Wyssa glared at Zann and the others.
"I thought I'd seen the last of you when I left Magica."
"We weren't looking for you, Wyssa," Perda said. "This brought us here."
Wyssa's eyes widened when Perda held up the ring. The old woman snatched it away.
"This belonged to my sister," she blurted out.
"She gave it to me as a last gift just before . . ."
Her voice trailed off, and her eyes narrowed. "Where did you get this?"
"The ring is yours?" Saffa said. "We thought it belonged to Morb."
"Ah." Wyssa's expression shifted into a frown.
"I should have known that dirty rat was the one who stole it from me.
He probably planned to use it to blackmail me."
"Oh dear," Saffa said. "If Morb stole the ring from you, it never really belonged to him."
Zann nodded as he figured out what had happened.
"So the Tracking spell worked," he said.
"But it led us to the ring's true owner, not its most recent possessor."
"That makes sense," Perda said. "Otherwise it would have led us to Teplo, because he had it last."
Wyssa held up a hand. "Silence," she said.
"What's going on here? Why are you tracking Morb?
I told you I'd make sure he never bothers Magica again."
Zann bit his lip and flashed a guilty look at his friends.
"Actually, Morb seems to have a new plan."
After he and his friends told Wyssa everything that had happened, the old woman looked furious.
Wyssa whirled away, muttering under her breath, and stomped over to a nearby bush.
She began plucking berries from its branches.
"What are you doing?" Saffa asked.
Instead of answering, Wyssa pointed at Zann. "You, boy," she ordered.
"Go up the lung tree, the one over there with the gray bark.
Break off three twigs from near the top.
Make sure they're small ones, so the tree isn't hurt."
"That's a lung tree?" Zann remembered his parents saying that they'd used a piece of wood from a lung tree to power the infusinator.
"Hurry!" Wyssa shouted.
Zann levitated to the top of the tree.
The air sparked around him, magic energy bouncing off him in ticklish little bursts.
He remembered his parents saying that Atmo's magical energy came from the air.
It felt very strange to be surrounded by that much magic all the time!
When he reached the top of the tree, he broke off the twigs, as Wyssa had requested.
Far below he could hear her barking orders at the others.
Zann glanced down to make sure she wasn't looking up.
Then he broke off another few twigs, which he stuck in his pocket.
Maybe they would help his parents with their experiments, if things ever went back to normal.
"Hurry up, boy!" Wyssa shouted. "What's taking you so long?"
"Coming!" he called quickly and floated back down.
When he reached the ground, Zann saw Wyssa scowl.
She grabbed the twigs out of his hand without saying thank you. But Zann didn't mind.
He was glad that they'd found her, even if it had been an accident.
She might be the only person who could help them find and defeat Morb for good.
Wyssa was crouching down by the pile of stuff she'd been gathering.
Saffa wandered over to look. "Aha!" she exclaimed.
"I just figured out what you're doing, Wyssa.
It's a Locator spell, isn't it? A much more sophisticated one than the one we used though."
Wyssa didn't respond. She was assembling the twigs Zann had brought her into a tepee shape, tying them together with some vines she'd gathered.
"Are you building a contraption like the Secret Eye?" Perda asked.
"Or like those things Morb is always building?" Gliss asked uneasily.
"It does look like Morb's contraptions, only smaller," Zann agreed.
"Where did you learn how to make it?"
Wyssa glanced up. "I need to concentrate," she growled. "Stop your incessant chattering."
The group fell silent while Wyssa continued her work.
Soon the little contraption resembled a pyramid. It was filled with various leaves and stones.
Green berry juice ran down its sides. Finally Wyssa tied the glowing ring onto it.
"The ring is part of the magic?" Saffa asked with interest.
"Will it help you locate Morb because he stole it from you?"
Zann expected Wyssa to ignore that question too. But she glanced up at Saffa.
"No," Wyssa said firmly. "I didn't attach the ring because of Morb.
This ring has been in my family for generations.
That gives me a special connection with it, which will boost the spell's magic power."
"Cool," Perda said. "I've read about that kind of thing. It's sort of like using a relic."
"Silence, please." Wyssa sprinkled a handful of sparkly powder over the contraption.
"Morb!" she intoned loudly. "Show us Morb!"
Zann held his breath as a puff of pale green smoke emerged from the contraption.
It slowly formed into a ghostly image of Morb.
"It's him!" Saffa cried.
Zann stared at the image. It showed Morb standing in a sandy landscape with a jagged ridge behind him.
He was scowling at something Zann couldn't see.
A second later a gust of wind blew the image away.
"Aah!" Gliss cried in frustration. "We didn't see enough to know where he is!"
"Yeah," Zann said. "There must be lots of desert worlds out there."
Wyssa's eyes met Saffa's. "I know exactly where that is," Wyssa said.
Saffa was nodding slowly. "I recognized Dragonjaw Ridge in the background.
It's one of the most recognizable features in the Far Frontier."
"The Far Frontier?" Zann said with a gasp. "But that means . . ."
"Yes," Saffa said grimly. "Morb is already back in Magica."