by A. Giannetti
“You will not escape me now, evil hound,” shouted Tullius angrily, and even as Elerian cleared the garden wall in one great leap, the top of course of stone to his right exploded with an ear splitting crack. Fragments of stone whizzed by his ears with an ugly whine, one of them striking him painfully in the ribs and wringing a yelp of pain from his throat.
Not daring to slow down for a moment, Elerian streaked across the front yard, lancets of pain shooting through his right side at each stride from the rib the stone had broken. He leaped over the gate which led through the rowan trees, and once he was out of sight of the pursuing mage, tugged desperately with his teeth at the skin which covered him. For one frightening moment, it resisted like real skin before suddenly coming off all at once. Throwing the hide over his shoulders, Elerian climbed into a large oak with a speed that would have shamed one of the brown squirrels that lived in the forest.
He had barely settled himself high in its leafy crown, when a sharp creaking sound announced that Tullius had come through the gate which led through the rowans. A moment later, breathing heavily, he stopped directly beneath the tree where Elerian had hidden himself. His hair and brows bristled, and there was a fire in his dark eyes that would have given even a Goblin pause as he cast back and forth for his assailant, his staff upraised and ready to launch the next deadly spell.
Thirty feet in the air above Tullius, Elerian lay full length on his stomach along a wide branch, still as stone despite the stab of pain which shot through his chest with each breath. He knew that as long as he remained still, he was invisible to the mage’s searching eyes even if Tullius chanced to look up into the tree.
Tullius lit a mage light, for the light was fading under the trees and stamped around for a long time before finally giving up the search for tracks and returning to his house. By then, Elerian’s racing heart had slowed, and the fear born of his narrow escape had faded away. Despite the pain of his broken rib, silent laughter caused him to shake violently as if he had suddenly caught a chill as he recalled the look on Tullius’s face when he had sprung out from behind the bush in the shape of a wolf. Elerian considered the pain of his broken rib more than worth the price of that look. It was a moment he would treasure for the rest of his life.
When his laughter finally subsided a little, Elerian drew on his power and was pleased when it responded at once. After healing his painful injury, he quickly returned home. It was still light on the hilltops, and he managed to return the hide to its place in the barn before Balbus returned from the fields.
Tullius arrived unexpectedly at the farm the next morning while Balbus and Elerian were still eating breakfast. He had come to warn Balbus about the creature that had attacked him last night, for as soon as it was light outside, he had examined his garden and had found the tracks of what appeared to be an exceptionally large wolf in the soft dirt. He drew Balbus aside and gave him an account of his adventure the night before. “It may be the same creature that has been skulking about the nearby farms,” concluded Tullius. “What puzzles me is how the creature penetrated the magical defenses around my home. It must have strong mage powers of its own.”
Balbus was surprised to hear Tullius finally admit that magic kept his home safe, but he kept his own counsel about the nature of the beast Tullius had seen. He recalled now that Elerian had returned home later than usual several times in the last few weeks. After Tullius departed, Balbus said nothing to Elerian, but later that same day, when Elerian went into the barn, he found that the peg which normally supported the wolf skin was bare.
“What happened to the old skin that was hanging in the barn?” he casually asked Balbus at dinner.
“It was becoming quite worn and tattered so I burned it,” said Balbus calmly. He gave Elerian a searching look, but Elerian’s face betrayed only casual interest although, deep inside, he was quite disappointed at the fate of the skin. From that day on, the black wolf of the Abercius, as it came to be called, never appeared again although it lived on in legend for many years. Mothers used the threat of it to frighten disobedient children, and the possibility that it might attack them kept the woodcutters close to the edges of the forest which pleased Elerian a great deal and comforted him somewhat for the loss of the wolf skin.
AN ALARMING DEVELOPMENT
Without the wolf skin and the excitement generated by his escapades, Elerian quickly discovered that his power had slipped beyond his control again. He felt it inside of him, maddeningly close but just out of his reach. With or without his ring, he was unable to raise even a simple illusion.
Despite his inability to perform any more magic, the thought of it was constantly on Elerian’s mind, even at night. Although his need to sleep had diminished markedly, Elerian, out of habit, still went to bed at night when Balbus did. After just a few hours, his need to sleep satisfied, he would awake and remain awake the rest of the night. While Balbus and Carbo slept peacefully, his mind wrestled endlessly with his inability to control his mage powers. “Will I ever become a true mage?” he often wondered. Even when he was able to turn his thoughts away from magic, there were other questions which surfaced to torment him. Why was he so different from everyone else around him? Why were the Goblins his enemies? What had his parents done to deserve their enmity?” No solutions or answers ever presented themselves, and Elerian began to dread the night time hours which had become a time of torment instead of rest.
One night, as he lay sleepless in bed wrestling with his troubled thoughts, Elerian idly watched as the moon rose and cast its shafts of silver light through the cracks in the wooden shutters that covered the bedroom windows. Impulsively, he decided to escape his mental turmoil by leaving the safety of the snug farmhouse and venturing out into the night. A rising sense of excitement battled with a sense of guilt as he rose quietly from his bed, for he knew Balbus would not approve of what he was doing. Sensible Hesperians stayed inside at night, safe behind four walls and a locked door. They only ventured out after sundown in cases of dire need. Besides putting himself in danger, Elerian knew he was also taking on another risk by venturing out after dark. There was a chance, however slim, that he would be seen. If he was, people would immediately begin to speculate on what had brought him out at such a late hour. Human nature being what it was, Elerian knew that such talk had a way of running out of control. It was exactly the sort of thing Balbus and Tullius had warned him against.
Tonight, however, Elerian found that he was tired of being sensible. Excitement won out over caution, and as Carbo watched with puzzled eyes, he quietly dressed and then, after motioning for Carbo to remain where he was, soundlessly left the loft. The dog listened uneasily as Elerian quietly opened the door to the farmhouse, but, heeding Elerian’s silent command, he did not stir, for he and Elerian were fast friends. The lock and hinges of the door were well oiled and made no sound. Tired from the day’s labors, Balbus slept on undisturbed. Once the door closed, Carbo lay back down, but his sleep for the rest of the night was restless as he kept one ear pricked for Elerian’s return.
Elerian stepped outside into the moonlight, and to his eyes, the night was bright as day. Even muted colors were present under the moonlight so that his surroundings were not the stark gray and black of moonless nights. He quietly walked down to the gate in the boundary hedge, breathing deeply of the soft night air and left the farm behind. Once he entered the forest, he found that it had taken on a magical, mysterious quality that was not present under the light of the sun. Owls hooted in the distance, and mice stirred the leaves underfoot as he walked beneath the trees, silent as the pale ground fog rising from the low spots along his way.
Without any fear of becoming lost, he wandered freely over the hillsides. In a small mountain meadow, he saw a herd of red deer and another of spotted deer grazing on the silvery grass, but they were not aware of him. Occasionally, as he walked, the long, lonely howl of a wolf drifted up from the lower forest below the foothills, and he heard the soft pad of the elusive hunting cats, b
oth great and small, in the thickets.
When he tired of walking on the ground, Elerian took to the upper pathways of the forest. Running lightly from one great branch to another, he gave no thought to the forest floor far below his flying feet and made great leaps across the gaps between the trees with unconscious ease. He traveled almost to the borders of the Abercius before turning around. Well before the first, faint blush of dawn broke in the east, he was in his bed, resting peacefully for the first time in many days. After only a little sleep, he rose feeling refreshed and in better spirits as he sat down to breakfast with Balbus.
After that first night, Elerian began to leave the farmhouse regularly when it grew dark. He now found it unendurable to lay in his bed, awake the whole nightlong, when he could be out walking the forest paths instead. He never met anyone else in his travels, which was not surprising, and he enjoyed the feeling of not having to guard his every thought and action. Safe under the concealing shroud of darkness, which others could not penetrate without some sort of light, he boldly stretched his legs into forbidden speed as he traveled familiar trails through the forest, his feet touching the ground so lightly they barely disturbed the grass and leaves.
For sport, he raced the fleet red deer across the meadows and thought it great fun when he sprang out at the hunting cats from some hiding place where they were not aware of him. His sudden yell, as he unexpectedly appeared before them, drove them hissing and snarling into startled fits of impotent rage, for Elerian was long gone into the treetops before they could gather their wits about them again and pursue him. Only once did Elerian prowl among the hilltop farms. The thought of the families sleeping comfortably behind their thick walls soon awoke uncomfortable feelings of isolation inside of him, and he fled back to the forest. “What would they think of me,” he wondered to himself, “if they could see me prowling about in the dark?” The imagined answer was not a pleasant one, and after that, Elerian kept to the forest where he was not troubled by such thoughts. He happily continued his nighttime adventures until one night, two weeks after his fourteenth birthday, when his world was suddenly turned upside down.
While walking through a grove of smooth skinned beeches under the dark of the moon, Elerian suddenly felt an unaccustomed dizziness, and his vision abruptly blurred in midstride. So sudden was the change that he almost fell, and unable to see clearly or even stand unsupported, Elerian wrapped his arms around a tall beech. Pressing his cheek against its smooth, cool bark, he stood on trembling legs, frightened and unsure of what to do next, for he had never been sick a day in his life before this. Even if his magical powers were to respond to him, he had no idea how to cure this sudden bout of sickness.
Suddenly, it became worse. His surroundings faded completely, and he found himself overwhelmed by strange lights and dark shadows which his eyes could make no sense of at all. The color of the lights resembled the gold of the spells which his errant mage sight revealed to him at times, but this was no brief flash that revealed the appearance of spells to him. Instead, he saw a confusing blend of indistinct, shifting lights and shadows that made his dizziness even more severe. With his head swimming, Elerian fell to his hands and knees, terrified that his vision was permanently damaged. Unable to see or move, he knew he would be easy prey for the first hunting beast that crossed his path.
Then, as suddenly as the maelstrom of lights and shadows had appeared, they faded, leaving Elerian able to see once more, but too frightened to move lest he set off another attack. Only after his sight had maintained itself for several long moments did he rise to his feet and turn his footsteps toward home, dreading, at every step, the return of the dizziness and the lights and shadows which would leave him helpless and unable to move.
Elerian was able to return home, but after that frightening incident, he avoided going out at night for several days. There were no more intervals of sickness, however, and he began to hope that he had made a full recovery. “Should I tell Balbus?” he wondered to himself one evening as he sat in front of the flickering fire burning in the fireplace. He would have liked to discuss the matter with his grandfather, but he did not want to reveal that he had been leaving the farmhouse at night. Basking in the comfortable glow of the fire, he stroked Carbo’s sleek head as the dog slept on the old rug in front of the hearth. When he turned his head to cast a fond glance on his four footed companion, Elerian received a terrible shock, for he saw an indistinct golden shape lying next to him instead of the familiar black form of Carbo. He caught his breath as he suddenly saw the golden image and Carbo’s dark form at the same time, one overlaying the other. His head began to whirl again until he blinked. Immediately, the golden image vanished, and only the black form of Carbo remained behind.
Trembling in distress, Elerian turned his face to the fire. It looked much the same as it always did, but when he turned away from the flames, the walls and floor of the room suddenly took on a dead black color, and he saw a golden shade where Balbus sat in his chair by the fire, breathing heavily in a deep sleep. Abruptly, his normal vision again returned, leaving Elerian frightened and afraid to move.
“It is time to talk to Tullius,” Elerian shakily thought to himself, grasping at the hope that the old mage might be able to help him. “I will not tell him that I first experienced this change outside at night, and hopefully, he and Balbus will not find out about my nighttime jaunts. If he cannot help me, I do not know what I will do next,” he thought hopelessly. “At this rate, I shall be confined to this house for the rest of my life, living in fear of the next attack that might leave me blind and helpless. I might even lose my sight permanently,” he thought despondently.
THE THIRD EYE
The next day, in a state of high anxiety lest he suffer another attack that would leave him helpless, Elerian went to visit Tullius in the afternoon. Relief flooded through him when he arrived at the old mage’s home without suffering another attack. Eyes suddenly bright with mischief, he bypassed the squeaky front gate and slipped silently through the rowan trees to the left of the gate, carefully parting the branches which made a green wall around the inside of the clearing. Soundlessly, he made his way across the thick front lawn. Crouching down behind the cover of the garden wall, he crept, out of sight of the garden, toward the gate. Stealthily, he peered through the wooden slats and saw that Tullius was out tending his herb garden in the warm afternoon sunshine as he usually did in good weather. He seemed possessed by an unaccustomed nervousness, however, for at times, he would suddenly stop working and cast a wary glance all around him as if in search of some hidden danger. Evidently, the attack by the black wolf was still fresh in his mind, even though almost six weeks had passed since the incident.
A smile crossed Elerian’s face at this opportunity for fresh mischief, and forgetting for a moment the reason for his visit, he leaped silently over the fence during a moment when Tullius had his back turned. Running silently along the flagstone path through the garden, Elerian approached the mage from behind, intending to startle him by speaking from nearby without warning. At the last moment, however, Tullius suddenly dropped his hoe, and with a surprising speed and agility, stooped and seized the staff lying near his feet before spinning around with the staff upraised and a fire burning in his dark eyes. The anger in his face was immediately replaced by surprise when he saw Elerian. Clearly, he had expected to find something much more dangerous than a small boy standing behind him. A relieved look spread across his face.
Elerian looked up at the old mage with an innocent expression on his face, but his eyes were bright with hidden laughter, for he knew what Tullius had expected to see in his garden. “Are you feeling well, Tullius?” Elerian asked innocently. “You seem awfully nervous today.”
A frown replaced the relief on Tullius’s face. As always, he was not quite sure if Elerian was as innocent as he appeared. “Someday, I will catch the young rascal red handed in the middle of his mischief,” he thought to himself.
“What are you up to you you
ng pup?” he asked crossly. “I did not hear you come through the gates.”
“I came through the trees and over the fence,” said Elerian. “It was more fun than opening your squeaky gates.”
Despite the innocent explanation, the frown remained on Tullius’s face. He had not said a word to Elerian about the beast in his garden, but he would have bet his staff that Elerian knew about the attack. “It seems impossible, but was he somehow involved?” Tullius wondered to himself.
“I was attacked by a strange black creature in this very garden a few weeks ago,” said Tullius abruptly. “You would not know anything about it would you?”
“What sort of creature?” asked Elerian, artfully dodging the mage’s question with one of his own and discreetly putting his left hand behind his back so that his ring would not catch Tullius’s eye.
“It appeared to be a wolf, but I have my doubts,” said Tullius giving Elerian a searching look.
“Were you badly frightened,” Elerian asked casually, his eyes bright with mischief again. “Is that why you are so nervous?”
Tullius slammed the end of his staff onto the stone walk, and there was a sharp crack that made Elerian jump. The flagstone beneath the staff had broken into pieces. “I was not frightened,” shouted Tullius angrily, and his beard bristled like a pincushion. “I was rather startled is all,” he said more calmly. “I chased the beast off, but I was unable to follow it. Somehow it was clever enough not to leave any tracks once it left my clearing.” He regarded Elerian with a probing look, searching for any signs that the boy knew more about the incident than he was admitting to. Elerian stared innocently back, but he could not hide the merry lights burning in the back of his eyes as he recalled Tullius’s amazing leap over the back wall of the garden.
