The Yeti Rebellion

Part #4 - The Yeti Rebellion

Chapter #22 - Igor's Ice Hut 

            Ivanilson opened his eyes slowly, unsure of what to make of his strange surroundings. He lay on his back, looking up at a makeshift thatch roof. He was no longer surrounded by bright light nor darkness, but instead by a pale uncertain light which seeped in from a nearby window. The dirt floor on which he lay was smooth and cold, firm but not too hard. The room around him was quaint, mostly barren save for a pile of books which sat in one corner of the room and an old man sitting in the adjacent corner. The elderly figure straightened up a bit as he noticed Ivanilson coming to life. The young mage made note of this elderly man's wizardry robes, they were brown and quite tattered. The robes of a renegade, Ivanilson thought to himself, thinking back to the rumors he had heard of the few mages foolish enough to desert from the Wizarding Order. The Wizarding Order existed as a cohort of mages who had graduated from the Academy of Brujopo. The cohort abided by certain rules established by the Academy and pledged to serve the good of the entire Order should the need arise. In exchange for these commitments, all members of the cohort retained access to the Great Library, a wealth of arcane and scholarly resources housed in the Academy. Deserting the cohort meant abandoning the best chance a mage had at furthering his own arcane knowledge.

            "You are a mage," Ivanilson more stated a fact than asked a question, his voice coming out far more raspy than he remembered it.

            "As are you," the old man stated rather indifferently, watching the young mage carefully as if he were trying to determine something, or perhaps many things.

            "Where am I?" Ivanilson questioned, unable to find anything around him that might serve as a clue.

            "You are in a small isolated hut, near the base of the Nievara Blancan Mountains," the old man explained, gesturing to the room around them, "I'm afraid I do not entertain many guests."

            Ivanilson ignored the second half of the old renegade's explanation, he cared little for the comfort of his surroundings, it was certainly nicer than most of the places he found himself. "How did I get off the mountain? Why did the yeti not tear me apart?"

            "Well they most certainly would have," the elderly mage gazed out the window, "Had I not found you and brought you all back here."

            Ivanilson looked the elderly figure over curiously, he appeared exhausted and leaned heavily on the wall for support. "You know spells powerful enough to rescue an entire group of travelers from a group of yeti and bring them back to your hut from atop the snow-capped mountains?"

            The renegade shrugged, "Power is a rather relative concept Ivanilson. The first spell you ever learned was a simple light spell. Yet, is there anything more powerful than light? Light is the essence and nurturer of life. It's prolonged absence results in almost certain death. Could there be anything more powerful than light? Or for that matter darkness?"

            Ivanilson looked the elderly wizard over skeptically, he certainly was not of the Order. The Wizarding Order had developed a very clear system for classifying the power of each individual spell recorded in the Great Compendium, the spellbook maintained by the Grandmaster of the Academy of Brujopo. Though few had ever seen the Great Compendium, all were familiar with the power classifications of the spells found inside. I suppose living alone in such isolation would drive anyone mad, Ivanilson concluded before directing another question towards the renegade. "How did you know that we were up on the mountain and in need of your assistance?"

            "If I told you, you would not believe me..." the elderly mage appeared somehow older in that moment, as he sat staring out the window, focusing his eyes on something far off in the distance, "though that too shall change."