by Awert, Wolf
Nill swallowed. His favorite magic of his limited repertoire was Earth and Wood, with a dash of Water. Did that mean he was not a fighter? If that was true, then perhaps Ambrosimas was the right person. But he did not intend to share this with the Archmage in front of him.
“I’ve never had the choice yet, so I don’t know what the best way is. I know of no offensive magic, leaving aside the humble fireball.” Nill thought his answer was very diplomatically chosen.
“Very well.” The Archmage’s face was as unmoving as a mask once more. “You may accompany me into the library.” With these words he pulled out his keystone, brushed it with the nail of his thumb, and made a swinging motion with his hand. The door opened silently.
Nill was thunderstruck. The mysteries of magical knowledge were a small crack away. He might not find what he so desperately sought, but at least he would finally know if the library was the place of hope he had dreamed for or just another dead end.
Anxious with anticipation Nill followed the Archmage into the library and found himself looking at a gigantic wooden construct in the middle of a large hall. He could not make out any order to the chaos. Massive poles on the ends kept the construct upright. Just above his head there was a ceiling of sorts on which stacks and stacks of parchment lay. Beneath the ceiling several smaller pillars, some looking akin to ladders, divided the space into narrow rows. Where planks were attached to the poles, more stacks lay that caught Nill’s attention. Four to ten, sometimes more, of these were always connected. They were either pinned or sewn together. “Concerning the Differences Between Wood in Water and Water in Wood,” one of them read. Nill could make neither head nor tail of this title.
Elsewhere the boards of wood were only a short space above and below each other and could be pulled out by use of wheels in the construct. Nill needed two hands to do so, since the shelf was heavy with the flat stone slabs that lay upon it. They were beautifully illustrated, but Nill could not tell whether the markings were letters or the tracks of a black mangan-worm that had eaten its way through the stone.
A few steps further he found himself standing before a Rocksailor’s nest; at least, that was how he would have described what he saw in nature. There were holes set in regular intervals into wooden boards, but these holes did not contain nesting or feeding animals, but rather scrolls. Every scroll was held by a differently colored ribbon.
In one corner thick wooden sticks were stacked. Each of these staves was covered in burn marks that Nill identified as Fire runes. He had always thought he could read and write, and had been certain that writing was done on parchment, exceptions like stone walls and castle gates aside. Here in the library he found not only countless markings and scripts he did not recognize, but also the realization that only a part of the knowledge was inscribed on parchment. Between the shelves, drawers and nests there were small cabinets, their delicate doors granting a glance at their contents. Round stones with markings, feathers with parts cut out, matted tufts of fur or rope put Nill in mind of the magical artifacts shaman used, but their presence here indicated their importance as a record. Knots could be letters and words? Nill found the idea enthralling. Carved bits of bark surrounded cores of wood, inscribed staves, knotted strings, stretched skins hanging from the ceiling and papyrus everywhere. Nill sighed. How was he to find anything in this jumble? At random he reached for a thin stack of parchment and read: “Waking the element of Fire in birds of prey. When does one combine Fire with Metal, and when the opposite? Where does the energy of Wood gather at which time, and where does it disperse?”
He put the stack back down, disheartened. So many small questions. He had not expected this. He turned around and saw that the Archmage had already left for the next room. Now that he took his eyes off the giant construct, he noticed the many niches, desks, lecterns and doors that led to side rooms. A fleeting glimpse of one of these rooms told him that certain magics were practiced here.
One room away, there was far more order. It was small, painted white and contained only scrolls, all neatly piled on one another. The scrolls were made of stretched skins that had been stuck together and rolled around a wooden shaft. Some of them were very thick.
“These scrolls contain the history of magic and of Ringwall. Besides that there are other aspects of magic that have little to do with power and spells,” the Archmage said, noticing Nill’s inquisitive glance. “They are of little interest to you if you desire power. That which you’re probably looking for is in the third and last room.”
Around the room tables were set against the walls. Thick, leather-bound books lay on every surface. Some of these books were more than an ell thick. Nill attempted to open one of them, but the book did not yield.
“What you see before you is the inner strength of Ringwall. It is the direct access to our power. Generations of mages have worked here and eternized the most potent magic and the strongest spells. And that is why the books are so old that they have to be bound with a protective spell, and so massive and heavy that you need magic to move them. Their power is such that a mage who wishes to utilize it must first show by using a spell to open them that they can control it.
“Some of these spells take more than one mage to cast. But in times of need any mage of Ringwall can awaken these spells.”
The Archmage clicked his fingers and the volume in front of him opened with a creak. It sounded almost like a sigh to Nill.
Nill attempted to pull one of the books closer to inspect the letters written on it. It was amazingly heavy. The pages were fine, thin parchment, made from yuki-cowhide and scraped as thin as possible, but there were so many of them that he could hardly budge the book.
“Those who wish to hold true power in their hands must first know the power of the books.” The Archmage’s voice was solemn. “Like the door to the library, these books may only be opened by mages. Unlike the door, there is no key. You must learn to open them with your own magic.”
“And what about the other, outer power?” Nill wondered whether there could possibly be anything as important in Ringwall as the library.
“The other part is its inhabitants, its mages. A library without those who use it is no more than a grave.”
Nill went from table to table, his eyes wandering from book to book. Every volume had a large, preciously decorated symbol on it; so extravagantly decorated, in fact, that Nill had difficulty recognizing the symbols at all. Others were engraved deeply into the covers of books. The covers themselves were made of hard leather, though some exceptions were present. A few had been bound between thin stone slabs. It would take a single person a long time to understand all this.
“Is your thirst quenched?” the Archmage asked with a small smile.
Nill shook his head. “I’d have to spend a whole day here for that, but I am deeply grateful for you showing me these chambers. I will henceforth do everything I can to become a mage and be allowed to study here.”
The Archmage looked at the boy. “A single day, you say? How amusing. Very well, a day you shall have. Until tomorrow you may have a key for the library and I will show you how to use it. After your one day is over, you will hand the key back to me.”
Nill’s mouth was agape, and his hands twitched as the Archmage placed his key into them. “Remember, one day.” The Archmage smiled a small, unfathomable smile.
Nill had wondered, at first, why most mages were either expressionless to the point of absurdity or else constantly smiling. He had thought that smiling meant friendliness, but he was not so sure any more. The mages behaved so very differently to the people in the village. And yet they were not like the noble folk. Dakh-Ozz-Han had smiled often. The longer Nill thought about it, the more he realized that a smile was not a sign of affability. “Never trust an Archmage,” he heard Brolok say.
Nill pulled himself together. He had a different problem to solve right now. One day was a very short time to find what he needed in this mess. And it might not even be here.
Where was he to start? What should he start with? The few books, the countless scrolls? Nill returned to the first room with the wooden construct. He noticed certain groupings of elements; Fire for heat and cold, Water for wetness and aridity. But what of the other elements? What was the opposite of Earth, of Metal and Wood? Non-Earth was not a thing. It seemed that Fire and Water were set apart from the others. And then there was Wood. He could find Metal, Water, Fire and Earth magic everywhere, from the deepest parts of the world to high up in the air. But Wood was limited to the surface. He supposed that made it special, but what did that mean anyway? Stronger, weaker – just different? Nill had to admit that his mentor had been right. The knowledge of the library was of little use to Neophytes. On the contrary: after all his troubles in the beginning he had begun to think he had a solid grasp on the elemental magic. At a cursory glance at the parchments here he found his meager foundation of knowledge crumbling to nothing. The elements were not equal. Each had their own past and history. It was not enough to know which element empowered which other one, which resulted in what effect; there were elements that were older, more real, and truer than the others. Perhaps it was all archaic knowledge and had no impact on the functionality of the spell at hand, but maybe it was required to know these things when combining certain energies. Nill regretted not having the time to follow these thoughts to their conclusions. Alas, he had but one day and no chance of working his way through every scripture here. He needed something clearer.
He entered the smallest room, the Chamber of Power, where spells were bundled together in thick books. He attempted to open one at random, but to no avail. The only book that lay already open was the one the Archmage had opened. He had conveniently forgotten to shut it again. Nill stepped closer. The book’s pages were black, and the writing on them was flaming red. The writing consisted not of colored runes, but of carefully carved cuts in the thick parchment, the glyphs redrawn with red ink. The strange symbols danced before Nill’s eyes. They crossed the pages in a sad, slow, circular motion, growing smaller and closer towards the middle of the page. Nill stared at the magical center point on the black parchment and felt it draw him in. Dead kings, mages trapped in the traverse world, deceased rulers that had not yet said goodbye after a thousand harvests.
Nill could feel the magic emanating from the book, but he did not like it. It dragged at his mind as if intent on making him another footnote on the page. He pulled away and returned to the Hall of History. He was not interested in power, but knowledge.
“One day. That’s all I’ve got,” he muttered.
The second room, the one the Archmage had told him was of no interest to those seeking powerful magic, was not a hall at all. On the contrary, it was a small room, but the glimpse into the past it offered, right back to the very beginning of magic, made the chamber feel endless.
Alright, he thought. The history of Ringwall and the Hermits’ Caves won’t help me win a duel, but I might find out something about my parents if I go through the name lists. I might find out something about the catacombs, come to think of it.
One day is all I have.
The heavy saturation of tradition, magic and the innumerable items and oddities that were marked with magical messages was oppressive and overwhelming. I can barely read anything in a day, and most of these I can’t read at all. He needed a plan to find out what he could find here and where to do so.
The Mages must know where to find their particular subject of interest. With so many things there has to be some sort of order to it, but I’m not seeing one. He took a scroll from a row and pulled the ribbon loose and unfurled it. What he saw was a line of strange symbols that seemed to jitter across the surface. Some of the markings were oddly familiar, but the message contained in the scroll was indecipherable. He carefully rolled it back up, tied the ribbon around it and replaced it on the row. He pulled down another one.
Parchment and dust, musty air and one scroll as incomprehensible as the last. Nill rubbed his eyes, gazing at the script. Time passed and Nill lost all sense of it. He was not hungry, but thirst began to rise in him. He resisted; he had precious little time as it was. I’ll do without, he thought. He had long since given up on fully unfurling the scrolls. Instead he simply opened them, shot a look at the first few lines and put them back upon finding more unintelligible writing.
There were not many scrolls whose meaning he could actually understand, but those he did were tales of old legends that did nothing for him. The registers of powerful sorcerers were similarly meaningless. He had looked for these lists in the hope of finding the names of his parents or grandparents and being struck by sudden recognition; this hope had since turned to dust like many of the scrolls around him. The parchments were dead, and Nill doubted whether they have ever held even an ounce of magic in them. It was only his stubbornness that kept him going. All he had learned so far was that rubbing his eyes with dusty fingers was a bad idea. They were irritated and itchy.
Just for a moment, Nill thought as he shut them and sat down by the wall. He fell asleep shortly afterwards.
Tiriwi and Brolok sat alone in the main cave and stared into the embers of the small fire between them. They were not worried about Nill’s absence; they knew how he loved to roam around aimlessly, and how bad he was at keeping time. But it was too late to stay up waiting, and they were tired.
Before the magical disturbances could wake the sleepers, Tiriwi was wide awake. She had slept badly. Dreams she could not recall had chased her. Her face was sticky with half-dried sweat and her belly was so hard she had difficulty breathing. She did something she had never done before, and entered Nill’s chamber. The entrance was unhindered, open and very cold. Nothing hinted that one of them had ever slept or even lived here.
“The present goes by so quickly,” Tiriwi mused. Walls, she thought, had memories, but the walls around her were quick to forget. Too quick.
She ran out and stormed over to Brolok’s cave. He had blocked off the entrance but she disturbed the magical barrier so heavily that the air behind it quivered.
“By all holy swords, what demon’s stung you?” Brolok opened the entrance and looked at Tiriwi through sleepy, half-crusted eyes. Where his eyes were still far from awake, his body was already working itself up. Brolok was always ready for a fight.
“Nill isn’t there. He hasn’t been home all night.”
“He’ll have his reasons.”
“Brolok!” Tiriwi’s eyes flashed.
“All right, all right.” Brolok returned to the darkness of his cave, pulled on a few garments, strapped on his armor, grabbed his staff and said “Let’s go.”
“Where to?”
“No idea, but I’ve heard tell that gifted Oas can follow any track.” Brolok attempted to lighten the worried atmosphere with light words. He was not particularly successful.
“That’s rubbish. Especially in Ringwall, where magic lies thick over everything.”
Tiriwi was certainly not in the mood for jokes. She stood there, gathering her thoughts, and made a decision. “Come.”
They went to the Wood quarter. Tiriwi was looking for Empyrade and asked all green mages that crossed her path. She was in such a rush that she sometimes left them standing before they could answer if they did not do so quickly enough. Brolok was left to give them an apologetic smile and then hasten after Tiriwi.
One green mage, however, seemed rather indignant at the request. “Do you even know who she is? You think she lets people just disturb her like that? … Well, it’s none of my business. You see the door over there?” He indicated it with a wave of his hand. “If I were to enter, just like that, I’d get into quite some trouble. And if you do, there’ll be a lot of… well, someone will take care of you. One way or another.” He gave a short, bitter laugh. It seemed he had had bad experiences in the past.
He had not finished talking when Tiriwi reached the door, throwing it open with such force that the handle slammed into the wall. The resulting noise signal
ed her arrival to anyone with ears, regardless of whether they cared or not.
Brolok ran after her, giving quick half-bows left and right when he passed a mage; it looked rather silly.
“Once she gets going there’s no stopping her,” he thought.
Several mages appeared in the corridor behind the door as if they had been conjured from thin air. They stared down at the Oa, looks of disbelief and irritation on their faces.
“Empyrade, are you here?” Tiriwi called so loudly that the very air around her seemed to tremble.
“At least she’s not using thought-speak,” Brolok thought. He was convinced that showing up in the inner chambers of the Wood mages was a bad idea.
After Tiriwi’s shout no door remained closed, and people started filling up the corridor. Bodies, cowls and robes, annoyed voices and raised questions made it difficult to even move.
“Get in here.” Someone grabbed Tiriwi by the arm. She tried to fight it off, but the grip was hard and she was pulled so forcefully through one of the doors that it was all she could do to stay on her feet. Brolok leapt after her, making it inside before the door slammed shut. The noise in the hallway died down instantly.
“What is it?” Empyrade asked shortly.
Tiriwi gulped. This was not the Empyrade she knew; not the jovial but serious teacher, not the concerned friend she had made. It was not her room, either. It had an austere, almost clinical feel to it. Only the wall covered in ivy represented the element they served here.
“We’re looking for Nill; he hasn’t been home all night.”
“Don’t you worry about him,” Empyrade said. “I don’t know where he is but if anything had happened to him, all of Ringwall would know.”
“How come?” Brolok’s curiosity was piqued.
“You mean you don’t know? The three of you are under constant supervision. Nill has been since his first day here, with his antics in the Hall of Ceremony. You, Tiriwi, because of your visit to the Magon and you, Brolok, because you’re always with one of these two.”
