In less than a week we had removed all of the gems from the stones we had excavated. We must have had over a hundred crystals. They varied in shapes and sizes. Some were smooth and allowed light to pass through them, shining brightly when held up to a fire. Others were rough and dark and looked more like stained pieces of the rock we freed them from, rather than a different material.
Despite the heap of treasures we had accumulated, Tower was unsatisfied. When we had exhausted the supply of stones we had brought back in the sacks, he rifled through all of the gems as if something had gone missing throughout our work.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“Something’s not right. We should have found one.”
“One what?”
He muttered something and walked away from the table. He crouched down at the collapsed tunnel entrance and started picking up some of the rocks that had spilled into the room. He motioned for me to do the same and we were quickly back to work with the new source of stones.
“Why didn’t you cause a cave-in like this to begin with? Seems like it was good for us. Lots of gems. No way for anything to crawl up and get us.”
“For now, yes,” Tower replied. “Eventually we’ll run out and the tunnel will be open again. We could collapse it a second time but each time the opening would become larger. It would have a higher chance of drawing more attention. It’s risky for us, too. An explosion might cause a much bigger collapse than you might think.
“The smaller tunnels are easier to seal up with spells. Each time you dig into danger you can retreat and try a different direction. Normally a cave-in wouldn’t happen. I was sloppy that day. It was my mistake.”
I remembered what happened to his familiar in the mines and regretted asking my question. I felt ashamed and wanted to change the subject. I looked down at the rock in front of me and reached for another question.
“Why are the gems here? Are they everywhere if you dig deep enough? Or is it because of the tower?”
“The opposite,” Tower said. “The tower is here because of the gems. Some of the stone dug out of this room was used in building it, as far as I can tell.”
I ran my eyes around the room and tried to picture people hauling slabs of stone back up the stairs. The room had always seemed unusually large to me. It started to make sense.
“So the tower was built because of the gems. And the gems are the source of magic here.”
“No,” Tower smiled and then shook his head. “I’m sorry. The magic was first. The gems were second.”
“I don’t understand,” I said and tilted my head at him.
“Think of magic like water. There’s water almost everywhere. In most places there’s only a little water. It’s in the air, and sometimes you can see it as mist when its cold. But there are also parts of the world where water is found in abundance. Lakes and rivers and oceans. Magic is like that. In time, you’ll be able to sense that for yourself.”
“There are rivers of magic?”
“In a manner of speaking,” Tower answered. “Let’s try an example. What’s on the roof? What do we use to heat and light up the tower?”
“Magic,” I said, and then quickly continued after I saw the look on his face. “There’s a channel in the wall. The water runs through it.”
“Imagine what would happen if there was a second channel that spiraled in the opposite direction than the first. Sometimes the channels would intersect and cross each other. The streams would join for a moment. Can you picture it?”
“Yes,” I said.
“The heat and light would merge and those points would shine brighter and radiate more heat. Magic flows through similar channels all throughout the world, although they are rare and far between. Sometimes they converge and, like the water, the magic in that area is amplified. The point that they meet is very powerful, and this is one of those places. That’s why the tower was built here.”
“But how do the gems get in the ground?”
“Think of water again and what happens when you pour it onto soil. It may stay present on top of the ground for a moment but it will soon seep in and be absorbed by the earth. Most streams of magic flow underground to begin with, and coalesce there when enough has accumulated. It’s a very slow process over hundreds of years. The small gems we find would eventually get bigger if we left them down here.”
He reached across the table and grabbed a handful of dust. It had built up over the week that we had been working on the stones. He held it out to me as if I should notice something but I saw only dust.
“The potential is even here, in the rock around the gems. It’s saturated with magic. Watch.”
The dust burst in a flourish of light and heat, with bright flashes of pink and yellow. It was a brief display of magic, barely enough to register a response from my magical focus. Despite only using a small amount of power, all of the dust was gone from Tower’s hand.
“It’s a tiny bit of magic, but it’s there. The gems leech most of it. Would you like to try?”
He scooped up another handful and offered it to me. I shook my head.
“It’s a lot like fire. I don’t think I’m ready,” I said quickly, trying to avoid admitting that I was afraid. “Is that okay?”
Tower nodded once. He tossed the dust over his shoulder and it crackled and popped in the air, leaving streaks of smoke where they ignited. He put his hand on my head and ruffled my hair.
We continued to pull rocks out of the tunnel for the rest of the day. I found myself wondering at the amount of power that had been focused at the monster that day. There were more loose rocks that I could count and more being revealed each time we moved the top layer away. I thought that the tunnel had only suffered a cave-in, but I soon saw that a crater had formed in the floor from the force of the explosion.
The pathway into the mines was sealed tight with a clump of larger rocks. Smaller ones were crushed and squeezed together so that nothing could be seen through any of the gaps. I wondered how far in the collapse had run and how many years worth of gemstone could be taken from it. Perhaps Tower was worried that the tunnel may be sealed permanently. I was worried that the seal may not last and we’d have to venture back into the dark.
Somewhere underneath the piles of rock were the remains of the monster that chased Tower back into the cellar. I wanted to ask about it many times but merely thinking about it was enough to frighten me. Each time we moved a rock I was afraid that I’d catch a glimpse of its body or face. The dragon-like snout and vacant eyes. I felt more comfortable next to the spider’s cell than the tunnel.
It was near the end of the day when Tower found what he thought had gone missing. He heaved a particularly large chunk of stone onto the work table. It was heavy enough that I saw him straining to carry it across the room. It landed with a loud crash and he stepped back, breathing heavily but grinning at his work.
“That’s more like it. Do you see it?” he asked.
I walked around the table and studied the rock closely. I felt like I was being tested and I didn’t like to fall below Tower’s expectations. Reluctantly, I had to admit that I didn’t see anything special about the rock. If anything it seemed more ordinary and mundane than the others. I couldn’t even see any gemstones shimmering amongst the stone. I said as much to Tower and his grin grew wider.
“Ah, but that’s exactly it,” he said excitedly. “Look again now. Feel with your magic. Draw your focus over the rock and tell me what you find.”
I gathered myself and concentrated on the stone. I felt the comforting sliding of my focus as I made a connection to the stone, like I was staring intently at it with my magic. To my surprise, I felt a vast amount of power coming from it. Tower had taught me that some gemstones were denser than others, and that size was not always the most important factor in judging a source of power. The stone felt full of more magic than any gem we had found.
“Very good,” Tower said after seeing the shock on my face. “You’re getting b
etter. There’s something special inside this stone. It’s rare, but sometimes magic will condense in just the right way that it forms a new material. It’s called sollite, and it’s capable of holding tremendous amounts of magic. It will draw from sources around itself and absorb all of the power. That’s why there are no gemstones on this rock. The sollite sucked all of the magic from it.”
He held up a hand to the stone and I saw it vibrate in response to his focus. He made it look so effortless to attune himself to the magic around him. I thought then, like I would many times, that I would be happy to be even half as good as Tower.
Cracks began to form on the outside of the stone. The fissures spread out over it like they were being drawn by some unseen hand. I had seen Tower split open rocks before but this was a much slower process. He was being careful, carving out small pieces and then pulling them out individually.
When the rock was about a third of its former size, Tower caused it to levitate above the work table. It began to rotate in the air, and I saw layers of the stone break off in concentrated sprays of dust. It looked like sand being tossed around in a wind around the stone, being siphoned off and dropped onto the table. Each moment that passed cause the stone to shrink further until there was only a small object left in the air.
Tower set the sollite down gently and it nestled on top of the pile of dust on the table. The sollite looked different than I expected. I imagined something closer to the gemstones but it resembled a chestnut. The outside was sleek and the light was caught on its surface in a white sheen. It was about the size of an acorn and the same rich brown color.
“It’s been many years since I’ve found some of this,” Tower said and stepped closer to the table. “I’ve read that there was a fair amount of sollite down here when they first built the tower. Some of it was used to create items. Trinkets for spells and storing magic.”
He reached over the table and plucked one of the gemstones from the pile. He slowly lowered it down toward the sollite until they touched. There was some sort of reaction that I sensed only with my magical focus. Even without being centered and concentrated on the table, I still felt something akin to a flash of light blind my focus for a few seconds. The gemstone was gone. It was absorbed at the point of contact.
He felt at his belt for the dagger he kept sheathed there. He withdrew it and held it out to the sollite on the table. I stepped closer. It was the first time he had drawn the dagger since I had met him. I saw that it looked similar to the sollite on the table. It was the same deep brown, although the dagger looked to have lighter patches scattered on its surface. It seemed to move in the candlelight, as if it was interacting with the light and moving with it.
“This was in the tower when, well,” he stopped and looked down at the table. “When I first came here, I found this,” he spoke again, firmer this time. “It was one of the only pieces of sollite I had until now. I’ve only read about other pieces in books.”
He leaned over the table and moved the dagger toward the pile of gemstones. I had a closer look as it moved. It looked more like an ornament than a weapon. It looked too blunt to be used to cut anything, and even the end point looked dull.
I wondered what the use of a decorative dagger would be until Tower tapped it against one of the gems. I felt another flash hurtle against my magical sense. I was closer this time and had a moment of similar disorientation that came when a sudden loud noise blasted too close to my ears. The gemstone was gone and its magic was now part of the dagger, waiting to be used later.
“This piece will be yours, I think,” Tower stated while he sheathed his dagger.
“What?”
“I want you to have it. Keep it in your room. Not too close to your candle or it may steal the fire away. Be careful that you don’t try to channel any magic when you’re holding it. It may drain a lot of your energy and you’ll have to sleep for a few days.”
I looked at him blankly for a few minutes. Being entrusted with a book had been one thing, but being given a potentially dangerous item was something else entirely. I thought of the large gemstone that Tower had in the corner of his study. I thought of how he wanted me not to touch it. He handed me the acorn-shaped sollite now and I expected it to burn my hands when I held it.
“Don’t be too afraid, Bryce,” he said and smiled at me. “There is a book here written by the first occupant of the tower, someone who helped build it. A lot of the sollite they extracted down here was used in the walls. It draws up magic and was used in spells and items. That’s how the candles stay lit and produce heat.”
“Is that why our writing books only work here? The magic is taken from the walls?”
“Clever boy, yes,” Tower nodded. “You can’t make something appear out of nothing. A small amount of magic is used each time, similar to how I make our food.”
“Why do we need to mine gems, then? Can’t we use the tower’s magic as well?” I asked, hopeful of a permanent solution to never having to go into the tunnel again.
Tower frowned. “No, we can’t access that magic directly. The tower is collecting it for something. It won’t allow anyone to access it.”
“Collecting it? What for?”
“Whatever it is, it must be a big spell from the amount of magic it’s accumulating. I don’t know,” he said, still frowning.
Chapter Ten
Winter arrived and we were prepared.
The gems we had collected were moved upstairs from the cellar. We kept them in a pile on the first floor of the tower. Combined with what Tower had collected before, we had a few hundred of them to use for heat, light, and food. Even if the tunnel hadn’t been collapsed, we would have had plenty of supplies to last throughout the winter.
My knowledge was growing each week but so was my curiosity. It felt like each new lesson brought more questions that I immediately asked Tower. Looking back I know I must have been testing his patience, but he always tried to answer as much as he could.
When we moved the gemstones from the cellar:
“Does the color of the gem effect the magic it has?”
“No,” Tower answered. “The color represents quantity, not quality. Think of fire. A blue flame burns hotter than a yellow flame. Darker gems are more concentrated magic. That’s all.”
When we collected fallen leaves from outside of the tower:
“You said the tower has a spell that tries to keep people and animals away. Could we ever find a way back here if we walked away right now?”
We collected leaves carefully, keeping our feet on the stone foundation around the bottom of the tower. We scooped them up and made a pile of them near the door.
“Would you like to?” Tower replied.
I shook my head quickly.
“If you left right now you would likely not find your way here again,” Tower explained. “I could if I opened myself and followed the source of magic here. You could too after a few more years of training. But now, no. You would be lost.”
He walked to the edge of the stone and stepped onto the grass. I felt a rush of panic but forced myself to remain calm. He turned around and looked at me. His eyes seemed to be lost, staring a few paces next to me rather than directly at me.
“I can’t see you or the tower now,” he said. “Can you hear me? I never tried that.”
“Yes, I can hear you,” I shouted back.
If he heard my words, he made no reaction to them. He stood still for another moment and then stepped back onto the stone. His eyes snapped to me and he smiled.
“Did you hear me when I spoke?” he asked.
“Yes. You couldn’t hear me?”
He shook his head.
“You try now. Don’t worry, I’ll keep hold of you,” he said.
I hesitated and then walked slowly to the grass. I kept my feet on the stone and felt like I was standing on the edge of a cliff. I think I would have felt more comfortable teetering on the rim of the tower’s roof.
Tower’s hands gripped my sh
oulders and he spun me around so my back was to the grass. He lifted me easily and placed me down one step outside of the stone. Immediately the tower seemed to pop out of existence. I could see the sky through the trees and the part of the forest that the building had been obstructing.
Terror gripped me just as quickly. I felt vulnerable and abandoned. I could still feel Tower’s hands on my shoulders but I couldn’t see them. I tried to endure the fear until he pulled me back in but my mind was already racing.
I turned my head back to stare in the direction of my village, the route I had taken through the trees months ago. I felt like the dragon could swoop down through the trees in an instant and snatch me from Tower’s hands.
I sprung off the grass and back toward him. The tower came back, seeming to grow abruptly out of the ground, and I felt my body lurch as if I was knocked off balance from it. I didn’t feel like I was completely safe until my back was at the wall near the door. Tower was staring at me.
“It’s okay, Bryce. You’re all right,” he said. “Do you see now why you’re safe here?”
I nodded and became aware that I had started breathing heavily. I had been sucking air through my nostrils and letting it out as a hiss between my teeth. I slumped down onto the ground and watched Tower resume collecting the leaves, giving me time to calm myself.
We spent that evening sealing the windows of the tower. We used a combination of the leaves and paper torn from our writing books to fill each of the windows. Tower brought up the spindles of spider silk he had been gathering over the weeks and we used generous amounts of it to finish the seal. The windows were thin but quite deep. It took us a while to fill each one.
“What would we have used if we didn’t have the spider?” I asked as I tore out two pages from my book. I closed it and then turned back to where the pages had grown back. I pulled two more out and handed them to him.
The Wizard And The Dragon Page 9