by Darkbringer
“Great,” I said sarcastically. “Now we don’t know if he’s simply a coward, or if it’s something which might affect any of us at any time. I don’t think I’m going to sleep any more tonight.”
“Me either,” Crystal agreed, and Jess just nodded.
“Then wake him on up Jess. If he asks, ummm…” I paused for a few moments to try and come up with something suitable to say, but I was at a loss.
“Michael was worried that he might hurt himself while under the influence of the skeleton’s magic, and that’s why he kicked him to knock him out like he did,” Crystal suggested and saved me.
“Okies!” Jess giggled lightly and nodded. “That sounds good to me. I’ll tell him that and make certain he’s calm while you two take the tent down. If no one’s going to sleep any more tonight, we might as well pack up and try and find the other team. If they have a fire going of some sort, we might notice them better in the dark.”
I couldn’t help but be surprised once again. Jess really wasn’t as bad as I’d first imagined her to be. Dino had turned out to be completely useless so far on this task, but Jess was surprisingly capable of pulling her own weight when push came to shove. I was definitely starting to revise my opinion of her as Crystal and I took down the damaged tents as carefully as possible and tried to pack them up while Jess was dealing with Dino.
Confessing Before the Darkness
By the time we’d finished taking down the tents, Jess had Dino healed and awake. He was at first grumpy and angry, but after talking to Jess for a while, he became embarrassed and apologetic. I didn’t think he had it in him to apologize for anything, and after a while I was wishing that he didn’t! He simply wouldn’t drop it! “I’m sorry. Honestly guys, I’m soooo sorry. I don’t know what got into me. I’m not like that. Yeah, you say it’s OK, but still…. I feel bad! I’m sorry!”
Gods above! I swear I think I’d rather have ‘arrogant ass’ Dino with him, over ‘apologetic broken-record’ Dino! By the time we had packed up, and Jess and Dino had gathered a few burning branches to use as torches, I was ready and happy to go charging into Death in the dark. Anything to put some distance between me and him!
The moment we crossed the threshold and entered into the perimeter where the death energy pulse, I knew it. The energy was wrong. Corrupted. Not at all like the normal energy that death provides naturally. Whatever was creating this energy was dark, twisted, and wrong, and it left a foul taste in the back of my mouth that wouldn’t go away.
If it wasn’t for the fact that Earth was my primary affinity, I never would’ve noticed that there was a slight undercurrent of earthen energy which marked the border between where the death was, and where it wasn’t. Honestly, it was such a subtle and mellow feel, I doubt even one out of a hundred experienced wizards would have even felt the earth flows. Mother, herself, probably would have even overlooked it. Only the fact that I’d spent years basically practicing in the forests secretly at home, drawing almost exclusively up on the earth and fire of the island, allowed me to notice it.
Around the perimeter of the… ‘Graveyard’ doesn’t seem like the proper term anymore for what we had stumbled into. I suppose ‘disturbance’ is a better term for it…
Around the perimeter of the disturbance was a small and subtle ring of earth energy which contained the deathly miasma inside and kept it from spreading outwards any further. Using my talents subtly so Dino and Jess wouldn’t notice, I felt the presence of a foreign ore in the ground below up, shaped and formed in an unusual arc that probably formed an enclosed circle around the whole area for miles ahead of us. The ring was relatively thin, being no more than a hand’s width in thickness, and was only about half that size in height. Buried several feet below the surface, it was something that most people would never dig deep enough to notice by accident, and the energy it gave off was light, subtle, and easily overlooked from the corruption and thickness of the death flows around us.
Truly, one could almost say that it was even a miracle that someone like me even noticed it!
Taking a moment to probe the ore a little more carefully once I became aware of it, I was surprised by the fact that I couldn’t readily identify it. It was primarily iron of some sort, but it had been altered in subtle ways and didn’t have the same feel or composite to it of anything I’d ever felt before. It was iron. At some point in time, it was probably pure, refined iron ore. But now it was…. almost iron, but not quite.
The oddity was enough that I finally stopped moving completely, held up my hands for the others to stop as well, and then I turned around and starting walking back to where we’d been camping at before.
“What the hell? Where are you going now?” Dino asked, all puzzled at my sudden change in behavior, while the two girls looked odd and curious at me as well.
“Back out of here for a moment. Come on,” I told them without stopping. We weren’t far from the edge, but being inside even this much was enough to make every hair on my body stand erect. I needed a few moments to think about what I’d learned so far, before we went any deeper.
Crystal was the first to shrug her shoulders, turn, and then walk back with me. Jess followed after a brief pause, and once Dino realized he was in the rear and probably closest to any more skeletons, he quickly caught up and walked closely beside her.
Finally getting outside the influence of death, I breathed the pure air deeply several times and enjoyed the true feel of nature all around us, without the taint of that corruption influencing things. I knew the others would have a thousand questions for my actions, so I took a deep breath to steady myself and started talking before they could.
“Jess. Dino. There’s something I need to confess before we go any further. Sit down, relax for a moment and hear me out. I’ll answer any questions you might have in a few moments, but let me speak for a bit to explain first.”
“What the hell, man? You gay or something?” Dino asked with a puzzled look on his face. “Not like something like that seems important right now.”
“No,” I said with a slight sigh, “I am not gay. And that’s not what I was going to talk about anyway! Sit your ass down and actually listen to me for a moment and hear me out for a change!” For whatever reason, he just pushes my buttons in the wrong way quite easily.
“Fine.” Dino snorted, but finally leaned back against a nearby tree and crossed his arms to show that he was listening.
Waiting for a moment for the others to get settled, I tried to arrange my thoughts as best as possible. I wasn’t certain how what I was going to say was going to be taken, so I figured the best thing to do was to simply get to the heart of the matter from the start. Drawing some of the energy from the fire that flows deep within the earth, I pulled its power to me, pointed, and then set a nearby bush on fire. “I, also, am a male wizard,” I told them calmly.
“Wha... What?!!” Dino was so shocked that he would’ve fell on his ass if he hadn’t been leaned against the tree for support. Jess simply stared wordlessly and ogled me like I was some two-headed rat or something to dissect. Only Crystal remained calm and completely composed – but then again, she knew that already.
“Yes,” I tried to explain, calmly. “I too happen to have magic like you, Dino. Never before have I ever seen a male wizard, and it was quite shocking to see you practicing your talents at the school. I’d always figured I’d tell you some time, but I wanted to wait until I met the rest of our roommates and saw a bit more about what type of people they are first. A male can never be too careful with who he trusts telling about his ability. There're some unscrupulous people out there that would take advantage of us in a heartbeat. I’m certain you can appreciate and understand that.”
Slowly, he nodded, and then sat down. “You could’ve told me sooner,” he pouted. “I’ve never seen another man with magic either! It’ll be nice to have someone to confide in and compare notes with some time.”
“And I’m certain we can do that in the future some time,” I
agreed, nodding. “But for now, we need to focus on the task at hand.” Everyone simply stared at me for a few moments, and then finally nodded slowly. The look Jess had on her face was actually a little worrisome to me – it seemed almost calculating and cold as if she was weighing her options with me now, the same as she had been with Dino earlier. It bothered me, but there wasn’t anything I could do about it at the moment. I’ll just have to be a little more cautious and on guard around her a bit more from now on.
“So why tell us now?” Jess asked, out of the blue. “You’d hidden your gift this long from us. What made you decide to suddenly tell us about it?”
“Because we’re walking into something really nasty,” I told her. “I mean really nasty. Just a few feet in that direction,” I pointed ahead, where we’d just came from, “the flows of energy and nature are completely twisted and corrupt. I’ve never felt, or even heard, of anything like it before in my life, and I’ve listened to talks about magic and how it works my whole life.” When they looked at me curiously, I simply shrugged and offered the barest truth. “My mother has magic, also.”
“But,” I continued on before they could ask any questions about her that I might not feel comfortable answering at the moment, “that’s not important right now either. What is important,” I stressed, “is the fact that we’re walking into someplace really wrong and nasty, and I have no idea what in the hell could cause something like that.”
“Dino seems to have focused on learning fire magic as his primary element,” I said while looking at him for confirmation.
“I have.” He agreed.
“Well, I’ve focused heavily on earth magic. It’s my primary element, and my gift seems to work greatest with it,” I explained simply. “One of the things I’ve noticed, with my gift, is that this corruption seems to have been contained in some manner. There’s a barrier of energy that is keeping if from spreading beyond the limits of where its currently at. Under the ground there,” I pointed ahead and downwards a bit, “is some type of metal that’s been purposefully shaped and formed to create a ring which holds the corruption inside.”
I paused for a few moments for what I was saying to try and sink in for them, before continuing. “What that tells me, is that whatever this corruption is, it’s probably been here for a looooong time. Somebody, some time long enough in the past that people have forgotten about it, felt this corruption and trapped it.”
“They trapped it,” I repeated for emphasis, “but they couldn’t cleanse it or get rid of it. And now, it’s had God only knows how many years or centuries to build up and grow inside it!”
“And that,” I said while slowly waving a hand to indicate the whole forest in front of us, “is where we need to go. In there is where the graveyard is, and where the other team will be. If they still are, that is,” I added grimly.
Everyone was glancing back and forth at each other nervously now, and I could tell that my words had sunk home for them. We were walking into an old, powerful, and forgotten darkness – and they all realized that now.
“Are we certain we want to go any further then?” Jess asked nervously.
“I don’t know,” I told her honestly. “I think at this point, that’s something everyone will have to decide for themselves. I’ve come this far; I’m not going to turn back now. But, I honestly can’t say that I’d blame anyone who did decide to turn back at this point. What’s out there ahead of us is just plain wrong, and I can’t blame anyone for wanting to stay away from something like that.”
“Well, I’m going wherever you go,” Crystal said with no hesitation. “If you’re heading forwards, then I am as well.”
Dino and Jess were both quiet for a moment, weighing their choices. It was Dino who finally spoke up first. “I’m going as well,” he finally said. “I believe you when you say it’s dangerous, but they’re my roommates and my friends. Since we’re this close, I want to help them if I can. Or, at the least, I want to know what to go back and tell their families about them, if it’s already too late somehow. I’m going to see this through to the end as well,” he said resolutely.
“Then I’m going also,” Jess said with a slight frown. “I realize it’s dangerous moving forward, but I’m also not stupid enough to try wandering through the forest and traveling the roads back all alone. If everyone else is going forward, I’m not going to be the only one running away. I’m with you guys.”
Slowly, I nodded to each of them. “I know we wanted to move on tonight, but let’s not do that right yet. Let’s wait and see if things change any when the sun comes up, and I want a little time to try and see what I can learn about that ore which works as a barrier against this corruption. Who knows. I may even be able to replicate it, or find some way to use it that can help us resist the trouble ahead.”
Without saying anything, everyone simply nodded and sat and stared forward into the darkness, waiting for daylight to come.
Girly Talk
As we waited on the night to pass, my Lord sat and focused his magic on trying and keeping us safe. The other two with us were fools who couldn’t see how hard he was working just to keep them safe and to find their friends. Honestly, they both disgusted me. That idiot, Dino… Well, what could I say about him except that he was an idiot? Whiny. Spoiled. Helpless and hopeless. I really wasn’t certain why my Lord brought him along, but I trust he had his reasons. Perhaps to show the fool a bit about how a real man, and a real wizard, should act. Heavens knows, someone needed to teach him!
As for the girl Jess… At first, I thought she was simply an idiot farm girl who had developed a small talent for healing. Now, however, I saw her as a disease and one that might be harmful to my Lord. He, unfortunately, is a man, and like all men, he seems to have a blindness towards the fairer sex. The Lady bought my debt, saved my family, and gifted me with a truly caring and lenient Lord. All she asked was for me to watch over him and take care of him, as his heart was sometimes larger than his mind. I could see that now, and I was becoming aware of what she was warning me about.
For several hours, I sat near my Lord and rested against his side, but I never took my eyes from the dangers around us, nor from the two fools who I perceived as almost as much danger as the forest itself. My Lord was studying the forest and would find a way to keep us all safe from whatever darkness it presented, which left me to be the one to keep us safe from the danger that was here close to hand.
Finally, the idiot Dino moved away from the harlot Jess, to go toss some more wood into the fires. Seeing my chance to make things abundantly clear, I eased up and slowly walked over to where she was standing and alternating her gaze between the Fool and my Lord.
“Jess,” I called out to her lightly. “Can we talk? Girl to girl for a few minutes, where the boys won’t hear us if you don’t mind.”
“Sure!” She turned, laughed lightly, and then bounced over to join me. Without saying anything, I walked out to the edge of the campfire’s light and waited for her to come stand beside me. “What can I do for you, hun? Is it that time of the month, or something? I’ve got some herbs that can help with that. You should’ve said something sooner.”
Strange how she could act so thoughtful and caring, and yet keep such a cold look in her eyes. I doubt the men could notice it, but it wasn’t something she could hide from me. “Nothing like that,” I told her calmly, as I pulled my knife and slowly started to use it to scrape under my nails. “I simply wanted to have a small chat with you about Lord Michael.”
“Oh?” Jess glanced back at him for a moment, then back towards Dino, before finally turning back to face me.
Leaning in close, as if I was going to whisper a secret just between us girls, I shoved the steel of my cold blade up against her crotch, where I was certain she’d notice it, without a doubt. Her eyes widened slightly, and she stood perfectly still and I caressed the tip of my blade between her legs.
“You should forget about the Lord. He’s out of your league.” Staring directl
y into her eyes, we never blinked at each other. I wanted to make certain that she got the point I was making. “For starters, he’s got me to help watch over him, and I know that you’re aware of his secret now. If by chance, something does happen to the Lord, I’ll come and shove his blade so far up your twat, you’ll be giving birth to razor blades. You won’t need a man to please you anymore, as I’ll teach you the pleasure of a knife.”
Without breaking my stare, I slowly pressed inwards with the knife. Her face wrinkled slightly in pain, and I could feel the pressure giving as the tip slowly worked its way into the base of her groin. “Am I speaking plainly and clearly enough for you to understand me?”
“I.. I understand.” She barely whispered the words, but I had to give her credit; she was holding up fairly well given the situation. And, she was wise enough not to try and scream for the others. They couldn’t get here in time to do anything to save her, and if she did do something foolish like that, I’d gut her from bottom to top in the blink of an eye. She might play the role of an idiot to make the jackass Dino lower his guard around her, but apparently she could read the situation when she needed to.
“On top of all that,” I told her warningly, “I’m not alone. If something happens to me, there’s others with a lot more influence and might than me, who are also looking after the Lord. I’ve got a magical device that lets me communicate with them, no matter how far apart we may be, and they’ve already been informed that due to unforeseen circumstances, you were given the Lord’s secret. If I were to get hurt, sick, poisoned, or die while we’re on this trip, you would find yourself facing a rather unpleasant homecoming.
“I’m not alone when it comes to watching over Lord Michael,” I stressed to her. “His talent is much stronger than Dino’s, it seems, and he’s caught the attention of much larger fish in the ocean. He’s already been claimed by another wizard of much greater power and status than anything you can ever hope to achieve, and they’d easily squash you like a bug…
