Lyura sat in an outdoor cafe in the Piazza San Mar Venice, sipping a deliaroo and sav a det chocote cake. The summer day erfect, and the Piazza looked absolutely breathtaking.

  She enjoyed all these things, but inside, she was still fuming. Each sip of the rich maroo and every bite of the det chocote cake only seemed to fuel her ahe picturesque view of the Piazza San Marco, with its elegant architecture and the gentle hum of happy tourists, did little to calm the storm brewing within her.

  Lyura’s thoughts kept returning to her mother, and the rage bubbled up anew each time. She wao Gate-hop hht that instant, to burst into her mother’s house with the force of a tempest. She envisioned grabbing her mother by the shoulders, shaking her until her teeth rattled, screaming in her face with all the pent-up fury that had been building inside her.

  “How could you do this to me?” she imagined herself yelling. “How could you let me grow up in that filthy, backward town without a hint of the magid wohat existed beyond those stones? Why did you keep me trapped in ignorance while you traveled the worlds, experieng things I could only dream of?”

  She wanted answers. She wao know why her mother had hidden this incredible truth from her for so long. The betrayal stung deeply, a wound that festered with every passing day. Lyura’s mother had always seemed like a bea of reason in a world drowning in superstitio she had kept this enormous secret.

  The need for an expnation g her relentlessly. She felt like a caged animal, desperate to break free and front the person who had built the bars arouhe injustice of it all was maddening. Lyura’s life could have been so different, filled with adventure and knowledge, instead of the narrow, dirt-streaked existence she had known.

  As she sat in the cafe, surrounded by the beauty and sophistication of Vehe trast to her past life was stark and jarring. She stantly felt the ahat simmered just beh the surface, which tainted every moment of joy in her current world and served as a stant reminder of what had been stolen from her.

  The thought of her mother’s calm, knowing face made her blood boil. She could see her mother’s serene expression, the one she wore whehought she was doing what was best. But Lyura didn’t need her mother’s misguided prote; she he truth.

  Lyura grew up in a backward, ued world in a small, dirty town that seemed frozen in time. The streets were unpaved and filled with mud and filth, creating a stant odor of decay and . The houses, built with rough-hewn wood and stone, were cramped and poorly maintained, with thatched roofs that barely kept out the rain. There were no proper sanitation systems; people dumped their waste in open ditches that lihe roads, attrag swarms of flies and rats.

  The residents only washed in the river from te spring to early autumhe water was warm enough to bear. For the rest of the year, they remained dirty and stinky, their clothes stiff with grime and their skin coated in yers of sweat and dirt. It wasn’t unon to see children with matted hair and adults with sores on their skin, ued aering. Personal hygiene was a luxury few could afford or even sidered necessary.

  Superstition ruled their lives. The townspeople immediately viewed every male stranger who ehe town with suspi, believing them to be dangerous bandits there to steal and pilge. Women travelers fared er; they were seen as evil witches who sought to ent and corrupt, bmed for any misfortuhat befell the town. It ce where fear and ignorance dictated iions, and trust was a rare odity.

  Whenever something good or bad happehe townsfolk bmed the spirits of the forest, rain, sky, or nd. If a child fell ill, they said it was the wrath of the river spirit. If a bountiful harvest came, they left s at the edge of the forest, believing the tree spirits had blessed them. They would pce little bowls of milk or bread on their windowsills, hoping to appease these unseen forces, muttering prayers and intations passed down through geions. Eae iown performed its own rituals at night, filling the air with whispered ts and the flicker of dles to keep the spirits at bay.

  Her mother told her o believe in those superstitions, urgio see the world through the lens of reason and logic. Yet it was all around her, inescapable and pervasive. Every er of their town bore the marks of these a beliefs, from the talismans hung over doorways to the carved idols pced at the crossroads. Despite her mother’s teags, superstitions permeated their daily life, shaping their as and decisions in profound ways.

  Her family loved her, but the other children were jealous of her. They called her a ‘spoiled princess’ because she was always er, had nicer clothes, her family was the richest in town, and she was the only one who knew how to read and write.

  Every early autumn, her mother would leave to buy stock for their store aurn in te spring with lovely things that even nobles came from afar to buy.

  When Lyura turned seventeen, her mother said it was time for her to find work aioned es with a good noble family that needed a governess. She also warned her and her father that the family po sail overseas, and it was unknowhey would return.

  Lyura refused at first, but her mother insisted. She said that if Lyura didn’t like the work, she could always return but insisted she go with her on the annual buying trip to meet the family.

  Instead of traveling on the road, her mother led her into a forest, and when they reached two enormous stones, she took her through them. Lyura experiehe most incredible pain she had ever felt, and when she came to, there was a blinking light in front of her eyes. Her mother instructed her to touch it with her mind, and she got a message about being a Gate Traveler.

  Her mother taught her how to view her information and access details about her css and skills. Then, she took her through a three-Gate to a world called Gaia, showing her how to sell in pawn shops and buy great things for their store. On Gaia, those things were called ‘Mass Produced’ and came from a pce called a.

  During their journey between Gates, her mother told her about being a Traveler and the different worlds she visited. She taught her spells, trained her in archery and short sword fighting, and showed her how to camp in the wilderness, build fire, and hunt. Her teags included how to eh individuals in magical worlds and uand teological worlds. She shared how she came to their world, fell in love with her father, and stayed.

  She took her back through the Gates and showed her how to sell the things they bought to earn many s until they reached home. They traveled for two and a half months, but five months had passed at home. Her mother told her always to remember the time jumps between worlds and that if she traveled long, she might return to find her father had died.

  Lyura spent another month at home with her father before leaving to travel. When they visited Gaia for the first time, Lyura fell in love with television, so she returo Gaia. For three months, she watched televisioo movies, and learned about this world. She uood the money system and traveling vehicles, but still found the ‘i’ aronic devices very fusing.

  She traveled all around Europe, eating new aing food, seeiiful architecture, visiting the theater and opera, appreciating the abundance of books and musid enjoying every moment.

  But she still fumed at her mother every moment of every day. How could she allow her to grow up in that backward “dump”—to use a local term—without magid, most of all, without TELEVISION!!