Beauty and the Magician (Tales of the Red Witch Book 1)

Chapter 33 - Tale as old as time

The walls were made of books stacked like bricks, the history of the world their mortar. The brobdingnagian library at the citadel was among the finest and most ancient in the known world. It was far larger than the modest outside of the castle would lead one to believe. But thus was the power of magic and thus was the magic of the citadel.

It was a place deeply familiar to Eben. He had spent many a days here as an apprentice supposedly lost in study. But in truth, he was usually goading the other apprentices into elaborate games of hide-and-seek. Dreluna had always been game when in residence with her master. It was a simpler time, a time when he thought he knew everything. Now he knew for certain just how little he knew.

His eyes combed over his surroundings as the conflicting thoughts and memories danced in his head.

The room stretched far beyond what the eye could see with corridors that twisted out like tentacles revealing hidden wings and went a great many levels both above and below the earth. A mosaic of black and white tile lay on the floor as he sat at a table nestled amongst the ancient stone columns and neat wooden stacks on the main level. Books and a certain small evil wooden chest lay spread out before him. The particular wing he inhabited was the hall of records. It was where basic information on every magician that had ever lived was kept.

He had combed through several dusty volumes looking for any record of Demelza. He found only three small lines about her. The date in which she had been confirmed as apprentice, the date she had made master, and the date of her death only a few short weeks after her confirmation as master.

He supposed the date of her death would correspond to when she became a prisoner of the chest. He had been right, it had been nearly a hundred years ago. He wondered why the record said she was dead and not imprisoned. It wasn't like the citadel records to be wrong. It was puzzling, but it was a small note on the first line that had truly unnerved him. It was the name of her master. It was a name Eben knew almost as well as his own.

Skywark.

He had not understood it. For such a great and honorable magician to have trained someone who had cursed people, turned a dragon loose and done something so bad as to have been put in a box for a century. He sat back in his chair and stared at those seven letters.

When he had known Skywark, he had already been a very old man. Sometimes Eben forgot that his teacher had lived a whole lifetime before they had met. The things he could have learned... He regretted not having ever thought to ask the kindly old man who had been so much like a second father to him about his past. He had been so selfish.

A soft patter of feet pulled him out of his melancholy. He knew instantly who it was because there was no sound of shoes, only soft bare feet.

"Eppley told me you were here. Mind if I join you? I couldn't sleep." She was dressed haphazardly in her worn work dress as if she had pulled it back on in a hurry. It was grey and was a collage of colorful miss-matched patches. It had been destroyed after the dragon attack but she had done an admirable job of putting it back together. Perhaps he should buy her a new one after this is all over. It would be something pink and pretty to set off her grey fur.

He nodded and pulled the chair next to his out for her to sit.

"What are you looking at?" She asked with her wide green eyes.

"Look for yourself." He pushed the book towards her and watched as her eyes scanned the open page.

"I can't read this... What is this language anyway?" He had forgotten that all the records were in Agamora, the ancient language of the magicians. He waved a hand over the book and said the words.