The Second Prophecy (Part 1 of the Dragdani Prophecies) (4 page)

John turned
around to look at her. “My eyes have changed.”

“
Not just
your eyes John,” she said, aghast. “Your ears have changed
too.”

“
It’s all
right,” said Delsani. “All Wizard-Elves go through
this.”

“
Why didn’t
you tell us that before?” asked John with a note of distress, now
that the novelty of his new eyes had worn off.

“
It
must’ve slipped my mind,”
said
Delsani.

John walked
over to a display case. He could see his reflection agsin and
looked at his ears repeatedly from one to the other. They were
exactly the same height and width. They were pointed, and both had
one small notch near the top of the lobe. John had not seen this
before when he noticed the change in his eyes, though now could see
all of it easily. Then his eyes returned to normal, though his ears
did not.

“
Why haven’t
my ears turned back?” he asked distraughtly.

“
Well,
that’s because they’re
permanent,” replied Delsani.

“
Permanent,”
repeated John loudly; he was even more distressed with this. “You
said Wizard-Elves can do things that ordinary Wizard’s and Witches
can’t,” he said almost desperately. “So does that mean that I could
find a way to change my ears back?” he asked
optimistically.

“
Perhaps,”
said Delsani.

“
Why do
Wizard-Elves have those strange eyes?” asked Helen, making her
self-known once more.

“
I’ll explain
on the way up to the Council Chambers. The Council will be waiting
for us,” replied Delsani.

They began to
walk toward the far doors at the end of the hall to their left. But
just before they had reached it, John saw the display case that
held Dragdani’s wand. The one the King had used before he got his
Wizard-Elf abilities. It also held a set of his robes from the days
when he attended the old Wizard college, Jaldgiler, along with his
flying broomstick that he used to win the B.A.R (Broomstick Amateur
Races) twice in a row.

The
once-great broom was a little worse for wear. Not too far from the
top of the broomstick shaft was a grip, a long thick piece of
material which was tightly wrapped around that part of the shaft.
It was torn. Half way down. The shaft was badly cracked, which was
the result of the unfortunate accident that almost had taken the
life of the young Wizard. The accident happened at the race during
Dragdani’s fourth year at college. It was the second year he had
raced, as young Wizards and Witches were only allowed to enter the
broomstick races in their third year.

All
broomsticks were fitted with safety bars. These were metal strips
strengthened with magic to ensure the safety of the rider. In the
event of a crash, the safety bar would detect it and a large bubble
would surround the rider and give them a softer landing. However,
the safety bar could not protect the rider if they were to fall
off. The bars ran down the shafts of the brooms then split into
finer pieces which were mixed amongst the twig bristles.

Those were
not Dragdani’s only possessions on display. There were many of his
things, even the necklace piece which they had seen his double
wearing only minutes before. His spell book was probably the most
famous of all of his possessions, for written somewhere in its
pages was the spell that defeated the Dark Wizard, Salith, though
none knew what it was. The Wizard-Elf had put protection spells on
the book to prevent it ever being opened by anyone but
him.

They walked
on, and when they got to the end of the hall there were three
doors. They took the one to the left. The runes on it moved and
changed into two separate words that both said WELCOME. The top one
was the Wizard language, and the bottom one was in
English:

Hiwol

Welcome

Then the door
opened by itself.

They walked
through the doorway. At first the room was black, though suddenly
there was a bright light. There were no torches or candles or
anything that would usually emit such a strong illumination. And
although the light was strong, Helen could still see no walls,
which intrigued her more than anything else. At first, all that
could be seen were wooden doors. The doors were numbered and
floating around the room on small pieces of what looked like thick
mist or cloud. Most of the doors were brown, but not all, for there
were red, grey, blue, and even green doors as well. To their right
there were two bright stone staircases. They were twisting and
coiling around each other, going up as far as the eye could see.
Well, as far as Delsani and Helen’s could see. Up the steps went,
around and around like two giant snakes. At the bottom of both
staircases, on either side, were posts bearing the image of
Dragdani’s Dragon carved into white stone.

“
What is this
place?” asked Helen.

“
This is one
of the three vault rooms,” replied Delsani. “The vault door moves
about each of the rooms, floating around with the dimensional
doors, and the only ones who know which vault room it is in are the
Grand Wizard and the other members of the Council.”

“
And what are
dimensional doors?” asked Helen, now totally baffled.

“
Remember
when I said that dimensional windows show us worlds that are very
like our own? Well. These are dimensional doors that allow access
to other worlds that in almost every case are so alien that it can
take years to learn how to talk to the people who live there. But
be careful not to open a door that leads to a demon
dimension.”

“
How do you
know the difference between them?” asked Helen.

“
Usually you
can hear screaming coming from the demon doors,” replied John
mordantly.

“
Why didn’t
you tell me about this John?” asked Helen, who sounded excited with
the idea but also disappointed that she had not known about it
before.

“
If you
remember, you didn’t want to know too much about Dorminya. You
wanted to use your imagination for your books or I would have told
you everything,” replied John defensively.

“
Well,
now I want to know
everything,” said Helen, very intrigued by all she was
learning.

When they got
to the foot of the staircase facing them, they stopped. Helen
looked up. It was so high that she grew dizzy. “That looks like a
long climb,” she said.

“
What climb,”
asked John. He stepped forward onto the staircase and stood there
for less than a second with both of his feet on the first step, and
then suddenly vanished.

“
What
happened?” cried Helen. John had not told her of the staircases
either.

“
The
staircases are just for
show,” said Delsani. “When you step onto the first tread on either
one, you’ll instantly be teleported to whatever floor you wish. You
should go next. Fifth floor, by the way.’

Helen said
nothing. If her facial expression was anything to go by, she was
not at all excited about this. Her morbid fear battled with her
fascination, and with this weighing on her mind, she stepped
forward onto the step, shut her eyes tight. Then, like John, she
too disappeared.

When she
reappeared, John was there waiting. “Congratulations,” he
said.

“
For
what?”
Helen asked as she opened her eyes
again.

“
For your
second magical experience,” replied John. “I forgot to congratulate
you the first time round.”

“
No,” said
Helen, putting up her right index finger and waving it slowly from
side to side. “That was my fourth magical experience. First I came
here,” and she started counting with her fingers, “Then the
dimensional window, and then there were the floating doors. Then
the teleporting staircases.” She finished, sounding clever and
looking quite pleased with herself.

“
You think
you’re so smart, don’t you?” John asked.

Helen
laughed. “Smarter then you, anyway,” she said.

“
You know,
now that I’m a King, you shouldn’t talk to me like that,” said the
Wizard-Elf, “or I might end up taking a leaf out of Henry the
Eighth’s book, and you know what happened to his wives.”

“
Don’t
even think it,”
said his wife with a
smile.

“
If the two
of you don’t mind, I would like to get to the Council before they
send out a search party to look for us, or before I die of old age
whichever comes first,” said Delsani, appearing just behind
Helen.

“
Somehow I
think the latter might come before the former,” joked the
King.

This made his wife snigger.

Delsani on
the other hand said nothing; he merely smiled.

From there,
they walked on along a grey corridor that displayed a number of
openings to either side of them.

“
Delsani, you
said that you would tell us why Wizard-Elves have those strange
eyes,” said Helen.

“
It’s because
of the Dragon blood that flows though their veins’ said Delsani.
“Thoucil’s great grandfather, King Basan, fought at one of the
greatest battles between Salith and the alliance of the six races
and was critically injured. He lost a lot of blood, and it was the
silver scaled Dragon, Lanisic, that gave the King some of his blood
in order to save him, not knowing of course the consequences of his
act, for Basan healed very quickly and found that he was stronger
and faster than ever. Although when Thoucil was born, her mixture
of Dragon, Wizard, and Elf blood that made her blood the most
magical of all. This gave her an energy and unique abilities. And
the eyes, like the ears and marks on the wrist, are all aberrations
caused by the mixture of three of the most magical races in
Dorminya.”

They had
reached the end of the hall where there were more steps. Helen
counted them. There were exactly ten. At the top of the steps was a
slender bridge, wide enough for at least four people. Running down
the walls at either side of the walkway were two thin waterfalls
that led to nothing but a deep dark drop below.

Helen stayed
in the middle of the bridge; Delsani was now her left and John on
her right. She found herself looking at the waterfalls, wondering
where the water was coming from, for they were five floors up. When
they were almost halfway over the bridge, Helen took the lead and
was almost across when she turned to see were the others were. She
saw that John’s wand was about to fall out of his right trouser
pocket. It was hanging by only a thread.

“
JOHN YOUR
WAND,” she shouted.

The
Wizard-Elf reached down, but just before he could grasp it, it
fell. He leaned over and stretched out to catch it but lost his
balance and fell off of the bridge. Helen saw it all as though in
slow motion. However, to her complete and utter surprise, John did
not fall too far. In fact, it looked to Helen that he had hit
ground. He stood up and picked up his wand and continued as if
nothing had occurred.

Helen was
standing there with her hands over her mouth, and although she was
naturally pale, she was now as white as a sheet with her hands and
very arms quivering.

“
What’s
wrong?” asked John.

“
I thought
you were going to fall,” said Helen with a twinge of distress still
in her voice.

“
You can’t
fall down there. It’s just an illusion,” said John tapping has foot
on the invisible ground. When he said that, her color started to
return though her hands continued to rattle.

They
proceeded to walk across the rest of the bridge.

“
Why is the
illusion there?” she asked.

“
The
re’s no real reason for it,
but it looks better than an ordinary dark dank room, don’t you
think?” said a strange voice.

“
I think so,”
said John.

Helen spun
round to see who else was there, but she saw no one.

“
What is it?”
asked John.

“
Who were you
agreeing with?”

“
Me,” said a
man’s grainy voice.

“
I, too,
agree completely. You should have seen it before they put the
illusion there,’ said a younger, smoother man’s voice.

“
Oh terrible,
terrible,” said a young woman’s voice.

“
Yes
terrible,” said another woman.

“
Who’s saying
that?” asked Helen.

“
Turn around,
Normal; we’re right here,” said the first voice.

Helen turned
to face the wall closest to her, and there on a shelf carved into
the stone were four head statuettes, two male, two female, two
young, and two old.

“
Be careful
what you say. Need I remind you that this is the new King and his
Queen?” said Delsani sternly.

“
So you are
King Jastark. Ha! Ha! I knew it! Didn’t I always say that there was
something special about that boy?” asked the older male statue with
the grainy voice.