled with large sticks, other piles might have been spell components...or yesterday’s lunch, John wasn’t sure. Several small tables were completely covered with piles of drawings, most of which had enough cross-outs and erasures as to be nearly unreadable. A bellows stood on the hearth next to a roaring fire, along with a wide variety of metal-working implements. Woodworking tools waited in one of the corners. The temperature in the room was well over 100 degrees, and enough things clicked, chirped and otherwise made noises that the room was a general cacophony.
    In the center of the chaos was a large table in the middle of the room. Although there were several chairs around the table (and two more lying on their sides next to it), some type of small creature sat on top of it, oblivious to everything going on around it. The creature didn’t acknowledge their presence; instead, it continued to draw on the blueprint it was sitting on. The creature had obviously been drawing for some time; it had blue all over its pants, most of its shirt, and the majority of the exposed skin that John could see. The skin that hadn’t been colored blue appeared to originally be charcoal gray with splotches of dark red. The creature’s skin color complemented its hair, which flowed down below its shoulders in waves of red.
    “What is that?” whispered John.
    “Vishdink is a fire gnome,” replied Ghorza. “They like to tinker with things, especially new things. I’d say that they like to build things, but it isn’t the completed product that interests them, as much as it is the process of figuring out how something works. Unless someone forces them to, it is rare for any of them to actually complete anything; they just keep improving whatever they’re working on and never reach a final end product.”
    The gnome was erasing something on the blueprint, but stopped and turned to look at them when it heard their voices. It slid over to the edge of the table and dropped to the ground, and then it rushed over to stand in front of John. Although John was short by human standards, he towered above the gnome, which couldn’t have even been three feet tall.
    “What have you brought, Ghorza?” it asked. “It looks like a human, but it is shorter than it should be, and it smells different.”
    “You know I’m standing right in front of you and can hear you, right?” John asked.
    “Oooh, and it is so sassy, too,” said the gnome. “Vishdink thinks that Vishdink may like it.” It peered up, squinting its eyes. “What are those things on its face? Vishdink see?”
    “Yes, you can see them,” answered John, taking off his glasses and handing them to the gnome, “but you need to be careful with them. They’re called glasses. They help me see.”
    The gnome studied the glasses. “Help you see, do they? Are they magic?” Vishdink asked. It put the glasses up to its mouth and looked like it was going to take a bite out of one of the earpieces.
    John didn’t know if the creature could bite through the metal, but didn’t want to chance it. The teeth that he could see were red and pointy and looked like they were meant to chop things up. “Hey!” he yelled. “No biting! I said you could see them, not eat them. Keep them out of your mouth.”
    “How is Vishdink supposed to tell what glasses are made of if you don’t let Vishdink taste them?” grumbled the gnome. “Never mind, Vishdink can tell by the smell.” It handed them back to John. “How do they work?”
    “I don’t know,” replied John. “The shape of the glass bends the light waves so that they focus properly on the back of my eye. The shape is important; you