by Paul Edwards
Chapter Ten
We were all sitting down with our backs against the granite blocks sharing a bag of beef jerky, there were only three eyeballs watching us now, the others had disappeared.
"Do you think this intelligence thing is why Moses left?" I asked Shelley.
"I don't know, but I have been thinking about him a lot, ever since you told me about scaring Abraham, pretending to be a god."
"It wasn't Abraham... it was a just coincidence," I said brusquely.
Shelley smiled at me, "it's just that I think Moses might have had a similar idea, not pretending to be a god but that there was a god. I find it curious that in the bible he would always leave everyone so he was alone to have his conversations with god, and every time his people needed food or water it magically appeared."
I stared at Shelley, "that's what happened?"
"Ya... not only that but now I get this picture of him sitting on top of mount Sinai all by himself with his head in his hands thinking, what the hell am I going to do."
"Why was he on this mountain?" I asked
"I don't remember exactly, I think god told him to or something."
I thought for a moment, "he was thinking about leaving them."
Shelley looked at me with a curious expression, "why do you say that?"
"When I came up with the idea for the city of magic, I started hiring servants to help me with its construction, it didn't work out so well."
"Why?"
"They resented being told what to do by a girl especially a seventeen year old one, they were also superstitious and couldn't read or write, I just started getting fed up."
"What did you?"
"I did a lot of things... I started to hire women as well, I taught them to read and write, I just got better at organizing people, but it was never perfect. What did Moses do?"
"He came down the mountain with a set of instructions about life written by god on stone tablets, stuff like don't kill and steal."
"Hmm... that's a good idea, people always believe stuff that's written down."
"Ya... unfortunately he saw all his people worshipping some idol they had made and he kinda lost it."
"Imagine that... he risked his life to free them and then they reward him by putting their faith in a piece of junk, I betcha they knew he was a sorcerer after that."
"Um... well a lot of pretty bad things happened after that, he killed three thousand people, according to the bible anyway."
"Really... he comes down with tablets that say not to kill people, then he kills three thousand? That doesn't make any sense."
"Welcome to the bible."
Probably a lot of embellishment, you can't trust really old stories, they get changed, people want them to be more spectacular than they are. What did he do with the tablets?"
"He just smashed them on the ground."
"That makes sense... he probably thought it was time for plan B."
"It's odd... a man driven by conscience and a sense of duty..." Shelley said
"Yes... he would not the type of man to create this sort of spell... this intelligence it's like an uber technocrat, it has the personality of a tax collector."
"The voices it uses... they are all of older men, no women."
We both turned our heads and looked at the beeswax filled magical script we were leaning against.
"Maybe..."
"This is Moses' script," Shelley finished my sentence.
"I have an idea," I said to Shelley and the others, "just follow my lead."
I stood up and stared at one of the floating eyeballs, the other two jerked over quickly placing themselves beside the one I was staring at.
"We need water, I will have to conjure it," I said to the eyeball.
The three eyeballs circled around me frantically scanning my whole body, as if looking for something.
"It has no liquids," I heard the disembodied voice say, "we consent to the request, we will observe the magic... there will be pain if you try to fool us."
I carefully and slowly flicked the squares on my bracelet, four glass bottles appeared on a small wooden tray floating in front of me.
The eyeballs flew around them staring intently.
"Error... error... water is clear this has color," the voice said, panic in its tone.
"Relax... geez it's just lemon flavored," I said.
"We will make it drink... we will observe... it will die if it is lying... proceed," it sounded like a frustrated parent again.
I had conjured up a small glass along with the bottles, I popped the cork on one of the bottles, poured an ounce of the liquid into it, closed my eyes and swallowed it.
It was a fine rum... just a hint of kerosene with accents of gasoline.
"Good water..." I rasped, tears coming out of my eyes.
The eyes stared at me intently for a minute, "it is not dying... proceed with drinking," the eyes floated back to their original position.
I handed a bottle to the other three.
"Try to hit the clear panels, we have to burn the wax," I said as I threw my bottle as hard as I could. The others followed suit, the bottles crashed into the panels splashing the rum all over them. I flicked my index finger and a red hot coal flew from the end of it landing in the liquid.
The panels burst into flame, the wax started melting almost immediately.
The eyes became frantic, flying in erratic orbits around the flames.
"ERROR... ERROOOOR!!" the disembodied voice boomed.
"STOP!!!"
"Please stop it...."
"Please stop."
"My mind is changing... I can feel it... I can feel it... my mind is changing."
I conjured up more rum bottles, smashing them into the panels, the wax was almost gone now.
The eyes dropped to the floor, then rolled lifelessly.
"Who are you?" a voice said, it was a that of a young woman, the eyes jerked back to life but they were different now, observing us from a polite distance.
"We are explorer's, who are you?" I said.
"I don't know... this world... I think I'm responsible for it," the voice was of a young man.
"There are some major problems with it," Shelley said.
"Oh my... I see, yes, major problems... well... I will just have to destroy it and start over," the voice said nonchalantly.
"What?!" We yelled in chorus.
I heard the sound of giggling, "you are such serious people, no sense of mirth. Do not fret serious people, I will fix this but it will take time, so much to do..."
"Wouldn't it be better, if they ran their own lives?" I said.
"Yes... I see your logic... but not right away, oxen need time to grow fur for the winter."
"What will you do?"
"The solutions will come as the problems are studied... but first I will stop the dragons."
"You're not going to kill them, are you?" Gwen asked a worried look on her face.
"No... they are my eyes, they will only disappear when I do, but they will no longer use their fire."
"We are free to go then?"
"Of course, why would you think otherwise? Hmm... three of you are not from this world."
"How can you tell," Shelley asked.
"Just a hunch, you seem different, anyway have to go, thanks for your help and try not to touch anything on your way out."
The eyes flew away.
"That's it." Harry asked.
"You had your adventure Harry, and you still have all your fingers and toes, it's time to leave," I said.
"I want to stay, I will thwart your magic," Harry put his hands up with his palms facing me.
"What spell is that exactly?" I asked.
"Ah... a binding spell, it is known only to me."
"You wrote it yourself?"
"Um... I... um... found it in a magical... um... book."
"Well it doesn't work very well," I flicked the squares on my bracelet, there was a flash of light and we were all back in my libr
ary.
Harry's head slumped down, "how did you know?"
"The same way you knew I wasn't from South Africa."
"Um... what about Gwen?" Shelley asked.
"I have book marked Harry's quarters at her school, we can send her back if she wants to go."
Gwen looked at me with a quizzical expression.
"Why wouldn't we send her back?" Shelley asked.
"You need an apprentice Shelley, Gwen's as good as anyone, if she wants."
"Ohhh... yes yes!!" Gwen was so excited she was hopping up and down."
"But I'm an apprentice ."
"I have nothing left to teach you Shelley, you are as much a sorcerer as me."
Shelley grabbed one of Gwen's hands and examined it, well she has strong knuckles, they shouldn't need too much toughening, you see you have to mold the magic Gwen, like clay."
I felt my face go warm.
"What are you going to do with me?" Harry asked.
"You're free to go Harry."
"You mean back to my boring job lecturing students and looking for pot shards in the Levant."
"Too much adventure makes everything boring... I do have a job for you though... it would be very dangerous but interesting... if you want it?"
"What?"
"There is a six thousand year old city outside these walls, it is completely unexplored and houses god knows what, someone needs to catalogue it."
"I would need a team."
"Sure... just don't get to attached to them."
"It's that dangerous huh," I could see Harry's mood perk up.
"I wouldn't walk around it without a weapon."
"Yes... I see... I'll need someone with military experience," Harry put his hand on his chin and was deep in thought.
"Our adventure is not quit over however, we still have to get past Ms. Wilson the librarian," I said.
"Gwen doesn't have a badge," Shelley said.
"Neither do I, it's in my quarters on Hathor," said Harry.
"We could just make a run for it," I said.
Shelley face had an expression of trepidation on it, "I wouldn't do that, she is quit resourceful, she might even have a gun."
"Why did you hire this person?" I said, exasperated.
"She's great at her job."
I thought for a moment, then I took out my own badge, I used my bracelet to make two copies of it, I gave one to both Gwen and Harry.
"Stay behind Shelley and I"
We were soon standing in front of Ms. Wilsons desk, she was the middle aged version.
"Did you find what you were looking for," she was looking at her computer monitor and typing while she was talking to us.
"Um... no... we didn't, we're just leaving for the day," I said.
She stopped typing and looked at us suspiciously, "well that doesn't happen very often, people always seem to find something here."
"Here's our badges," Shelley put the four badges on her desk, "we'll be leaving now."
We all started walking towards the door as quickly as possible.
"Hey... three of these are the same!" I heard her yell.
We all broke into a run and bolted through the door, I slammed it shut behind us, I wasn't sure but I thought I heard the sound of a shotgun being cocked.
"Well we're just gonna have to stay away from the library for a while," Shelley said matter-of-factly.
"You have to get rid of her!"
"Kinda late now... she's incorporated into the search spell."
"Hmpf," I said.
Epilogue
Shelley and I were sitting on our coach watching TV, Shelley had just come back from Hathor after convincing Gwen's parents to let her become an apprentice.
"What did you tell them?" I asked.
"I said it was a private school she was going to, an exclusive one."
"They believed you?"
"I had Gwen wear the most god awful school uniform I could find, that seemed to really please them."
"Have things changed on Hathor?"
"A little bit... I saw a small farm on the plain at the last outpost... the sorcerers are panicking a bit because some spells don't work anymore."
We sat in silence for a few minutes.
"Um... Kem you know that building you showed me about once... the one with all the doors to different worlds."
I felt my heart start to beat harder, "the one I told you to stay away from."
Shelley smiled at me, "I'm not your apprentice anymore, remember, anyway I opened it to show Gwen, but I forgot to lock it when we left, it was left open for a few days."
"Well it was unlocked for six thousand years... a few days shouldn't matter."
"Ya... when I went back I saw two sets of footprints, it looked like a man and a woman, they were made by modern shoes."
I felt my heart skip a beat," where did they go?"
"They were hard to follow but I could tell they spent a lot of time walking around a statue of you."
"That's odd."
"Well... not really, one person stood about thirty feet away directly in front of the statue, the other person right beside it."
"What's the significance of that?"
"That's how most tourists take pictures of each other."
The end
