Alex saw Daphne let go of the truck and heard her shout a rune-word spell that sounded similar to one he knew just before she was about to collide with the wagon. A cloud of dust and old straw erupted as a great gust of air struck the wagon and slammed the back of it to the ground a fraction of a second before the front wheel of Daphne’s bicycle made contact. Alex stopped pedaling and coasted in amazement as he watched Daphne ride her bike up the wagon like a huge ramp and then shoot off the other end into the air, flying over the startled horse and landing some twenty feet on the other side. Daphne braked to a hard stop and swung the bike sideways as the truck, driven by the oblivious Mr. Wilson, rumbled away behind her.
“What gorping idiot parks a wagon in the street like that?” Daphne panted as Alex and Nina coasted to a stop in front of her. Gorping was one of Daphne’s many favorite curse — gorp being the local name for the slime left behind by the large magical snails that congregated at the edge of the Silent Swamp.
“And I thought I was insanely irresponsible and dangerous,” Alex said, still reeling from the near miss and noticing that Daphne was not nearly as calm about the close call as she was trying to appear.
“You are,” Nina said with a laugh. “But Daphne is worse.”
“So do I win the race or what?” Daphne asked, ignoring Alex and Nina’s taunts.
“Since you’re likely to kill yourself if we say no, and we need you for the mission, I’ll concede defeat,” Alex said as he looked over at Nina.
“Alright, fine,” Nina said, with a small pout. “But only because we need her for the mission, even though you still haven’t told us how we’re going to find the dragon, much less wake it up, or what we’re supposed to do once we’ve got it awake, and you can bet when I’m a full member of the Guild, I’ll be voting for a little more planning for our adventures before we start them.” Technically, Nina was not yet an official member of the Young Sorcerers Guild — a fact which irked to her to no end — but she accompanied them on all of their adventures anyway. Alex had found that he couldn’t stop her if he tried.
“Too much planning spoils the fun,” Alex said with a wink.
“Besides,” Daphne said in a deceptively sweet voice, “Alex’s plans always go haywire.” Alex gave Daphne a sour look as she as she turned her bike and began to pedal along North Street. He and Nina quickly caught up and the three rode down the middle of the largely traffic-free lane.
“Where are we meeting the others?” Nina asked.
“Down by the bridge,” Alex said as he leaned back and let go of the handlebars, balancing with his arms wide as he pedaled. The cobblestones of North Street were more level than most streets in town and proved only a minor challenge to Alex’s stability. Nina glanced over, and because she did everything her brother did and then some, she was soon riding the same way. It only took a moment for the competitive Daphne to notice and mimic them. Alex chuckled and looked around at the town as he pedaled out of it.
The town of Runewood was not large, consisting of only a few hundred families. Named for the forest to the northwest of town and the stone runes sheltered within its trees, it was more than a simple village — it was a sanctuary. At least for people like Alex and his friends and family. People who could sense and use magic. And for people who were not technically people in the human sense of the word, but were magical nonetheless.
It was, by and large, a safe place. Hidden from the rest of the world by powerful enchantments, it was the best place imaginable to grow up if you were a mage or magical creature. Where else, Alex thought to himself, could you climb up a mountain all afternoon and find a dragon to wake?
As they approached the Azure River, Alex could see two boys sitting on the eastern wall of Ravenstone Bridge, its wide, midnight-black stones supporting a small metal box between the boys. The boys were a study in contrasts, the first an impossibly large African boy with a gentle face, dark chocolate complexion, light brown eyes, and enormous hands, while the other was strikingly small and wide with a glorious mane of wild red hair that matched his reddish-brown eyes. The boys were Clark Millberry and Ben Karnath, Alex’s friends and fellow members of the Young Sorcerers Guild.
Clark was gigantic. Literally so. His great grandmother had been a giant and Clark looked like a miniature mountain, not a thirteen-year-old boy. A full-blooded dwarf, Ben stood half a head shorter than Daphne, but was wide and stocky like a tree stump.
Clark and Ben had been best friends since they were babies, their mothers marveling at how well the two got along as they played in the sandbox. While Clark had an easygoing manner to match the slowness with which he normally moved, Ben was like a densely packed firework, its powder ready to explode with energy at any moment.
Alex clasped the handlebars of his bike again and coasted toward Clark and Ben on the bridge, Nina and Daphne on either side of him. As they approached the bridge, a small burst of flame and tiny fountain of water arose simultaneously out of the metal box resting between Clark and Ben.
“Ha!” Ben said with glee. “Water douses fire. I win.”
“Hmm, one more,” Clark said in a low, rumbling voice.
As Alex came to a stop, he watched Clark and Ben counting off to three silently at the same time with their fingers. Then they both spoke a rune-word spell simultaneously and there was another burst of flame as a plume of dirt erupted from the box.
“Yes!” Ben said, bouncing up and down with excitement. “I win again!”
“Mmm, no,” Clarke said with a frown. “Fire scorches earth.”
“No,” Ben said, frowning back at Clark. “Earth covers fire.”
“Ahh, I don’t think you remember the rules very well,” Clark said.
“Lex,” Ben said, turning to Alex for the first time. “Tell him. Fire scorches earth, right?”
“Depends on the rules,” Alex said to his two friends. They were playing Elements and, now that he was closer, he could clearly see the small metal box divided into four equal segments: one containing a tiny burning fire, two containing small samples of water and earth, while the final segment was empty. It was a game that many kids in Runewood played to pass the time.
“Rules,” Ben said, his voice rumbling nearly as low as Clark’s. “You don’t need rules to tell you that earth puts out fire. If you’re going camping and you need to put out a fire, what do you do? You kick dirt over it. Earth covers fire. Simple.”
“As much as I hate to agree with him,” Daphne said, “Ben has a point.”
“Well, sure,” Clark said, “but you make glass by blasting sand with fire.”
“That does sound reasonable,” Alex said.
“Sand!” Ben said, blinking rapidly as he craned his neck back to stare up at Clark. “It’s dirt, not sand.”
“Ah, but you see, I didn’t have any dirt,” Clark said with a wide grin. “So I filled the box with sand from the riverbank.”
“No dirt?” Ben said. “There’s dirt everywhere. It’s a farm town. Look under your fingernails!”
“I think Clark is right,” Nina said cocking her head thoughtfully. “If it had been dirt in the box, then Ben would be right, but since it was sand, that seems to change the rules and, since the first rule of Elements is that there are no real rules, then Clark’s rule about sand and fire seems to apply.”
Alex laughed at his sister, admiring her rambling logic while Ben stared at her open-mouthed.
“That,” Ben said, “doesn’t make any sense at all.”
“Rules don’t have to make sense,” Daphne said.
“Yeah,” Nina added as she poked Alex in the ribs. “Like rules about how old people have to be to join certain clubs.”
“It’s not a club,” Alex said, rubbing his ribs. “It’s a Guild.”
“Rules,” Ben said, hopping down from the bridge. “I don’t understand how I’m ever supposed to win if no one can explain the rules.”
“Hmm, I guess you’ll have to rely on luck,” Clark said with a smile as he blew out t
he small flame and packed up the Elements box.
“We’ll need some gorping luck where we’re going,” Daphne said.
“We don’t need luck,” Alex said, trying to sound like he meant it. “We have skill and planning.”
“Right,” Ben said, “Which will be useless if the dragon changes the rules.”
“Speaking of things changing,” Alex said, trying to change the subject. “Where’s Rafa?”
“Hmm, he said his aunt had some chores for him to finish on the farm,” Clark said.
“Mountains,” Ben said. “Rafa’s going to meet us at the base of the mountains.”
“Then what in the name of Erebos’ earwax are we waiting for?” Daphne said as she kicked off and began to pedal over the bridge. Alex and the others pedaled after her, Ben on a bike that was as small as Daphne’s while Clark rode a colossal contraption that looked as though its frame had been reinforced with steel girders.
They road along the Ravenstone Bridge across the Azure River and continued along North Street, which soon became the dirt-packed North Road that led through the farms and fields north of town. They rode for some time, the early spring sun warming their backs. Clark and Ben bickered about the rules of Elements, Daphne came up with ever more inventive curses for the horseflies that swarmed around them while they rode beneath the shade of the intermittent trees along the road, and Nina held a running conversation with herself that alternated between naming all of the animals they passed and listing, for anyone to hear, all the reasons that the age limit for membership to the Young Sorcerers Guild should be lowered, if only just once, to make room for an exceptionally talented young mage who looked remarkably like herself.
Alex, on the other hand, said little. He was thinking about where they were headed and what they were about to do. He was as nervous as the others, but while their anxious energy was expressed in talkativeness, his came in the form of contemplation. He looked over his shoulder across the fields and town to the Crimson Forest and the Copper Blood Mountains at the southern edge of the Rune Valley. Like most of its inhabitants, Alex had never been outside the valley and probably never would be. There was no magic outside the valley.
The power of magic — the energy that made magic possible — came from the land, from the earth itself. Thousands and thousands of years ago, during the War of the Shadow, the magic had been burnt out of most of the land upon the earth. Only a few pockets of magical energy remained. Normally, the Earth would have replenished the depleted magical energy, but the war had so scarred the land that, in most places, magical energy would never again arise. The Rune Valley, and a handful of other secluded places around the globe, escaped the magical blight. Because it was one of the few places where the land still radiated magical energy, it drew to it magical people and magical creatures. People like Alex’s Iroquois ancestors a hundred generations ago. People like Ben and Clark and Daphne’s families. And even more magical people, as well.
Alex’s daydreaming was interrupted by another curse from Daphne.
“Great Gorgon Goobers!”
Alex followed Daphne’s gaze and blinked in surprise. A kangaroo hopped at a furious pace across the open field of wild grass to the right of the road. The kangaroo was on a direct course to intersect with Alex and the others at the base of the mountains where the North Road came to an end. As Alex looked at the kangaroo, it raised a furry paw and waved at him. Then it ducked its head down and doubled its speed, its great legs stretching longer with each hop.
“A race!” Alex heard Daphne shout as she spurted ahead of the group. Alex and the others pumped harder to catch up, but Daphne was already too far in the lead. In seconds, the kangaroo’s path had converged with theirs and it hopped through the field parallel to the road. The strange animal raced neck and neck with Daphne as the road came closer and closer to where it dead-ended in a wall of mountain rock. Alex winced as Daphne brought her bike to a sliding halt inches before crashing into both the rocks at the base of the mountain and the kangaroo, which came to a sliding stop right beside her.
“Beat ‘cha,” Daphne said to the kangaroo between gulps of air as Alex and the others came to a stop around them.
The kangaroo cocked its head at Daphne and then did what Alex knew it would. It spoke.
“Nearly killed me, you mean,” the kangaroo said.
“Not my fault you can’t figure out how to stop with those giant feet,” Daphne said, grinning at the animal.
“I can fix my giant feet, but you’ll still be crazy no matter what you do,” the kangaroo said with what might have been a smirk.
“You say that like it’s a problem,” Daphne said, wiping the sweat from her forehead with the back of her hand.
“That’s the best one yet, Rafa,” Nina said, smiling up at the large marsupial.
“Thanks,” the kangaroo that wasn’t really a kangaroo said.
“Why a kangaroo?” Alex asked his friend.
“Hopping,” Ben said, laughing. “He loves hopping.”
“Loves showing off, you mean,” Daphne said, climbing off her bicycle.
“You are the definition of irony,” Rafael the kangaroo said, hopping sideways toward a small stand of bushes. “And to answer your question, Lex, kangaroos have pouches.” The kangaroo pulled a pair of jeans and a flannel shirt from its pouch and leapt behind the bushes.
After a momentary burst of red light, a young Hispanic boy with hazel brown eyes and high cheek bones popped his head over the edge of the bushes. The boy was Rafael Santiago, best friend to Daphne and Alex, the final member of the Young Sorcerers Guild to join the day’s mission, and a changeling, able magically to transform into any living creature. He was also an orphan of sorts, his non-magical parents having abandoned him in Runewood with his Aunt when he was five years old after they had discovered his magical ability. A changeling's magic was part of their nature, allowing them to transform even outside the Rune Valley. Rafael's parents had found they couldn't raise a child who could turn himself into a giant frog at will.
“Hmmm, a pouch,” Clark said nodding his head. “I wonder how many sandwiches he can fit in there?”
“Hungry?” Ben said. “How can you possibly be hungry again? You just ate twenty minutes ago.”
“Well, my mom says I’m a growing boy,” Clark said, pulling an apple from a nearby Macintosh tree.
“Growing mountain is more like it,” Rafael offered as he stepped from behind the bushes, now fully dressed and brushing leaves from his shirt. Alex smiled at his friend as he dismounted his bike and stashed it behind the bushes. Alex, Daphne, and Rafael had been the first members of the Guild. They had started calling themselves The Young Sorcerers Guild to contrast themselves with the Mad Mages Club, a group of troublemaking mages a year older. The Mad Mages Club wouldn’t accept members who weren’t full-fledged humans. That left Daphne and Rafael out of consideration. Ben and Clark had joined the Guild a few weeks after its creation and were an excellent fit.
“Ready for an adventure?” Alex asked Rafael as he stepped up to the other boy.
“Is that what we’re calling our suicide mission today?” Rafael asked.
“It’ll be fun,” Alex said.
“That’s what you always say,” Rafael countered.
“And I’m right most of the time,” Alex protested.
“Most of the time we nearly get killed,” Rafael said.
“That’s the fun part,” Alex said with a laugh that wasn’t as loud as he’d hoped it would be.
“When you two stop chatting like two old ladies at Sunday brunch, we’ve got a gorping mountain to climb,” Daphne said.
“And a dragon to find,” Nina added, stepping a little closer Alex.
“Easy,” Alex said. “Only one mountain. Only one dragon. How hard can it be?”
“Has anyone ever pointed out that your optimism has no bearing on reality?” Rafael asked Alex.
“Yes,” Alex said, “but I ignored them. Besides, we have Clark.”
/> “Right,” Ben said. “Find the dragon, Clark.”
“Ahh, okay,” Clark said, sniffing the air once and then heading toward a well-worn mountain path near where the North Road came to a dead end. Alex looked around at the others momentarily as he adjusted the knapsack on his shoulder and then gave them all a big grin. This is what the Young Sorcerers Guild had been created for: having adventures and practicing magic. And waking the dragon would be their biggest adventure yet. With that thought firmly in his mind, Alex followed Clark up the mountain path.
To continue reading:
The Dark Shadow of Spring (The Young Sorcerer’s Guild – Book 1)
The First Chapter of The Celestial Blade
Chapter One: The Crumbling Castle
Wyconna (Wi-KON-Ah): The name given to the human section of the starship Celestial Pilgrim by its inhabitants. The name comes from the oldest living tree on the Origin World. Wyconna is 10,000 km long, giving it a square area of 31,416,000 km, making it slightly larger than the Origin World continent of Africa.
The Traveler’s Guide to Wyconna, 23rd Edition
The clouds above the thin forest obscured the moon and stars beyond them, leaving just enough light to make out the castle on the hill. The moon was not real, nor were the stars. They were merely projections provided to comfort those creatures used to living under a moon and stars.
But the clouds were real. And far beneath the clouds, in the crook of the valley, stood Jeddu and Kylla, a light drizzle falling on their moonlit faces. Thin and tall for their thirteen years, Jed stood half a hand shorter than Kylla, his dark brown skin a mild contrast with her deep olive complexion in the bluish-white moonlight.
“It’s really here,” Kylla said, pushing her sandy hair from her chestnut eyes and wiping raindrops from her forehead.
The Wizard of Time Trilogy (A Fantasy Time Travel Series) Page 92
