Aflia flicked her tail impatiently, "of course I trust you Mul. Lead on."

Mul nodded and beckoned Aflia to follow. "just outside the town, I can open a Gate at sundown. It should take us to the matching hilltop just outside of Sapphire. Just don't open any of the doors."

Aflia's brow furrowed, "what doors?"

"You will see once we enter the Gate."

A few hours later atop the hill, Aflia stood back and watched Mul draw an incredibly intricate Magic Circle in the dirt. Whispered Primordial words lit twinkling rune-lights the color of starlight. A slash of un-light cut through reality into the middle of the Circle. With the screech of tortured metal, it ripped wider and took the shape of a doorway into nothingness. Mul motioned Aflia forward, then stepped into oblivion.

Aflia took a deep breath and followed Mul into the Gate. Immediately she was ambushed by a sense of vertigo, and her hooves went out from under her. Aflia sat there on the floor that wasn't a floor until her mind managed to orient itself. The Gate burned closed at her back, melding seamlessly into a wall of carven stone. Aflia climbed to her hooves and looked about the area for Mul. Instead she found a endless procession of doors. Some were set into the walls, some stood out from them at odd, unnatural angles, and yet others were freestanding. Some were simple timber, others were of gilded metals, and yet more were blood-drenched wrought iron.

Mul was nowhere to be seen, and Aflia felt her heartbeat accelerate in panic. She wasn't in the material realm anymore, had no idea where any of the doors lead to, and had lost her guide.

"The Blood of the Dragon. We meet at last."

Aflia whipped around to face the source of the cadaverous voice and found a thin figure in a black cloak leaning casually against the frame of a doorway.

The figure held up a gloved hand in a gesture of benediction, "no need to fret, I mean you no harm. The Voice of the Outsider is Pacted to me, and has brought you to my realm that you may go with all haste to where you need go. I simply wished to look upon you with my own eyes."

Aflia drew herself to her full height, "and now that you have, may I be on my way?"

The figure flicked a dismissive hand, "as soon as The Voice of the Outsider finds her way to us to open the door, you may leave. I would offer you a gift, if you would choose to accept it."

Aflia tapped a hoof impatiently, "and if I choose not to?"

"Then it may be some time before the Voice of the Outsider finds her way here."

"No choice huh. What would you give me then?"

"I would unlock the power that sings in your Blood; ice as well as fire. Not all at once, no mortal could survive that unprepared, but it would blossom as you grow and learn."

"Do it then."

The black-cloaked figure stepped closer and stretched out one gloved hand, "this may feel odd dear." It tapped Aflia gently on the cheek, specifically on the fine scales just below her eyes.

Aflia gasped as she felt her body twitch. A crackling sparkle of magic raced down her veins to her heart, where it exploded back outward along her arteries. Her blood ran cold as ice and hot as molten stone. Her skin itched furiously. Her vision swam, then faded out. Aflia collapsed to the floor in an untidy heap.

Mul cam around a corner and saw Aflia in a heap before her Patron, "Lorekeeper, will she live?"

"She will live, and she will be fine. The Blood of the Dragon has made no pact with me, but you should take her from this place before she wakes. It will make the translocation through the second Gate easier for her."