Anyway, what I'm really talking about is trying to do spells, i.e. I STILL CAN'T DO THEM! Well, OK, that's maybe a bit of an exaggeration. After yesterday's triumphant performance, I bounced out of bed ready for a fresh effort. Yes, the life of arch-mage was beckoning, but it turned out to be harder to get to than I thought.
Curses! It was a lot more difficult than it had seemed at first - I suppose it must have been beginner's luck, or something. After an hour of straining (I really must see a doctor, it really could be a hernia coming on) I managed to get a small flicker of light, which at least was something, I suppose. Right then I would have been glad to see my diminutive green friend make an appearance as I sat grumpily down on the bed to get my breath back, but no such luck - I have a feeling he'll only show up at random or inopportune times instead of when needed, kind of like the police.
Pretty soon I realised it was time to head back to the library - I needed some kind of instruction. As I shoved open the rather grubby door to the flat, I noticed the old beggar from yesterday was still slumped against the wall, staring at me impassively. I couldn't help feeling a bit embarrassed - I'd been just a little bit over excited when I saw him last night, so I gave him a few bits of loose change that were rattling around in my pocket to make up for it. He took them without a word, transferring his gaze to the wall opposite. Not even a flicker of gratitude! He almost looked disdainful, honestly. I suppose I could have made some comment or other, but there really wasn't any point - hanging around on the street all the time probably wouldn't fill me with joie de vivre either.
After returning the previous library book, I returned to the magical books section and began scanning the titles. I thought of asking for anything featuring lightning bolts or any kind of cool and destructive beam, but the librarian looked like she was the type locked into a permanent state of disapproval, and I thought better of it. As I looked through the various tomes, I wondered if I'd still be able to wear black robes like before, after all, robes don't come cheap and I kind of liked the ones I'd got, despite the holes and stubborn curry stains.
Annoyingly, the number of books didn't seem as great as that for the dark magic section. That seemed to prove what I'd suspected - dark magic was way cooler. Also, the titles seemed very discouraging. Most of them seemed to be about healing, or purifying things, how lame is that? I've got nothing against healing people, of course, but you've got to admit, making large explosions has got to be more fun. Also, how many things in do you encounter on an everyday basis that actually need purifying, whatever that means? Can you return gone off yoghurt to its pristine state? How about purifying a newspaper of all it's rubbish journalism? Purification of Nigel the Gnome's dirty mind? (admittedly, that would probably be impossible). I don't know, it just doesn't sound that handy in the modern day and age, where as offering people a light at parties in the form of a great big green and purple flame that comes out of your palm in the shape of a skull has got to be a whole lot more impressive.
In the end, I managed to find a book entitled "The Dark Forces: A Practical Defence" by someone calling himself Arnold Gribbington. Arnold Gribbington? What sort of name was that for a self-respecting wizard? Where was the impressive and over complicated title followed by abnormally spelt moniker, usually followed by an arcane sounding place name? It looked a bit old and moth eaten, and full of quirky, old fashioned language and the occasional "colour plate" proudly trumpeted on the preceding page. Leafing through it, it seemed to have some fairly promising looking spells in it: making magical barriers, repelling physical attacks, neutralising enemies, the sort of thing that sounded entertaining enough to try out. It also appeared to have histories about the famous dark wizards of the past which looked pretty interesting. They'd probably make me feel a bit jealous, even though you know the wizards in question would unquestionably meet a disappointingly sticky end, right before their evil schemes came to fruition. I really must get myself some evil schemes one of these days...
Back at home, I was leafing through the book, hoping it would begin to make sense at some point in the near future. Like many an older book, it seemed to be full of pompous prefaces, complicated drills set out in tables and assumptions of previous knowledge in seemingly random areas, i.e. it took you ages to work out what the hell you were supposed to be doing with it. Plus, there was the problem of testing stuff out - it wasn't as if I had anyone to try stuff out on, though who would accept that duty was beyond me. The only spell I'd tried out so far had been the one for deflecting attacks. At least something actually happened, which was good in a way, though I'd have preferred the curtains not to have detached themselves, then shot wildly around the room and onto my face like some kind of juvenile delinquent ghosts. Yes, I did fall most impressively flat on my face, which I'm sure would have been very amusing had there been anyone there to see it. On second thoughts, maybe learning a bit of healing would be a good plan after all....
After a few hours, I got fed up with reading the book, so I decided to go and walk about randomly outside for a bit, always a good thing to do before the shift at that blasted sandwich factory started. The weather that day wasn't really that bad, just a bit overcast and gloomy, a sort of low grade unpleasantness similar to that beggar from outside the flat, who incidentally had disappeared. At least that was one good thing. A combination of gloomy weather and walking around with no particular purpose or place to go gives you a strange sort of feeling sometimes, as if you're displaced, disjointed, a sort of interloper. Everyone around you seems alien and other-worldly; they're all hurrying, intent on their own purposes, they flitter about with the restless movement of an ant hill and fade away into a sort of fog, the only sense of reality being a kind of acute introspection. I snapped out of it suddenly, though, when a familiar face hovered into view. Unfortunately, it was too late to pretend I didn't see her, which was a shame, considering the embarrassing episode the last time we met.
"Oh, err, hello there," said Maevrin.
"Umm, yes, err, hello," I replied.
Needless to say, both of us were ready to enter the Awkwardness Olympics.
"Err, how's it going?" I said, hopelessly.
"Ah... not too bad. How about you? How's the sandwich factory?"
I grimaced involuntarily at the mention of the place.
"Oh, not too bad. By the way, don't I still owe you some money?"
"Oh, err, don't worry about that," said Maevrin, shuffling, "you did loose your home, after all. A bit of loose change doesn't really matter."
"Don't worry about that," I said, as cheerfully as I could, "I've got a new place."
Maevrin appeared suddenly to remember something.
"Hey," she said, almost excited, as far as I could tell from behind her glasses, "That reminds me. That tower you used to live in, I bet you thought that wizard was going to knock it down, right?"
"Yes, he's done that already?"
"Well, I got kind of curious, I was in the general area last week, I couldn't resist taking a look."
What on earth could she possibly be doing in the general area of the howling waste? It's not exactly known for its picturesque scenery. Still, never mind.
"So, it's a big smoking crater, then?"
"No," she replied eagerly, "It's still standing!"
For a moment, I was so surprised I couldn't think of anything to say.
"That wizard's been pulverising it, by the looks of things. The whole area's been totally torn to bits, but there's not a scratch on the tower. Can you believe it?"
This was too weird for words. What the hell was going on?
"I can't understand it," I said in disbelief. I thought for a moment. One thing was certain. I just had to go over there and see for myself, though of course with the maximum possible level of sneaking.
"I'm going to go over there," I announced, "I've got to have a look. You never know, I might even somehow manage to get in there, stranger things have happened. Plus I left all my stuff there."
Maevrin looked at me, her expression unreadable behind those impenetrable glasses.
"I'll come along," she said, unexpectedly, "I can help you carry your stuff if you get back in. Don't worry, I'll not charge you."
"Why on earth do you want to come?" I said incredulously, "Not that I'm complaining, any help would be really handy, actually."
"Well," she said, shuffling about again, "You know, even stamps can get a bit boring, I need a bit of excitement now and then. You know what I mean."
Well, personally, it wasn't my idea of excitement, more like mortal terror, if that Eldrigar spotted us.
"I suppose we'd better go under cover of darkness. How about tomorrow night? I'm doing days at the factory from tomorrow. Meet in the town square at 10pm?"
Maevrin agreed, then I realised I had to hurry back to start the shift on time, so I said my goodbyes and hurried off. Isn't life a rich tapestry, eh? Just when you think things are looking a bit down, something like this happens....
***
Oh yes, just two more things to let you know, before I sign off for this exciting instalment!
Later that evening, in the factory tea room, I was grimacing my way through part one of the library book yet again, hoping the repetition would somehow make it make some kind of sense. Gorgrod the horrible troll was sitting there as usual, reading the newspaper with his finger slowly tracing the text, occasionally reading bits out which were largely ignored. Nigel the Gnome, well, you know what he was up to.
The subject of my former position as dark wizard extraordinaire came up (well, that's the impression I was trying to give, it passes the time) and I couldn't resist bringing up the subject of tomorrow night's nocturnal escapade. To my surprise, Nigel the Gnome wanted to come along to help me carry stuff, provided he got to keep anything from the tower I didn't want. That's assuming we could actually get in, which remains a bit doubtful. Still, I supposed the more the merrier, it somehow made it seem less likely that I'd need a change of underpants during the coming mission.
I decided the technical parts of the book were giving me a headache, so I switched over to the historical wizard section. I noticed, with interest, that the first wizard featured was the legendary Venedir Telvarin himself, who of course was the one who'd given Sir Henry his abnormal appearance all those years ago. Come to think of it, I was a bit hazy about his life story, even though he was incredibly famous. Bit of an exception to the whole accepted pattern of magic in general. Nobody in history had ever had the power to do anything other than becoming a kind of localised menace, at which point they would generally get defeated by some kind of heroic action of some sort. Actually, looking at it, it was almost depressingly predictable, you kind of wondered why people ever bothered with any serious effort at taking over the world. Anyway, that's the way the world that we (or rather I) live in is set up. The exception was Telvarin.
I read through the short section. How Telvarin's childhood and place of birth was a complete unknown, yet later he'd become a dark wizard of note in the region of Calgaran, eventually rising to such incredible power that he was able to utterly destroy the combined forces of several nations sent against him. After that, it was acknowledged he ran everything, there was no resisting his will, despite a few hopelessly failed assassination attempts. He became entirely reclusive in his later years, and nobody was known to have seen his face in the last twenty years he was active. Though it was true that Telvarin only every really acted in self defence, the period he cast his god-like power over the world was regarded as a dark and fearful time. Most mysteriously of all, one day he had simply disappeared, and was never seen again.
It was then, unexpectedly, that I ran into a passage that made my blood run cold.
Come to think of it, had I ever actually heard of anyone able to do what was mentioned in the passage? Yes, I had. Only one person. The passage read:
"Venedir Telvarin was known and feared from very early in his career for the three chief powers he possessed at that point. First was his ability to unleash incredible destruction by way of a beam of pure energy, said to be bright purple in colour and dazzling to the eye.
Second was his ability to fly by way of a cloud that surrounded his legs, also of a purplish colour.
Third was his complete mastery of self-transfiguration, commonly known as shape-shifting."
Suddenly, the darkness outside seemed incomparably darker than it had been, like a black abyss, ready to swallow me without a trace. I had the awful feeling I'd uncovered something serious, especially as I'd idiotically agreed to go back to Zarfang the very next night.
Just who exactly was the man who had kicked me out of my home?
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