Onward: Grand Quest

Chapter 5

Barley looks back over the seat. "We are almost to the manticore. How is the studying going?"

Ian shrugs. "It's a process."

Linda smiles a little. "I hope she can help us."

"So when we get the diamond what is the plan?" Ian questions. "I mean yeah, we will have a diamond but I don't know any sealing spells."

Barley points under his seat. "Grab the spell book. I'm sure there is something in there about using gems for sealing or some kind of sealing spell."

Ian pulls the thick book from under the seat.

"Is it too much of a stretch to think something like that would be in the..." Linda starts.

"Here is a sealing spell." Ian says. He follows the spell with a finger while mouthing the words as he reads it. "Looks complicated." It says. "This is advanced magic that requires multiple elements."

"Ok." Barley thinks while facing the road. "Elements'' probably means magic users or items. Not elements like fire or water."

Ian nods. "So in other words I can't do this myself." He thinks for a moment. "Cinda could help but I'm not sure she knows the spell either."

Linda shrugs. "She is a pretty fast learner, and from what I understand you don't need to know the spell yourself in order to assist with it."

Barley nods. "In Yore, players can simply link arms or hands to channel the magic. The more links in the chain the more powerful the magic."

"Ok that makes sense." Ian nods. "So theoretically I need to learn the spell and we'll be fine?" he begins to read.

Linda reads her text book for a moment and asks ian a question. He doesn't respond because he is reading and didn't hear her. She shrugs and moves to the front passenger seat. "Is he going to be able to handle this by himself? I mean levitating and magnifying is one thing but that's a very advanced spell."

Barley frowns. "If we have any hope of saving brimstone, if he can be saved, ian is the one who can do it."

Linda frowns slightly and looks back at ian. "It's kind of funny how we ran into you guys trying to escape magic in Forestgon. Tried to leave it and ran right into another mage." she glances at Barley. "Do you have magic too?"

Barley realizes Ian must not have had the chance to tell her yet. "No, I do not," he replies. "I had the knowledge, I had the books, I believed, but Ian had the gift." he smirks a little. "It was kind of difficult to grasp at first. I wondered why the gift would spark in someone who didn't seem to even want it, but he proved he could handle it after a little push."

"So you kind of mentored him even though you don't have the gift?" Linda nods. "That's amazing. When I met Cinda I had no idea how special she was. She hid it because she thought it made her weird. I told her it made her uniquice."

"Ian grew up without my dad." barley says. "I knew him a little. It was rough. I can't imagine not having my mother too. I'm sorry."

Linda nods. "It was hard." she clutches her ring again. "They never really told me what happened. Just that my parents had gotten sick."

"They?" barley questions.

"Uncle brimstone." Linda nodded. "He raised me for a short time after my parents passed."

He raises an eyebrow. "He raised you?"

Linda nods. "He is pretty much the only family I have left." She looks back at ian. "We can study later."

Again Ian doesn't hear her.

Barley kind of chuckles. "Don't worry, he gets like this sometimes but I'm sure he will snap out of it soon."