SandRider by Angie Sage Page B

straight back, okay?”
    â€œOkay.” Tod smiled. She loved traveling the Ways on herown and she loved the fact that Septimus trusted her to go alone. Septimus watched his Apprentice place her hand onto the hard white marble below the steps, then he saw the shimmering shape of an archway begin to appear and the surface of the marble soften. Septimus was impressed by his Apprentice’s skill. She was a good choice—unlike his jinnee.
S HADOWS ON THE S EAL
    In Marcia’s Hub three Drummins were perusing the shimmering purple skin of a Magykal Seal . Drummins were very short, stocky, human-like creatures accustomed to living belowground. They had been caretakers of the Hub for three years now and they knew it better than they knew the suckers on the ends of their broad, flat fingers.
    Using their preferred language of signing, Fabius Drummin signed, There’s something behind the
Seal
on Way One .
    Claudius replied, Three humans, I think .
    And a creature , added Lucius.
    We should tell the boss , signed Claudius.
    Claudius and Lucius both looked pointedly at Fabius, whowas on upstairs duties that day. All right, all right, I’ll go , he signed grumpily.
    Fabius hurried off, his bouncing strides taking him across the white stone floor of the immaculately clean Hub and up the winding stairs that led out of it. The remaining two Drummins stared at the Seal , watching for any sign of failure. They were looking so intently that they did not see the arch behind them—the only one UnSealed —light up with a golden glow and a slight figure in a green tunic and leggings come striding out. Tod stopped. She saw the Drummins were busy and, not wanting to interrupt, she tiptoed over to them. “Hey,” she whispered.
    â€œArgh!” The Drummins spun around. “Don’t do that, Alice,” Lucius hissed, and using the Drummin sign for being quiet—one that everyone understood—he put his index finger to his lips.
    Tod knew the Drummins were annoyed with her: they had called her Alice. “Sorry,” she whispered. “I didn’t mean to startle you. What’s going on?”
    Trouble , Lucius signed. Tod, being a PathFinder, also used signs, and although the PathFinder sign language lacked the complex grammar of the Drummins’ language, many of thesigns were similar. And “trouble”—the first two fingers of each hand folded at the second joint and twisted together—was easily recognizable.
    What trouble? Tod signed.
    Claudius proceeded to sign something much longer, but seeing Tod’s look of incomprehension, he stopped and whispered, “There are creatures behind the Seal .”
    Tod’s eyes widened in fear. “Not . . . Garmin ?” Garmin were nightmarish beings that the sorcerer Oraton-Marr had used to abduct, terrify and control people—including, once, Tod herself. The Seals were placed across the arches for good reason: to stop any danger of the Garmins’ return.
    Both Drummins shook their heads—it wasn’t Garmin.
    Human , Claudius signed.
    Tod understood the sign for “human.” Encouraged, she signed, May I try?
    The Drummins respected Tod’s knowledge of the Ancient Ways, and now that she was Apprentice they knew she would be careful with the Magyk protecting the Seals , so they stepped aside.
    Very gently, Tod placed her hands on the delicate skin of the Seal . Beneath the thrum of the Magyk warming herpalms, Tod could Feel the energy from something alive on the other side, but her skills were untrained and she had no way of knowing whether it was even human—let alone if it was a good human or a bad one.
    On the other side of the Seal , Sam lay slumped against the cold stone of the wall, with Marwick and Kaznim on either side. And, for a reason neither Sam nor Marwick understood, the tortoise was now resting on Sam’s wounded stomach. When Kaznim had first placed Ptolemy on Sam’s