Blood of the Abyss

blood of the abyss Part 4

Chapter 4

The Hunt for Answers

Caspian

'Promise me sometimes you will think of me...' I awoke to what felt like someone whispering in my ear. Glancing wildly left to right and seeing no one, I thought that once again I was losing my mind. It had been three years since I had felt this way. Shaking the thoughts from my head, I stood up and dressed in my standard linen shirt and leather trousers. I still found the puffy outfits that my father wished me to wear still obnoxious, just as he found my casual wear obnoxious. Callan waited for me outside my room to escort me to breakfast with my father.

"Good morning, father." I say, as I have said for three years. It had become so routine that I practically had it rehearsed down to minute detail. Father seemed slightly distracted today. When he didn't respond, I looked up to see an angry scowl on his face. "Father?"

"Why are you here, boy?" His voice was angry. I had noticed the shift in his behavior more recently than I had three years ago. I tried to avoid him when he was in these moods. They seemed to pass after a while. It had been three days, and his attitude had remained the same, if not a little more angry.

"Father? Are you feeling alright?"

"Get out of here now!" He snarled, "I have work to do."

Callan looked at me and shook his head swiftly and escorted me from the palace.

"I'm sorry, m'lord. It's another bad day for him. They seem to be more frequent."

"There has to be some information somewhere about this. He isn't the only one acting differently. Other townsfolk have become increasingly irritable. Mostly only the humans. The Dyrads, dwarves, and city elves seem to be unphased for the moment. We must find something."

"We will, my lord. I swear." Callan promised me. He was a good friend, the one constant in my life.

"Maybe there will be some answers in the library." I pointed across the square. "Come, Callan." We started toward the library. I suddenly heard a gasp to my left and turned to see a girl in a hooded cloak staring widely at me.

"Caspian?" She sounded astonished. I was even more so, as I had never seen this girl in my life.

"I am, and you are?" I asked, but she was already turning away from me and running into the woods. What on Evrand had just happened? How did that girl know who I was? Taken aback by this random happenstance, I shook my head and continued toward the library.

Upon entering, I saw the familiar green-skinned, milky-blue eyed Dryad who had her nose buried in a book. I approached the desk and tapped on it.

"What can I do for you?" The Dryad asked, annoyed.

"I'm looking for a book. I need something that explains where madness comes from." I tried peering at the shelves behind her, but had no idea what I would be looking for.

"Causing madness or the birth of it?" She asked nonchalantly.

"Both?" I looked at Callan who nodded. "Both." I repeated more affirmatively. She snapped a protruding twig from her arm and placed it inside the book she had been reading. Then, she turned away from the desk and started combing the shelves for the books. She slammed a stack of thirteen books onto the desk.

"Bring them back when you are done." She said without looking at us and returned to reading her book.

"Looks like we've got our work cut out for us, Callan." I grinned, gathered the stack and started toward a table in the corner of the room.

"That we do, my lord. Where shall we begin?"

***

Book after book and nothing. Most of the authors seemed mad themselves, claiming science was the answer to madness, or the cure, though I couldn't follow which it was. I reached for the thirteenth book titled 'The Concordance of Magyks.' I flipped through the first through pages and thought we had run into another blockade. Then I saw the discussion of madness.

"Callan, I believe I found something."

"What is it?"

"This book discusses an abyss that seemingly appeared overnight. There seemed to be a great power coming from it. According to the people who researched the place, lingering for long periods of time resulted in increasing madness, rage, and self-destructive behaviors. No one really knows what is going on there. In a different section, it discusses a library that could contain some more information about whatever this abyss is. I think this book is the one we need to keep." I picked the useless books up and returned to the desk.

"You find what you were looking for?" The Dryad asked. I nodded and handed her the book that we needed to buy.

"Callan, pay the woman." I said as I grabbed the book and Callan handed her a pouch of Yven. She nodded satisfied by the payment and we exited the bookshop. As soon as we had left the shop, my eyes were drawn to a woman in a hooded cloak. Auburn hair peeked out from the hood and I froze in my tracks.