The Lost Gate

The Lost Gate (2011), a fantasy novel from author Orson Scott Card, is the first novel in the Mithermages series. Danny North has resigned himself to being the only member of his family who isn’t a mage and doesn’t have magical powers. Suddenly, he does show a talent, but it’s one that’s been forbidden for thirteen hundred years. He’s forced to flee his family and live among regular humans as he tries to figure out how his powers work. Card is the best-selling author of numerous sci-fi and fantasy novels, most famously the Ender’s Game series.

Danny North is growing up on an isolated family compound in the mountains of West Virginia. His younger cousins are developing their powers as mither mages, or gods, but Danny has never shown a talent for magic of any kind. He’s become the family’s teacher and babysitter for the younger children. But one day, while trying to teach his cousins a lesson, he inadvertently creates a magical gate that teleports him a short distance. It also heals his bruises when he passes through it. Danny knows the creation of gates is a forbidden type of magic, so he hides his newfound powers from his family.

The North family, along with many other magical clans, has long been exiled on Mittlegard, or Earth. They once traveled between their home planet, Westil, and Mittlegard through magical gates created by gatemages. Traveling through the gates strengthened their powers each time they made the trip. They appeared on Mittengard as the Norse gods. But thirteen hundred years ago, the gatefather Loki sealed the gates between Westil and Mittlegard and promptly disappeared. Since then, gatemages, seen as tricksters and liars, have been looked down upon as worse than being a drowther, or regular human. The magical families on Mittlegard, locked in rivalry, have agreed to outlaw gatemagic, killing any child born a gatemage so no one family has an unfair advantage over the others. Over generations, their power has dwindled, since they are no longer able to use gates to recharge their magic.



When Danny is thirteen, a Greek magical family, the Argyros, visit the North Compound. Danny tries to spy on interactions between the two families when a younger girl, Yllka, announces that Danny is a gatemage. Known as a Finder, someone who can sense gates, she identifies the powers he has kept secret. Danny learns that not only is he a gatemage, he is a gatefather, the most powerful type.

Forced to flee his home or be killed, Danny runs into Thor, a relative of his. Thor tells Danny he’ll have to track him, but promises not to try too hard as long as Danny hides. Danny has no choice but to live among the drowthers, the nonmagical humans. He enters a Wal-Mart, hoping to dress like a drowther, but as he has no shoes, he is refused entry. Danny sneaks in and steals a pair of Nikes.

He meets Eric, a teenage boy who is already a practiced thief. The two join forces. Sometimes security guards catch Danny and try to question him, but he moons them or strips off his clothes, pretending to have been assaulted to escape questioning.



The boys steal and beg rides, making their way to Washington, DC. There, Danny meets a windmage named Stone, and a couple named Ced and Lana. Lana tries to sexually assault Danny shortly after meeting him. Stone tends plants that spread pollen designed to attract other mither mages, which is what drew Danny to his DC home. Stone is considered an “orphan,” a mither mage not connected to any of the major families like Danny’s.

Other orphans include Stone’s wife, Veevee, who helps Danny harness his powers and to learn more about gatemagic. Danny is able to read more about his abilities in a rare book, thought to be a fable or fairy tale, at the Library of Congress.

Card weaves between Danny’s story and that of a nameless man on Westil. He wakes up from a mysterious coma encased in a tree. He is a gatethief, someone with the ability to destroy gates between worlds. He magically unseals himself from the tree, and, with no memory of who he is, seeks work at the nearby castle as a kitchen boy. The cook gives him the name Wad, or “wad of dough.” Wad slowly becomes entangled in palace intrigues, slowly falling in love with Bexoi, the queen. The king and queen have no children and no heirs. The queen has an affair with Wad and bears his child, then ignores Wad, wanting nothing more to do with him. Later, she is pregnant with the king’s son and a legitimate heir, so she kills Wad’s son when Wad fails to follow her orders, revealing herself as a cruel, ruthless woman.



Danny, adopted by two orphans, Leslie and Marion Silverman, attends high school. He tries to use his knowledge of fantasy novels about magically gifted children trying to blend in with nonmagical humans, but his experience is not smooth.

Danny decides to reopen the Great Gate between Mittlegard and Westil. In Westil, he encounters Wad, the gatethief, who has been working all this time to “eat” or close any Great Gates opened between worlds. It is revealed that Wad is Loki and that he had a reason for sealing the gates. He had encountered an evil mage, Bel, who posed a threat to all of both worlds. In sealing the gate, he prevented Bel from spreading destruction.

Loki threatens to destroy Danny, and they become locked in a mental battle. Danny uses the story he read at the Library of Congress to defeat Loki, turning the magic back on him. Loki’s powers are broken and Danny absorbs them instead. The Great Gate is now open, but Bel may come back.



The Lost Gate received mixed reviews, with many critics and readers praising the premise and magic system, but finding aspects of the plot problematic or difficult to read. Card wrote two additional books in the series, The Gate Thief in 2013 and Gatefather in 2015.