"Either way," Sycamore droned, "I'm sure we'll find out if we decide to-"
"We're going over there," Brendon said.
Sycamore sighed. "I shouldn't be surprised. There was a huge deadly explosion so what do you do? You lead us right into the epicenter!"
Chapter 3
Ellen led the way forward, her knife drawn and ready. The strange red blade gleamed in the daylight. It was almost as long as her forearm, but she still called it a knife. The pristine road had survived the explosion unscarred, but the trees became more battered and broken the further she went. Fallen leaves lay scattered across the ground in messy piles. All of them were gray, nearly black. The strange explosion seemed to have drained the life from them.
Tear walked beside her. Even though the forest was perfectly silent, she'd sworn to watch the area for monsters.
"You're not going to start acting weird again if I tell you we need your shield, are you?" Brendon asked. He'd switched places with Alice, claiming they needed to balance their groups.
Ellen shook her head. Those times were behind her now.
"That's just how things are," Brendon said. "When you're in a tense situation where one wrong step will get you killed, it's easy to forget that the people around you are really people and not just tools to use for survival."
"I get it," Ellen said, trying not to sound annoyed.
"You just happen to have one of the best survival tools around built into you, and another in your hand, so you shouldn't be surprised if people come to you for help. And no matter how nasty they are, you can't let them warp your view of the world."
Ellen opened her mouth to complain, but Tear spoke first. "She knows that already!" she snapped. "You need to stop living in the past and move on."
Brendon let out a deep, dry chuckle, then he gave Tear a hard pat on the shoulder. "How many weeks did you spend wandering around that old castle after little Ellen passed away? You shouldn't give advice that you're not willing to follow yourself."
"I stayed there to help people!" Tear insisted. "You keep saying all kinds of bad things about that place, but I notice you have no trouble going back there and looting it for supplies."
"It's a very dangerous place, but I'm an expert at what I do," Brendon boasted. "Have you ever been trapped inside a building that's sliding off the side of the world? I have, twice, and I managed to escape both times. I bet if something like that happened to you, you'd break down crying and make a mess in that pretty little skirt of yours."
Tear had no rebuttal except to glare at Brendon, to which he responded with another chuckle.
Ellen laughed too. How exactly she'd attracted such an odd group of people was a mystery to her, but she wouldn't trade them for anything.
"Don't humor him," Tear said, her face turning red. "I-I'd never do something like that!"
The source of the explosion, which had seemed much closer earlier, ended up taking over an hour to reach, but eventually the forest to the left of the pristine road gave way to a massive crater. It was as deep as the average watchtower was tall, and wide enough to fit a small village or two. The trees around the rim, the ones that had not been ripped from the ground, had been stripped of all their leaves, most of their branches and large chunks of their bark.
"There's no fire, smoke, or even a char mark," Brendon said. "This isn't like any explosion I've seen before."
"There aren't any signs of life, either," Tear said, a sad tone in her voice. "You don't think anyone was living here, do you?"
Brendon shrugged. "If there was, there's nothing left of them now."
Ellen scanned the crater. If there was something here that might've helped her learn about the nature of her shield, it'd been destroyed in the explosion. All that remained was bits of broken wood, stone and glass.
The other group soon caught up. They set their gazes upon the crater.
"I don't know what's going on in this dimension," Sycamore said after a moment, "but I don't like it. How much longer are we planning to stay here?"
Alice looked terrified. "We can't leave yet," she pleaded.
L.L. urged Alice forward into the crater. "I can see some trees with rags caught in them. They look like clothes. There might be something up there you recognize."
Alice looked even more terrified, but she didn't argue. She followed L.L. into the crater. Sycamore trailed behind her.
"Let's take a look around," Brendon said. "We'll probably stay here for a day or two. If there's someone nearby, I'm sure they're curious to know what caused this explosion as well."
He marched forward into the crater.
Ellen put her knife and buckler away and followed. Already she was feeling drowsy. The rest of the dimension had been mostly tame so far, and the crater did not look like it was going to be much different.
All the commotion caused by the strange explosion was bound to lure something here, so she kept her eyes on the forest, what remained of it, while Brendon and Tear looked over the bits of scrap scattered around the crater.
But despite her fears, nothing, monster or otherwise, ever appeared.
Brendon searched until the sky started turning orange. "Something about this place is putting me to sleep," he said in a yawn. "I think there's another watchtower down the road. Let's hope it's still intact."
He called the other group over. As they marched over, he glanced back at Ellen and quietly asked, "Do you think she's going to take off?"
He must've noticed the way Alice had been distancing herself at night. "I'm not sure," Ellen admitted. "She accepted my apology, but she doesn't seem like she likes us very much."
"I'm not letting her ago anywhere," Tear said firmly. "We went through so much to find her. If she tries to run away, I'll stop her myself."
She quieted down as the other group approached.
"Is something wrong?" Alice asked Tear, who was giving her a fierce glare.
Tear smiled. "It's nothing."
"There are clothes up in the trees back there," L.L. told Brendon, "but she didn't recognize any of them."
"At least we know there are other people in this region," Sycamore said. "Well... there used to be other people."
Brendon beckoned everyone forward. "We'll stay here another day. If nobody shows up tomorrow then we'll continue on our way."
There was a watchtower made of white bricks down the road, just as Brendon had predicted. Its roof was missing half its shingles and bricks all over stuck out in odd directions.
"It looks alright," Brendon said after looking it over for a moment. "Just don't do anything rowdy inside. If you start acting crazy, you're going bring the roof down on us." He yawned, pushed the heavy wood door open then made his way inside.
Ellen followed. The floor inside the watchtower was hard and stone, but she was tired enough to fall asleep anywhere. She waited for Brendon to set his backpack down, then dug out a sleeping bag from inside and lay down near a wall. Tear was beside her in just a moment, and asleep in two.
"Getting rowdy and crazy," L.L. said. "Who were you referring to? Kilroy was the rowdy one in our group. Our old group. Everyone here is docile compared to him."
Brendon glanced at her, wide-eyed and seemingly confused. Then he shook his head and sighed. "I'm going to sleep. I think all those pink leaves out there are doing something to the air." He set his great axe aside and sat down against the wall. "I doubt there's anything out there, but close that door anyway."
Sycamore took care of it, then dug out a sleeping bag and lay down. L.L. did the same.
Alice was the last one standing. Ellen watched her stir in place, probably looking for a secluded area to hide, but this watchtower didn't have anything like that. Eventually she moved to the wall furthest from everyone else, set her sword and shield and knife down, then unrolled her sleeping bag.
Ellen closed her eyes and tried to sleep, and she managed to doze for a brief while, but it wasn't long before a stomping sound in the distance stirred her awake.
A tinge of fear shot through her body, but it soon faded. The stomping was far off and it did not seem to be getting any closer. The source probably just wanted to keep her on her toes, and remind her that she'd never be perfectly safe.
She frowned. It was working.
She was the last to wake up the next morning. Ellen quickly ate a few scraps of meat and a piece of bread so stale she would've thrown it out if their supplies weren't running low, then made her way outside.
The others were all waiting on the road beside the watchtower.
"We still don't have any idea what caused that explosion," L.L. said. "But it does seem like it was something... magical," she grumbled, obviously not liking that explanation.
"It would be great if we could find the source," Sycamore said, "but accident investigation isn't really our job, is it? And besides, aren't we looking for someone?"
Brendon started forward, then beckoned everyone to follow. "Give it one more day. If someone shows up here, it'll be worth the delay."
Ellen stuck to the back of the group as they made their way to the crater. Despite having just woke up, she already felt drowsy. Maybe Brendon was right about the strange pink leaves. They might be putting something into the air. That would explain why the dimension was so empty: nobody was going to willingly live around trees that poisoned them.
"What did Alice say about your knife yesterday?" Tear asked. "You tried to create magic version, but-"
Ellen startled. She'd been too busy trying to stay awake to notice Tear walking beside her. "It exploded," she said. "It wasn't a fiery explosion, like Sycamore's barrels, it was... raw energy, kind of like the explosion we saw yesterday."
The others paused and looked back at her.
"I thought you didn't have the affinity for creating magic weapons," L.L. said, sounding annoyed. "If you were holding back all this time-"
"I don't have it," Ellen snapped. She frowned. They were going to want a demonstration, she had no doubt.
"Have you ever tried?" Sycamore asked. "I'll admit I haven't known you that long, but I don't think I've ever seen you or your twin ever try to use any kind of magic weapon even once."
Ellen looked to Alice, hoping she'd give her some kind of support, but Alice kept quiet.
"Let's see this explosion of yours," Brendon said, turning his gaze on Ellen. "I'm sure you're exaggerating the whole thing. The only part of you that explodes is your temper." He chuckled.
Ellen scowled and took out her knife. The last time she'd tried creating a magic weapon, back in Kilroy's training hall, she blew all of her friends off their feet. The same thing would happen again now, but if they wanted to get hurt then she had no problem dishing out the pain.
"You should stand back," Ellen warned.
Alice was the only one to listen. She darted backwards several steps and covered her face with her shield. Everyone else stayed where they were and watched her.
"I've never met anyone who couldn't create a magic weapon before," Tear said happily. "I'm sure you can do it, Ellen! You just need to practice!"
Ellen held up her knife and started concentrating. What she needed wasn't practice, but something else entirely. What that something was she couldn't put her finger on, but she didn't have it.
Just like always, she had no trouble picturing a knife in her mind. It was shaped exactly like her own, but its appearance was wrong. While her own knife was red, the imagined knife was white and crystalline. No matter how much she tried, she couldn't imagine her knife in any other form.
A wave of disappointment surged through her. Despite everything she'd been through, nothing at all had changed since the last time she'd tried creating a magic weapon. She didn't have that power and she never would.
Annoyed, she imagined her hand shooting forward and grabbing the crystalline knife.
She grasped the handle, then pulled the knife towards her side. It was warm to the touch and very light, even more so than her actual knife.
She startled. This was the first time she'd ever managed to grasp the imagined blade. It had to be her imagination going overboard. There was no way this was really happening.
Someone nearby called out her name. Ellen opened her eyes.
Right away she looked down at her left hand. The white, glowing, crystalline knife she'd failed to summon so many times before was no longer a figment of her imagination. It really existed, and she was wielding it.
The others were more enthused about her success than she was. Brendon and Sycamore were giving her a soft round of applause, Tear was bouncing up and down, Alice was smiling for the second time since they'd come to this dimension, and even L.L. looked satisfied.
"I knew you could do it!" Tear cheered.
"I really did it," Ellen said, staring on in disbelief at the glowing white knife.
Chapter 4
"I don't understand," Ellen said, her eyes locked on the white blade. "I could never create a magic weapon. Why did it work now? And why does it look like this?"
Not only did the magic knife look nothing like her real knife, it didn't feel like a knife either. It was light, almost weightless, and it was giving off a strange energy she'd felt only once before: back in the cathedral inside Amadeo's castle, right after she'd died and was forced back to life.
Nothing made sense, but Ellen couldn't help but feel ecstatic. After countless mishaps, she'd finally created a magic weapon.
Her excitement persisted until dozens of cracks spread across the surface of her magic knife. Its glow immediately vanished, and it completely stopped giving off energy.
Ellen frowned. Just like so many things before it, the magic knife had been too good to be true.
The others continued praising her, until her knife exploded, then they let out cries of shock.
The blast sent Ellen stumbling backwards. While the pressure was overwhelming, she did not feel even the slightest tinge of pain, not until she slipped off the pristine road and crashed into the hard dirt ground.
She spent what felt like hours laying on her back, staring up at the clear blue sky in a daze, until Alice of all people helped her onto her feet.
"You did warn them," she said quietly, glancing at the others. Brendon, L.L. and Sycamore lay sprawled out on their backs. Tear was face down in the dirt.
Ellen's heart clenched up tight, until she saw Tear's chest moving, then she relaxed. Tear might be dazed or maybe even unconscious, but she was alive. So were the others.
"That's why I haven't been practicing," Alice said. "I'm afraid something like this is going to happen."
"Your knife isn't that similar to mine," Ellen said. Alice's knife could summon a cloud that concealed its wielder's presence from monsters, but it appeared sparingly and stopped working if the wielder attacked. "And your sword is just a sword. There's no way it can explode."
Despite her encouragement, Alice still looked glum. "I'm not so sure," she mumbled.
Brendon heaved himself up. "That's enough demonstrations for now," he said, sounding tired. "Let's... let's go back to our search."
"I don't know what's worse," L.L. grumbled, "her temper or her weapons." She led Sycamore and Alice away.
The search continued on exactly as it had the day before. Ellen trailed behind Brendon and Tear while they sifted through scattered scraps of what looked like building material, looking for what exactly she couldn't imagine, but they weren't having any luck finding it.
"That burst of yours was pretty similar to the explosion we saw yesterday," Brendon said after a while. "Of course, it doesn't tell us what happened here." He glanced back at Ellen. "But it did make me wonder: what exactly is that knife of yours?"
He wasn't planning to take her knife from her, she'd accepted that fact a while ago, but Ellen could not help but feel defensive. "My knife is a little bit strange," she said, "but I don't think it's really that special."
Tear reached into the air with both hands and started stretching. "I don't know where her knife came from or w
hat that explosion was, but I haven't felt this awake in weeks. You should use your magic on us more often, Ellen."
"I-I'd rather not," Ellen said. The burst had revitalized her, she couldn't deny it, but an extra bit of energy was hardly worth the pain and the disappointment.
While her group didn't find anything worth mentioning, the others had better luck. They hurried over, and L.L. explained their findings.
"We found a mineshaft," she said. "The entrance is mostly buried, but I managed to fit his head inside it," she added, gesturing to Sycamore. "Parts of it are still lit up."
"So what?" Brendon asked flatly. "You're not planning on going inside, are you? There's no way it's stable after what happened here."
"Of course I don't," L.L. snapped, "but there's a whole underground cave system running beneath us. I think it's worth checking the area for other entrances. We might finally meet this region's inhabitants."
Brendon pondered. "That sounds more productive than what we're doing here. Let's go take a look."
Sycamore crossed his arms and declared: "You'll have to do this without me. I don't get along with underground caves. I'm staying here."
"You can take care of the kids while we're out," Brendon said with a chuckle. "But we still need a shield, just in case." He eyed Ellen for a moment, then set his gaze on Alice. "You're coming with us."
Before she could argue, Brendon grabbed Alice by her wrist and started dragging her away. L.L. followed. They left the crater and disappeared into the forest.
"What do we do now?" Tear asked. "We already searched most of the crater. I don't think there's anything here."
"I was thinking about laying down and taking a nap," Sycamore said, "but I'm not tired anymore, and I'm not sure why." He shrugged, then glanced at the trees near the back of the crater. "There's a bunch of clothes caught in those branches. If one of you is feeling brave, you should climb up there and see if someone had a note or a brochure or something in their pocket." He looked to Tear, then Ellen. "What do you think?"
Scouring Majula (Ellen's Friends Book 3) Page 3
