Awakened Spells Box Set

by Logan Byrne

  Half an hour passed before a smiling man walked in the front door of the motel. “Are you the two seeking safe passage to Lake Natron?” he asked.

  “Yes, are you able to take us?” I asked.

  “Yes, but the journey won’t be easy, I can assure you of that, and you’ll need to sort yourselves getting out. Do you have a way out, assuming the harpies don’t kill you?” he asked.

  “Yes, it’s taken care of,” I said.

  “I require the fifty silver coins up front before I can take you,” he said. I shuffled through my pack, pulling out the last of the money Pote had given us, before handing it over to him. “Excellent,” he said, shaking the coins around in his hand. “Come.”

  We followed him out of the motel into the streets of Nairobi. We walked for fifteen or twenty minutes, before he pointed to a small helipad surrounded by a metal fence made up of over a hundred different pieces of scrap metal. Barbed wire swirled around the top, some of the barbs cut off or missing. He unlocked the sliding door and we walked inside.

  “I just need to get her started and we can leave. Do you require parachutes? It will be another twenty silver,” he said.

  “We need to buy parachutes?” Charlie asked, shocked.

  “Well, I can’t give them for free, you know. The fifty silver covers me risking my life and helicopter to get you to the most dangerous area of the land. I’d much rather drive through a guerilla-occupied town than fly into this lake,” he said.

  “We’ll make do, I’m a witch. I can get us down,” I said, and Charlie rolled his eyes. “It’ll be fine,” I said to him, trying to ease his tension.

  “Okay, you can get inside, and we’ll leave shortly,” the man said, before opening the sliding door. The helicopter wasn’t much, but it was in better shape than the rinky-dink plane we’d gotten to Nairobi in. The man climbed in the front seat, going over his gauges and numbers with a paper and clipboard, which did make both Charlie and I feel a little more at ease. The gnome had just booked it after we all buckled up.

  “How close will we be getting?” I asked, as he turned on the engines and the propeller started to pick up speed above us.

  “It will depend on the harpies’ activity today. The sun is out, so they might be more active. I’ll try to get you as close as I can, but I make no promises,” he said, before pulling back on the joystick. The ascent was a little wobbly, but the man quickly stabilized the helicopter, and we took off for the lake.

  The city was quickly left behind, the scenes of open African land the only thing in view. I saw a herd of wildebeest running below as a massive dust cloud formed behind their bustling hooves. It was amazing, as if we were on a private aerial safari. I’d ever seen these types of animals before except in a book or on a screen.

  “Are we getting close?” I asked, forty minutes into the flight.

  “We’re just about there, another few minutes and we’ll be in range,” the pilot said.

  “How are the conditions? The harpies, that is?” Charlie asked.

  “I see some in the distance, it isn’t great,” he said, confirming our worst fears.

  “How are we going to do this?” Charlie asked, as he peered out the window.

  “I’ll Levio us down to the ground, but I might need to Obscurio us before we even hop out of here. We’ll be falling slowly, so if we aren’t invisible then we might be easy targets for them, especially if they’re out and active,” I said.

  “And you’re sure you can pull this off?” he asked.

  “I’m positive. Have faith in me at least a little bit,” I said, smiling and nudging him.

  “Live together and die together. Partners,” he said, and my heart suddenly warmed with love. If Charlie was anything, he was my brother, and I knew I could count on him to make me smile.

  “Okay, get ready, dropping in thirty seconds,” the man said, and Charlie rolled open the sliding door.

  The fumes hit me immediately, and I turned my head to cough a little as the smell of rotten eggs and gas filled my lungs. “Ten seconds,” the man said.

  “Lexa, do the thing,” Charlie said, grabbing onto me.

  “Levio Maximus,” I said, swirling my wand around us.

  “Go!” the pilot said, and Charlie pulled us both out.

  “Obscurio,” I incanted, and our bodies were instantly wrapped in a thin, sheer veil of magic that blended us in with the surrounding air. We began to float down, Charlie’s arms locked tightly around me. We saw at least ten harpies flying around, not paying attention to us.

  “They don’t know we’re here,” Charlie whispered, as softly as he could.

  “And they won’t, I promise,” I whispered back.

  “Look at the lake, it’s amazing,” Charlie said, and I looked down for the first time, having forgotten at first about the lake, as focused as I was on surviving the harpies.

  “It’s like they said, as red as blood,” I whispered, the magnitude of the lake taking my breath away, and not just because it was toxic.

  It was massive, far larger than Charlie or I had imagined, and the eastern side, which we were approaching, was a deep blood red. I’d never seen water that wasn’t blue. A flock of flamingoes gathered not too far away on the shore. I looked back up, leaving my vision of the lake behind.

  “Lexa,” Charlie whispered, sounding scared.

  A harpy was coming straight towards us. I clenched my teeth, holding my spells strong, before it flew past us, our weightless bodies swirling around like we were on a ride at an amusement park. The harpy didn’t even sense us. “It was just flying,” Charlie said, relaxing.

  “That was a little too close,” I said. After falling for four minutes, we touched down on the ground, and the salt from the lake instantly caked on my shoes. “Move back,” I whispered, getting a little further back from the shore.

  It was magnificent—there was a cliff above us, the harpies flying in and out without a care for who or what saw them. “Their nest must be inside the cliff,” Charlie said, as we both looked up.

  “You don’t think?” I asked.

  “That the crystal is in there? No, I don’t, and I’m not just saying that because I don’t want to look,” he said.

  “I do feel something,” I said.

  “What is it, the mark?” he asked.

  “I—I don’t know,” I said, trying to make sense of the fuzzy feeling inside me. It was strange, not like anything I’d felt before—a bit of a nervous feeling, mixed with a sixth sense, as if something was watching me. I looked around, seeing nothing near us but the harpies, as I tried to tell where the thing was watching me from.

  I didn’t know.

  “I think it’s out there,” Charlie said, nudging towards the lake.

  “We can’t go into the water, that’s crucial,” I said.

  “Don’t you have a spell to walk on water or part it or something?” he asked.

  “Do you think I’m Moses?” I mumbled, before pulling out the small spell book I’d brought along.

  I looked up, my eyebrows furled, as Charlie watched me intently. “What’s the matter? Is someone here?” he asked.

  “I think it’s calling me, that’s the only way I can explain it. This wasn’t happening before,” I said, as my eyes were drawn towards the center of the lake.

  “We need to get out there and get it before they catch wind of us. That Obscurio can’t last forever,” he said.

  “Sure it can,” I said, focusing back on my spell book. I flipped through, looking for anything relating to water. I could create water, freeze it, vaporize it, but there was nothing here about moving or parting it in any way. That was what I got for bringing a book so small.

  “What about that?” Charlie asked, pointing to the freezing spell.

  “Will this even freeze?” I asked, thinking of the saline content in the lake.

  “It’s better than us just standing here huddled up,” he said. “At least try it.”

  I pulled out my wand, letting Charlie
hold onto the book, before I cleared my throat. “Glacio,” I said, pointing the tip of my wand at the edge of the lake. It began to freeze, although it struggled, as fragments of ice tried to fuse together to fight the caustic red water.

  “Give it more strength,” Charlie whispered, before looking up at the soaring harpies. “They still don’t know we’re here.”

  “Glacio Maximus,” I said, and the ice crystallized quicker. It was red, the color of the water. Charlie and I walked cautiously over, tapping it, before testing our weight on it. “I think it will hold.”

  I kept the spell up, incanting it over and over, as the surface of the ice gained strength, even under the harsh African sun. “I think they notice something happening,” Charlie whispered, when we’d gotten about ten feet out from the shore.

  I looked up at the harpies circling our area, staring down as they tried to make sense of the freezing water. “God, do you smell that?” I asked, before I looked down at the ice. The sulfuric water was bubbling through, burning small holes through the ice, as the gases were quickly expelled upwards into our mouths. “We have to get out of here,” I said, coughing.

  We shuffled our feet, the ice beginning to crack under our weight, as I coughed so much I couldn’t keep the spell up any longer.

  “Lexa,” Charlie said, grabbing onto me, before we hit land and I fell to my knees. As quickly as I did, our Obscurio faded, exposing us to the angry harpies above.

  One let out a shrill, terrifying screech, and the entire flock of them responded. The air sounded like it was filled with tornado sirens. Tears filling my eyes, I tried to catch my breath as Charlie shifted and began to growl. “We need to get out of here, Lexa. It didn’t work. Teleport us back.”

  “No, we can’t,” I said, before spitting off to the side. “We have to get it, we need it.”

  “Lexa!” Charlie yelled as the harpies swooped down. With my wand in hand, I tried to fire off some bolts as Charlie swiped at the fearless harpies. They swung their talons at us, their bird-woman bodies and blackened eyes sending shivers down my spine. I hit one in the wing, knocking off some feathers, before it slowly retreated towards the nest. More spewed out from the cliff, blackening the sky above us.

  They covered the sun, hundreds of them swarming us, as I stayed on my knees and tried to gather strength as oxygen refilled my lungs. They descended, Charlie valiantly trying to shoo them away before they began to claw him. He whimpered as their talons grazed his fur, drawing spurts of blood.

  “Charlie,” I whispered, looking up to the skies.

  As they came for me, I felt it, the hope fleeting from my body as I realized I wasn’t strong enough to fight them all off. It was over. We were going to die.

  6

  The harpies swarmed me and pecked me with their razor-sharp beaks, cutting into my skin, as I struggled to crawl towards Charlie. He looked at me desperately, still in his jaguar form, as they continued to attack him without relent. “Charlie,” I whispered, reaching out for him.

  My hand wavered in the air, trembling, before a flash of light filled the air. Charlie winced, trying to cover his eyes, as I looked around for the source. It was…me.

  My hands were glowing, a light as intense as the brightest star, as tiny pebbles began to float around my feet. The harpies flew backwards, abandoning their attack, as I pulled my elbows close to my sides. With my fists raised towards them, I felt a surge of power flow through me, as if lightning had struck me ten times over.

  I screamed as the buildup of energy shook the ground around us and the salt deposits around the lake began to crack and shatter under the pressure. With one giant thrust, I expelled it all, the blue energy slamming into the harpies, their bodies being obscured from view.

  Just as quickly as it had happened, the flash was gone, and the harpies were flying back to their nests, no longer interested in fighting us. “Lexa, your eyes,” Charlie mumbled, looking up at me.

  “What about them?” I asked, looking at my hands still glowing blue.

  “They’re glowing,” he said, before passing out.

  I looked at the lake, putting my hand out, and the water began to ripple. I focused on the strange feeling I’d been having since we landed here. My mark was acting like sonar. I felt it growing closer.

  Something burst out of the lake, a giant mound of earth coming up with it, enough to fill an Olympic-sized swimming pool. It came towards me, and when I turned over my hand, the crystal was floating there, settling gently onto my palm. The glow faded from my hands, and I was normal again.

  “Charlie, I have it!” I said, turning around with a gigantic smile on my face. He didn’t move, his eyes closed. I rushed over to him, dropping the crystal by his side. “Charlie, don’t act like this, don’t try to tease me like this.”

  I began to cry, my eyes filling with tears, as I tried to shake him and wake him up. His body was covered in cuts and gashes, blood staining his clothes and skin. “Charlie, please wake up.” My tears fell, wetting his skin, but he didn’t wake up. He didn’t say he was pranking me, didn’t show any sign that it was all for fun.

  I looked down at the crystal, picking it up, before remembering what Pote had said. It healed people and gave them immortality. I felt Charlie’s neck, his pulse faint, before I gripped the crystal and begged it to help. “I don’t know how any of this works, I don’t know if you’re a spirit or present or anything, but please help my friend. He doesn’t deserve to die, especially because of me. If you’re going to take anybody, take me! Please!” I yelled.

  Sniffling, I pushed the crystal against Charlie’s chest, and it began to glow. “What?” I mumbled, as I watched as the cuts and gashes begin to close up, the blood that had spilled being sucked back inside as it disappeared.

  Charlie’s eyes shot open and he gasped for air, then he looked frantically around before focusing on me. “What happened?” he asked.

  “It saved you,” I said, showing him the crystal.

  “I just remember you, that’s it. You were looking at me, your eyes were glowing, your entire body was glowing, and then you were gone,” he said.

  “You were hurt, Charlie. You almost died,” I said, sniffling, before grabbing him and hugging him as tightly as I could.

  “Well, I’m going to die for sure if you choke me like this,” he said.

  “I needed that sass,” I said, my forehead against his, before I took out my wand. “Let’s get out of here.”

  “About damn time,” he said, wrapping his arm in mine, and I took us back to the camp.

  “How did you get it?” Pote asked, leaning over her desk, staring at the crystal sitting atop the rough wooden surface.

  “We almost died, at least I did. Lexa saved my life,” Charlie said.

  “I just did what I had to do,” I said, shrugging it off.

  “No, you don’t understand. I was dying, my body was giving out from the injuries from the harpies, and you brought me back. You healed me,” he said.

  “The crystal healed you, I just pressed it against you,” I said.

  “Yeah, but without you getting the crystal while I was down, I would’ve died there by that lake. You saved me,” he said, giving me a hug.

  “I just can’t believe it’s real,” Pote said, hovering her hand over it.

  “I thought you knew it was,” I said.

  “We thought it was, we wanted it to be, but there was no knowing for certain. It needs to be destroyed,” she said, calling for some mages to come to the tent.

  “Wait, after all that, you’re going to destroy it?” I asked, in absolute shock.

  “It’s too powerful, you know this. Merlin wanted to destroy it, so we’re just carrying out with his mission and wishes. This could fall into Kiren’s hands, and we cannot allow that,” she said.

  Five mages entered her tent, dressed in robes, before circling the crystal and pulling out their wands. “Wait, there has to be another way,” I said, panicked. I knew the crystal was powerful, too powerful for s
ome, but I saw what it had done for Charlie. We could use this in the camp, to heal the diseased and injured. It wasn’t about immortality, but healing.

  “Go,” Pote said.

  The mages started to incant an ancient-sounding spell, maybe Latin or Gaelic, faint purple beams of light emanating from their wands as they surrounded the crystal and lifted it from the table. I watched as it started to fade, the hue disappearing as if it were a ghost, before it began to crack and crumble, the entire thing falling to ashes on the table. The incantation stopped and the mages left as the ashes of the crystal started to melt away, leaving no trace behind on the desk.

  “I can’t believe you did that,” I said, my palm against my forehead.

  “I know you went through a lot for this, both of you, but this is for the best. Imagine if Kiren got a hold of this. We would never be able to take him down, and he would rule with an iron fist across both realms for the rest of time. Would you like to see that happen, or even take that risk?” Pote asked.

  “No, I wouldn’t,” I said, knowing that I’d rather die than have that ever even come close to happening.

  “So where was it? You said something about harpies? I don’t know of any nests in Morocco,” she said.

  “That’s because we weren’t in Morocco, at least not for this,” Charlie said.

  “We started there, before learning about the myths in Africa that it was located outside Nairobi, at a place named Lake Natron. It’s a lake with red water so toxic that it could kill you on touch. The gases were the hardest part, though,” I said.

  “It was buried there? How did you get it, then?” she asked.

  “We were being attacked by the harpies, they were clawing us and pecking us, and then Lexa turned into a god,” Charlie said.

  “Charlie,” I quipped.

  “I don’t follow,” Pote said.

  “Her eyes began to glow, and so did her hands and her entire body. The mark, or whatever it was, looked like it filled her entire being. She looked like she descended from the cosmos or something. It was amazing,” Charlie said.

  “I don’t know what happened, it just triggered itself, I guess. Maybe it was because we were under attack, or I was under high stress from seeing Charlie being killed in front of my eyes by a bunch of bird-people, but I was overcome with energy and it scared away the harpies,” I said.