Chapter 19: Chapter 18: The White Owl’s Librarian

His green kindle unveiled the continuous turn of the stairs. The darkened void in front of his venture did not make him shudder. As well, each step of his leather shoes left no prints of disturbed dust. His hand on the curving wall secured his travel until it were like a fever dream in the dim stairs was he sure he arrived at its base.

Bapi came to a wide hallway, drew his kindle atop his head and made it glow brighter. His patience had perhaps lacked meditation when after moments of standing around the dark gallery, without any sign of his guide, he decided to find his own way to the library.

The mage went on. He was sure that the end of the narrow path would be the room he was looking for. But his confidence was stifled when the hall gave to other hallways, doors, and even another set of stairs. He gripped his rant. Patience. He needed his patience.

He dare not use an enormous amount of eth less his presence would not in doubt give off signals to those up above, especially those Blessed monarchs. So, in exchange for an immediate eth casting of room checks, he each opened a door and looked inside. No books–not a library. When one hallway ended to a wall, he went back to the last path and turned to the next.

It was hours of closing and opening doors, straying one hall from another when Bapi heard a crossbow being fired and a bolt shot from one dark hall and hitting his left clavicle, just near to his heart.

He grumbled, ugh, and he cursed, “fuck.” As pain devoured his shoulder, a second shot from the same hall came, the mage reacted a fast cry and a grassy shield coated his body . The bolt bounced and shattered into tiny pieces. He touched the bolt on himself and obliterated the bloody sharp object from existence. He was angry and the eth in him boiled.

He ran to where the supposed assassin aimed, his kindle brightening all to a blazing. Panting, Bapi caught up to a hooded figure with a mage light on their hip. The assassin had already loaded another shot, fired again and scattered to the same shield. Holding onto his consciousness, Bapi reared his anger and lost his concentration on both light and defenses. He began to cast a spell in Fanda tongue, one he knew would help. He was dashing and chanting towards the assassin when he felt a sharp line tugging on his foot that immediately choked his eth and he fell over. Bapi didn’t move.

 

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Clanadrin’s stoic laugh was muffled by her entire attire. When the mage did not move on his back, she stored her iron crossbow to its bag by the floor and jaunted over to him.

“Your reliance on the arcane has muddled you away, mage. Spellcasters, puh! I doubt even the Master, when he trusted your prowess.” She was in both glee and ire. Clanadrin crouched near him and shed her mage light over his dark lifeless head. Clanadrin had no bloodlust but she had killed people. Brigands, even Scholars were trained to kill for Enthah. But she was too anxious to take on a mage. When she pushed his head to the side, it revealed a fine enough face but marred by dark circles around the eyes. The fear, she thought, had brought her dark machinations. She had made an overkill.

Clambering up, Clanadrin’s mind went to make excuses for the Master as to why the foreign mage did not return. She was held in her thoughts however, when she felt a tight grip on her ankle and the wave of tiny piercings scaled into her body. Giving control of her limbs away and shuddering.

 

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When Bapi heard the sack of potatoes crashing on the floor, he immediately cared for his shoulder before the next faint was real. It was a short time before he healed himself adequately and peered over the excited killer. Her nerves were pricked by thousands of tiny shocks and the shocked face was the only sign she was in pain. He smiled.

“But we can still fake it just like you,” Bapi said as he poked her head, the tendrils of electricity coursing through his fingers. “And you must be my guide?”

The assassin shot him a glare...of what could have been a glare. “And why would you be my supposed guide? Perhaps if the school had allowed the use of poisoned bolts, I could have died. Or... if the Pillar-States were not infamously known for its enchanted weapons. One that can hit its target, despite the dark.” The woman’s mouth struggled to open over the seizures.

Bapi sighed. If it weren’t for his patience, he could have died by tripwire alone. He sized up his potential enemy, a woman. Why is it always women? He thought to himself. Decided, he offered, “Say Scholar.” Her eyes went wide open. “Yes, you are a scholar. Say Scholar, what if I stop this spell and we can finally head towards where we’re supposed to be?”

The Scholar tightened her jaw and growled.

She was playing hard to get. “Well, I know if I continue to search these halls, I will eventually find the library. I can kill you and know that the Master will trust who survives this. But... if you guide me to the library, I can search what I need, then, I will leave all of these,” He gestured to the galleries, “Forever. Deal?”

The Scholar mumbled through the pain but she finally nodded.

 

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“The scholars and mages call you Monterpelagious,” Clanadrin said as she picked herself up from the stone floor. Although the spell was promised to be gone, she still felt the tingles. “I believe the Master does not.” It was not a question, and she knew that the Doyen Lord Visor had made a bet with the mage’s trust. The foreigner nodded silently, agreeing or not, Clanadrin could not tell.

“One condition however, before I show the way,” the Scholar took a chance despite not knowing what else the Mage can do. “I need to know what connects you to my former Master.”

“Let me explain along the way,” the Mage bent his head towards the darkened hall. Clanadrin had formerly doubted a mage’s wisdom. But this man, this spy perhaps was too bright, a rare and dangerous kind.

“We traveled together,” the Mage started. As he did, Clanadrin led him through the same walks she had used for the longest part of her life. She had strapped the mage light, encased like a lamp, back to her hip and listened to the brief story. Through the talk, her mind lapsed over the times when people had passed the same gallery they were walking on. It had been a long memory but a good one.

“When Hailaga had banished their own Acolyte, we drove to many places in Entherah. We shared our knowledge on spells, enchantments, alchemy and even copied our own casting. It was however brief, we had to separate ourselves so that we could help more people.” His shadowed eyes glanced towards her, Clanadrin knew what he had meant. “Last thing I knew, we weren’t going to see each other again.”

He mourned for him, that Clanadrin could relate. In fact, all of Cheron had mourned for his loss. Even the king. “He had fallen too ill,” she began. “Master Dabgha was one of many who had accepted ethless apprentices. I had slowly lost his time as he kept to his room. We buried him in Snan, our last day of winter, hoping it was a sign to wait for new life.”

They had entered a higher arch hall. One its design matched the sharp edges that echoed up above in the school. But it's only difference was that it was still stone, not charon. They had reared up to the large double doors. Chiseled within one of the door’s surfaces were the Alohima letters of protection. Its sister egress, the same enchantment but in Thravbon.

“What happened to the Faharan?” the mage inquired, startling Clanadrin from her depressed thoughts. “And this door had lost its power.”

“You mean the nehawki?” Clanadrin clarified, it was not the only Faharan that was lost. “The transportation broke all the arcane equipment.”

“Transportation?” The mage was caught off guard.

The conversation was going elsewhere if she answered. So, when she pushed one of the hefty stone doors, it took her effort but she tried returning to the first question. “We… uugh… don’t know. It went- woah!” Again, she fell to the floor.

The mage had chosen to push the door with eth-koram, moving the door with ease. “You could have warned me,” Clanadrin chided. The same grassy eth like his kindle left the door and had returned to its master. The mage shrugged and grinned.

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Gathering herself up for the second time, Clanadrin entered the library with the last of her dignity. “Tell me what you need.”

So long has the White Owl’s library been bereft of light from its windows. Windows that would not open to stone and earth. She had raised her mage light and led themselves to the large reference book. The book was settled between the short stairs leading to what was beyond the compiles of bookshelves, its thick leather bound was still intact and without dust.

“Any research pertaining to the revival of Faharans.” Clanadrin was not given a breather to digest the request when all the sconces of the library flared up. The first time in years Clanadrin could see the entire library in a fire light.

 

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The Scholar was glaring at him again. This time, more feline. “Why did you do that?”

“Um, light?” He had enough of those mage lights. Its bluish tint was making him sleepy. More importantly, he could finally see how organized his friend really was. The library was excessive. Bigger of what he had hoped for from a personal office.

He knew the ceiling was farther from what that mage light could reveal. The library had an open ceiling, leading up to three more floors of shelves. The divided stairs gave paths for the study tables. He could not hold his inner desires had his friend still adorned the habit of collecting almost any arcane book possible. He had almost lost himself to the imagination when the scholar cut in, “he did research on that subject. If you truly are his friend, you’ll know it was his life’s work.”

She had closed the reference book and commanded, “Come, he made a special place for it.”

Then she brought him beyond the study tables, the other circulating stairs, empty glass cases, and even lounges until to the far end of that athenaeum. They had now stood before a large nest, with the statue of a nehawki crouching within. “You may start reading,” the Scholar gestured towards the shelves surrounding the project in question. “Know that even a Master could not find all the answers.”

Watched, Bapi sat on one of the chairs designed for the caved tables. It surrounded the statue of the legendary bird, opposite to him was the Scholar. They were at this for hours now. Her glaring at him not long before getting back at whatever book she deemed worthy to read. For himself, he had finished scanning over the near destruction lore of other Faharans, many out of surviving and not reviving. He had found and read the experimental attempts his friend had started, many of the failed attempts on reviving the chrovo. Leftover skin to alter in alchemy. The Gasolin guard’s secret venom. Breeding the cousin of the species. And even praying to the goddess and making sacrifices. But there was no necromancy involved, his friend would never dare.

Further as time went by, the stress of the circumstance had finally gnawed at his guide. She asked one of the many questions for his endeavors. “Why?” She had said abruptly, taking his attention from the Faharan, kakim that survived one of the storm rages of its Acolyte. “Why even try to learn, this reviving is unheard of.”

Tired, Bapi wanted to share what he can, maybe it was a little way to make a memory of their futility. He yawned before he answered, “because the Tarmorein fanatics want to reinvent the Faharian War. Sure, you know this information by now since it had been what the Pillar-States fought for for years. But this time, not only does it affect the Fae Folk, but the Elementals and humans as well.”

She had visibly scoffed the idea. It was always hard for a mage to teach a scholar, especially when it comes to the moving of the world. Bapi did not like her reaction so he did not bother to add in. She surprised him however when she asked, “then what truly ended the first war? Yes, I heard many tales of bravery but what makes you think we can’t use what my Master had? Was not that enough?”

For a teacher with her own students, she is immature like he was once. This time however, there was someone that would stop her. He started with what had begun the war in the first place. “Not many have access to this knowledge other than those in rank with the Doyen Lord Visor. So, I will tell you this Scholar, as a former apprentice, you are credited. We all know that the Faharian War had started in the boundaries of Cludhern province but not in the place of origin. You see, Krugan, its place of origin had already fallen, even to this day.”

“I know this, mage, it is general knowledge.”

Ignoring her disdain, he retorted, “but had they told the people what created the Tarmorein?”

Her silent scowl answered, no.

“If I must, Krugan’s head mage had used the soul of that region’s familiar, the Faharan drocon, to access the divine power of the goddess and created the abandoned bodies of rotting fae.” Bapi’s sleepless head looped to whatever the scholar knew and what she did not. She must have known how his friend saved Entherah. She was after all the librarian.

“But if such a formula was disrupted by my Master’s, why not now?”

Bapi gave her the time to think. Then she bolted upright from her seat.

“It was like a counter… a counterspell! You mages use to override another’s. Master Dabgha’s not only countered through the divine force of his nehawki, he was using… he was using himself.” She started to deflate. “No wonder he was sickly, he was using himself to deflect the war,” she said, a whisper to their large room.

The thought of such sacrifice was out from Bapi’s reach. No one could, except for those like them.

“Then why?” Again, the Scholar asked him. “Why on Faharans? Such work is especially loathed in Chustern. The Chrav Alliance even gathered themselves to bully a child of eight, though it was obvious that the prince was not inheriting anything from his father.”

Bapi could only laugh. Such fools are for being the center region. Bitten by his horrible reaction, the Scholar evidently asked what made him amused. There was a long pause before Bapi had finally flattened his face and held his fervor. “Then of what from the princess?”

There was coldness in her voice. A bitter sharpened bolt ready to fire. The ire seized Bapi's attention. Weird. The scholar then accused, “if you plan to use the princess as a test subject, I wished I had used poisoned bolts indeed.”

“And that Mistress, would be beneath me.” He stood and went to the striking owl, considering its feathers. “How is it though, that the color of my eth matched her eyes,” Bapi proposed as his hand brushed through the stone fuzz. The bird was also this large, he thought to himself. A perfect replica. He was rubbing over one of its standing feathers when he noticed the well carved barbs.

 

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Clanadrin could hardly control her growing anxiety from what the mage had mentioned when the said individual cried out.

“Oh Monowa! Poor brave lady. How could they do this to you!” Clanadrin watch as the spellcaster burrowed his head over the bird's chest, saying something she was not familiar and not long, unfrozen its weak state.

Clanadrin was then the one turned to stone. She could see the giant owl resting its head on the mage’s neck. A red slash had finally bled over its wing. The one named Monowa started to close her eyes as the mage crooned an accented Alohima, “Rest dear. Your Master waits for you beyond your mountain home sky.”

Without blinking, Clanadrin watched as the bird started to disintegrate itself, from dust, then to nothing. After a short breathe, Clanadrin broke from her frigidity and was about to murder the mage a second time when he started foraging the nest. She immediately left her table to see what he was again up to.

She almost fainted right on the spot when she saw the pale white egg that had remained from its tale.

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