Balance Keepers #1: The Fires of Calderon Read Online Free PDF Page A

show Albert around the place. The dog grabbed ahold of Albert’s shoelace again and started tugging.
    “All right,” Albert whispered, unable to speak too loud. He followed Farnsworth through the maze of pipes, ducking every so often as steam escaped from holes in the copper pipes. Soon the pipes started to spread off to the sides of the walls, leaving an open space large enough for him to move comfortably about. And there, just across the room, stood a man, looking downward into what looked like an open grave.
    Albert ducked behind a pipe and hid at a safe distance.
    It took him a moment to gather the courage to peek out. The man was tall and thin, almost spiderlike, and on his head was a miner’s helmet, the hard kind with a light on top. Wild strands of rusty-orange hair flopped out from the edges of the helmet.
    Farnsworth, who looked at Albert like he was crazy for hiding, wagged his tail and took off toward the strange man, barking.
    “Hello, Farnsworth,” the man said. “Did you bring the package?”
    Oh, great, Albert thought. This really is a warlock, Farnsworth is his dog, and I’m about to be cooked in a stew.
    Farnsworth yipped across the room.
    “Is he, now?” the man said to the little dog.
    Albert scooted deeper into the shadow of the pipe, but hot water dripped onto his back from one of the pipes overhead and he jumped out into the open. The warlock, or whatever he was, was too busy to notice, though.
    “Move,” Albert said to himself. “Come on, it’s not that hard. You can do it.”
    The man paced back and forth around the open area, peering down into holes Albert couldn’t see the bottom of. Every few seconds he’d stop, reach down with delicate motions as if he was moving pieces on a chessboard, and then slide over to another hole and repeat the process. He mumbled a lot, as if he was trying to coax things to move in certain ways.
    “You might as well come out from behind the pipe,” he said at length. “Not much sense in hiding.” Then he went back to work.
    Albert took a deep breath and stepped out from the shadows, moving around a fat pipe the size of a giant’s thigh. So far, so good.
    “You have something for me?” the man asked without turning around.
    There was a small part of Albert that thought, Hey, I’m just delivering mail down here, no big deal.
    Albert pulled the envelope out of his back pocket and unfolded it. He took two more steps forward and set the envelope on the top of a copper pipe.
    “I guess I’ll be on my way, then.” He began backpedaling. “Pleasure meeting you. I can show myself out. Really, it’s no problem.”
    “Could you bring it to me?” the man said, holding his hand in Albert’s direction without turning his attention away from whatever weird work he was doing.
    Albert picked up the envelope and paced back and forth a few times. What he really wanted to do was leave, but he didn’t really know how to make that possible. He marched toward the wizard or the mad scientist or whatever he was, and resolved to deliver the letter, even if it turned out to be the last thing he ever did.
    He passed by one of the holes in the ground on his way to the man. It had a round rail that came to about Albert’s belly button, and not being able to help himself, he peered over the edge. Inside lay something Albert recognized at once as a miniature version of the forest he’d just come from. There it was: the same wide perfect circle of trees. And from above, he could clearly see the streams he’d crossed with Farnsworth, and the paths he had stumbled through. The Troll Tree stood right in the middle, only this one was the size of Albert’s hand. The rail contained an array of buttons and knobs that Albert very much wanted to touch. He reached out his hand, nearly had his finger on a button . . .
    “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”
    Albert nearly jumped out of his underwear. The man was standing right next to him, staring over Albert’s shoulder