The Shrine of Avooblis

by Charles Streams

  * * *

  January brought an end to the rogue cross-over classes, but the warrior ones began. Warrior Sawkett, the third-year teacher, led a more laidback training than Scar had. While Scar had been intent on the students learning some slight skills, Warrior Sawkett didn’t show much hope for the magic users who struggled to even lift a sword.

  For the first class in the entrance hall, Warrior Sawkett asked for two warriors to volunteer to give a demonstration. Earl raised his hand and stretched his neck, so Warrior Sawkett called him forward. As the teacher looked into the crowd to find the next volunteer, Dagdron yelled out, “Byron!”

  Earl, surprised, looked in Dagdron’s direction, but the other warriors repeated Dagdron’s call, chanting for Byron to step forward. Warrior Sawkett finally motioned to Byron. The teacher called out sword fighting positions, and Earl and Byron demonstrated the correct footwork and angle of sword to use. Posing slowly, Earl had a hard time keeping his balance, and when he and Bryon clashed swords his feet were even more unstable. Byron was obviously striking Earl’s sword with more force than the demonstration required. When chuckles sounded from the other warriors, Dagdron saw embarrassment cross Earl’s face. He must feel awkward with Lita watching, Dagdron thought.

  “Faster!” Dagdron yelled.

  Warrior Sawkett glanced in Dagdron’s direction this time, but the other warriors started chanting, “Fight! Fight! Fight!” Giving in to the warriors’ call, the teacher backed away and signaled for Earl and Byron to sword fight at a normal pace.

  Byron smirked at Earl before attacking. Earl backed up uncoordinatedly as he blocked the blows, but once he found his balance, he took up the offensive himself. Byron was completely taken by surprise as Earl drove him backward, clanking his sword powerfully on his opponent’s. The entire group of warriors, who had been yelling raucously, fell silent as Earl overpowered Byron, causing the royal Fortigroff to stumble and fall on his rump. Warrior Sawkett jumped in between Earl and Byron. The chamber was filled with mumbles of surprise, but Dagdron felt content inside. He knew that, even though the other warriors made fun of Earl’s clumsiness and overly optimistic attitude, once Earl was in an actual battle, his sword fighting skills were top notch.

  Warrior Sawkett extended a hand to help Byron up. As he got to his feet, Bryon plunged his sword around the teacher, clanging Earl’s knee and causing him to stumble to the ground.

  “Low blow!” Lita yelled. “Charge!”

  Following Lita’s war cry, every single lady warrior rushed forward, drawing their swords as they went.

  Warrior Sawkett jumped out of the way, and Earl crawled to safety as the lady warriors swarmed Byron, clanging their swords violently against the warrior’s. Byron’s sword was dislodged from his hands, clanking as it skittered across the floor.

  Warrior Sawkett forced his way among the lady warriors, ordering them to retreat. And then, intent on taking the focus off Byron, who was sheepishly recovering his sword, the teacher shouted for each rogue and magic user to choose a sword and pair off. Dagdron picked up a rusty sword just as Earl approached, trying not to smile.

  “You shouldn’t have done that,” Earl said.

  “Done what?” Dagdron asked.

  “I want to be an adventurer, not a sword fighter. I don’t need to show up other warriors, I just need to fulfill quests and serve the people of the land.”

  “But it was Byron, and Lita was watching,” Dagdron said.

  Earl smiled. “Stop making me have dishonorable thoughts about dishing out what other people deserve,” Earl said, lifting his sword and pointing it at Dagdron.

  Dagdron pointed his rusty sword back, unused to the heavy weight compared to his dagger. Earl coached Dagdron in different sword positions. Warrior Sawkett walked from pair to pair, giving out pointers, but not detailed instructions. While some of the lady warriors intermixed with the enchantresses, the male warriors only paired off with each other and spent the time laughing at the rogues and magic users, who were having much difficulty.

  Dagdron, having slacked off since the Winter Carnival, reminded himself that it was time to get back to delivering payback to the warriors.

  For the rest of January, Dagdron focused on slipping into each of the warrior’s bedrooms at night. He did an especially effective job the nights after they had cross-over classes, being fueled by the cockiness of the fighters. He had originally planned to continue where he left off but, when he realized many of the warriors had received deliveries and gifts from their families before the snowfall, he started over completely. And he was especially glad he did. He found all sorts of equipment, trinkets, and treats that made their way under Earl’s bed.

  “Why don’t you put that under your bed?” Earl asked as Dagdron crammed another stone statuette of a knight under his bed.

  “I don’t want this stuff under my bed,” Dagdron replied.

  Earl crossed the room and bent over to look under Dagdron’s bed. It was completely bare.

  “You don’t have anything under there. Where were you keeping those amethysts you gave my family?”

  “Somewhere safe,” Dagdron said, sitting on his bed and taking out his dagger.

  “Don’t keep secrets from me,” Earl said.

  “Why not?”

  Earl gave Dagdron a frustrated look before crossing to his own bed and looking underneath it. “What am I going to do with all this stuff?”

  “I don’t know. What do the warriors do with those worthless statues? I’ve found a bunch of them.”

  “It’s a tradition some families have in the east. The figurines represent honorably working toward becoming an adventurer. It doesn’t matter! What are we going to do when someone finds out you’re the one who’s been stealing?”

  “We’ll blame it on Cort,” Dagdron said.

  “Who’s Cort?”

  “One of the second-year rogues.”

  “You know one of your classmate’s names? I’ve been telling you to network with them.”

  “I’ve never talked to him. Scar always yelled at him.”

  “I’ll take that as a start,” Earl said enthusiastically.

  Toward the end of January, Dagdron only had a few warriors’ rooms left to raid. He crept along the second floor, thinking he would finish them all off at once. When he reached the first room that night, he quietly tested the door and found it locked. That’s odd, he thought. It was the first time he hadn’t been able to sneak right in. So, either the knowledge of the thefts was getting around, or...

  “Landon and Gordon’s room,” Dagdron said quietly to himself.

  Dagdron visited the other two rooms, slitting bootlaces and claiming a treasure in each before returning to his bedroom to sleep.

  The following morning, as the second-year students gathered in the entrance hall for warrior cross-over class time, Dagdron kept watch until he saw Landon and Gordon.

  “You’ll have to fight with someone else,” Dagdron told Earl.

  “Dagdron, I know you prefer your dagger, but you still need to learn a little sword fighting.”

  “I’ll be back in a while.” Not letting Earl respond, Dagdron slipped through the crowd and back up to the second floor. Landon and Gordon’s door was still locked, so Dagdron picked the lock.

  Like most of the warriors’ rooms had been, Landon and Gordon’s was a mess. Dagdron had suspected that they might have nicer stuff for being Byron’s minions, but their possessions were very run-of-the-mill, scattered around carelessly. Scanning the room, Dagdron identified the out-of-place object almost instantly. Tucked away on the top of one of the wardrobes was a wooden box, making it all too obvious that it had been placed with care while everything else had been tossed willy-nilly. Dagdron opened the wardrobe, stepping on the edge to reach the box on top.

  He opened the box on the floor, finding it filled with a variety of gemstones. Earl had told Dagdron enough by then for the rogue to identify that they had come from the Broodavian mines. But the question was why
Landon and Gordon had them in their room. They must be some form of payment, Dagdron thought. He snatched a red, blue, and yellow gem, before closing the box and replacing it. As he peered on top of the wardrobe, he scolded himself for focusing too much on the box. He had almost missed the parchment that was now visible underneath where the box had been.

  Unfolding the parchment, Dagdron immediately knew what he had found. A crude map had been drawn, leading in the direction Dagdron, Earl, and Grizzard had taken when searching for the spumasaur. Only now, Dagdron understood that Byron hadn’t been following them. He must have been on the path this map depicted. He memorized the trail the best he could before folding the parchment and returning it under the box exactly as he had found it.

  Landon and Gordon were currently wearing their boots but, before Dagdron left, he took out his dagger and sliced rips in a few of each of their shirts. Then, locking the door on the way out, he hurried back to the entrance hall, hoping his absence hadn’t been long enough that Earl would be lecturing him on sword fighting for the next week.

  At dinner that night, Dagdron bolted down his lamb stew as fast as he could, not answering Earl when he got up to leave. The rogue went to the girl’s side of the eating hall and walked in between the second and third-year tables. As he passed Elloriana, he jabbed her in the back with his dagger. The enchantress gasped in pain, whipping around with her hands ready to cast a spell, but Dagdron was already too far away.

  Earl had watched Dagdron, so as soon as he finished eating, he headed to the quest tree, meeting Elloriana along the way.

  “He’s gone too far this time,” Elloriana said.

  “What did he do?” Earl asked.

  “He stabbed me in the back with his dagger.”

  “Dagdron would never do that.”

  “Yes, I would,” Dagdron said, jumping down from the tree. “She deserved it because she’s not very smart.”

  Elloriana’s mouth dropped open in a huff.

  “You got distracted by your obsession with Byron,” Dagdron said before Earl and Elloriana could banter back.

  “What are you talking about?” Elloriana said.

  “You should’ve been focusing on Landon and Gordon. I broke into their room and found a map leading into the forest. Bryon wasn’t following me and Earl. He was going to wherever the map leads.”

  “I am stupid,” Elloriana said.

  “I know,” Dagdron replied.

  “Be nice, Dagdron,” Earl said.

  “Where’s the map?” Elloriana asked.

  “I left it in the room,” Dagdron said. “I don’t want Earl’s family to get kicked out of Lordavia this time.”

  “Good thinking,” Earl said.

  “I memorized it. We can go whenever you want.”

  “Tonight,” Elloriana said.

  “Tonight?” Earl said. “Don’t you think that’s a little impulsive, Princess?”

  “We are going tonight,” Elloriana said firmly. “Dagdron’s not right about much, but I appreciate the active approach he’s taken to learn about the Arches of Avooblis. My method of wasting time with Byron to get no information was totally ineffective. We need to be smarter adventurers.”

  “Like I said, wench, you’re not very smart.” Dagdron walked off, heading around the side of the academy, while Earl and Elloriana stayed under the tree to discuss plans for later that night.

  Dagdron led Earl, Elloriana, and Lita up the mountainside a little way.

  “I don’t think Byron went up this high,” Earl said.

  “Snow isn’t our friend,” Dagdron said. “If we leave footprints, Byron will know someone else was there. I checked earlier, and there were no prints in the snow to follow. That means Byron hasn’t been along the path since the snowfall.”

  “I have to think like a rogue,” Earl said, holding his hands around his head and shaking them. “Just be careful. We don’t want to run into that spumasaur at night.”

  Dagdron had already realized that, so he led the group on a path slightly above the spumasaur’s terrain before coming back down the mountain. When he judged they had gone about the same distance as the map indicated, Dagdron stopped the group. Earl pulled out four torches and handed one to everyone. Then, Elloriana lit each of them with a flame spell. Dagdron directed everyone to walk amongst the trees, searching below for any sign of a possible destination.

  The cave stood out enough to be easily seen in the torchlight when they came to a ledge. Down below, to the left of the cave, they could see a few boulders sticking up out of the snow. Dagdron led the group along the ledge until they were directly above the cave. He nimbly climbed down a pine tree on the right side. Once he was grabbing hold of the lower branches, he jumped over the snow to the dirt floor under the cave entrance. Elloriana cast a levitation spell, her hands glowing and humming as she lowered herself slowly and gracefully next to Dagdron. Earl and Lita, without a second thought, jumped from the ledge, bringing an avalanche of snow down with them.

  “Oh, no,” Elloriana said. “If Byron comes here soon, he’ll see the snow.”

  “It looks kind of natural,” Dagdron said, remembering snowy times in Cliffmount. “We’ll deal with footprints on our way out.”

  Elloriana relit Earl’s and Lita’s torches, which had been dowsed by the snow, and they walked deeper into the cave. It didn’t take them long to arrive at a naturally carved out section of the wall. A gray column connecting the ceiling to the floor stood in front of it, with stalactites to the left and right. Hidden in the shadows behind the column, they found a chest. Dagdron tried to beat Elloriana, but she sent out an open spell, the tiny ball zooming into the padlock. Dagdron pulled it off and opened the lid as the other three crowded around.

  “Oh my goodness,” Elloriana said. The chest was well-organized, but still crowded with all sorts of trinkets, vases, and other objects.

  “Those are all products from Lordavia,” Earl said.

  “First the seeds, and now he’s gathering keepsakes from Lordavia?’ Elloriana said, a confused expression on her face.

  “He’s a hoarder,” Dagdron said. “Most warriors are. You should see under Earl’s bed.”

  “That’s not funny,” Earl said, though he chuckled mildly. “Where did he get all of them? He didn’t have these when he was in Lordavia. Did he have another chest hidden somewhere?”

  “Not in his room,” Dagdron said. “And we watched him leave Lordavia with only one chest.”

  “Can you think of anything else you noticed?” Elloriana asked Dagdron sincerely.

  “Does anyone know anything about Landon and Gordon?” the rogue replied.

  Earl, Lita, and Elloriana shook their heads.

  “Why?” Earl asked.

  “I found a box of gems with the map, but their other stuff was junk. The gems seemed out place.”

  “I think their families are low-ranking nobles in Broodavia, so they probably wouldn’t have too much wealth. But they can afford the Adventurers’ Academy,” Elloriana said. “Maybe Bryon is paying them for helping him? Were they in Lordavia during the summer without us knowing it?”

  “No,” Earl said. “I’ve heard Byron talking to them about you and Lordavia. I don’t think they’ve ever been there.”

  “About me?” Elloriana said.

  “Of course, Princess,” Earl said. “You and Byron were seeing each other every night before the Winter Carnival. He bragged about you being his girlfriend all the time.”

  Elloriana shook her head with a look of disgust.

  “Why are you surprised, wench?” Dagdron said. “The same thing happened last year and you just kept at it.”

  “I was trying to find out information about what he was up to.”

  “You might want to work on your social skills,” Dagdron said.

  “Like you have the right to say that to anyone,” Elloriana said.

  Earl laughed as Dagdron crouched next to the chest.

  “What?” Elloriana asked Earl.

  �
�After a year and a half, I’m getting to know Dagdron a lot better. He’s more a jokester than you’d think. He was just being sarcastic. Like he can comment on being social.”

  Dagdron pulled his dagger out and jabbed the point into Earl’s side.

  “Ouch,” Earl said, rubbing the sting. “What was that for?”

  “Landon and Gordon go to the meetings in the mayor’s house,” Dagdron said.

  “You’re right, Dagdron,” Earl said. “We tried to peek in the window, but the curtains were closed. Maybe the mayor’s been receiving these items from Lordavia for Byron. Landon and Gordon pick them up and give them to Byron or bring them here.”

  “But why do it so secretly? Anyone can buy these items in Lordavia,” Elloriana noted.

  The cave was silent for a minute, and then Dagdron shut and locked the chest.

  “Let’s get out of here,” he said. “We have to figure out a way to hoist Earl and Lita up so we don’t leave footprints.”

  “Yes!” Earl said. “I just love these real-life adventurer situations.”

  Elloriana, knowing she was going to have to help hoist them up, scoffed, and followed Dagdron out of the cave.

  Chapter 20: Fuzzfiest Fur

  Dagdron, Earl, Lita, and Elloriana decided to keep their eyes on Landon and Gordon in addition to Bryon from then on. Earl was in the best position, having classes with them, but Dagdron knew he was the one stealthy enough to spot them if they ever snuck out of the academy.

  Dagdron found it fitting that, as February rolled around, the warrior cross-over classes came to an end just as he had finished sneaking into every second-year warrior’s room. He wasn’t against another round of paybacks, but his annoyance quickly turned against the enchanters and enchantresses as the magic-user cross-over classes began. Not only Elloriana, but all the magic users, had a haughty air about them. As Enchantress Higgins led the second years in breathing exercises to clear their minds, Dagdron looked around the chamber. The enchanters and enchantresses alike were stretching their necks and sticking their noses in the air.