by Platt, S. P.
Landing, they gave their dragons a hug then headed off to find out if the creatures had been taken care off. As they went through the gate in the tower they could see the wizard up in the tower and he was acting as if nothing had happened. They quickly run to the door into the tower and down to their secret room even through Gavrie knows where their room is.
They get to their room and head upstairs where they find there has been nothing untoward happening. They look around and there are no signs of any creatures having attacked. They couldn’t very well ask where the dead creatures are or how was the battle when there is nothing to show there was one.
They head off to the library when they bump into Gavrie a long the hall. He stops them and asks where they are going. ‘We’re just going to the library for a while.’ Angel spoke hoping he would not delay them.
‘That’s ok keep learning and the best way to do that is the library. Just put books back that you have finished reading ok?’ He was starting to walk away when he spoke those last words. He was not expecting an answer.
They are up in the library searching for more on the Renegades with Angel up one ladder and Medwin up the ladder on the other side. The girls were slowly pushing them along the isles while Angel and Medwin looked at the names on the books trying to find something anything.
They were half way down the isles when there was a cough and they looked behind them to find Gavrie standing looking at them. ‘May I ask what you are looking for or is it a secret?’ Giving them a stern look as he asked not meaning it but it might get them to open up a bit on what they do.
Angel climbed down with Medwin doing the same. They walked back up the isles to stand before Gavrie. Angel moved slightly in front. ‘We’re looking for more information on the creatures that attack us and try and see if there was something that might help us.’ Angel hoped telling him that might just be enough to keep him happy.
Gavrie looked at them and didn’t answer right away, as he wanted to see the expressions on there faces. ‘I think you will find all the information in the class where you learnt about them. I know you have had that class so shell we find another answer to the question.
They looked at Gavrie and then at each other thinking what they could say that would satisfy him. Angel looked at the others and they gave a nod of their heads indicating to go ahead. ‘In truth we are still looking for information on the creatures but also on those who send them against us, the Renegades. It is they who send them at us, so there must be something in the library about them. Where they come from who they are and why they are like that.’
Gavrie looking at Angel then to the others could see in their faces the determination to look and find anything they can. He could see that if he forbids them from looking, what that would achieve nothing, for looking into their eyes he could see they would not listen. I don’t really want them finding anything on the Renegades even though there would be no harm in it.
Deciding he must put his faith in them for he has a feeling they are going to be central in this battle against the Renegades. I’ll let them find what they like but will not put the information in their hands; instead let them find it themselves. That’s the only way they’ll learn their skills better and besides he does not know what there is in the library.
The library has been here for hundreds of years and there was a practice of books that they did not want anybody to look at, these they hid in the library and the library is very big so the chances of anybody finding anything, is very remote. Looking at them again he nods his head.
‘Ok you can carry on but I don’t think you will find anything that can help you. The wizard who controls the library has looked and had no luck for we would like to know more about them. A very long time ago all information on them was destroyed for what reason no one knows. With the attacks coming now it would be good to have more on them.’ This was his way of telling them they had nothing more on them.
‘Thank you headmaster we’ll try and find what we can and bring it to you when we find anything if that’s ok with you?’ Angel looked up at him as he said this wanting to see the look in Gavrie’s eyes. Wanting to see whether it was concern for what was happening.
Gavrie was happy and turned and left the library leaving them to their search. He knew they would bring anything they find to him only after they themselves have read everything they can from the book. I will still need to come in on them now and again, this way it will keep them on their toes.
Angel watched him leave the library and knew Gavrie had his suspicions about the little group. He’ll be keeping an eye on them, what do you think Aura you can see it in his eyes. ‘You are right he knows we do something but not what we do. You must be very careful now when you come to us even using your secret room entrance.’ Aura reassured him they would always be there for them.
They went back to looking with Angel and Medwin climbing back up the ladders while Shylyn and Maive push them along the shelves. They got to the end of that isle and then moved the ladders into the next isle. This time Shylyn and Maive were up the ladder looking as the boys pushed them along.
They had not gone far when Maive called out to slow down. There in front of her was another book of legends and this book looked to be centuries old. ‘I just found another book on legends and this one if you take the dust of it looks to be very ancient. I’ll bring it down instead of dropping it.’
She came down the ladder and handing the book to Angel, stood and looked over his shoulder as he opened it. He flipped to any page and looked on it to see what it had. As he did so suddenly his eyes lit up and a smile came to his face. ‘This page says the battle lasted almost one year and the battle was won but at great cost. They lost all bar one Dragon Mage.’ Angel stopped and started to flip through the pages trying to find more. He was stopping every now and then and reading a little and going a few more pages and doing the same.
The others looked at him as he did this, trying to figure out what he was doing. Medwin had enough and asked. ‘Angel what’s wrong what happened in that great battle?’
Angel stopped and looked up at them and then back at the book. His eyes could only betray the look of dejection that he felt. ‘That was all the book held, there is from what I can see no more. We’ll take the book back to our rooms with us and have a good read through it but we’ll find nothing else. All that’s in the book is those few lines, it was just a reference it got from another book, but doesn’t give the name of that book.’
‘You know that one sentence says a lot and then again tells you nothing, we need to find the book it got that sentence from. We’ll have to keep going and looking the two things we desperately need to find. That on the Renegades and what a Dragon Mage is, there will be more books on them it’s just going to take us a while to find them. Shylyn showed she shared Angel’s dejection and headed back into the isles to look.
She stopped and looked back at the others. They just stood there and looked at the book. She turned to carry on walking but turned. ‘Well are you coming, we’ll never find the book if you lot are just going to stand there and mope around, so come on and lets keep looking?’
Looking at her they then bounded down the isle to stand just beside her. There were smiles on their faces as they rushed up to her, they knew she was right and so they were going to keep going no matter how long it took.
They found no more books that afternoon and it was getting close to the evening meal. They grabbed the book and took it back to their room to stick with the other two. So now they had three books that had only a few lines off the information needed.
They deposited the book with the others and headed down for their meal, they were finding their apatite was not the same as their apatite for more information. Angel thought on the disappointments of that one sentence. All it really told us was we need to find more books with bits and pieces for that was what it looks like.
When they decided to hide the information, they made it very hard and split all the informat
ion they did not want found, breaking it up into little segments and stuck those in a lot of books. The hard part is we need to find where all those parts are and where they are kept. I think for the moment we concentrate on the Renegades as that is what is more important.
Angel comes out of his thoughts as they entered the meal hall. It was slowly starting to fill up so went and got a meal and found a table to sit at where they could talk in peace. Maive looked at the group and decided they needed to cheer up, and so called their dragons up to help. Or to be precise she called her dragon and got him to let the others know what she wanted.
‘Ok what we found is not bad for at lest we found something and that is better than nothing. We’re slowly building a picture and soon we hope to have a bigger picture, we are going to build it up till we have enough to show us what we need to do. So let’s cheer up.’ Maive looked them in the face and they all looked at her and smiles coming to their faces. They got up nodding their heads to Maive as they did so.
They were heading out the door when Gavrie came up to them. ‘I hope you left the library in good order and all books back in place?’
‘We are keeping it very tidy and will make sure when we finish a book we put it back in place.’ Finishing Angel suddenly had an idea about getting some information from Gavrie. ‘Gavrie we’ve been lucky as there has not been any attacks for a couple of days and the weather has been good.’
Gavrie looked at Angel then his friends as he talked. ‘We got word just before a Dragon Rider patrol spotted Renegade Wizards on their dragons in a group. The Riders surprised them and the Renegades had to disperse with out opening a portal for the creatures to come through.’ The group cheered as Gavrie told them this. ‘So Angel your idea was right and the council decided to go with your idea. They are very happy they did this now.
‘Thank you headmaster for telling me as I had hoped they might just listen if it came from you. We were just off to bed so good night Headmaster.’ Angel and the group moved off to their rooms. They arrived and went in to talk for just a few minutes before going to bed.
‘They listened to your idea so now the Renegades will have to find another place to let the creatures in and it will be close like up in the mountains behind. They could open a portal down in one of the valleys and then push the creatures up over the mountain and down on top of us.’ Shylyn looked at Angel as she gave them her idea of where they will come from next.
‘You’re probably right and that means our dragons are going to have to be careful as well as us when we are with them. Did you hear Aura; the creatures when they attack next will probably be coming from over the mountain so we’ll have to be careful from now on. I think we just made it harder for ourselves, aren’t we just so bright, come on lets go to bed.’ They headed off with Angels little talk still in their minds.
Angel lay in bed thinking on that one sentence, so there had been a great battle but whom with, was it the Renegades or something else.
Laying with his hands under his head, looking out the window at the double moons, lighting up the night with their slivery glow. They moved slowly across the sky shedding their ghostly glow over the sea. After a while he slowly drifted off to sleep wandering about the Dragon Mages and who they were and what were they.
Thinking about that little bit of information in the other book about the Renegades great wizard. Then it hit him the one who survived the great battle was the Renegades great wizard. He was a Dragon Mage whatever they were and from what the book says there had been more of them but they were killed in the great battle. He sat bolt upright and looked over to Medwin but found him fast a sleep so lay back down and eventually went to sleep.
In the morning he was itching to tell the others about his thoughts. As they walked to the meal hall Angel told them about the Dragon Mage and who he thought he was. They thought on it and agreed it was very likely the one. As they walked into the meal hall Gavrie come out almost knocking them down.
‘Ah, just the ones I wanted to speak to. Class will be up in the large hall on the forth floor.’ He left as soon as he finished talking to them.
Having finished their breakfast, they head off up to the forth floor to find out what they were going to be doing today. They arrived to find Gavrie there waiting, standing in the middle of a large room they had not been in before. As they walked into the room they looked around to see there were a lot of burn marks all over the walls.
There were no windows in this room which made them wander what the room was used for. Angel looking around as he walked out to the centre to stand beside Gavrie and was amazed at the size of the room. It would be nearly quarter the size of a Dragon Deck with there being no supports to hold the roof.
Medwin was the first to speak of what he thought of the room and what it might be used for. ‘Incredible the size of the room, you could get a full sized dragon in here and then there would be plenty more room. What are all the burn marks around the wall, it’s looks as if there has been a battle in this room. They look like Dragon Lance burns, as if they practice firing them at the walls.’
‘I think we are going to find out in just a minute, looking at Gavrie he has a big smile on his face. I actually think he is bursting to tell us what the rooms for. I think this is going to be interesting come on?’ Shylyn looking around for she wanted to know what the room was for.
Gavrie looked at them with a big smile on his face just as Shylyn had said he had. It looked like Gavrie enjoyed what ever happened in this room but he still had not said a word to them as they came up to him. It seamed he wanted them to anticipate what the room was for and what he was going to get them to do.
Gavrie watched them come into the room looking at there faces as they entered. This was the part he liked as this was the first time a student got to see this room, was when their teacher thought they where ready to use it. They would not be allowed in here especially when wizards are using it.
This room was just too dangerous for students to enter without an adult wizard here with them. This is going to show me just how strong their shields would be and how quick they learn how to adapt their shields.
I will watch very closely now how they do and I will not be easy on them for they need to find out for themselves just how strong they are. Maybe they will give me a little look at what they are really capable of doing for I sense they hold back when in other classes. They will not show what they are really able to do; they hide it very well so this room hopefully will show me just what they can do.
As the four came up to Gavrie he come out of his thoughts and looked at them, not speaking just looking, making them wait. He wanted them to get their anticipation to a high so what he was about to tell them would show in their eyes just what they thought.
Gavrie had long been good at reading students eyes to let him know what their feelings for something new would be. Weather they are scared or excited at what was about to happen.
‘Ok now that you have arrived and looked around I will tell you what this room is for and we will see if you are going to be able to handle just what it can throw at you. Now follow me and I will show you to a spot where you will stay and not move. If you move you can be killed is that understood?’ He looked at them with one of his most serous looks for what they were about to see, if they walked out of the safe area it could be the end of them.
The four of them followed him over to the side of the room to an area marked with white lines. They could see the white lines had included the door where they came in and to a little way along the wall. Gavrie stood just outside the white line, where he indicated to them to stand on the other side of.
Angel was about to ask Gavrie what was going on but Gavrie indicated with his finger to his mouth not to talk. They looked at him and could see in his face he meant it, so they moved back from the line and leaned against the wall. Gavrie turned to move back out into the centre of the room.
He had got half way to the centre when he turned around and looked at them. ‘You
will not cross that line, is that understood, don’t talk just nod your heads if you understand.’ Gavrie looked at them as they nodded there heads. ‘Now what happens is very dangerous and you will see why this room is off limits to students till they have been taught how to survive in here. Now watch and learn.’
Gavrie moved to the centre of the room and with a wave of his hand he cast a small spell and Angel and his friends could sense a spell wall in front of them. It would not stop them crossing the line so they were not sure just what it was for.
Gavrie readied himself and got into a position as if he readied for battle with another wizard. They were just about to turn to each other when suddenly out of the air a ball of fire appeared and headed straight for Gavrie. Angel was about to move when Gavrie brought up a shield and deflected the ball so it hit the far wall.
Next minute there were more balls of fire heading for him and they could see Gavrie working with his shields to deflect the balls away from him. As Gavrie deflected and moved about throwing his body around to counter the ball of fire. They could see there would be about for or five balls at a time no more than that.
Gavrie lifted his hands in a little motion that told them he had cast another spell. The balls of fire now stopped and Gavrie motioned his hand again and this time the balls of fire got faster and there were more appearing out of thin air. There would be now about eight to ten balls of fire trying to hit him and Gavrie was moving faster to get out of their way or into a better position to counter them.
They watched him for a good half hour going through the exercise, for that was what it was. This was where wizards come to hone their battle skills and keep in readiness. They could train their shields to act before they could and so started off slowly then built up their speed with their shields.
Gavrie stopped with a wave of his hand and came over to the four standing there just looking at Gavrie. He could see the look of awe in their eyes at what he had just done and he thought to himself I have not been keeping up with my practice for one almost got through my shield. I’ll have to remedy that with some more practice.