“Trekrama.” A golden rock appeared in her hand out of nowhere.
“What the…” I blinked. Was I going crazy? Had I lapsed into insanity as well? Were my eyes playing tricks on me? Maybe I had gotten a concussion without realizing it and slammed my head into the wall or something. Did concussions bring hallucinations?
“G…o…l…d.” She said the word slowly, enjoying every second of this. Judged by the expression on her face, I would never live this up. Whatever ‘this’ was.
“You must’ve completed a trick of some sort,” I muttered, “or I’m totally losing it.”
“A trick? Losing it? We’ll see about that.” Emilie laughed dryly, sitting back in the chair. “What if I told you that I could make a red ribbon appear in my hand out of nowhere?”
“I wouldn’t believe you until I saw it.” But wasn’t that kind of what she did with the gold?
“Okay, fair enough.” Emilie pulled the lining from her pockets and pushed up her sleeves. “Do you see any red ribbons?” I shook my head with two accentuated jerks.
“Good, watch carefully...” She placed the rock of gold in the middle of the table and focused intently. “Brisa Crame.” A red ribbon appeared on her hand from nowhere in a flash.
“I am going crazy…” I murmured, staring at the red ribbon completely perplexed. Nothing could’ve prepared me for this at all. Nothing could’ve prepared my brain to figure out how this was happening. Nothing.
“You’re not going crazy.” Emilie said mildly, but the amusement on her face faded to exasperation.
“I’m dreaming…” I ignored her.
“You’re not dreaming, and you know it.” Emilie sighed.
“I’m going crazy.” I pinched myself, wondering if I would wake up in my bed, and this would all be a dream. A crazy dream, that’s what it was, that would all go away when I woke up. Stick in the new girlfriend part in the dream too- it’d be almost like showing mercy.
“Well, then. Are you going to believe me yet?”
“We’re just going to pretend that never happened.” My brain still needed to develop an explanation of how that display could’ve happened.
“Okay, whatever. Do you want to hear more about my Vatra, at least?”
“Yes.” How could I explain what had just happened? I couldn’t. Not now, at least. That didn’t mean I didn’t want to hear the rest of this story from start to finish.
“My power allows me to mimic things. It’s a very useful trick to have… but I’m guessing you think I can only mimic voices?”
“Well, yeah. If you think I believe you.”
“If I can make out a person’s face or features, I can automatically perform a perfect copy of the person’s voice.” Emilie continued as if she hadn’t heard me.
“Are you kidding me?” Time to key ominous background music and stick a hot guy into the picture. We’ll have an overrated fantasy movie yet. While the stories Emilie told were unbelievable, I still couldn’t explain her magic tricks yet.
“No. Basically, if I was in Aughmortor and you were there as well, I could mimic your voice instantly if I saw your face.”
“Can you mimic movements too?”
“Yes, but not on all things. I can do some things that are reasonable. Like I can’t mimic a hawk because I can’t fly. I can mimic some things humans do, but not perfectly. That part of my skill is still developing.”
“You can’t fly?” I asked with mock disbelief. “Wow, and I thought you were a legendary superhero.” Emilie rolled her eyes at the ‘legendary superhero’ part. “Anyways… how’d you make that ribbon appear out of nowhere?” She’d used some fancy gibberish, I knew that but what was the fancy gibberish.
“I thought we were going to pretend that didn’t happen?” Emilie asked smugly, crossing her arms over her chest.
“Uh… whatever.”
“Well, to complete magic, you must use certain words and pronunciation to produce the desired effect. Of course, the harder the magic gets, the longer the sentences are that you must recite. I was simply making an object appear from somewhere nearby. It was conjugated as a simple transportation spell. If I wanted to make the gold form into a sphere shape, I would have to recite more words to define the precise shape of the object and how much force was needed to change the rock’s shape.”
“So magic has its own sort of language?”
“Yeah, the language is called Jakost, and it’s the only language used to produce magic.”
“So, what if I tried to perform that gold thing you did?”
“Nothing would happen. To perform magic, you have to believe that it actually exists, which I’m fairly certain you can’t vouch for at the moment. You have to believe in the magic for it to work. At first, when I joined the Ones of Within, I couldn’t do anything. It took me weeks to perform the slightest flame of magic. It takes time to it.”
“Can you explain something to me?” I asked thoughtfully, thinking about seeing Emilie on the bus when I’d thought of her as the strange girl and nothing more. But the one thing that she’d been overly interested in about me was my mother’s necklace.“When I first met you, my necklace interested you. Is there a reason for that?”
“Yes, there’s a reason for that. That’s how I recognized you were the one Shay and I were searching for. Shay barely touched on the powers of the Ones of Within.” Emilie unzipped her burgundy jacket, revealing a glittering golden necklace. The necklace, while the same size and shape of mine, had a snarling, scaled dragon with a stream of smoke coming from its nose. The piercing eyes of the dragon took my attention entirely; they were the shape of almonds with a talon-like pupil in the center.
“See this?” Emilie rolled the necklace around her finger a few times. “This is the necklace my father gave to me before he left. All of the Ones of Within members have a necklace as we do. These necklaces are inherited from family. In Jakost, a dragon is defined as a creature stronger than any other loyal to its cause.”
“What does mine mean?” I asked, taking a look at my own necklace again. The intricate, fire-against-water design never failed to amaze me every time I looked at it. “And, how were these made?” Anyone who’d made my necklace would’ve spent long, grueling hours on each precise line.
“I don’t know what your necklace means.” Emilie looked at the table, but something about her expression made that hard to believe. Her necklace was beautiful, of course, but there was something about mine that remained unmatchable in my eyes. “But, I can tell you how they were made. The dwarves forged the gold for our necklaces, but the elves used complex magic to design each one of these. They joined together to make the necklaces. It proved their alliance to the Ones of Within.”
Emilie looked up from the table to meet my expecting face and she sighed, loudly, bending forward and putting her elbows on the table. “Fire means ambition in Jakost and water means desire. That’s all I can tell you. The way the pattern is laid out makes it almost seem the ambition and desire are clashing, fighting for control,” She said finally.
Ambition and desire where two words that could have both good meanings and bad meanings. So, what did the necklace really mean?
“Don’t try to take more out of the necklace than is necessary. All of these necklaces are full of secrets. Of course, the elves specifically made the necklace for each member, but it could mean anything. In fact, it could’ve been related to your mother or even the generation before that.”
“I guess so.” Why should I worry about something that didn’t affect me? But, Emilie’s necklace … it was too close in size and shape to mine to be a coincidence. Could there, honestly, be some truth in her words? My brain dismissed the thought at once, but another thought joined the first that didn’t help my confusion. How did she get that gold and ribbon to appear out of nowhere?
“Is there anything more to these necklaces?” I asked, continuing to play the story out.
“Of course! As you know, Vatra’s strength is based on how powe
rful the wielder's spirit is. Some powers take longer to evolve while others take less time. These necklaces enhance the strength of your Vatra and help it appear sooner. However, your necklace must be from your bloodline. If its former owner was not in your family, it won’t enhance the strength of your Vatra. It’d just be an accessory.”
“How long did it take for your Vatra to appear?”
“Not as long as some take. After about four months in Aughmortor, my powers finally showed. I’d been talking to a girl, and I said something to her in her voice. That was embarrassing as hell at the time, but James helped me out with my Vatra, so I learned how to use it instead of just randomly taking other people’s voices.”
“James?”
“James is the sovereign of the Ones of Within. He’s only eighteen years old, but he was meant for the job. He’s the son of the previous sovereign of the Ones of Within and he’s so good he can take on five or more of the best, fully armed Ones of Within members with a weapon. At such a young age, he’s teaching the soldiers how to fight and leading the army. James’s known by his equals as the Silent Valor.” Emilie’s head bowed and an admiring smile tugged slowly at her lips. By the way, she talked about him, I almost wondered if she had a crush on him. Wait, that’s assuming that any of this story was true though. Scratch that. Still, I couldn’t explain the recent “magic” demonstration yet, so I found myself slowly, bit by bit, starting to believe some of these stories.
“Only eighteen?” Presidents, even the ones that were sixty years old, sometimes never ended up fulfilling their goals and being successful. And Emilie was talking about an eighteen-year-old… someone only three years older than me being the leader of hundreds of people?
“Don’t think that his age harms his leadership or anything. James might not have as much experience as most, but he was the best choice. Since the day he turned three, he trained to become the next sovereign.”
“Why did he have to train at such an early age?” When I was three, I probably spent my days watching television, coloring with crayons, and bothering my mother. It seemed that every kid should have a chance of living in blissful ignorance before growing up.
“James’s father was the sovereign of Ones of Within, and he was a powerful man who wanted his son prepared at all costs so he would get his rightful position. You have to understand, I mean, that the Ones of Within was in war with the Larta and the battles were vicious and filled with deaths. Eventually, everyone knew James would be his father’s heir. It wasn’t like James didn’t want to train and become leader. I mean, he could’ve just transferred the position to his younger sister, but, he knew he was meant to rule the Ones of Within all along.”
“What is James’s Vatra?”
“Earth. Any part of his body can become solid rock. Of course, the rock is still his skin. If his rock form gets hurt, his body gets hurt. His ability lets him have a powerful upper hand on his opponents since he’s naturally heavier in rock form and he also still keeps his body’s normal speed. So he can attack with his fists just as effectively as he would with a sword, if not more effective.”
“James is serious. I mean, he did miss some of his childhood and all. But, believe me, things have cooled down quite a bit in the past few years because of him. There hasn’t been a battle in a while. Nothing, nothing at all.”
“I mean, you can say that there wasn’t a choice and that James had to grow up early, but there’s always a choice.” For some reason, this was really important to me. Every kid should have a childhood. Every kid should have a family. Two parents. But that’s not how it worked in life sometimes.
“Are you sympathizing with him? Maybe you’ll understand better when you meet him.”
When I meet him? I laughed aloud but not out of amusement before drawing back my tense shoulders. This had gone on long enough; it was time to finish this once and for all.
“Emilie, this is just a story, like a game. There’s no such thing as Aughmortor. I don’t have an explanation for that ribbon you made appear, but this is ridiculous!”
Emilie looked at me solemnly. “I understand your position, Natalie. I just wished that you would be a little more open-minded.”
I sighed and reached for the gold that was on the table. She said everything with such a certainty that it made me feel stupid. I touched it in my hand, dragging my thumb against the gold’s cold, rough edges. It felt real in my hands and for some reason, stirring.
“Are you related to Shay?” Maybe insanity ran in the family.
“No, Shay’s a member of the Ones of Within.”
“I guessed that,” I muttered under my breath, realizing Shay looked nothing like Emilie anyways. I wondered if I looked like my own mother. Lydia Quinn. Wherever the hell she was. I thought I looked more like my father though.
“Did you ever find your father?” I questioned, finally, since I didn’t really want to contemplate Emilie’s paranoia any further.
“No. In the records, it showed that he died in the second battle on Aughmortor after he came back. He died saving a comrade who was cornered by five Larta soldiers.”
Emilie’s head turned in the direction of the glass windows. I could tell that her father’s death pained her greatly even though I knew he must’ve had a mundane death. Must’ve been driving late at night after a drink and rammed the car into a pole or something.
“Were you close to your father?” I asked, wondering if she even knew if her father was dead or not. Dreaming up a noble ending for a parent’s death had to be better than imagining why else they might not be with you.
“No. I don’t want to talk about it.” Her platinum blonde hair fell in her face as she bent over the ribbon, pretending to be interested in its material.
“Do you have any friends in Aughmortor?”
“Adam,” Emilie replied, and her whole face lit up into a smile. “I mean, I get along with most people. Shay is also like a mentor to me.”
“How many Ones of Within members are you recruiting right now?”
“You are one of four. The remaining three recruits, other than you, are the only ones left.”
“Emilie… have you ever heard of my mother? Lydia Quinn?”
“Natalie, no one has ever been charted under the name Lydia Quinn,” Emilie replied slowly.
“What do you mean?”
“Your mother’s name was never charted in any records. We believe she must’ve changed her name on Earth to hide her identity.”
“How do you know I’m meant to be apart of the Ones of Within then?”
“James has a possession that the leader’s of the Ones of Within have passed down for generations. It’s called the Definirati. The Definirati is an object that detects the location of Ones of Within necklaces and people with Ones of Within blood.”
“So, you must’ve used the Definirati to find me…”
“Yeah, it was easy from there. Shay came with me to assess how well I could teach someone our ways. You could say this is a mission for me. It also was meant to assess how well I had learned about the Ones of Within in my time on Aughmortor.”
I nodded, feeling a bit disappointed. So my mother had been sneaky and not given us her true name? Then what was her true name? Why had she kept it a secret?
“I can tell you are upset about not knowing the truth about your mother, but don’t be. Maybe you’ll even recognize her among the Ones of Within when we get to Aughmortor.”
“I guess I am disappointed. After all these years, I have had so many things I’ve wanted to say to her? So many things I’ve wanted to do with her.” I confessed my feelings, not ashamed. I missed her a lot. Things hadn’t been the same after she left. It was almost as though the family fell apart, and my father had changed a lot.
Emilie nodded thoughtfully. “You shouldn’t lose hope, Natalie. Your mother could easily be in Sybra right now.”
Or she could just be a memory written in a book. I didn’t even get to know my mother before she left!
&n
bsp; Emilie had obviously not said aloud the most likely possibility because she didn’t want to make me bad, but I thought about them all the same. “Emilie, what are the Shadow Bringers? Shay mentioned them when she spoke to me yesterday.”
Emilie’s expression darkened.
“Shadow Bringer’s are former members of the Ones of Within that have turned against them. They joined the Larta seeking forms of power above what they already had. Shadow Bringers are usually spies that try to gain information from the Ones of Within. They’re killed or imprisoned if they’re caught, but most are deceptive. They leave while they have a chance and report back to their master.”
“Do Shadow Bringer’s have a leader, like the Ones of Within do?”
“Of course. The Larta’s leader also controls the Shadow Bringer’s and their armies”
“A lot of power for one person.”
“The current leader of the Larta is a vile woman called Lucia. She is beyond powerful, and from what I’ve heard, she’s somewhat messed up in the head. I think James would have a handful with that woman if not face death by her hand.”
“What is Lucia’s Vatra?”
“No one knows for sure. However, a member of Ones of Within tried to kill her with magic once. She never made a blocking curse to their magic, but it just flew right through her body, leaving her untouched. It didn’t harm her in the least!”
“Perhaps her Vatra is the ability to avoid death by magic? Someone must’ve written down her Vatra when she trained among the Ones of Within.”
“We don’t think Lucia ever trained with the Ones of Within since she was never listed as one. She rose through the ranks of the Shadow Bringers to become second-in-command of the Larta and eventually the ruler.”
“How could Lucia have not trained among the Ones of Within? Wouldn’t the Ones of Within have trained all of the people who contained Vatra’s capabilities?”
“The records are hidden from everybody except for James. None of the Ones of Within has any idea where they are located. Many people say that the records are hidden somewhere in James’s bedroom, hidden by lots and lots of magic. And most likely, the Ones of Within would have taught Lucia, but not all people with Vatra join the Ones of Within. There is a chance that Lucia was the child of two Shadow Bringers as well. The Larta have been around for a long time.” Emilie shook her head as though to dispel dark thoughts and held up the piece of gold to my face. “Anyways, Natalie, did you feel anything weird when you touched this?”
Secret of Words Page 6
