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“In any case, what is this emergency I heard about?” I asked as Basanti’s soldiers rushed to put out all the fires.

“That.” Basanti pointed at the throne room’s massive double doors.

“Doors. How terrifying,” I said drily.

The closed doors shook, like someone with a very big fist had just knocked.

“Duckies?” Sierra wanted to know.

“Among other things,” Basanti said warily.

There was a loud snap against the door, like the crack of a whip. And the next moment, a perfect cylinder of wood about the size of a wine cork hit the floor.

“Well, that doesn’t look good,” I commented as smoke started oozing through the newly-made hole in the door.

“Pretty,” Sierra cooed, pointing at the growing cloud of mist in front of us.

She was right. The smoke was bright purple andverysparkly. It’s what I imagined amethysts would look like if they turned into a gas.

“Yeah, it’s pretty all right.Prettydangerous.” Basanti lifted her sword.

The sparkling purple smoke rumbled like thunder, then spat out a sparkly purple duckling. The duckling was bigger than my massive cat.

Boom. Boom. Boom.

Three more sparkly smoke creatures peeled out of the mist: an emerald squirrel, a turquoise turtle, and a sapphire stallion. Sierra jumped up and down, clapping her hands in delight.

“Easy there, little one,” Basanti said. “They might look pretty, but theywillzap you if you get too close.”

“What are they?” I asked her as the mist popped out a swarm of ruby butterflies.

“No idea.”

“What do they want?”

“No idea.”

“Where did they come from?”

“The Elemental Magic Lab down the hall,” Basanti said. “Leila had a team running experiments aimed at increasing the amount of elemental magic the Legion’s standard enchanted weapons can hold.”

“WhereisLeila? Please don’t tell me the mist ate her.” I cringed.

“No, she’s away from the castle at the moment. She left this morning to repair some damage on the Elemental Expanse, and she took most of our soldiers with her. When all hell broke loose here, I tried to contact her.” Basanti’s brows crinkled with worry. “No response.”

I set my hand on her back. “I’m sure Leila is fine.”

“Yeah, butwewon’t be if we can’t stop this mist.”

The smoky squirrel scampered past one of the soldiers. It must have gotten too close because the soldier instantly toppled over like a felled tree.

“Ok, so in case this wasn’t already obvious, you don’t want to touch that weird mist,” Basanti said as two soldiers pulled their fallen comrade to safety.

“Is he all right?” I grabbed Sierra before she could run off after the purple duckling.

“He’ll be fine. He’s only unconscious. The mist has knocked out a few of my guys, but as long as we get them away from it right away, they recover within a few minutes.”

“So what happens when youdon’tget them away from the mist fast enough?”