Wizard of Elements

by Calista Lambrechts

So did I.

  And the other two.

  “Now, let’s take a look at those other wounds of yours.”

  Both Adrian and Terrowin let go and helped me to my feet, but I wasn’t exactly making it easy for them. I had no strength left. My body was numb and I could do nothing. I merely slumped in their arms as they dragged me to the nearest room – a room where they gently set me down on the soft, comfortable bed. Thereafter Deodonatus entered and gestured them to leave. Terrowin looked over his shoulder one last time before completely exiting.

  For a few seconds, I swear I passed out.

  ***

  I sat up straight on the bed, my legs dangling off the side. Deodonatus had with him a small wooden bowl and a piece of cloth. He had tend to most of my wounds by now, cleaning them and treating them in the proper way by use of his medical skills he so clearly had mastered. He dabbed the cloth at the cut on my cheek and left behind only a scratch and a few bruises, some of them already turning a terrible purple-blue.

  As one of the last things left, he moved on to my arm and also cleansed it, but it stung and, by instinct, I reeled away. He calmed me down and reassured me. I sighed and let him clean all the dirt and blood from my arm wound. He grabbed a bandage and bound it around the wound.

  “There.” He gave a smile of satisfaction, stood and put the bowl onto the dresser against the wall. He then dusted his hands off.

  “Uh, will that help for a dislocated shoulder?”

  Deodonatus’ eyes widened and for once looked speechless. His gaze jumped from object to object around the room. All he could get out was, “Uh…”

  But an idea soon hit him and his eyes gave a satisfying spark.

  “Wait, I’ve got an idea, but first…”

  He approached me and tightened the bandage around my arm wound some more.

  “Let’s leave it at that.” He stood and brought me my old clothes.

  “Put these on. I had them retrieved for you.” I gave a chuckle.

  “Looks like I just can’t get rid of these.”

  Deodonatus gave me a faint smile, patted me on the back and left.

  ***

  A while later I had my old clothes on and felt great... well, better than before that is. Right about now, I’m physically and mentally incapable of feeling ‘great’.

  Deodonatus volunteered to put on my shoulder blade. Carefully, he slid it on my wounded shoulder and fastened it. I moved my shoulder around for a moment.

  “Ugh, this is kind of tight!”

  The monk nodded.

  “That’s the idea. The shoulder blade will help keep your shoulder in place. You may only loosen it when you are sure that it is fully recovered.”

  He turned around to exit, but I stopped him by grabbing his shoulder from behind. He turned around to face me.

  “I just… wanted to thank you for everything you’ve done for me. Without you I never would’ve survived.”

  “It was my pleasure. Besides, you still have a destiny ahead of you. I cannot let another Drachem die in the hands of evil. Isn’t that right, Thorelnius?”

  I nearly choked.

  What?!

  Brother Deodonatus left me speechless and frozen as he left without another word.

  WHAT?! What did he… mean by that? More so, how did he know…?

  I soon snapped out of my daze and forced myself to find my feet and rushed out the door, following Deodonatus from behind. “Wait! I need answers.” Without turning around to face me he said, “Not now. We need to focus on getting that artefact in our possession. Terrowin told me that Governor Du Perron escaped with it as soon as he got the chance. Who knows how far he could’ve gone by now.”

  I picked up the pace and stopped in front of him, blocking his path.

  “Didn’t you notice the satchel?”

  He frowned with confusion.

  “What?”

  I failed to fight back that smile.

  “Here.” I went back into the room and came out, tossing him the satchel. Luckily, it was a successful catch, otherwise if that thing broke…

  He gently opened it and got the content into sight. A clear round glass orb with a golden dragon swirling about it, looking like it’s grasping the top. I had never seen Deodonatus so shocked.

  “A-And the governor?”

  “Let’s just say that he got what he deserved, but he made a promise to hang me when he gets his hands on me. That is why I have to leave as soon as possible.”

  “No.” My eyes widened and I was ready to start arguing about the matter.

  “What? Why not?”

  “You have to get some rest for your wounds to heal and recover properly. You cannot go on in this state. You may stay hidden within the cathedral walls. He won’t suspect you here. You will be safe. Besides, I have to study this artefact and give it some thought. It might take a while.”

  “But it is the artefact, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, but I just have to make sure. Now, go get some rest and lock the door behind you.”

  I didn’t argue and knew he was right. I left the artefact in his possession and retreated to my room, locking the door behind me.

  ***

  I tried, but found it rather difficult to fall sleep. Heck, I couldn’t even settle down. I twist and turned, fluffed the pillow, switched positions, but nothing seemed to help.

  It was odd, though.

  One would think that I was dead tired by now, but no… I stood. To think, here I am, locked myself in a room with no possible access for anyone else. Great. I sound like one of those paranoid royals who fear to be assassinated in their sleep… I should’ve known that Brother Deodonatus would’ve forbid me to leave at my first request. At least I’m feeling a lot better. Does that count? Guess not.

  Bored, I paced around the room with my hands clasped behind my back and absolutely nothing to do. My eye caught sight of my other satchel I found at the Lost Inn. I couldn’t help but sling it around my shoulder as a reminder of my memories and the idea that no one must find out about the Frozenfire I’ve got stashed away in there. It is still forbidden and I’m as good as dead if anyone might discover its whereabouts.

  Thoughts kept racing into my mind, which I only seemed to encourage by keeping them there and argueing against them with hushed murmurs. I walked aimlessly about the room until I came to a stop next to one of the torches mounted to the wall. I sighed and put my one hand on it, leaning.

  “Typicaaaaaaaaaal!”

  Leaning on the torch caused part of the wall to swing open like a door and shot me through the opening as it swung open. It sent me falling down the stairs, one by one.

  “Ow… ow… ow… ow… OW!”

  I fell all the way down until finally face-planting in a mysterious dimly lit corridor. I snorted and blew the fringe out of my face. Woozily, I got back to my feet and dusted myself off. The place looked quite old and was covered in dust and small spider webs grappling to the torches still lit on the walls. The corridor looked as though it stretched out for quite a mile, but I’m not accurately sure since the far end was filled with nothing but the gloomy darkness.

  My entire body was stiff and somewhat aching, but if that wasn’t enough, I had to go and fall down a staircase…

  Wonderful, Carlaylin.

  A strange stench suddenly hit me.

  “Ugh! Did my great grandmother die in here? This place smells old.”

  I paused to scan the area to try and get my bearings.

  “No, it smells ancient rather.” The smell was musty and dampened. I tried to ignore the smell and looked at the lit torch on the wall next to me. “I guess someone must still be using this place.” I looked a little bit closer with narrowed eyes. “That or these flames are unnatural.” I shot another glance at the darkness up ahead. I was going to need that torch.

  As I reached out to pull the torch loose, the spider webs clinging to its bottom caught my eye. At first I hesitated, but th
en scraped my courage together.

  “Eh, in comparison to what I’ve been through, this is nothing to worry about right now.”

  I stuck my hand out and dusted the spider webs away, but just as I did the last bit, a large hairy spider dropped to the ground right in front of me. I swear that thing was watching me with those dark beady eyes of his. I yelped and panicked, instinctively giving a step back. Without hesitating I instantly stomped it with my boot repeatedly. I paused to catch my breath and collect myself, but stomped it one more time for good measure and to make sure that thing wouldn’t jump on me when I wasn’t looking. I studied it for a moment, but saw nothing but a flat spider. I couldn’t help but cringe. I gave a sigh of relief, but frowned afterwards.

  “Damn my arachnophobia!” I muttered, swallowing.

  I took the torch with caution and slowly started making my way down the corridor.

  When in the darkness, I was sure to hold the torch close to the walls. There were signs of writing and carved hieroglyphics engraved to the old stone walls. A manuscript maybe? It puzzled me even more as I already was and made me wonder.

  “What is this place?”

  The cartouches and carvings showed pictures of past wars and deaths. I swung my torch to the left side. The horrendous carvings of war and death continued as I moved along, but as I moved on, I started seeing more and more deaths and fewer warriors.

  Soon I came upon images of the last survivors bowing, all facing a certain direction.

  All bowed down to a single knight wearing heavy armour, standing tall and proud in the middle. He was holding something in the air in both his hands. Though I couldn’t identify the object since the hieroglyphics only displayed what looked like rays of light shining outwards from his hands. Both rival countries were bowing with no intentions to murder the other anymore. I also noticed the skeleton of a dragon…

  Could the shining light held by the knight be the Star, perhaps? And the dragon… Could it be Thorodan?

  From there on out there were only carvings of peace, harmony and tranquillity. There was peace between the two kingdoms once more.

  “Could that be Ysellian and Brendwin?” I leaned in to study the images from up close.

  “What could’ve happened to start this tragic war again?”

  As I sauntered and wondered, questions growing the more I saw, I stumbled across a large ancient door made of stone – one of intricate design and allegorical symbols. I could see no way of opening it. Instead, I saw four massive circles within each other in the middle of the door, each displaying a variety of images of unknown symbols. Writing in the elven language was etched on the top of the arch, above the three circles. It read, “Du kairda ma so lonu ka vendor.”

  I frowned with absolutely no idea what it meant, but it wasn’t long until I started identifying the words as the language of dragons, not elves. The words started making sense, falling into place, like puzzle pieces connecting in my mind.

  It said, “The dragon in trust with a saviour.”

  This made me wonder, but I couldn’t get stuck on that saying for too long. I made a mental note to remember those words.

  I brought the torch closer and ran my fingers around the edge of the circles. It clearly felt like they could move. I tested it out by grabbing the first that could move, the second circle, and gave it a spin. It moved successfully, but not easily. It was quite heavy and took some effort. I turned all three circles around the small solid fourth circle in the middle that could not move at all. I let three specific symbols come in line with each other, according to what I’ve seen and thoroughly observed on the hieroglyphs. Only when I mastered all three, the door still wouldn’t open.

  I took a moment to think until I pushed the fourth. Instantaneously, the door lowered down into the ground with the grit of stone grinding against stone, and opened to what led into a small circular chamber.

  I stepped into the chamber and noticed the floor to be made of smooth white tiles. The wall was of white plaster. A chandelier hung from the golden dome shaped ceiling above. It shed quite a lot of light, natural light.

  The room was empty but for a single stone table with a wooden chest placed upon it. I went in closer to examine, but it was locked with a strong metal lock. I didn’t have time for this and, important or fragile or not, I let my torch make contact with the wooden lid. It was set on fire at an immediate pace and burned the wood away.

  When done, I extinguished it with but the wave of my hand – a little trick I learned from Murray – but the flames didn’t seem to work. The chest was most clearly imperishable. The flames had left behind only what seemed like charred wood and blackened soot.

  Either this wasn’t normal and perhaps masked with an enchantment, or this was some very strong wood.

  I then got another idea and threw the torch to the ground. I stuck my hand out to the lock and slowly turned my hand clockwise. Using the power of air and some light drops of water, the metal lock slowly turned a coppery brown as it rusted. I picked up my torch and hit the lock with its butt, causing the lock break open and drop to the ground.

  I then curiously opened the chest and found a dagger lying inside on the red carpeted surface of the chest. The dagger wasn’t a normal one though.

  It was connected by three blades, instead of a single one.

  I took it and held it in the air to examine it from underneath. The blades ran together to the edge. Looking at it from below, it gave a triangular form. I brought it back down and saw the hilt made of textures of beautiful emerald glass. A little golden dragon statue twirled around the hilt and clutched the top. It was a similar one to the one on the artefact itself.

  I noticed an old weathered, fragile tattered note lying in the bottom of the chest. I read it.

  I leave this to thou, thy dear brother. I beg of thou to not let this fall into the hands of the enemy. I cannot even begin to describe the chaos it could bring upon us once it does. Keep it out of their grasp and deliver this to our honourable king without any delay. Keep this dagger of secrecy as for it is essential that thou do. And remember: Ma frundo so dicodai.

  It made me wonder as much as the previous saying.

  Ma frundo so dicodai?

  “The favour in the beholder…”

  I was ready to get out of there and make my way back, but a single thing caught my eye. It was a little black spider running around on the stony surface of the table with absolutely no idea where it was going.

  I shivered, but left it alone.

  Even I wasn’t that heartless as to kill a tiny spider.

  As I threw the note into my satchel and adjusted the dagger to my belt I saw another. It seemed as though they kept on coming. Their numbers grew extremely fast and left me startled and totally freaked out.

  The corner of my eye caught sight of the wall being infested by more of these little black spiders. They moved upwards, coating the walls in a black fresco of their own kind, and only then did I saw the roof completely infested with large spider webs. I noted two or three skeletons hanging upside down, all wrapped up in a weathered cocoon of webs. Fear and a horrible realisation settled over me.

  They weren’t there before… Now they were.

  This was a trap!

  I immediately made my way to the door, fearing that I might join those guys, but the spiders moved unbelievably fast and instantaneously created webs that blocked my path. They were too fast to be real.

  I backed away, my back touching another newly spun web. I gasped and tried to shake it off, yelling, “Get it off! Get it off!”

  I managed and tried to find another way, but the webs were closing in. Instinctively, I swung my torch around and saw as the webs burned down, the flames moving from string to string in the webby pattern it possessed. At least, unlike the chest, the webs were impenetrable.

  A smile settled on my lips. I started burning all the webs down and ran forward, down the corridor, but it was also blocked by w
ebs. Spiders closed in like a giant black wave moving on the walls and on the remaining webs. They came at an incredible speed.

  I ran as fast as I could, but some caught my ankle. I gave a quick shriek and hastily shook them off as I kept on running. Unfortunately, they were quite hard to get off and moved all the way up the back of my leg, but I waved my torch at them and, by luck, they fell off.

  I ran up the stairs and exited into my room, throwing my torch back down into the corridor to try and ward them off as I tried at my hardest to close the heavy wall door, but it wouldn’t budge. I saw as the wave of spider approached in the distance at an incredible pace. I pushed harder, but still nothing happened. It didn’t take me long to realise my stupidity and I hit my forehead with the palm of my hand. I acted fast and pulled the mounted torch, seeing how the door swung close, hopefully squashing some of those crawling little buggers as well.

  I took a moment to catch my breath and gave a sigh of relief as I sank down to the ground to sit, my back against the hidden door.

  A burn on the back of my leg caught my attention. I looked at it and saw the back of my boot completely chewed into pieces, my leg had picked up a serious wound. By that, I mean the flesh was completely gnawed off. I swallowed my nausea and grabbed a bandage resign close by and bound it around my boot to keep it from falling off and also to help conceal my ankle’s wound.

  That was the last time I wanted to make an acquaintance with cannibal spiders.

  Makes you think why they rather won’t eat themselves!

  ***

  Well, I passed out on the bed. I slept for goodness knows how long, but it was a sleep I really needed – one I truly deserved. I had never been so tired in my entire life. I had never been so exhausted. You don’t really get to sleep at the arena… I was out for about two days. Not once did I open my door.

  When I woke up, I had never been more rested. Sure, I was still somewhat and all that, but it was only a minor setback. I soon grew used to it.

  I was up and at em’.