She got out her own manual, paged it open to where the worldgating pickup information would be… and as the page showed her the words “Outbound/return transit approved, pickup imminent, please hold position,” that was when she remembered.
Try not to destroy your host civilization or anything …
A pang went through Nita. But then she smiled. If there was anything they hadn’t done for their host civilization, it was destroy it. It had become something greater than it had ever been before, something it had been destined for millennia to become. That they’d been there at the time to help it along was… not luck. Nita knew better than to describe the Powers that sent wizards on errantry by such a name. It was lucky for us, though, she thought, and smiled one last time, not entirely sadly, at the thought of Quelt’s face.
A moment later, she and Kit vanished. Night came down on the Inner Sea of Alaalu.
And not very much later, the keks came out of the water, up onto the dry land, and began at last to build, not models, not the plans for their new civilization, but the real thing, the civilization itself, in a world that at last had been vacated by its old tenants and was ready for the new ones.
***
It took them some hours to get home. The Crossings was as busy as always, and Grand Central, too, was congested when they passed through. For Nita, getting into her backyard at last was a tremendous satisfaction, if a little strange. She came out of the sassafras trees into the backyard proper and stood there for a moment in the twilight. Softly she said to Kit, “Look how close the horizon is.”
He nodded. “Weird… ”
Together they went through the yard, with Ponch bouncing along behind them. Down the driveway they went, and up to the back door of Nita’s house. Nita pulled the screen door open, and they went in.
“Hey, I’m back!” she said.
There was no answer at first. Then her dad came out of the living room, went over to Nita, and hugged her hard. “Hey, welcome home! I missed you!” he said. “And you!” he said to Kit, and hugged him as well.
Nita looked around her. The house seemed smaller than it had when she’d left: cozier, somehow. But this wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. “How are things going?” she said.
Her father laughed weakly. “Uh, not too badly,” he said. “The past few days have been a little hectic… but let’s not get right into it. Want some tea?”
“Wow, yes,” Nita said.
“Kit?”
“You could convince me,” Kit said, and sat down at the dining room table with a look of great pleasure.
Nita went to put the kettle on. “Where is everybody?” she said. “Where’s Dairine?”
“The boys are over at the mall,” Nita’s dad said. “Dairine’s having a shower. She’ll be down in a little while.”
On the counter, her dad’s cell phone rang. “Hey,” he said, “that’s the way it’s supposed to work. And about time… ”
“What’s the matter? Was the network busy again?” Nita said.
Her dad picked up the phone and answered it, shaking his head. “Hello?”
He listened for a moment, then shook his head again. “Just a moment, please.” He handed her the phone. “It’s for you.”
“Uh-oh,” Nita said. Her father was firm about not having Nita’s friends call her on his phone. “I’m sorry, Daddy! Who is it?”
He looked resigned. “Someone on Mars.”
She took the phone and threw Kit a bemused look. “Holiday’s over,” she said. Kit shrugged and went to get some tea.
… And in the living room, none of them saw Spot crouching down in the middle of the floor, and whispering in a voice dry with dread and hardly to be heard:
“Uh-oh. Uh-oh. Uh-oh… !”
By the same author
In the Young Wizards Series
So You Want to Be a Wizard • Deep Wizardry
High Wizardry • A Wizard Abroad
The Wizard’s Dilemma • A Wizard Alone
Wizard’s Holiday • Wizards at War
A Wizard of Mars
The Middle Kingdoms Series (for adult readers)
The Door into Fire • The Door into Shadow
The Door into Sunset
Other standalone adult fantasy:
Raetian Tales: A Wind from the South
Stealing The Elf-King's Roses
In the Star Trek (TM) universe:
The Wounded Sky • My Enemy, My Ally
Spock’s World • Doctor's Orders
Dark Mirror • Intellivore
The "Rihannsu Quartet"
The Romulan Way • Swordhunt
Honor Blade
(omnibus edtion: Star Trek: The Bloodwing Voyages)
The Empty Chair
Collected short fiction:
Uptown Local and Other Interventions
Midnight Snack and Other Fairy Tales
***
For ebook editions of many books above
and others not listed here,
please visit
EbooksDirect.dianeduane.com
or the Books page at the author's site:
DianeDuane.com
***
Visit the author on Tumblr:
dduane.tumblr.com
Or follow her on Twitter:
@dduane
*****
Diane Duane, Wizard's Holiday, New Millennium Edition
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