The Wizard And The Dragon

by Joseph Anderson

  I had wondered why Tower had always used a clear gemstone and it suddenly made sense. Even years later he still would have had something to teach me. The tunnels were dark enough that a clear barrier would serve as well as any other. When I brought light I would be able to see through it.

  Before I shrunk the barrier, I picked out two gems in preparation. One was a clear one, ready to replace the barrier after it was brought down. The other I kept firmly gripped in my other hand, ready to unleash its energy at whatever might have been waiting for me on the other side. I had learned well from the week I had spent asleep. I was not about to strain my body again recklessly channeling magic without a source.

  The barrier drained away into the center of the tunnel, where I had originally levitated the gem. A rush of warm air ran over my face like something exhaling and made me flinch. My hand gripped the gemstone instinctively but there was nothing in the tunnel. I remembered Tower telling me that the underground was somehow warmer during winter. The barrier must have been blocking some of that heat.

  I shifted on my feet and tried to relax, but my shoulders remained tense until I had the clear barrier blocking the tunnel. The tunnel was clearly visible in Candle’s light but was lost in the darkness like everything else when we walked away. Still, I spent many days extracting all the clear gemstones I could find and erecting multiple barriers before I was satisfied.

  In a few weeks I was convinced that I had safely secured the mines and my life regained some of its old routine. I spent my mornings in the mines collecting rocks, and then the early afternoon working on them. I added half of whatever I found to the massive gem in the study, and left the other half in the cellar for emergencies.

  The rest of my days were filled with exercising and reading. I kept growing taller and I pushed myself to become as strong as my body allowed. I often practiced funneling magic from my own body into spells to test my limits. I was often surprised by how much of a difference a few months could make when sustaining spells.

  Around the time of my eighteenth birthday, and my eighth year in the tower, I finally built up the nerve to venture outside. I had long since moved the table away from the door but I still had not stepped off the tower’s foundation.

  Looking back it seems like a silly thing, to have an almost fully grown man afraid to take one step away from his home. I spent hours trying to teach Candle some way to signal me back if I got lost, and then even more standing at the edge of the tower’s stone looking down as if I was on the top of a wall, urging myself to jump off.

  I turned and faced the tower before I did it. I kept my eyes open and stepped backwards and then nearly fell over as the image of the tower was torn away from my eyes. Even after so many years of magic and spells it was still astonishing to witness a whole building vanish. I was sure Tower would have had some explanation as to why that magic wasn’t impossible but I could make no sense of it.

  I reached out with my focus and it was like hearing someone singing in the distance. The magic was emanating in front of me, or so I thought. I stepped back further and the sensation was fainter. It was then that I could feel that it was coming from below the tower, not the structure itself.

  “The tower was built here because of the magic below it, not the other way around,” Tower had once said.

  That winter I was able to finally mix in fallen leaves with the paper when sealing the windows. It was a small victory but I relished it. After so many years of nothing but stone it was good to once again feel soil under my feet.

  In the spring I was able to take short walks out into the forest and it was during those that I decided that I needed to change what I was teaching myself. I would watch the sky between the trees and remember how the dragon had dominated the horizon. So many years later I could still picture it clearly.

  My nightmares of the attack had faded but still, then, I had not yet forgotten the vow I had made as a boy. I promised myself that I would kill the dragon, but I had struggled against just one farren, a rat of the underground as Tower had said.

  I decided that I had to go into the underground.

  The barriers were closed one at a time and I placed each of the clear gems into its own small bag. I had several others strapped to my belt that were already full and a few loose gems in each pocket. Candle was on my shoulder. I had spent weeks getting ready and I still felt unprepared.

  The last barrier came down and I stepped into the tunnel. I spread the same gem over the tunnel behind me. I had no idea how many twists and turns were ahead of me. I wasn’t going to risk something sneaking by me again and getting to the cellar.

  Initially I walked quickly, riding on the burst of courage that had let me decide to venture into the tunnels that day. I didn’t slow down until I came to the first fork and that was when my decision began to bear down on me. The new tunnels must have looked identical to the others but they seemed new, foreign, and terrifying.

  Candle stirred on my shoulder and let out a gentle hiss, as if he was urging me on. I brought out a gem and closed off the left tunnel of the new fork. I looked behind and considered, if only for a moment, how easy it would be to turn around. I closed my eyes and decided against it, walking forward through the right hand tunnel.

  After a few minutes the floor began to incline, and I stopped to study the walls. Gems glittered in both sides and the ceiling. I didn’t understand why whoever had dug this out had decided to go upwards. I thought of the sollite that Tower had been so anxious to find and considered it a possibility. Still, the change didn’t bothered me.

  I continued through the tunnel. The incline eventually leveled and then begin to descend. I stopped again and had to kneel down to see if the floor was safe to walk on. The angle wasn’t too steep but it was just out of Candle’s light. Each step was a new danger. It didn’t sit right with me to lower my feet into darkness.

  I opened one of the bags and brought out a gemstone. I held it up to Candle and pressed it into his body. It floated around his core as if it was in orbit.

  “Don’t eat quickly. Use it to shine brighter,” I whispered to him.

  He let out another hiss and I wasn’t certain if it was a protest or an agreement. Either way his light extended further on and I could see the floor a few meters ahead of me. Each step became more comfortable but I still moved slowly. If I fell I had no idea what might be waiting for me at the bottom.

  The floor abruptly straightened and I brought my foot down too hard, expecting there to be air where I met the ground. I spat out a curse and brought my other foot down carefully. It was only then that I noticed the light coming from down the tunnel.

  I snatched Candle from my shoulder and extinguished him. The gem I had given him fell to the floor and bounced along the stone. I crept forward, unsure what the light could mean and preparing for a fight. When I put Candle’s core in my pocket I brought out a handful of gems.

  The air grew warmer the closer I got to the light. I had read in books of underground lakes and rivers of lava, but it was another thing entirely to experience them. The tunnel felt hotter than a midsummer’s day when I reached the end. When I stepped out of the tunnel I found out why.

  There was only a small ridge that stuck out of the floor. The roof was still close to my head and I saw that whoever had mined here had broken into a massive chamber. I crouched down and looked down into the opening.

  The drop from the tunnel would have easily killed me. I had once considered the top of the tower the highest I had ever been, and this drop was at least ten times that. Directly below me was a river of fire, and it took a few moments for me to realize that was the lava I had read about. Even from my height I could feel the heat of it causing my forehead to sweat.

  The lava moved slowly and it was oddly hypnotic to watch. Candle had helped me move past my fear of fire but part of me was still unsettled by the river. Parts of it were charred black, as if it was burning up itself as it crawled along. It reminded me of the river’s surface, with a t
hick coating of ash on top, after the dragon had attacked.

  I looked up to survey the rest of the chamber. It stretched out far enough that it faded away into the shadows, where the light from the river didn’t extend. I frowned at that, not being able to grasp how such a large place could be found underground. Maybe it wasn’t a chamber at all, but a gigantic cavern that kept stretching on and on.

  The floor of the cavern, comfortably above the lava, was littered with pillars and statues. I considered for a moment that it might have been a lost city, or another structure made by whoever built my tower; however, the statues seemed to be lined up and stretched off into the shadows. They filled the entire floor between the pillars, row upon row of them, with seemingly no purpose. There were no creatures or monsters among them. They were alone.

  It didn’t make sense to me. I wanted a closer look but I had no way to safely get down. I had read of a spell that seasoned wizards could use to slow themselves as they fell from a great height. It was not something I felt capable of yet and trying it above a river of fire would be foolish. Even so, I felt as though I stumbled upon something important as I turned away and went back into the tunnel.

  I brought Candle back out when I had climbed the first slope. Back at the fork I scorched a large ‘S’ into the right tunnel wall in the same way I had learned in the window’s room. I didn’t like to think about those words but the letter would remind me that this tunnel was safe if I ever came back.

  I removed the barrier and stepped through before I placed it back. The discovery of the statues had sparked some excitement in me. I felt like a boy again, exploring parts of the village that I wasn’t allowed to, or wandering off into farms when my parents were fishing. I patted down the bags of gems on my belt as a reminder of my ultimate goal. I continued on with my eagerness somewhat diminished.

  The tunnel continued forward for a long time. It felt like there was a slight downward slant to the floor but it was too dark to tell. There were no turns or diverting tunnels. I considered turning back many times and Tower’s reassurances suddenly made sense. Something would have to be determined to make the journey through here to get close to the cellar.

  My attention waned after nearly two hours of creeping forward. I started walking faster, growing complacent after seeing nothing but rock. I hadn’t heard anything either. When the tunnel abruptly opened I had to stop and remind myself to be careful.

  The darkness melded with the rock around us. I could only see a few meters out in any direction as Candle’s light made a visible circle around us. I took a few steps forward and saw that the floor was uneven. The tunnel had, at least in part, been penetrated into this opening rather than dug out. Like the previous chamber, it was so dark that I had no way of knowing how far it extended.

  The thought of the room’s size made me turn around and panic. I took a few steps too many and I couldn’t see the tunnel in Candle’s light. I all but leaped back in its direction until I could see it again. I suddenly wished I had brought a vial of enchanted water with me to mark the entrance. I shook my head at that. The light might attract attention.

  It was unnerving to do, but I placed a barrier over the tunnel. I didn’t like the thought of being blocked out if I had to run, but I liked the thought of being ambushed in the tunnel even less. Afterwards, I took another gem and held it loosely in my right hand. As I walked I scored the floor with a magic line as I had the wall. The line was lost in the darkness as I moved away but as long as I maintained the effect all I had to do was look down to know how to get home.

  I tried to keep moving forward in the same direction as much as possible, but the floor often rose and fell in ways I wasn’t ready to trust in the dark. Some of the shadows in the floor were so deep that I couldn’t see the bottom even after bringing Candle near them. I kept my distance from those as I walked around them.

  When I judged that I was a fair distance from the tunnel, I withdrew several more gems and clutched them tightly in my right hand. I ceased my marking on the floor and stopped, concentrating on flowing the energy in the gems through my body. I held Candle above my head in my other hand and let that energy flow into him.

  My familiar flourished above my head. The brilliance of the light that shot out of him made me wish I could watch him revel in it. I was too busy scanning our surroundings, not sure how long I might have to maintain the illumination of the room.

  I could see the tunnel clearly. I hadn’t walked as far as I thought and that was the only wall I could see. The top of the cavern was higher than I expected and as rough as the floor. Stalactites hung from the ceiling and I saw that there were even a few stalagmites amongst the floor around me.

  Candle popped and crackled in my hand and it was only then that I saw the movement. The light was powerful but the farren’s skin could easily blend in with the rocks and shadows of the underground. The light had done nothing to disturb them but a crackling fire was easy for them to hear.

  There were three of them together. They looked like they had been eating something and turned from it to face me. One of them was easily double the size of the other two and it launched off its feet toward me. It had been at the edge of Candle’s light when it jumped and it had halved that distance when it landed.

  Stupidly, I closed my hand around Candle’s core and extinguished his fire. That only gave the farren more of advantage; I had blinded only myself. I swore again and backed away while I quickly brought Candle back to life. He spat a protest at me but I ignored it. I shoved the handful of gems I had been using into his fire and sat him on my shoulder.

  One of the smaller ones rushed at me first. It sprinted into the ring of light around me and I used its own momentum against it. My focus locked onto its legs and swept them out from under it. It was the barest use of magic but it sent the monster face down into the stone floor.

  The large farren came next and I snatched at one of the bags at my belt. It was only my second fight and I was clumsy. I got a handful of gems but spilled the bag on the floor in the process. The sound of dozens of gems bouncing along the stone rattled out in to the cavern and all three of my attackers roared out in response.

  The monster dove and swiped its claws at my head. I ducked from the blow instead of stopping it with the fistful of magic I was holding. I narrowly dodged it and rolled to the side away from it. Another bag opened up as I moved and emptied out more gems onto the floor.

  Candle jumped from my shoulder and started running to all of the scattered stones. Each one he absorbed into his fire and it joined the other floating near his core. His light grew each time and I could soon see all of the farren. The first small one was still reeling on the floor. The second was waiting behind the large one that was coming in for another attack.

  I had planned to mimic Tower’s kill and had practiced the fire with Candle. The flames burst around my hand and spread up my arm. It crossed my shoulders and I felt the power of it jolt down my spine. It was as if my body was vibrating with the strain of focusing so much energy.

  The fire erupted out of my other hand and filled the air in front of me like a focused explosion. The large monster was already close and was caught in the flames. It shrieked in pain but kept coming. Tower’s fire had stopped his attacker in its tracks. Mine charged through my magic and tore one of its claws along my stomach.

  The pain was immense and burned hotter than the fire I was channeling. Still the large farren kept lashing out at me as I jumped back, keeping my flames burning away its body. Its shrieks turned into a gurgling sound when it finally fell to the ground. I stopped the spell and released both of my hands. The gemstones I had been clutching were tiny specks of color as they left my hand.

  The two smaller farren were attacking Candle and I stumbled forward to them. Each time they ran their claws through his fire, they would recoil back in pain. They attacked his fire harmlessly instead of bashing at his core. If my stomach wasn’t screaming at me I might have been amused.

  I went
for the gems in my pocket this time and stirred the energy up into shackles for the two of them. Their ankles clamped together and they dropped to the ground. I focused around the neck of one of them and broke it easily.

  The second one struggled against me. It screamed as it flailed its legs free and I felt the gem I had been using shatter in my hand as it broke the magic. I was stunned by it and suddenly understood why I had been so hurt when the farren had done the same to me in the cellar. The gem was a jagged mess of pieces in my palm.

  Candle dived at the last monster. He had so many gems floating in his fire now that I couldn’t count them. He had grown greatly in size with each magic source that he had found. He was easily as tall as my chest. His core was bright even amongst his fire, as if an even hotter flame burned within him. He swarmed the farren’s head and burned it in seconds. Its body twitched as its head was roasted. It looked red and raw by the end.

  Candle stood in front of me and spluttered the gems out, one by one. He shrunk in size as each one fell to the floor. I lifted my shirt in the light and groaned as the cloth peeled away from the slices on my stomach. The shirt was bloodied around that area but the wounds weren’t deep. The skin around the torn flesh had only just started to swell up and turn red.

  When I looked to Candle he was his normal size again. He tilted his head at me.

  “I’m hurt, we need to go back,” I said.

  He tilted his head again and then jumped in place, as if suddenly figuring out what I said. He sucked all of the gems back into his fire and did slow circles around me as I walked back to the tunnel. I smiled at how protective he was and then scowled. I hadn’t realized how much my body moved, stomach included, when walking. Each step brought a new jab of pain.

  I forced myself to stop and put up multiple barriers as we climbed the tunnels back up to the cellar. It didn’t take as long to walk back since we didn’t have to go as quietly and carefully as possible. Still, I had enough time to feel foolish that I hadn’t prepared any healing spells. I had fumbled my way through another fight, one I purposely went out to find, and learned only that I knew next to nothing.