The Gate is the only entrance to the Oasis. Travelers find that if they try to leave the road to search for another way in, after a few yards they find themselves right back in front of the Gate again.

The Gate is huge. It is at least ten stories high and gleams. The silver metal latticework is never dusty. The adobe walls that protect the Oasis are unscalable. And the Gates themselves never open.

To enter the Oasis is a matter of permission, not ability. Permission must be sought from the gatekeeper, as he is the only authority on who may enter and who may not. Even I do not have the power to gainsay him.

Seph is a gryphon: a being with the body of a lion, the head and wings of an eagle, and his tail is a snake. He is a fierce warrior and dispatches unwanted visitors with no trouble at all. Though he can make himself properly lion-sized if he chooses, when he is guarding the gate he lounges on the wall above it and presents himself as twenty feet tall. The wall groans when he shifts to get a better look at a petitioner.

I have left him explicit instructions. No one with ill-intent is allowed within the Oasis. Anyone else is welcome. Seph obeys my instruction with the rigid loyalty that only a gryphon can have. Once Seph has deemed a visitor acceptable, they are allowed in. They find themselves on the other side of the Gate without having any idea at all of how they passed through it.

As the Gate is the entry into my mental realm, it here symbolizes the page to learn more about me, Eliste Anath.