At the top of the main staircase was a large gargoyle
I had passed many times without thought, so it was a bit of a shock to me when
I saw it glowing deep, fiery yellow. It was made of stone with a muscular
frame. Although it stood on two legs, its arms were longer than a person’s in
proportion. Its head was also very large. Its face more closely resembled an
animal’s than a person’s, with a very short, smashed snout and sharp teeth
sticking out between its dark gray lips.
Completely caught up in studying its features, I
shrieked when it turned its head to study me back. I continued shrieking until
I tripped and started to fall down the stairs. Fortunately, I caught myself on
the banister and didn’t go tumbling to my death.
The gargoyle stared at me with his hard, emotionless
face. I cleared my throat and approached the gargoyle cautiously.
“Good evening… I’m Ayden.”
The gargoyle showed no sign of having heard me, so I
stepped back, hoping to get out of sight without turning my back on him. After
a few steps, however, I jumped when a hand settled on my back.
“Careful there, you don’t want to fall down the
stairs,” Mira said affectionately. I realized she was right, that I had been
about to fall again, but she went on before I could thank her. “I see you
finally met the housekeeper.”
“Housekeeper?”
“Yes. Like I said, he’s very shy and doesn’t talk
much. He’s very friendly once you get to know him.”
“Okay. I think it’s time for me to call it a night.”
She smiled brightly and hugged me. When she pulled
away, I forced myself to ignore her sweet scent and glanced at her hands. She
didn’t have anything in her hands, but I patted my pocket just in case. My
money pouch was still there.
She pouted when she saw me do it. “We’re friends now,
and I don’t steal from friends. Sweet dreams.”
* * *
I didn’t have sweet dreams, though. It took me
forever to fall asleep, because I kept hearing the whispering. When I finally
fell asleep, I immediately started having nightmares of being locked away in a
cage. It got even weirder when I dreamed of being bound and laid out on a
perfectly drawn pentagram with sigils all around. I knew it was perfectly drawn
and I knew that it would kill me by sucking out my life… because it wasn’t me
lying there.
I was seeing through Merlin’s wolf eyes and I knew
what he knew. I knew he was in trouble.
* * *
I woke myself out of desperation, and as soon as I
did, the dream started slipping from my memory. By the time I got out of bed, I
couldn’t remember what I saw, only that Merlin was in trouble. I didn’t
remember why, but that only spurred me to act.
I grabbed my still-packed bag, staff, and wand before
running out of my room and down the stairs. When I passed the dining room, I
heard Mira calling out to me, but I ignored her. By the time I got to the
ritual room, I’d forgotten that I’d had a dream.
The ritual room was not like Magnus’s, because
although Vactarus had all kinds of magical tools, he kept them in the basement.
There were three windows on one wall, filling the room with early morning
light. The opposite wall was taken up by a bookshelf full of very common tools
of magic, such as candles and chalk. In the middle of the room was the base of
a portal already painted permanently on the floor. An identical pentagram
inside a double circle was painted in the ceiling right above it. All around
the outer circle was a curtain of crystals hanging from strings, which nearly
touched the floor.
“What are you doing?” Asiago asked, coming down the
steps.
I grabbed a box of chalk and got to work on the
pentagram. “Merlin is in trouble. I’m going to his world to help him.” I didn’t
know why I was so panicked, only that I couldn’t stop my hand from drawing the
sigils. “I remember the code for the portal to his world.”
“Code?” he asked.
“That’s what he called it.”
Vactarus floated down out of the ceiling to stand
next to Asiago. “What’s going?” he asked.
“Merlin is in trouble, so we’re going to his world,”
Asiago said.
I would have missed the worry in Vactarus’s expression
if I hadn’t been paying attention. I shook my head. “I’m going alone.”
“I told you I owe you my life and I meant it. I’m
with you until I save you or die. What do you want me to do to help get the
portal ready?”
I didn’t bother arguing with him, because I really
didn’t want to go alone. Asiago didn’t know any more about this foreign world
than I did, but he was somewhat level-headed, albeit morbid. “I just need to
draw the right sigils for the portal. If I get one wrong, we could end up on
the wrong world or worse.”
“Or in the wrong time,” Vactarus said.
I looked up at him. “What do you mean?”
“Next to world travel, what is time travel? I can’t
read the code, but Merlin could have easily added a couple of sigils to land
exactly
when
he wanted to.”
“So he could have gone back in time to stop the curse
from happening?”
“Only if he is an utter fool. I take it he hasn’t
explained paradoxes to you?”
“He said they could destroy everything… but there was
a moon rose blooming and I wanted to pet it, so I didn’t pay a lot of
attention. I never thought I needed to know.” Moon roses only bloomed when both
moons were full.
Vactarus sighed. “You know, for an avid reader,
you’re not the most intelligent sorcerer I’ve ever met.”
“I like books. I can focus on them. It’s hard to
listen to someone just talking.” I turned my attention back to the portal. The
whispers started again, fading in and out like they were trying to get closer
and kept being pulled back.
“Get five candles down and place them at the points
of the pentagram, outside the circle. It will help you focus,” Vactarus said.
Asiago immediately did so, and by the time the candles were perfect, I was done
drawing the portal. “Are you certain this is correct?”
I wouldn’t let doubt slow me down. This was more
important than when I ran away from home to defeat Magnus. I knew the portal
was right. “Yes. We’ll be back with Merlin,”
or not at all
. I stood in
the center of the pentagram with my bag, wand, and staff, and waved my wand at
the candles, lighting them all. As the flickering light illuminated the
crystals hanging from the ceiling, it created the illusion of a waterfall
around me. “Wow.”
Asiago entered the circle, carefully stepping around
the sigils.
“I’m assuming it can send us both. If we get separated
for some reason, find the nearest safe place, stay there, and wait for me to
find you.”
“One more thing before you go,” Vactarus said,
pointing to a small treasure chest on the bookshelf. “In there is a pendant
that was invaluable on my travels.”
I stepped out of the portal, opened the box, and
found a pendant. It was a round piece of silver, about the width of my palm,
with a black fish and a white fish circling each other. “What is it?”
“It’s called the Siren. I got it from a very pretty
young lady. She said it was created for the ‘ultimate quest,’ whatever that is.
There are two others related to it out there, and they all do different things.
This one translates words, even script.”
“Thank you. This will definitely be useful.” I went
back into the pentagram. The crystals really helped me block out everything
outside the pentagram. “Ready?” I asked Asiago. He nodded.
I cleared my mind, looked down at the pentagram,
visualized it being the night sky, and pushed my magic into it through my
staff. Like Merlin had taught me, I aligned the stars into the lines. When my
energy vanished into it, I braced myself to feel the strain on my body. For a
moment, I felt like a heavy pressure wrapped around me from all sides that
squeezed tighter and tighter until I couldn’t breathe.
Then it was dark.
Part 2
Merlin
Peace was a long forgotten dream by the time I was
born. Our world was overrun by fear and famine. Although the kings all owned at
least one wizard, they tried to rid all their enemies of magic. Most wizards
were killed on sight unless they impressed the right person.
One day, a small, forgotten, insignificant village
was in the way of King Zokkor’s army. By the time they were gone, the village
was reduced to ashes. All that was left standing was a dozen villagers,
including my mother. There were nine women and three men who were too old for
battle. All of the children were taken. Soon after, it was discovered that my
mother had become pregnant during the invasion.
The other villagers assumed my father was a soldier
until I was born, for they quickly realized I had supernatural abilities. I
learned to speak, walk, and conceptualize things very early in life. Magic was
inherited.
King Zokkor had a number of wizards, so I never
learned which one was my father. My mother always spoke fondly of him, as if he
was a prince who would return and take her away from this place. She adamantly
refused to admit that he was a wizard, saying instead that my father was a
demon from another world. This was probably for the best. Although I was feared
and shunned by almost everyone in my village, at least the kings never
discovered me.
I worked in the fields with my mother. Some of the
girls made comments about me that I was too young to appreciate, but everyone
who remembered my birth spoke as if I had horns and a tail. For most of my
childhood, I thought I had some kind of physical deformity that only adults
could see.
On my seventh birthday, I began having dreams. They
started gently, such as dreaming of seeing a rabbit in the field and then
actually seeing it the next morning. Sometimes I would dream of a trap I could
use to capture a rabbit, or even bigger game. Then the dreams began turning
violent. Even at that age, I knew I would suffer some horrible treatment if I
told anyone, so I kept it to myself. It got bad enough where I would fall out
of bed or injure myself flailing to escape the monsters in my mind. Although
she must have known, my mother pretended it never happened. The rest of the
village assumed she was beating me and that was why I had bruises.
When I was eight, five travelers were welcomed into our
village. They brought food, tools, and weapons we had never seen before, but
the most important thing they brought was opportunity. Of the five travelers,
four were men— a blacksmith, a leatherworker, a carpenter, and a hunter. Since
our village was on a major crossroad, it was the perfect location for them to
settle down in, because they could provide for the village and sell to all the
surrounding villages.
As the oldest of only three boys in the village, I
became the apprentice to Dantur, our new blacksmith. I loved it; it gave me a
sense of place in the village. In exchange for teaching me his trade, I would
be in his service for ten years. My only stipulation was that I would not live
with him, though I didn’t tell him it was because of my dreams. Thus, I spent
most nights in the smithy.
For months, I worked hard and learned everything I
needed to be a blacksmith. The new villagers, especially Dantur, were kind to
me. Unfortunately, it could never last. No matter how much I wanted to be
normal, I wasn’t.
On an ordinary day, while I was firing a sword, I
suddenly felt very ill. Dantur was out of the shop at the time. I remembered
dropping something and then all I could see was fire and a battle. Blades
clashed, blood spilled, and people screamed. I saw strangers attacking our
village with swords and axes that Dantur and I had built. In my dream, Dantur
had me guard the armor and weapons while he fought.
I saw him standing alone as he tried to guard the
women and children. There were just too many fighters on their side, and no one
but the newer villagers even knew how to fight. The battle was lost so quickly.
Three women and all of the girls had been taken by the invaders and four of the
adult men were killed, including Dantur.
I woke surrounded by fire. Someone was dragging me
out, and only when the black smoke and bright fire had given way to sunlight
did I realize it was Dantur. Everyone in the village surrounded us while the
small smithy burned. Dantur asked me if I was hurt and what happened. Before I
could answer, the older members of the village told him that I was the son of a
demon and this was to be expected.
Dantur took me to his home and laid me on his bed. I
explained everything about my dream with great dismay, certain he would say it
was just a dream and berate me for causing the fire. Instead, he listened
carefully and without judgment. “Did you recognize anyone from the other
village?” he asked when I was done.
I started to shake my head when I remembered someone.
“Not anyone in particular, but one of them had that broadsword with the black
leather hilt and the black, twisted pommel.”
“We made several that---”
“It had that nick in the tang I was worried about.”
“Oh, that one. I see. Did your dream give any
indication of when they would attack?”
“It was night. I didn’t see any snow.” I focused
harder than I had ever focused before. I opened my mouth to say I didn’t
remember anything, but instead said, “The moon! I saw the moon! It was almost
full.”
“It will be full in just a few days.”
“So you think it’s really going to happen, then?”
“I know such premonitions are possible for great
wizards. I do think your dream will come true. Maybe it’ll be next month… or it
might not be for many months.” He stood. “Get some rest.” With that, he walked
back outside.
I heard him as everyone gathered around him right
outside the door.
“Do not fret; Merlin is fine. He has been up working
without sleep for many nights. I have unsettling news, though. On my way back
from selling in the west, a soldier warned me that Adelard’s village was going
to attack us.”
I could hear the startled gasps. Several voices
drowned out others, but they essentially wanted to know how and when. No one
asked why; there was too much war for us to be overlooked for long.
“I can’t be sure, but I do think we have time to
prepare.”
* * *
Over the next month, Dantur prepared everyone in the
village for battle, including the women. Although none of them were trained,
the women of those days were tough. When the neighboring villagers showed up to
attack, just as they had in my dream, we were still outnumbered, but we were
somewhat prepared. The smithy was cleared out, so instead of having me guard
it, Dantur wanted me to guard the other children. I wanted to help fight, but I
was too little to be of much help. We did lose two women and our eldest man,
but we drove the enemy out.
Life settled down for a while after that, although
Dantur always wanted to know about my dreams. In fact, the dreams weren’t as
violent. When I was nine, my dreams changed altogether. I started seeing things
that didn’t exist in my world. Some of the crafts and weapons could be confused
as just foreign, but I saw steam-engine weapons and electronics. The weirdest
part was that I somehow knew they were all real. I even knew their names.
When I had a dream in which I stood before a cave at
the base of a mountain, I felt very strange for the rest of the day. For the
next three nights, I had the same dream where there was a deep voice speaking
from the darkness of the cave. When I tried to approach the cave, I was shocked
by the heavy waves of heat. I woke from the dream sweating heavily.
Then, I began to understand the voice, at least
enough to know it was directed at me. I told Dantur about it and he let me
sleep longer, hoping to make me understand it better. It didn’t work. After a
few nights, I finally saw the creature who was speaking to me.
It was a black dragon. I didn’t see his body, since
only his face was visible out of the blackness of the cave. There were two,
long, curved horns on his head and smoke billowing from his snout.
When I woke, I told Dantur about it. Surprisingly, he
wasn’t shocked or confused. He said that he knew there were dragons to the
north and suggested I listen to what the dragon had to say if I dreamed of it
again. That night, I did just that. When I faced the dragon, I asked, “Are you
real?”
“Of course, young wizard. I am Cennuth.”
“Why am I having dreams about you?”
“Your powers are developing without direction, and
this can only lead to destruction. You need guidance. I can teach you the magic
you need to reach your potential.”
“I don’t want to learn magic. I just want to live in
my village.”
“You cannot remain a child forever.”
“Why me?”
“You are destined to end the war against magic.”
“I refuse. I’m not going to learn magic.”
“I will see you again, on the next full moon.”
I woke after that and although I didn’t believe the
dragon, I told Dantur anyway. He told me not to worry and that my future was
mine to decide. The full moon was a long time away, and since I didn’t see the
dragon again, I started to think it really was just a dream.
* * *
Unfortunately, it was a dark time for the world, and
it was time for me to lose my place. On the morning of the full moon, a group
of soldiers came to the village on horses and searched everything. They weren’t
looking for gold, although they took all of it they found; instead, they
rounded up all of the men and boys to stand in the center of the village.
“What is this about?” Dantur asked.
The captain of the soldiers sneered. “King Zokkor has
heard that one of you
is
, or is
harboring
, a wizard.”
I glanced at my mother, who was standing right behind
me. Her expression gave no hint of guilt or worry. Dantur, on the other hand,
glared defiantly. “Who told the king such lies?”
“It doesn’t matter. Give up the wizard or we will
kill you all.”
“Well, that’s a foolish threat since we all know you
have to bring the wizard in alive. Otherwise, he can’t work for the king.”
“He is bringing in a man who will do a thorough
investigation. He
will
find the wizard. Give up the wizard now and the
rest of you will be spared.”
At this point, I knew everyone in the village would
give me up. Even if they thought I was the child of a demon and not a wizard,
they would side with the king over magic. To my shock, everyone glanced at
Dantur, who glared even harder. The blacksmith had gained so much respect in
our village that they would spare me. “There is no wizard here,” he said.
The soldier glared back at him. “Very well. We will
stand guard until the hunter arrives to make sure no one leaves. Anyone can
come to us to give up the wizard and be spared. Anyone who attempts to leave
will be killed.” With that, he turned his horse around and left with the other
soldiers.
Dantur told us to get back to our work and we did. I
was torn; I wanted to turn myself in and spare everyone else, but I didn’t want
to be forced to work for the king. Dantur worked with me and didn’t say a
single word on the matter. I figured that he was also trying to come up with a
solution.
* * *
I was awoken that night as Dantur pulled me off my
bed. My mother stood by the door. “What’s going on?” I asked.
“Quiet. We’re getting you out of here.”
I was mostly confused, since I was still lost in a
dream of motorized vehicles that could run faster than horses and only ate
liquid as food. I felt somehow that I was in the wrong place. “What about the
guards?” I asked quietly as he pulled me outside.
“They’re asleep.” As he said it, we passed right by a
soldier, who was in an odd position on the ground.
Before I really understood the situation, we were
deep in the forest. We traveled for hours and Dantur never let me take a break.
When I asked where we were going, he just told me we were going into the
mountains. I had never strayed far from the village, so it was both exciting
and frightening.
When we reached the mountains, Dantur led me to a
cave that was partially hidden by a tree, and I recognized it immediately. “You
brought me to the dragons.”
“You will be safe here.”
“I thought dragons were dangerous. I don’t want to
learn magic and work for the king.”
He put his hands on my shoulders. “I know this isn’t
what you want, but you need to trust me. Magic is not your enemy, and neither
are the dragons. Ignorance will not protect you from the king. Learn what you
can from the dragons and don’t return until you know enough magic to protect
yourself.” He turned me to face the cave. “Approach the cave and bow until the
dragon answers you; don’t try to enter or he may burn you for lack of respect.”
“You said I can decide my own future.”
“This is the moment when you do. Learn from the
dragons or be a captive of the king.”
I didn’t like either option, but I definitely didn’t
want the soldiers to take me to the king. “What’s going to happen to the rest
of the village?”
“We’ll be fine as long as they don’t catch us
harboring you.”
I turned to the cave, knelt, and bowed as Dantur
instructed. After a while, I became worried that either the dragon was out or
he refused to answer me. “Should I call out?” I asked.