Sunlight poured in from above, comfortably without heat, glimmering gold and green in separate shafts in-between the trees, and these all splendid in stature and with graceful limbs. The air bore a fresh, mingled scent of crushed autumn leaves that was completely clear of all vapors, slightly touched by a fragrance that inspired vigor and seemed to restore and rejuvenate; so it was gladly felt by Dillan’s aching muscles and his sore, throbbing gash that had yet to heal fully. A patter and pleasant gurgle, soft and calming, he strained to hear, for he guessed at once it was the sound of water flowing, a stream he thought it the more he listened; but there was also another thing, rushing like a steady wind before a mounting rainstorm; there was apparently a waterfall nearby as well, a good companion in its reverberating rush to the slower, more thoughtful lapping of the other waters, stream or river. Less diminished was his sight now, and as he blinked and peered into the dissipating blur he quickly came to the realization that most everything about him was a rich brown wood, deeply carven and in some places intricately engraved with runes that he could not distinguish; most of the woodwork was in pillars, smooth columns that came from the floor and reached all the way up until instead of tapering off, they were seamlessly interwoven into the darker wood that made up a curved ceiling. Through this many wide slits allowed the outside world to peek in, and each had a semitransparent veil that for the moment hung aside and swayed in the breeze, but of what material they were of he could not guess; for they fluttered in the gentle air, emitting a flower-like aroma.
But there was also a deep undercurrent of magic, partly foreboding as the dark wreathing of sorcery tended to always be, and still partly soothing as the spells of healing Dillan was training in. Malice and goodness seemed to be at war, though now that he had come it was like each had been dulled and now lurked in suppressed pivot. Evidently the light was prevailing for the moment.
Caressing the fair sheets that he lay under with his good hand, trying to recall the events that had occurred before, Dillan concluded that it was now a day or to later. How he arrived here at this haven, he could not guess. What had transpired and in what order he could not remember with accuracy. It all was in his mind a haze of swirling mists, broken in places by images of clashing swords glittering in their rage, shields being cloven to splinters, and the cries and shouts of fighting men. Squinting into the fog of his thought a gruesome thing presented itself, a grief-stricken soldier mourning over the fallen body of a comrade, pierced with many arrows, barely alive. Sobbing and speaking words of hope, the boy, who Dillan recognized to be Klar, seemed to grow grim, and in his pale eyes a smoldering fire burst into flame, and with a wailing screech he drew out his keen blade and advanced in a wrath, hewing all who had the courage to stand before him. The tormented face of the young man faded rapidly, and before he could retrieve it, it vanished altogether like a puff of smoke in the evening.
Dillan shuddered and was relieved once the memory of sorrow had passed, departing into a shadowed labyrinth of his mind where it would be reluctant to reveal itself again. So there had been a great scuffle with arrows flying and swords ringing, but the aftermath of it he did not know, and this was a dull pain to him now. Of his friends who had fought their fates he did not know either, and partially did not want to know. Already devastating had been the loss of Oren in the crossing of the mountains. No more did he desire to know about.
Gazing around the room he decided that no one was going to came to wake him, and yawning he stretched his feet until he slumped down and was half off the bed. All his stiffness evaporated. He rubbed his face, thinking about food. With a flash of excitement the weary archer yelped and was out of the bed in an instant, jolted to full awareness as adrenaline coursed and pulsed through his veins, un-summoned and perhaps unwanted, when he thought about it later. Dillan swept his hand across his features once more, feeling for where the blow that had sent him senseless had left its bruise; once more he felt nothing at all. Any reminder that he had been smote to the ground was gone as though dust in a gale. The rippling sensation in his skull, the blunt thud and sickly of the strike. These in his mind were all that remained. Cured with an unseen enchantment no physical scar or mar was left to be seen.
This lightened Dillan’s mood considerably, and he hummed an elvish tune from one of Aväll’s taverns as he strode about in a merry way, surveying his room, not bothering to wonder where it was that he was exactly. His surroundings were so serene and brimming with beauty that he was burdened by not a single worry, all his troubles washed away. Birds chirped and whistled their songs somewhere undetectable above, actually perched upon the boughs of the trees that towered through and above the roof. The architecture of everything in view was so amazing, Dillan heeded not the vast complexities of his lodgings, mesmerized just by the arcane aura that even the polished stones adjacent to the trees emanated. Surreal in their ancient presence the trees were firmly planted in separated plots of earth, their trunks within the room and most of their leafy extensions out in the open air, expanding through gaping circles in the ceiling needing no shielding for weather could penetrate the intense latticework of tree; only the light of day.
Walking this way and that without clear purpose Dillan managed to find a bowl of clear lapping water that smelled strange, indescribable, not foul but fresher than all water he had known before. A ing sort of essence was in it. What was more was that trickling in to feed the bowl was an inlet directly in the wall, its bed so precisely hewn that it seemed an axe had slashed an extremely thin line down in a swerving path. This particularly fascinated him, as it seemed to ascend rather than descend straight up into the ceiling. He guessed that its original source fed the other running waters he had gleaned with his sensitive ears. Acute after their own fashion, it had not been overly arduous to attune and enhance his hearing, smell, and sight amid ranger training.
After washing and selecting an elaborate tunic of a delicate silver hue, a color that shone with a reflective illumination in the sun, he removed from a latch on the wall a lantern that kindled itself on touch. He adjusted the shutters so that it gave only a thin ray, more golden than red, and then set off in search of breakfast and his hosts. Very grateful was he that he had not perished earlier. The possibility that the folk who had set him here were his saviors made him nervous. Their estate was beyond words, and all manners of plant life thrived while at the same time coexisting within the wooden structure. Dryleaves rustling about in healthy autumn conversion swept about his feet, despite none of the trees here were in falling season. Anfractuosities took turns high in the walls, deep recesses lined with life. The artifices of his care-givers were beyond bountiful. It quite literally took his breath away.
Many corridors he passed, all with lush foliage ingrown into them, many pure green ferns among the collection, until finally he arrived at a massive double-door, masterfully set with an assortment of gems near its hinges. Bolted it was not, because no mechanism of locking existed. Lithe green vines coiled up its azure-shaded wood, covering most of it. Two shining rings were set upon it, each studded with a marvelous red jewel; they had faint inner glows that appeared friendly, and with a tug Dillan heaved open the door.
Answering the very movement there came a pulsing series of jolts that rippled throughout the floor, and a tingling sensation enveloped his entire body as he slowly lifted up off the ground, suspended as it were. Feebly writhing in mid-air had no plausible effect, so Dillan was quick to give it up. He actually cut a fairly humorous picture floating there, hovering weightlessly and shifting between positions with all the bursting speed of a snail. Gravity seemed to have forgotten its duties. Possible was the fact that magic was feverishly at work, though if it was, it was magnified to such an extent that the young archer couldn’t fathom the depth one would need to delve to be ability to harness such power. Confounding the eyes of sentries and blending in with nature he could manage, but levitating a person and rendering them utterly helpless? That would take some rigorous practice. Dillan sought back to the day he had failed to influence the trajectory of a lightly tossed apple, supposedly by twisting the weavings of energy close to fruit with sufficient force. The fruit had dropped like a stone it had, leaving him to feelings of embarrassment and frustration.
“To grip the torrents of overflowing magic around you, you must first learn to gently prod the weavings of reality. Then you can advance further to being able to bend the impossible to your will. Such is the nature of the greatest wizards.” Oren had spoken those words gravely compared to more spirited mood. Recognizing as much, Dillan had since then strived to conquer all his lessons related to that. Now it seemed as though Oren, from some heavenly abode, was mocking him.
Making matters more annoying, the doors had shut, impervious to the nonsense. Fearing that rage would overcome his sense of thought, Dillan breathed deeply, relaxingly, before finally asserting himself to the situation. Very meekly he brushed his magical self, he stretched out a hand, and he concentrated. He ignored deflections off of the walls, and closed his eyes, engulfing his being intently under the flow. Suddenly a new sensation erased the old, a familiar sensation of pine needles poking his skin, and something began to form in the air. A circular distortion arose, seething as if the very fabric of the world was undoing itself, and it almost pounded with a steadily rising sound, rapidly enlarging in potency. The immense will required to sustain the magic was made possible only because Dillan had endured the intense bouts of stamina and agility that had come coupled with being an apprentice ranger, albeit for the short period of time.
With enough exertion, he hoped that he might disable or disrupt the field of other magic controlling the levitation, but he soon found that to nullify such a force demanded remarkable determination. The distortion suddenly flickered, and all at once random flushes of variegated color dashed through it, responding to Dillan’s press of concentration, but then it throbbed once, powerfully, and blinked out; and summoned from the remains of the distortion burst a blistering shockwave of magic, a cascade of invisible energy. Luckily the odd levitation faded, melting away into the floor paneling. Releasing its clench, the dispersing power vanished as would a mist swept by a gust, and consequently Dillan was dumped flat to the ground.
But as quickly as it had ceased, the levitation resumed itself, and Dillan was hauled upwards till he struggled against the nothingness again. His first inclination had been to respect with tender appreciation whatever this place was, whoever owned it, and everything within it. Except now he was starting to doubt whether or not he would be able to extricate himself without scorching a hole in the wall or something. From this pathetic position Dillan turned his attention to the closed door. Though the intricacies of magic continued to elude him, the archer had a basic understanding of magical traps and snares, activated when a trigger laced with certain spells was tripped. He glared at the door through keen eyes, sharpening his sense farther with an uttered word, and carefully gazed all around and at anything near. Tugging on the agglomerate of fan-leafed plants to his left had not effect, and they were the only section of plants in alignment with the spot upon which he had stepped.
It might be the door handles, he thought. But then again, it also might be a leaf on a plant I passed, or a floorboard (though he couldn’t really discern where one floorboard ended and another began) that I trod on. Aloud he muttered half- cried,
“And it might very well just be a glitter of light I walked under!”
“It might very well be indeed,” answered a voice, fair yet wise far beyond Dillan’s comprehension. To spin himself around Dillan had to twist hard, and within a swathe of sparkling gold behind him stood tall an erect figure, shapeless until the abrupt harshness of the outside glare died, the sun barred by clouds. Mysterious wisps of evanescing froth broiled about it, as if a cauldron of magic had been emptied and embodied by a corporeal shell. The fume hissed like wind through a forest, but cleared obediently when the enshrouded creature gestured ever so subtly.
That was when Dillan vaguely recognized where he was; for before him, yet he had no inkling of it at first, was an elf. He knew that it was an elf only because he caught the stately pointed ears that adorned him. Clad in a robe of simple gray that draped down elegantly, the elf immediately struck Dillan as incredible in years. He was lean and strong, with dark hair that streamed down until it rested at just below the chest, and he donned a fine belt clasped with a silver circlet, and every time he moved the clasp would flash bright. But his eyes were pools of memory, wells of knowledge and integrity that intimidated and yet inspired awe with their benevolence. Only an evil creature, or a creature bringing evil with it should quail before those eyes. With another flick of the wrist he let Dillan fall permanently. The elf strode forward till he stooped above the embarrassed and equally amazed archer, who sat in a disoriented heap.
Smiling, he said, “Welcome, Dillan, friend of Oren, to Eldon, queen tree of the Morian forest and flowering center to the elves of Hith’ Morian. I am Adan. Your timing is late, but under the circumstances you shall be excused.”
A thousand different questions welled up inside Dillan, and it was all he could do to resist blurting them out. Presently he was on the verge of saying something when two other elves thrust into the corridor from the double-door, each lumbering along and hefting a colossal battering ram-looking hunk of wood, conversing at a great speed with one another. They, after observing for a moment, set aside the monstrous stalk and introduced themselves.
First to come forward was a female, her crisp-fitting raiment adjusted to fit her attitude, fiery and reckless, their curves exaggerated and their make rous. As with most elves, her hair was long and dimly shone. Dillan would come to know her well, and the very first thing he noticed of her came to be of importance later on; the life in her eyes was alight as if shining from without a thousand facets, but subdued like the splendor of an eerie gloom.
“Finally! Well met, Dillan, friend of Oren, at last. So great is your fame that I have been overly eager to meet you, and have been fidgeting while you healed. I thought it a marvel when I did not burst! But as usual I am getting ahead of myself. How is your room? Do you find it acceptable, because it was I that arranged your lodgings.”
Overcome by the flurry of compliments and eager to please, (and also by her melodic voice) Dillan hesitated as he processed the words. Then he said, still searching his mind,
“Yes, my room is so magnificent I thought I had strayed into a dream! Before I ask anything else, I must know how one can bend nature into such crafts of beauty! When I awoke I was struck dumb by my surroundings. Does the flora naturally grow, or what do you do to them?”
“I am partly responsible for that,” answered the elf who had supposedly levitated Dillan. “The abstract aspects of magic that I work with allow for rather surprising results when affecting plants. Alchemy, some might call it, but the term is far too broad for my liking. During the time you shall spend here I think you will learn much, and about time I must add. Have of us quite nearly had a heart to seek you out after our wanderers and messengers reported you engaging lizards without knowledge of magic…”
While he continued to talk, speaking lengthily of Dillan’s incapability with magic, words that Dillan didn’t much listen to, the other elf out of the three took the opportunity to exit the hallway. “…and that burst of mist and light when I found you, that was conceived using a technique you should enjoy. But then again, magic is rarely allocable. As an example, no other elf in presence, therefore not counting those passed beyond and gifted with freedom from all possible chains, can do this.” On that abrupt note he outstretched his hand gently grasping nothing. Then flame, a fiery boulder reeling within itself grew inside of this grasp until spouts of it leaped out from between his fingers.
Coalescing the flame, he issued a jet of fire from his other outstretched hand, and almost instantly the shot ignited into a dense ball of roaring flame that spouted random gouts in every conceivable direction, forming a shield wall of fire, and the great conflagration did not cease its fountaining and ling until the elf lowered his hand, which curled into a fist. Next he plunged his hand out again palm-forward, and with a tensing clench of his eyes ribboning, arcing jets of water shrieked into existence, tearing and shredding at the air as more were summoned forth from his palm like antifire from a dragon’s maw. The intertwining blasts raced and gushed, engulfing wider and wider expanses of area, yet only area of air; no thing of the corridor was touched.
“No other elf has exhibited a flare for bending those two elements except for me. And though all elves can work magic, not all can work it mightily. But it can still be potent, for our wanderers, aloof and far-flung throughout the world twist good workings from subtle ones. Many times the most subtle can become the key to the most of impact.”
Dillan digested this, marking out of the corner of his eye that the third elf was back standing rigid behind the stalk of wood, that the double-door was swinging shut, and wondering how he had slipped back in so stealthily. For a moment there was an odd silence, disturbed only by the patter of birds flitting on extending branches outside the carven window. At last the third elf made a notion to greet him, but at that exact instant a fourth elf, drabbed in solemn thick drapery, wearing a crested mantlet and girt with a elegant dagger unsheathed at his side, approached fluidly at a swift pace for a jog, compared at any rate to a man. Rather than address Dillan politely as had the others, he bore (later Dillan found out) a message for the stiff elf still teetering between nervousness (which was becoming increasingly obvious). He leant and whispered something quick in the grace tongue of the elves, then took back the way he had come.
Like an unnerved sparrow alerted to the presence of a bird of prey, and who’s just recaptured enough dignity to try a smooth exit, the third followed.
Dillan was left then just with the magically empowered elf, Adan, and the bright sunshine elf maiden whose name he didn’t know and who really didn’t seem at all like one to sit back from a fight…and the large log whose purpose was unclear at best. Really all the sudden happenings had left the young archer in a state of utter bewilderment, and the cold shock of all the proceedings had yet to thaw.
An echoing bell sounded TONG! in the distance, and instead of thawing this cold shock shattered into fragmented shards. He was on the verge of finally erupting into all his unanswered questions, only one of which he had asked, except that Adan interrupted him in mid-beginning of his first word. “Whe—”
“The bell of the Council chimes, and it is summoned! Alas. I was hoping they should at least give you time to unravel. My pleas go unheard. Either way, we’ll escort you, as it’s amazingly easy to become lost in the labyrinth of our buildings, and we should get along quick, for to be late to a meeting with the Council cannot do.” Catching the pale look on Dillan’s face, he said, “Be glad, ranger! As soon as you become acquainted with everything there is to come to know here, you shall rue the day you leave.”
But there was also a deep undercurrent of magic, partly foreboding as the dark wreathing of sorcery tended to always be, and still partly soothing as the spells of healing Dillan was training in. Malice and goodness seemed to be at war, though now that he had come it was like each had been dulled and now lurked in suppressed pivot. Evidently the light was prevailing for the moment.
Caressing the fair sheets that he lay under with his good hand, trying to recall the events that had occurred before, Dillan concluded that it was now a day or to later. How he arrived here at this haven, he could not guess. What had transpired and in what order he could not remember with accuracy. It all was in his mind a haze of swirling mists, broken in places by images of clashing swords glittering in their rage, shields being cloven to splinters, and the cries and shouts of fighting men. Squinting into the fog of his thought a gruesome thing presented itself, a grief-stricken soldier mourning over the fallen body of a comrade, pierced with many arrows, barely alive. Sobbing and speaking words of hope, the boy, who Dillan recognized to be Klar, seemed to grow grim, and in his pale eyes a smoldering fire burst into flame, and with a wailing screech he drew out his keen blade and advanced in a wrath, hewing all who had the courage to stand before him. The tormented face of the young man faded rapidly, and before he could retrieve it, it vanished altogether like a puff of smoke in the evening.
Dillan shuddered and was relieved once the memory of sorrow had passed, departing into a shadowed labyrinth of his mind where it would be reluctant to reveal itself again. So there had been a great scuffle with arrows flying and swords ringing, but the aftermath of it he did not know, and this was a dull pain to him now. Of his friends who had fought their fates he did not know either, and partially did not want to know. Already devastating had been the loss of Oren in the crossing of the mountains. No more did he desire to know about.
Gazing around the room he decided that no one was going to came to wake him, and yawning he stretched his feet until he slumped down and was half off the bed. All his stiffness evaporated. He rubbed his face, thinking about food. With a flash of excitement the weary archer yelped and was out of the bed in an instant, jolted to full awareness as adrenaline coursed and pulsed through his veins, un-summoned and perhaps unwanted, when he thought about it later. Dillan swept his hand across his features once more, feeling for where the blow that had sent him senseless had left its bruise; once more he felt nothing at all. Any reminder that he had been smote to the ground was gone as though dust in a gale. The rippling sensation in his skull, the blunt thud and sickly of the strike. These in his mind were all that remained. Cured with an unseen enchantment no physical scar or mar was left to be seen.
This lightened Dillan’s mood considerably, and he hummed an elvish tune from one of Aväll’s taverns as he strode about in a merry way, surveying his room, not bothering to wonder where it was that he was exactly. His surroundings were so serene and brimming with beauty that he was burdened by not a single worry, all his troubles washed away. Birds chirped and whistled their songs somewhere undetectable above, actually perched upon the boughs of the trees that towered through and above the roof. The architecture of everything in view was so amazing, Dillan heeded not the vast complexities of his lodgings, mesmerized just by the arcane aura that even the polished stones adjacent to the trees emanated. Surreal in their ancient presence the trees were firmly planted in separated plots of earth, their trunks within the room and most of their leafy extensions out in the open air, expanding through gaping circles in the ceiling needing no shielding for weather could penetrate the intense latticework of tree; only the light of day.
Walking this way and that without clear purpose Dillan managed to find a bowl of clear lapping water that smelled strange, indescribable, not foul but fresher than all water he had known before. A ing sort of essence was in it. What was more was that trickling in to feed the bowl was an inlet directly in the wall, its bed so precisely hewn that it seemed an axe had slashed an extremely thin line down in a swerving path. This particularly fascinated him, as it seemed to ascend rather than descend straight up into the ceiling. He guessed that its original source fed the other running waters he had gleaned with his sensitive ears. Acute after their own fashion, it had not been overly arduous to attune and enhance his hearing, smell, and sight amid ranger training.
After washing and selecting an elaborate tunic of a delicate silver hue, a color that shone with a reflective illumination in the sun, he removed from a latch on the wall a lantern that kindled itself on touch. He adjusted the shutters so that it gave only a thin ray, more golden than red, and then set off in search of breakfast and his hosts. Very grateful was he that he had not perished earlier. The possibility that the folk who had set him here were his saviors made him nervous. Their estate was beyond words, and all manners of plant life thrived while at the same time coexisting within the wooden structure. Dryleaves rustling about in healthy autumn conversion swept about his feet, despite none of the trees here were in falling season. Anfractuosities took turns high in the walls, deep recesses lined with life. The artifices of his care-givers were beyond bountiful. It quite literally took his breath away.
Many corridors he passed, all with lush foliage ingrown into them, many pure green ferns among the collection, until finally he arrived at a massive double-door, masterfully set with an assortment of gems near its hinges. Bolted it was not, because no mechanism of locking existed. Lithe green vines coiled up its azure-shaded wood, covering most of it. Two shining rings were set upon it, each studded with a marvelous red jewel; they had faint inner glows that appeared friendly, and with a tug Dillan heaved open the door.
Answering the very movement there came a pulsing series of jolts that rippled throughout the floor, and a tingling sensation enveloped his entire body as he slowly lifted up off the ground, suspended as it were. Feebly writhing in mid-air had no plausible effect, so Dillan was quick to give it up. He actually cut a fairly humorous picture floating there, hovering weightlessly and shifting between positions with all the bursting speed of a snail. Gravity seemed to have forgotten its duties. Possible was the fact that magic was feverishly at work, though if it was, it was magnified to such an extent that the young archer couldn’t fathom the depth one would need to delve to be ability to harness such power. Confounding the eyes of sentries and blending in with nature he could manage, but levitating a person and rendering them utterly helpless? That would take some rigorous practice. Dillan sought back to the day he had failed to influence the trajectory of a lightly tossed apple, supposedly by twisting the weavings of energy close to fruit with sufficient force. The fruit had dropped like a stone it had, leaving him to feelings of embarrassment and frustration.
“To grip the torrents of overflowing magic around you, you must first learn to gently prod the weavings of reality. Then you can advance further to being able to bend the impossible to your will. Such is the nature of the greatest wizards.” Oren had spoken those words gravely compared to more spirited mood. Recognizing as much, Dillan had since then strived to conquer all his lessons related to that. Now it seemed as though Oren, from some heavenly abode, was mocking him.
Making matters more annoying, the doors had shut, impervious to the nonsense. Fearing that rage would overcome his sense of thought, Dillan breathed deeply, relaxingly, before finally asserting himself to the situation. Very meekly he brushed his magical self, he stretched out a hand, and he concentrated. He ignored deflections off of the walls, and closed his eyes, engulfing his being intently under the flow. Suddenly a new sensation erased the old, a familiar sensation of pine needles poking his skin, and something began to form in the air. A circular distortion arose, seething as if the very fabric of the world was undoing itself, and it almost pounded with a steadily rising sound, rapidly enlarging in potency. The immense will required to sustain the magic was made possible only because Dillan had endured the intense bouts of stamina and agility that had come coupled with being an apprentice ranger, albeit for the short period of time.
With enough exertion, he hoped that he might disable or disrupt the field of other magic controlling the levitation, but he soon found that to nullify such a force demanded remarkable determination. The distortion suddenly flickered, and all at once random flushes of variegated color dashed through it, responding to Dillan’s press of concentration, but then it throbbed once, powerfully, and blinked out; and summoned from the remains of the distortion burst a blistering shockwave of magic, a cascade of invisible energy. Luckily the odd levitation faded, melting away into the floor paneling. Releasing its clench, the dispersing power vanished as would a mist swept by a gust, and consequently Dillan was dumped flat to the ground.
But as quickly as it had ceased, the levitation resumed itself, and Dillan was hauled upwards till he struggled against the nothingness again. His first inclination had been to respect with tender appreciation whatever this place was, whoever owned it, and everything within it. Except now he was starting to doubt whether or not he would be able to extricate himself without scorching a hole in the wall or something. From this pathetic position Dillan turned his attention to the closed door. Though the intricacies of magic continued to elude him, the archer had a basic understanding of magical traps and snares, activated when a trigger laced with certain spells was tripped. He glared at the door through keen eyes, sharpening his sense farther with an uttered word, and carefully gazed all around and at anything near. Tugging on the agglomerate of fan-leafed plants to his left had not effect, and they were the only section of plants in alignment with the spot upon which he had stepped.
It might be the door handles, he thought. But then again, it also might be a leaf on a plant I passed, or a floorboard (though he couldn’t really discern where one floorboard ended and another began) that I trod on. Aloud he muttered half- cried,
“And it might very well just be a glitter of light I walked under!”
“It might very well be indeed,” answered a voice, fair yet wise far beyond Dillan’s comprehension. To spin himself around Dillan had to twist hard, and within a swathe of sparkling gold behind him stood tall an erect figure, shapeless until the abrupt harshness of the outside glare died, the sun barred by clouds. Mysterious wisps of evanescing froth broiled about it, as if a cauldron of magic had been emptied and embodied by a corporeal shell. The fume hissed like wind through a forest, but cleared obediently when the enshrouded creature gestured ever so subtly.
That was when Dillan vaguely recognized where he was; for before him, yet he had no inkling of it at first, was an elf. He knew that it was an elf only because he caught the stately pointed ears that adorned him. Clad in a robe of simple gray that draped down elegantly, the elf immediately struck Dillan as incredible in years. He was lean and strong, with dark hair that streamed down until it rested at just below the chest, and he donned a fine belt clasped with a silver circlet, and every time he moved the clasp would flash bright. But his eyes were pools of memory, wells of knowledge and integrity that intimidated and yet inspired awe with their benevolence. Only an evil creature, or a creature bringing evil with it should quail before those eyes. With another flick of the wrist he let Dillan fall permanently. The elf strode forward till he stooped above the embarrassed and equally amazed archer, who sat in a disoriented heap.
Smiling, he said, “Welcome, Dillan, friend of Oren, to Eldon, queen tree of the Morian forest and flowering center to the elves of Hith’ Morian. I am Adan. Your timing is late, but under the circumstances you shall be excused.”
A thousand different questions welled up inside Dillan, and it was all he could do to resist blurting them out. Presently he was on the verge of saying something when two other elves thrust into the corridor from the double-door, each lumbering along and hefting a colossal battering ram-looking hunk of wood, conversing at a great speed with one another. They, after observing for a moment, set aside the monstrous stalk and introduced themselves.
First to come forward was a female, her crisp-fitting raiment adjusted to fit her attitude, fiery and reckless, their curves exaggerated and their make rous. As with most elves, her hair was long and dimly shone. Dillan would come to know her well, and the very first thing he noticed of her came to be of importance later on; the life in her eyes was alight as if shining from without a thousand facets, but subdued like the splendor of an eerie gloom.
“Finally! Well met, Dillan, friend of Oren, at last. So great is your fame that I have been overly eager to meet you, and have been fidgeting while you healed. I thought it a marvel when I did not burst! But as usual I am getting ahead of myself. How is your room? Do you find it acceptable, because it was I that arranged your lodgings.”
Overcome by the flurry of compliments and eager to please, (and also by her melodic voice) Dillan hesitated as he processed the words. Then he said, still searching his mind,
“Yes, my room is so magnificent I thought I had strayed into a dream! Before I ask anything else, I must know how one can bend nature into such crafts of beauty! When I awoke I was struck dumb by my surroundings. Does the flora naturally grow, or what do you do to them?”
“I am partly responsible for that,” answered the elf who had supposedly levitated Dillan. “The abstract aspects of magic that I work with allow for rather surprising results when affecting plants. Alchemy, some might call it, but the term is far too broad for my liking. During the time you shall spend here I think you will learn much, and about time I must add. Have of us quite nearly had a heart to seek you out after our wanderers and messengers reported you engaging lizards without knowledge of magic…”
While he continued to talk, speaking lengthily of Dillan’s incapability with magic, words that Dillan didn’t much listen to, the other elf out of the three took the opportunity to exit the hallway. “…and that burst of mist and light when I found you, that was conceived using a technique you should enjoy. But then again, magic is rarely allocable. As an example, no other elf in presence, therefore not counting those passed beyond and gifted with freedom from all possible chains, can do this.” On that abrupt note he outstretched his hand gently grasping nothing. Then flame, a fiery boulder reeling within itself grew inside of this grasp until spouts of it leaped out from between his fingers.
Coalescing the flame, he issued a jet of fire from his other outstretched hand, and almost instantly the shot ignited into a dense ball of roaring flame that spouted random gouts in every conceivable direction, forming a shield wall of fire, and the great conflagration did not cease its fountaining and ling until the elf lowered his hand, which curled into a fist. Next he plunged his hand out again palm-forward, and with a tensing clench of his eyes ribboning, arcing jets of water shrieked into existence, tearing and shredding at the air as more were summoned forth from his palm like antifire from a dragon’s maw. The intertwining blasts raced and gushed, engulfing wider and wider expanses of area, yet only area of air; no thing of the corridor was touched.
“No other elf has exhibited a flare for bending those two elements except for me. And though all elves can work magic, not all can work it mightily. But it can still be potent, for our wanderers, aloof and far-flung throughout the world twist good workings from subtle ones. Many times the most subtle can become the key to the most of impact.”
Dillan digested this, marking out of the corner of his eye that the third elf was back standing rigid behind the stalk of wood, that the double-door was swinging shut, and wondering how he had slipped back in so stealthily. For a moment there was an odd silence, disturbed only by the patter of birds flitting on extending branches outside the carven window. At last the third elf made a notion to greet him, but at that exact instant a fourth elf, drabbed in solemn thick drapery, wearing a crested mantlet and girt with a elegant dagger unsheathed at his side, approached fluidly at a swift pace for a jog, compared at any rate to a man. Rather than address Dillan politely as had the others, he bore (later Dillan found out) a message for the stiff elf still teetering between nervousness (which was becoming increasingly obvious). He leant and whispered something quick in the grace tongue of the elves, then took back the way he had come.
Like an unnerved sparrow alerted to the presence of a bird of prey, and who’s just recaptured enough dignity to try a smooth exit, the third followed.
Dillan was left then just with the magically empowered elf, Adan, and the bright sunshine elf maiden whose name he didn’t know and who really didn’t seem at all like one to sit back from a fight…and the large log whose purpose was unclear at best. Really all the sudden happenings had left the young archer in a state of utter bewilderment, and the cold shock of all the proceedings had yet to thaw.
An echoing bell sounded TONG! in the distance, and instead of thawing this cold shock shattered into fragmented shards. He was on the verge of finally erupting into all his unanswered questions, only one of which he had asked, except that Adan interrupted him in mid-beginning of his first word. “Whe—”
“The bell of the Council chimes, and it is summoned! Alas. I was hoping they should at least give you time to unravel. My pleas go unheard. Either way, we’ll escort you, as it’s amazingly easy to become lost in the labyrinth of our buildings, and we should get along quick, for to be late to a meeting with the Council cannot do.” Catching the pale look on Dillan’s face, he said, “Be glad, ranger! As soon as you become acquainted with everything there is to come to know here, you shall rue the day you leave.”
[This message has been edited by locomonster1 (edited 08-07-2007 @ 09:50 AM).]