The Wizard And The Dragon

by Joseph Anderson

  I pried a rock loose from the cave-in, like I had many times before over the years. The rocks above me toppled forward as I pulled and I stumbled backwards into the cellar. The sound of it was immense, like the tunnel was collapsing all over again. Dust blasted into my face and I stepped away, covering my eyes as best as I could.

  When the air finally cleared I looked at the tunnel. Candle was next to me, his head tilted to the side staring along with me. I had been teaching myself for nearly five years. All of those months of magic and spells and now the mines were open once again.

  For all of my studying I could only stand there stunned. I had no idea what to do.

  Chapter Sixteen

  I scooped up Candle from the floor and held him out toward the open tunnel. The light from his fire stretched forward and penetrated the first few meters of darkness. The cellar was always a cold, dark place but it looked as inviting as a sunny day in comparison to the tunnel.

  The next few minutes stretched out for me as I stood there, struck dumb by indecision. I felt frozen in place, stilled like my food was each day, by how unprepared I was.

  Too many questions came hurtling to my mind:

  How can I cause another collapse? What kind of spell did Tower use to create a barrier? Should I risk it? How can I sleep now that this is open? What if something attacks me now—right now? Should I leave the tower? What if Tower comes back and I’m gone?

  Candle tilted his head to the side as he looked into the tunnel as if he was considering it. Tower’s return was the least of my worries over leaving. I felt shame admitting it to myself even then, that my fear of the dragon was even stronger than the unknown monsters of the tunnel. I made other excuses to stay—that I was too young to survive outside, that I needed gems to feed Candle, that my magic would make me a target—but it was that fear that really kept me captive in the tower.

  Once it was decided that I was staying, I tried to remember my days with Tower in the mines. We brought food and pickaxes. We tried to move quietly until we were deep enough to dig. There was a fork in the tunnel that I needed to turn left, not right. He used gems to create barriers to close the tunnel after we left.

  I crouched down and picked up a small piece of rock and shattered it against the wall. I had no time to be precise and pick out individual gems. A handful of whatever broke apart would be enough. I shoved them into my pocket and faced the tunnel once again.

  A scream came out of the darkness, so shrill and loud that I swear I felt it as a rush of air slapping against my face. It must have heard me smash the rock. My legs almost buckled as they shook and I tried to steady myself. The scream sounded like one of the farren, the blind monster Tower had burned on my first day. I pushed away any possibility that it might be one of the dragon-like creatures that made even Tower run away.

  Candle seemed unfazed by the noise and I focused on his light as I stepped forward. My boots crunched down on small rocks as I climbed over what was left of the collapse and into the mines. My familiar’s fire gave off much better light than I remembered from the enchanted water bottles that I used so many years ago. I tried to take some comfort in that.

  The little skittering shapes that I had seen as a child weren’t at the edge of the light, and I had to wonder if my boyish imagination had seen things that weren’t there. The gemstones still glistened in the walls as we passed them and I decided that, if necessary, I could collapse the tunnel deeper in and have enough gems to survive for many years. I didn’t plan on staying in the tower forever. My mentor’s warning of ruining the mines seemed frivolous in the face of constantly worrying about monsters climbing up the stairs in the night.

  At the fork I paused and considered both directions. I had never been told what lay down the right tunnel and I remembered all too well what was down the left. The giant spider’s nest was supposed to be collapsed but Tower had been attacked in the process. I remembered an explosion but I didn’t know if he had been successful. I also remembered the filled sacks of stones that we had collected and left behind, choosing to drag the spider instead. That decided it for me. I would collect the bags and then come back here. I hoped I could create the barriers out of the gemstones.

  I turned left and started to walk again without a second look into the other tunnel, unaware that I had just made my first mistake in the mines. I walked as calmly as I could but I could feel my heart beating faster with each step that I took.

  The first bag I came across was empty. The rocks were strewn around it and the bag had been tossed aside. Someone or something had found it and rifled through it. I spent a few miserable minutes filling the sack up again, paranoid the entire time that something could creep up on me from either direction in the tunnel. When I was finished I hauled the stones over my shoulder.

  Another scream came from behind me and I whipped around on my heels so quickly I almost dropped both the bag and Candle. The sound echoed through the tunnels and then was replaced with an eerie silence.

  A few minutes passed and there were still no other sounds. Whatever had made the noise had been from the other tunnel. I exhaled and realized I had been holding my breath. I turned around and started walking again to the end of the tunnel.

  The second bag of gems was near where I remembered this section of the mines ending, but something seemed wrong. Behind the sack there was no wall but a deeper darkness, as if the floor stopped just a few paces behind it and then fell like the edge of a cliff.

  I sent a surge of energy through my arm and Candle’s light burst outwards for a brief moment. It flashed through the tunnel and I saw what had happened. I was both terrified and impressed by what Tower had done.

  The tunnel ended in a crater. I wasn’t sure if he had caused a chain reaction with the gemstones in the walls, or if he was capable of more destruction than I realized, but there was a huge spherical abscess in front of me. It was so large across that it was possible the spider’s nest had been destroyed completely in the blast.

  I sent a second wave of energy through Candle and sustained it. I peered down into the crater as the light was released. There must have been hundreds of loose rocks and stones pooled at the bottom, all glittering with gems. There was no danger of digging into something like another spider’s nest with these rocks. I knew that if I could seal off the other tunnel that I could safely survive for years without even using a pickaxe.

  The light from Candle receded and I felt a dull ache build in my arms from channeling magic. Despite all of my exercise I was still a growing teenager, and my body wasn’t happy about losing energy when it still wanted to grow.

  Candle climbed up my arm and settled on my shoulder. I knelt down and picked up the second bag and then turned to walk back to the cellar. I was surprised and impressed that I was able to carry both at once. The last time I had been down in the mines I hadn't been able to lift one of them.

  My thoughts were cut short when another sound came from down the tunnels. It wasn’t a scream this time. It sounded like something striking against metal. The clanging noise was echoing through the walls and I was getting closer to it with every step.

  I slowed my pace at the fork and intensified Candle’s flames for a few seconds. The sound was louder and I wasn’t taking any chances by letting something leap out at me from the dark. The tunnel that led to the right was empty but that seemed to be where the noise was coming from.

  I carefully placed the bags on the floor, slowly enough so they didn’t make a noise. I stuck a hand in my pocket and pulled out the largest gem that I could find. It was a vibrant green color and I didn’t think much more of my selection at the time. That was my second mistake I made in the mines, although I wouldn’t discover it for days yet.

  My focus was brought around the single gemstone and I floated it in the center of the tunnel. There was little to read about the barrier spell in the books. I got the impression from the few pages there were on the topic that it was deemed too simple a spell to be even worth writing about. A
sadistic sort of laugh wanted to burst out of me when I thought about it.

  The banging noise was getting louder and I forced myself to concentrate. I trusted Candle to warn me if anything was approaching us and closed my eyes, trying to picture the times I had seen Tower create the spell.

  The gemstone looked like it melted into shape over the area, spreading through the air like jam over a slice of bread. When it was reverted back to a stone it was the same size as it had been. Little energy was lost in the process.

  I opened my eyes and focused on the gem once more. That final piece was enough to get me started. If the magic energy was preserved then I knew I was only manipulating the form of the magic instead of changing it into something else. I needed to change the way the pattern of the gemstone was layered, not the pattern itself.

  It took me a few tries and reminders to ignore the clanging sound. I pictured a monster shambling through the tunnels, slamming some metal tool it found against the tunnel walls. When the gem started to change I felt a rush of relief and finished the spell. The gem filled in the tunnel like rain water taking the shape of a puddle as it fell.

  I placed my hand on the barrier and smiled. It looked like a huge pane of glass, stained to the point that not even Candle’s light could penetrate through it. I tapped my knuckles against it and a ripple of light shot out over the surface from where I struck. My hand tingled as if it had been shaking from the resistance.

  I picked up the bags, turned from the barrier, and started to walk back to the cellar. It was only then that I noticed that I could still hear the noise as clearly as ever, and that’s when I realized my first mistake. I had left the tunnel open and vulnerable while I went to where the spider’s nest had been. Anything could have climbed its way out while I was down there.

  The light from the cellar was a fuzzy glow in the darkness as I got closer and I rushed toward it. There was something standing in front of the spider’s cage and I wanted to scream. The sound was too loud and too close now. It had some sort of club and was beating it against the metal bars. Each time the giant spider let out a low growl.

  I dropped the bags without thinking and they hit the floor with a loud crash. The monster whipped around on its heels from the noise and I saw that it was a farren. It was larger than the one I had first seen but just as blind. They had exceptional hearing however and I had just given it two loud sounds to pinpoint exactly where I was.

  The monster lurched forward at me and Candle hissed at it from my shoulder. I felt his heat brush against my face. The farren stopped at the noise and snuffed at the air. Its eye sockets were empty holes where its skin had grown to cover, and yet it still felt like it could see right at me. It drew its arms forward and let out a screech.

  The giant spider behind it screamed back and dived forward against the bars. Its legs shot out and yanked the farren back just as it was about to dive at me. Its body was brought back against the cage and its head collided with one of the bars, letting out another loud bang as if it had struck it with its club.

  It was enough time for me to snap out of my fear and panic. I tried to ignore that my hands were shaking as I raised them. Tower had taught me often to focus magic under pressure. He had drilled me on it so many times before I even cast a spell. He would shout random words and numbers at me while I tried to keep my focus.

  I was brought back to the times we would stand on the roof in the rain or a snowstorm in winter, making me learn how to keep my focus no matter what my body was feeling. He had done that for a reason.

  The farren thrashed out of the spider’s legs and it recoiled back into the cage with another scream. The monster shook itself free and staggered toward me but I was ready.

  I attacked with the same shackle I would have put on the spider, but I aimed it at the farren’s legs. It clamped around its ankles and smashed them together, sending the monster hard onto the ground. It roared and swiped at its own legs, expecting to find something binding them. It dropped its club to claw at them but the binding spell might as well have been in its legs rather than on them.

  I stepped forward and readied another shackle but then it happened. The farren flailed wildly on the ground and its muscles strained against the energy I had trapping its legs. My spell was cut short as I felt the pressure of its movements reaching back to me. I could feel its resistance draining more of my energy as the spell struggled to hold.

  It felt like I had been smacked in the back of the head when it happened. The farren’s legs parted free and I stumbled backwards, disorientated and weakened. I had never experienced something fighting back against my magic before. The spider was usually asleep when I chained it. The shock of it was both physical and magical. I felt like I had been punched in the stomach and was winded.

  The farren scrambled to its feet and wasted no time in rushing at me. It leaped at the end of its run and I raised my hand more out of instinct than anything else. I pushed back with waves of energy and slowed it just long enough to dive out of the way. It slammed into the wall where I had been.

  The monster was quick to recover but I was expending too much power. The gems in my pocket were going unused and I was spending too much of my body’s own energy. The farren dived at me again and I fell into a heap on the floor. It dug both of its clawed hands on either side of my neck and opened its mouth over my face.

  The sight of seeing its jagged teeth must have sobered part of me. The monster reared its head back ready to bite into my neck just as I refocused my magic on its throat. I funneled all of the energy that I could find in myself through that shackle and tightened it around its neck. My grasp on it was so strong that it couldn’t even let out a scream or a whimper.

  I didn’t have the time to think about caging it or letting it live. I had no moment to pause and consider that I was about to take my first life in a fight. In those few seconds it was either me or the monster and it was close enough to killing me that I didn’t just hear its neck snap, I felt it crunch before it fell dead on top of me.

  The corpse of the farren was too heavy to push off. I squirmed my way from under it and turned to see Candle jump on its back as if claiming the kill. He must have fallen from my shoulder at some point during the struggle.

  My vision was already darkening as I got to my feet. My body was shaking from having narrowly avoided dying. I hobbled toward the tunnel entrance, intending to erect another barrier, but had to stop after just a few steps.

  My legs felt like I had been climbing the tower stairs for days without a rest. My arms and shoulders hurt, a deep pain as though it emanated out of my bones. It was taking a conscious effort to keep my eyes open.

  I had flung around too much magic without a source for my body to handle. The urge to sleep was overwhelming but I refused to do that in the cellar, so close to the tunnel. I took two steps toward the stairs and then fell to my knees in front of them.

  Candle rushed ahead of me as if to light my way. I followed him in a slow crawl. Each stair was excruciating and made my body feel like it was burning from the inside. Half way to the top I started to feel nauseous. My legs felt numb, as if they were someone else’s limbs that I was somehow moving.

  To this day I still don’t know how I got to the top. Most of the climb is a blur, but the last thing I remember seeing was the table still pushed next to the front door. It was as if I needed that visual confirmation of safety before letting go.

  The front door was barred to the outside. The barrier had closed off the underground. That was enough. Everything went black.

  Chapter Seventeen

  I was unconscious for at least a week. In the years that I had lived in the tower I had only managed to read about a quarter of the books in the study. Even with that meager knowledge I knew that I should have been dead. At the time it didn’t make sense.

  Years later I would read one of the books that Tower mentioned. It detailed some of the tower’s magical properties, although it shed no light on why the tower was built in the
first place. He once told me that the tower maintained the candles and books kept within it. In a similar way it could keep its occupants alive. After reading it I should have felt reassured, but I mostly felt sickened and violated. It was strange to know so much about magic and then discover you know next to nothing at all.

  I woke up on the floor in the same position that I had been in. My stomach and chest shrieked in pain when I moved. My entire body felt stiff and dirty. My clothes were disgusting. It took me an entire day to set myself right.

  Candle looked to have watched over me for the entire time I was asleep. I had to move slowly but I felt more stable than I had when I crawled up the stairs. The tower had sustained me well enough, although I was ravenously hungry.

  There was no water upstairs and I washed myself with cold water in the cellar. I had a moment of horror when the farren’s body was gone. I found it in the spider’s cage. It had dragged it inside somehow and devoured most of it. The corpse was a mangled mess of misshapen organs and bones. The spider was bloody and looked pleased with itself. The smell of it was terrible and I would have vomited if I had had anything in my stomach.

  Upstairs I changed my clothes and then went to eat. The food on the table was rotten and discolored. I couldn’t recognize what the food had been before. I moved into the study and ate there instead. The gems in my pocket were enough to create several meals.

  I recovered over an additional week. I did barely any physical activity except for getting water for myself and the spider. I let it keep the monster’s corpse and it was soon covered in its silk.

  When I felt strong enough I went back into the tunnel. At the fork I immediately saw my second mistake. The barrier was still standing in its solid green. A little too solid, since I couldn’t see through it and know whether it was safe to take down.