The Mark of Aether

Fallen Stars-Part I

Three weeks it had been since we retrieved the final key. Three weeks locked aboard that nasty, pegged out craft. The ride was not near sound and calming at a raging, storming sea.

As foreseen from long, the unity would reveal destiny. And the place was near nothing of not being shocking.

A flight from left field.

We were settled, one night, in a small shack—too small for comfort—underneath the light of a few dispersed candles. It was after we were entirely sure that no ear was eavesdropping on us that we decided to meet. Like once Ramos prophesied, the unity of four sides would unlock the door leading to the existence of all worlds.

The markings on the outsider of the rings glowed, casting shadows across the depth of the faces. The curves tossed and twisted with each other until coherent words could be formed. Running eyes on the four in order, from the one given by Siltheres to the one we recently retrieved, I carved the name of the place in my mind.

Sculpted should I say, as etchings on stone.

Cantelot.

Vemor.

The first norm.

The library.

And with that simplicity came dread and an already rising doubt.

As I leaned on one wall, nigh the end of the deck, I watched. The salty breeze kissed my cheeks, running in my hair that swayed in rays of midnight. The sun high in its throne burnt as a sphere of fire and heat. In the back, voices could be heard. And I loathed it.

I was tempted to slide my fingers down the throat of that filthy sailor, piercing my nails and chocking him. Mayra said I was being icky, but hell if I cared. Whenever I needed time to think, that rough, unnerving sound would boom all around, peering in whatever nonsense he had no qualm into.

In other words, my life.

I was reeling, planning for everything. The location sat me the most at edges, rippling in my head like a blur. For a month I was seated in that school, slept and lived in its walls. The library, that same space closed between more walls than ever bothered to count. The grimoire could be there, hidden beneath our noses, yet had never been found by anyone.

Just how ironic.

Some blowing in empty horns blew in the air, gulls and cormorants complaining from the sudden burst. It was our cue that we reached destination. Depending on the movement of the sky, I knew that we still had little time before the eclipse started. Before our chance to break a spell forged by a lifetime of magic.

We had planned, that if we still possessed time, to check the library and look for everything that might be a clue when the clock would strike the long awaited noon.

And from all the way from near the shore of Cantelot and until we descended from the ship, I was mumbling silent prayers to the gods above. Hoping—begging—that for once, they would answer my call.

"Duck!'' screamed one of the sailors, throwing boxes of wood that carried most probably rotten fish above our heads. Or dead corpse. What I knew was that the smell made my stomach sick.

After all that experience in sailing, I doubted I would even put fish in my mouth for the upcoming while. Stumping on the wharf, we pushed our way through the mob of sailors, travelers, women and children, and too much people that my senses refused to take them all.

Leaving the shore and all that business, we headed to the closest stable we could lay eyes on and snatched the best four horses they had.

From where we were located, it was three quarter of an hour to reach the Norm. Our old school.