Everyone stilled. We all exchanged frantic glances to one another and then turned them on the surrounding walls. Julian was the first to speak, "What of the compass, specifically?" as he strode over to me in two brisk steps.
"It hasn't failed me before," I admitted softly, holding the returned compass flat in front of me—the pointer still wildly spinning. "It has been pointing here, to her, all this time...but no longer. It is...directionless."
He reached out a hand when Michaela hurried past us to Sammy's side, matching his motions. When she said, "I cannot Manipulate it, either," I forwent the compass for the spell book, letting the page fall open and the words fall from me.
"My summons do my bidding; my words speak the power; my magic grants my wishing, to aid me in this hour.
"I call forth Mondal, Guide of the Growth."
For a moment, there was silence. Even the distant calls of the guards were muted. The sound came first, the crunching of grass underfoot. Then, a tremor from the ground and the earth began to part, shape, and form, twisting up as dark soil, dead grass, and brittle branches became something else, something more.
Until standing before me, "I am your summons, Mondal. What is your bidding?"
The book remained open and limp in my hand. I remembered my summons with Wintha, surrounded by nothing but cold and fear. There was little difference between then and now, still with the cold and fear, but in another place and time and company. I cleared my throat once before I asked, "Do you know what this structure is? Can you lead us through it to the Dark Wizard?"
With, not legs, but a toiling of soil and grass propelled Mondal forward until even with the wall. Then, with a voice not unlike the shuffling of dry brush, "This is not Earth, not any longer."
"If it isn't earth...then, what is it?" I asked.
"Metal is earth, when not smelted and molded, and even when, it is still earth of essence. This—" a vague gesture at the expanse of the structure. "—is not metal of earth, but of pure once-iron, tainted and changed through and through by the All—an Art, as you say. I cannot lead you through something not of earth."
"Can you tell which Art?" I pressed, hopeful.
"We do not hold all the answers to which you seek," Mondal stated without any inflection.
I had assumed as much, but, "You answered our other questions, why not this one?" Michaela asked hotly.
Mondal's face, framed by grass and set with rocks and twigs, turned to her. "We do not hold all the answers to which you seek. Not of those outside our realm. Earth is mine, this is yours."
"I have what you requested of me," I quickly interjected, reaching for another pocket.
Mondal held up a hand, shaped not like mine, and said, "I have received what I requested. For now."
"Something new," I murmured, and then dropped my hand, snapping shut the book in my other. "Thank you, I hope to call upon you again in the future."
"I will now part," and with a breath, the figure crumpled back to the ground, leaving behind little more than a pile of earth.
I released my own breath, feeling the ebb of my magic crinkling within me. I began to thumb through the spell book once more, when a hand gently grasped my wrist. "You do not need to do more, Lyra," Julian stated. "Save your magic for the fight."
"We need to find her to fight," I countered wearily.
"Then we find her on our own," he shot back. "We need not rely on magic for everything. Trust me."
YOU ARE READING
Eternal Winter
FantasyWaking up, alone in the cold and surrounded by snow with no memories of how she got there or who she even is, was not how Lyra would have wished to start her new life. Only by the guidance of the man who found her, the man who became her teacher in...
