Koltira kept moving until they well away from the city proper, mainly because he did not want to cause a commotion. The spell was innocuous, but it wasn't invisible. When they had reached the first thin lines of trees, he stopped and turned, Byfrost glowing violently in his hand, reacting to his anger.

"As you know," Koltira said, his voice tightly controlled, "those illusions attacked anyone they saw--intruders and dreamers alike. When I stumbled into the boy's memory, I defended myself from his sister's strange needle-weapons ... but then she bit into a medallion. She cast some kind of spell. A spirit emerged--a snake. The thing looked wild, and I worried that it would lash out against the both of us. So I did this."

Koltira lifted Byfrost above him, and as he did so, a shimmering, dark purple sphere emerged from the ground. The sphere grew rapidly until it became a barrier that encompassed both Bariyan and himself, humming softly as it stayed in place.

"This is an anti-magic zone," Koltira went on. "Its sole purpose is to protect those within it against offensive magic."