by Des Pensable
‘That would be an acceptable solution,’ said Whooshoo.
‘Can you tell me where the old way is, and I’ll go there and see if I can reopen it,’ said Aquitain.
‘I’ll take you there,’ offered the elder elemental, and before Aquitain could say anything, a whirlwind appeared around him and he was lifted up into the sky and flown off to the south.
Zephira screamed through the mindlink, ‘What’s happening?’
‘I think I’ll be all right,’ said Aquitain calmly. ‘An elder air elemental is taking me to see their problem,’ and then the mindlink faded.
They didn’t fly far, perhaps a league from the town, and Aquitain felt himself dropping. He fervently hoped that the old air elemental knew what it was doing, but needn’t have worried. He touched down on the ground no harder than if he had jumped off a chair, right beside the top edge of a rocky cliff, which extended down into darkness. A closer inspection revealed that the cliff circled around the edge of a dark hole, possibly fifty paces across. In most places the jungle encroached right to the edge of the cliff. He couldn’t hear any waves nor smell the sea air, so he concluded that it must be inland somewhere.
The ground was rough and uneven. He was concerned that moving around with metal feet might be dangerous. He might slip and fall into the hole, so he slithered out of his body shell and reformed as a newman. He reached into his shell and took out three powerstones, each loaded with useful mental powers, and being naked and having nowhere else to hold them, swallowed them. He had also brought one of Zephira’s rings with him and placed it on a finger. This was his main protection and means of escape. It was a teleport ring allowing him to instantly transport to a teleport marker, such as the one near which they had arrived just outside the town, or the entrance to Featherdown’s tower, both of which he had memorized.
Finally he retrieved Alpha and asked it to grow thin spider-like legs, and placed it on top of his head where it could cling onto his hair and have a good view all around, as Alpha had much better vision in low-level light and darkness than he.
‘Show me what you can see Alpha,’ he commanded.
Alpha’s view revealed that they stood on the edge of a roughly circular sinkhole that was about 10 paces above the surface of the water that filled it. He could see the glow of the sky reflecting back off its surface. Aquitain picked up a rock and threw it in the hole and heard the splash. He re-used his power to see the glow of magic, and looked around for Whooshoo. The old elemental was a good hundred paces above him.
‘Where is the old entrance?’ he asked, using Alpha to relay the message using mindspeak, and Whooshoo sent him an image of a large crack in the rock face below his present position. He lay on his stomach and looked over the edge of the cliff, but couldn’t make out the crack properly until one of the small air elementals, still glowing from his fairy sprinkles, darted down into it.
‘Wizard, why do you hide in a box when you can walk as a newman?’ asked the old elemental.
‘My spirit is newman yet my body is not. I can only make it look newman for a short time before I get tired,’ replied Aquitain through Alpha.
‘I have often thought that newmans do strange things.’ said Whooshoo. ‘You have once again proven me right.’
**
Back in Panmagica, High Priest Kelnor’s assistant received some interesting information which he hurried off to show his master.
‘Excuse me your Holiness; I have something here from the Inter World Council of Justice. One of their archons captured a political criminal in Panmagica a couple of days ago. The archon also detected that the criminal had an accomplice who was using forbidden magic in Panmagica. The archon was not allowed to apprehend him without a warrant or agreement from us. They want to know whether we want him arrested for breaching Panmagica’s laws.’
‘Do we know who he was?’ asked Kelnor suddenly attentive.
‘We have a drawing of his likeness here, Your Holiness. He was last seen in the grounds of the wizard Sol Theolaur’s estate. You will recall that he is the Secretary to the Wizards’ Guild.’
‘Really!’ said Kelnor. ‘Now isn’t that interesting. The Secretary of the Wizards’ Guild is harbouring and aiding political criminals who use forbidden magic. I think we need to have this person arrested. Draft out an arrest warrant for me to sign and send it to them. Let’s do a bit of fishing and see what we catch.’
Chapter 8 The Hatchery
Aquitain decided that the best way to get down to the entrance crack in the cliff face was as a slime creature. So he changed to his Logicon body, and holding Alpha up on a pseudopodium like the eye stalk of a snail so that he could see, he slithered down the vertical cliff face to the crack, and then into it. Alpha acted as an eye, sending him images of their surroundings through their private mindlink.
He followed the crack down a few paces, passed through a narrow roughly circular opening into a larger chamber, and followed it down to the water. The young air elementals kept him company, flying around excitedly. He slithered along the wall, following the flow of water until finally he saw a section where a newman could walk and on arrival there shape changed to newman form.
Absolute darkness greeted him, mildly disorienting him until his eyes adjusted; then he was able to see the six young glowing elementals exploring the cavern above him. He created light on himself and the cavern lit up in eerie yellow light generating huge shadows, which moved as he moved his body. He carefully edged along beside the flowing water for a few hundred paces, and came to a dead end. The ceiling had recently collapsed, blocking off any further progress along the underground waterway.
He examined the water flow and surrounding rocks. It seemed that the cave in must have totally blocked off the water flow for a while as there were recent high water marks along the cave walls, but in the end the water had found a new way through and was eroding its own passageway right at this moment. He could see a hole and a lot of turbulent water around it as it sped through. This was as far as the air elementals could go.
He stood there wondering whether he should continue when he was hit in the face by a large splurge of greenish goo, which burnt into his eyes. Anger exploded in him and his body involuntarily reacted by changing back to his Logicon body shape, and his skin changed to match the colours and textures of the surrounding rock. Normally this would have been a successful strategy except for one problem. He now resembled a patch of ground giving off a strong beam of light.
‘What happened?’ he asked Alpha, struggling to contain the sudden rush of inner rage.
‘I think that there is another slime creature. It attacked you. Use forbearance. You can do this.’
Finally he received an image from Alpha. There was a grey slime oozing out of a crack but it was under attack by the young air elementals. It must have been quite confused, and after a few hits on its body it retreated back into the crack again.
Aquitain slithered back the way he had come and reformed his newman shape, shaking, tense, and ready to fight. The slimy goo on his skin burned a little but he seemed to be relatively resistant to the acidic muck. He had to decide whether to push on or quit.
‘Damn it,’ he thought angrily. ‘There’s no glory in quitting!’ so he resumed his Logicon shape and hurriedly slithered down into the water to follow it’s winding course, and as a bonus washed off the goo.
When he reached the bottleneck in the flow he felt a little worried. The turbulence and the pull into the relatively narrow hole was enormous. One moment he was on one side of the hole, then he was whirled around, belted, bashed and flung out the other side into a wide but shallow pool. Fortunately his rubbery body absorbed the punishment with minimal damage. He reformed to his newman shape and waded to the edge of the pool, only to come under attack again by more grey slimes. So he changed shape back to his Logicon form, and went with the water flow like a piece of flotsam.
The next two hours were surreal. He was washed though countless twists and turns, spun a
round, tipped, slopped, slapped and bashed, all the while progressing down the stream towards the sea. For a short part of the trip his body illuminated the small gullies, caves and grottoes that he passed through, and holding Alpha and viewing the images through it gave him a fish eye view of the trip that probably no living creature had ever experienced.
Later, after the light effect had expired, he dreamily floated along paying attention only to his primitive Logicon senses. He could feel minute changes in water temperature and taste the slight differences in minerals as he flowed over the varying types of rock. In several places he saw lights above the pool surface and once stopped to see what caused them, only to find the cave roof supported a population of glow worms.
Finally the journey ended, as he was washed into a large wide, shallow pool. He snapped to alert when he heard water-slapping sounds reminiscent of water elemental speech, and carefully slithered out of the pool onto a sandy underground beach. The cave roof several paces above him was covered with some type of algae, which gave off a greenish glow that illuminated the area, like strong moonlight. He noticed a metal pipe projecting down from the cave roof into the pool.
He decided to change shape to his newman form to have a closer look, and almost immediately two humps appeared in the water nearby and moved towards him. He backed up to the wall and moved the teleport ring onto his finger and Alpha into his hair. He attempted talking to the creatures but they continued towards him, flowing out of the water onto the sandy beach. They looked like two large formless bags of water about his height, but with light behind them he could make out two turbid spherical patches which might have been eyes.
He was just about to take flight up the sandy beach when Alpha gave out a long string of watery splashing and slapping sounds. Moments later there was a large splashing sound which he recognized as ‘Stop!’ The two large water elementals moving towards him halted threateningly close.
‘What did you say?’ Aquitain asked Alpha.
‘I found a special greeting that mentioned the name of a past hero,’ replied Alpha, and while they watched a huge water elemental flowed out of the water, joining the other two a few paces away.
Alpha repeated the greeting and the huge elemental spoke, using mind speak.
‘I am Squalash, Wave rider of the Great Sea. Who are you that speaks to our minds in our language and knows of our greatest hero from beyond the Great Storm?’
Aquitain asked Alpha to repeat his words using mindspeak to the elemental.
‘I am Aquitain of Twin Towers, a mind wizard from the newman town above. I am here to discuss peace. I have spoken to the air elementals and they say their passage to the food is blocked.’
‘That may be true as we haven’t seen them here for some time. Their kin have been coming here since before the Great Storm as have we, and generally there is peace between us while they are here. There is still plenty of food here for all. They have been attacking our young above and our young, refusing to be bullied, have fought back.’
‘What food do they eat?’ asked Aquitain, a little mystified.
‘Why the same as us! It is here in abundance, we need but to lie around and absorb it at our leisure, and it is an ideal hatchery for our young,’ said the huge elemental.
Suddenly the whole situation cleared in Aquitain’s mind. This cave was situated directly below the town in the middle of the magic node. The elemental creatures consumed magic essence as food. That’s why they came here. It was like a water hole in the jungle. All the creatures would need to use it, so they were peaceful while here. The air elementals were only making trouble because they were denied access.
‘Can you tell me about the ways into this place used by your aerial cousins?’ asked Aquitain.
‘Yes. They always came by the tunnel over there. Then some time ago it became blocked, so they began coming down the water flow as you have done.’
‘May I examine the blockage in the old tunnel?’
‘If you wish,’ replied Squalash, and they moved along the beach towards it.
The tunnel was about three paces wide and its walls were smooth, having been eroded by water and time. As they progressed along it, the tunnel narrowed and inclined upwards until it stopped at a wall, a rock and mortar wall built by newmans.
‘As you can see it is your kin who have blocked our aerial cousins’ entrance. Had it blocked our way, we would have knocked it down.’
Aquitain examined the wall carefully. It was strongly built and there were no gaps or holes where he might squeeze through. He could hear the sea not far away, so he wondered whether there might be another tunnel or entrance that was only accessible at low tide.
‘During the day does any air or sunlight enter the cave here, or in any of the other tunnels nearby?’
‘There is one place where light shows through the rock but no air enters, however, you will see nothing until the sun rises.’
Aquitain thought on this for a while, then said ‘Would you allow me to make a new entry for your aerial cousins?’
‘Perhaps, if it would stop them attacking our young and it did not affect us adversely,’ agreed Squalash.
‘Good. I will leave you now. Would you allow me to return later today, to examine the place where the light shows through the rock?’
‘Perhaps, if you will tell me what you have heard of our great hero.’
Alpha suddenly began talking to Squalash and continued for a full minute. The ancient water elemental seemed quite moved.
’Thank you,’ it said. ‘I have always wondered how he died. You are welcome back whenever you wish, Aquitain, Mind Wizard of Twin Towers.’
‘What did you tell it?’ asked Aquitain.
‘Among your hidden memories was a poem about the last fight of their hero. I told Squalash the poem,’ replied Alpha.
‘Good - it seemed to be quite effective,’ Aquitain said as he placed Alpha on the ground then used the teleport ring and transported to the entrance of Featherdown’s tower.
On arrival he found Featherdown, Senior Wizard Curbut and Zephira standing engaged in discussion.
‘By the Powers, what do you think you are doing?’ yelled Zephira. ‘I thought you might be dead.’
‘Some tasks take time. I haven’t wasted any, and I have more to do yet to solve our problem with the air elementals. I have learnt a lot about this place during my absence,’ he said, looking directly at Featherdown.
The High Wizard held up his hand.
‘Say no more here, come inside and tell me your tale,’ and they entered the tower and teleported to the entertainment area.
Aquitain was given a robe to hide his nakedness, and sat and related his story, suggesting then that they could finish it by making a new entrance into the lower cave if they could determine where the cave wall was thin enough to allow sunlight to pass through.
Zephira sat amazed at the whole story; she had never imagined her cousin to be brave or resourceful. Curbut was not happy about granting the air elementals access to the lower cave. He wanted to take the wizards down and exterminate the water elementals on the grounds that they were too dangerous to have around the town.
He argued that sooner or later they would attack someone on the local beaches, so it was better to eliminate the threat now. He also argued that if the air elementals caused trouble then they should also be destroyed.
Aquitain and Zephira were both horrified, and strongly argued for a peaceful co-existence; after all, they had been coming here for hundreds of years.
Featherdown quietly considered both proposals and finally made a decision.
‘It seems that this could be a continuing problem, and best fixed now. If we deny the air elementals access to their food they may eventually run amok, harming people and property when the wizards are not around. The water elementals have caused no trouble during the time the town has been here, consequently they don’t appear to be a great threat. Now that Aquitain has made peaceful contact with them, they should
be even less of a threat. Could you make some type of door that the air elementals can pass through but which would deny access to other more substantial creatures?’ he asked.
‘I think so. Some sort of baffle would probably do that,’ replied Aquitain.
‘Excellent, then we will take the peaceful option. You have my permission to continue. Might I suggest that if we fire a strong flare or two over the sea, that would simulate the sun at least for long enough for you to make an initial entrance to allow the air elemental young in to feed. I’m sure it wouldn’t take long to make one of these baffles and cover the entrance, would it?’
‘No, Your Excellency,’ said Aquitain, quite pleased with himself.
‘Curbut, can you please teleport Aquitain back to where he left his body shell so he can retrieve it, and tell his air elemental friends of his plan, then bring him back here and help him finish the job, will you? Use some of the military flares in the armoury. I must leave for other business again.’
The remainder of the night proceeded like clockwork with the help of the other wizards. Senior Wizard Curbut was not happy but he followed his instructions to the letter. Aquitain found out that all six wizards had been among the crowd watching him, with a high expectation that he would fail. When the huge air elemental had taken him away, they had expected that he would be killed.
Curbut had turned himself invisible and flown along following him, expecting to retrieve his body. After watching the soft landing and Aquitain descending into the cave, he had decided that Aquitain must know what he was doing and returned to report what he had witnessed. Later when Aquitain hadn’t returned after a few hours, they had called the High Wizard back.
As the sun rose over the sea and the young air elementals were in the cave drinking in magic essence, Aquitain stood talking to Whooshoo at the edge of the cliff face, on the headland not far from Archwizard Granwell’s tower.