The Legend Of Black Eyes

Beatrix and I were trying different ways to use our Fragments now. She tried to merge with shadows and move through them until she reached an objective set by the witch. I had to imbue different objects with my essence and observe their reaction.

For instance, I"d imbue a bucket full of water with my energy and throw it into the air. I"d have to observe how time affects its movement… and reflect upon it. "Reflect on what?" I kept asking that hateful witch, but she wouldn"t give me a clear answer. She"d just ask me to repeat the exercise and… reflect upon it.

Hilda burst into the room. Her hair was stuck to her face in tangles. It was windy outside. Winter started announcing its approach. Hilda closed the door to the arena as soon as she got in. She took some time to recover her breath.

She had obviously been running. I waited for her to speak with great antic.i.p.ation. I grew tired of the exercise, bored. Seeing Hilda was a welcome change. I needed something to spike my adrenaline, get my brain to properly work again.

"Hartwell, as it appears, is moving something big from Handels Market," she told us after she recovered. "The shadows and Konig"s men have already been seen busy in preparation."

"What are they transporting?" Beatrix asked.

"I"m working on that," Hilda said. "I just thought I"d let you know."

"What are they transporting, whatever it is, on?" I asked.

"There will be two carriages. That"s all I know at the moment," Hilda said. "I"ll give you the details tonight. I am yet to meet with my sources at the city council."

"Why would they need so many men to escort two carriages?" Raiya asked. "The shadows are more than capable of managing two carriages."

"That"s the thing," Hilda replied. "Konig"s men don"t know what they"re moving. They only have orders to move something big from the darkest streets of Handels Market. They are under strict orders not to let anyone get within a hundred feet radius from it. Anyone who dares approach will be put down."

"That"s it!" Beatrix yelled, excited. "That must be the helm. I heard father speak about a hidden warehouse in Handels Market when I was still under his roof."

 "It"s a trap," Raiya said. "Hartwell isn"t the kind of man to rely on others to protect his goods."

"It feels like one," Hilda said. "I"m going to the city council to sign on my family"s death certificates and get my family name restored. I also arranged for a meeting with some men who might know more about this whole deal.

"Elsa thinks we should take advantage of this opportunity and make a move on the carriages. I think we should reconsider. I want you to think about it while I get more information. We might not have time to prepare if we decide to make a move."

"What do you think?" Raiya asked us as soon as Lady Fisher left.

"It sounds a lot like a trap," I replied. "I"d do the same if I were Hartwell."

"What if they"re transporting the actual helm?" Beatrix asked.

"Then we try and find out where they"re taking it," I said. "We can try to steal it from there instead."

"They"re taking it to Fort Mercer, Hartwell"s humble abode," Raiya replied. "We can"t allow it to reach the fort."

"He"s challenging us," Beatrix said. "He dares us to take it from him, or lose it forever."

"Aren"t we forgetting something important here?" I asked. "Even if we get the helm, we don"t have the ghost captain to get us to Milogac."

"You mean Osgar," Raiya said.

"That filthy swine!" Beatrix cursed out loud. "I swear if I catch him… I"ll cut his tiny p.e.c.k.e.r into tinier pieces."

Osgar had disappeared the day we attacked Fischer. He went on a romantic escapade with a woman he met at Elsa"s party. It turned out later that it was the same woman he introduced me to during the feast, a blond extravagant lady that went by the name Hartwell. According to the letter he left us, the lady had made him an offer he couldn"t refuse.

When I came back with news of the leader of the underworld in Merinsk, the name Hartwell took a new meaning to us. Beatrix had finally seen it fit to reveal Osgar"s true ident.i.ty as the ghost captain.

Beatrix asked him to take her to the isle of legends when she received her powers, but the man refused. She stole the ship"s helm from him and hid it in her father"s house. She"d entrusted one of her servants to hide it in their quarters. – Like I always say, "m-t-e-u-r."

It was then that Bodrick had decided to make a surprise visit to the servants" quarters. His guards found the helm, executed the servant for stealing, and the rest is history. Beatrix vowed revenge on her lord father then, sabotaging all his operations.

"If Osgar went with a lady by the name Hartwell," I said. "Then he would be in Fort Mercer."

"Not necessarily," Raiya said. "Let"s wait for Ladies Vogel and Fischer. They may bring more news during our next meeting. Now, resume training."

Elsa and Hilda jumped at the opportunity to work with Raiya. They said we needed as many allies on our side as possible. I was a wanted man now, and anyone involved with me will be sentenced to public execution by way of beheading. Hilda also said she"d perceived some change in our fates. We were, in her words, closer to agony and gruesome deaths than ever before.  

We needed a powerful ally. One that knew of Hartwell"s powers would be a great addition to the team too. Raiya was all of the above. She even offered to train us, help us understand our powers, embrace them and fully merge with them. Despite all my worries and growing paranoia, I couldn"t turn her down. I needed to grow even stronger.

I didn"t expect the training to be so mundane though…

"Up until now," Raiya addressed us. "You"ve been using the Fragment"s powers as they"ve manifested themselves to you. What you need right now is a change of perspective. You need to know the element you possess, become one with it."

"It"s easy for you to say," I complained. "I don"t see how throwing buckets in the air will help me with anything."

"You need to observe how your powers work," Raiya said. "Don"t concentrate on the matter, but on the flow. Understand this, and new possibilities will present themselves to you." She turned to explain some things to Beatrix, and I went back to training.

I was used to training my body and perfecting my fighting techniques. They"re boring work too, but necessary. I didn"t understand what Raiya wanted me to find, but I knew I"d see it if I stuck to her instructions.

The morning went by quickly, and I wasn"t any closer to a reflection than when I began. I sat down by a wooden bench outside the training arena. The wind spared us its angry lashes while the sun shone bright at its zenith. Food and refreshments arrived when Raiya sat beside me.

"Found out anything about the flow of time?" she asked.

"It pa.s.ses," I said, munching on a chicken leg.

"But you can reverse it," she said. "You can also stop it if one, for instance, possessed Minsec"s Fragment. How can that be possible?"

"I don"t know," I said. "I don"t know how these Fragments work. I don"t even know how magic functions. All I know are the spells I can use."

"And that"s the heart of the problem Zedd," Raiya said. "If you don"t understand the element you control, how can you understand the knowledge hidden in your Fragment?"

"I don"t see how flipping buckets will help me understand anything," I replied.

Raiya sighed. "Okay, let"s try this instead." She left and came back with a flower at hand.

"Observe this," she said then held the flower at my line of sight. I felt her activating her essence by way of a gentle tingle down my spine. The flower started losing its color, then its petals started falling one by one. Eventually, the flower ended up in dust and Raiya with sweat on her forehead.

"As time pa.s.ses," she said, panting. "Life expires. This is the cycle of life and death, but…" She took the dead flower and picked up a seed. "Death stops the cycle, only to trigger it to repeat itself."

"So there can"t be death without the existence of life," I said.

"The same can be said about dark and light," Raiya said. "We know there"s light because there"s dark, and vice versa. But what triggers them to appear?"

"Another cycle," I said. "Day and night."

"What about the seasons?" Raiya asked. "What about the moons? Can we have spring before winter? Can we have life before death? Each of them happens in a specific, natural order, but what remains constant is…" She looked at me, expectantly.

"Time," I replied. "Time pa.s.ses, unhinged, undamaged, unchanged."

"Not so sure about that last part," she said.

"So, you say everything changes thanks to the pa.s.sing of time," I said. "But we all know that. It doesn"t bring me any closer to merging with the fragment."

"It brings you closer to understanding time as a different kind of element," Raiya said. "When you create fire," she said then raised her forefinger. A tiny flame emerged, like that on a candle, and flickered above her finger.

"You simply urge the elements that already exist in the air to merge together, give you a flame. In order to make that transformation happen, you pay with your essence, mold it into a spark that gives life to a fire. Its intensity, however, doesn"t depend on the essence you"re providing alone."

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"I"ll deactivate the spell now," she said. "I want you to use your senses and see what happens to the essence I"ve provided."

I did as I was told. I activated my senses and felt Raiya"s essence rage within her body, then slowly exit through her finger. Then her essence stopped flowing through the finger and fire faded. I could still feel remnants of her essence in the air. It started changing into something new though. Her imprint vanished, replaced with pure energy I couldn"t define.

"Being a witch includes studying everything," Raiya said. She still had her finger pointing towards the sky. "Creating fire, for instance, requires an incantation. That incantation is a way for the wizard to communicate with the elements. You imbue your words with essence and think of the result you want to achieve. It takes a great deal of concentration." She started moving her finger in the air then, following the remnants of her essence. "If you can see remnants of the same spell in the air though, recognize what result it would have, you can touch it. Imbue it with your essence and… voilà!"

Fire ignited in the air with a loud whoosh!

 "So magic exists in the air," I said. "And all I need to do is find it?"

"It"s easier said than done," Raiya retorted. "You saw the remnants of a spell I had just used. You saw my essence transform. How would you recognize it"s a fire spell if you didn"t see it beforehand?"

"That"s why you"re having me imbue buckets of water with my essence then throw in the air?" I asked. "You could have started with this demonstration."

"What I want you to recognize is the imprint of the time energy itself," Raiya said. "not your own transformed essence. It"s not something that you can learn overnight Zedd. You"ll need to keep practicing. You need to see time as an element, its pa.s.sing as a spell. You can"t start by observing people age and die. You need something you recognize as your own, then work on it from there."

So after lunch, I kept practicing. Throwing buckets in the air, breaking cheap clay vases, everything that would help me see my essence transform and see how it changes. By the end of the day, my eye hurt, my head throbbed, and my head felt heavier than a rock at the bottom of the sea. I managed to recognize the remnants of my spells though. I took it for a good start.

We headed for dinner later that day. Before we reached the dining hall however, we heard Hilda and Elsa"s voice ringing through the corridors. Elsa was standing near a round table, gesticulating with her arms as she screamed at Hilda. Her face had grown red with anger, or perhaps frustration.

"It"s an obvious trap, yes," she said. "We know it"s a trap, so why don"t we take advantage of that knowledge?"

"Because we"re against Hartwell and Stalwart," Hilda replied. "I don"t see this end well for any of us."

Elsa scoffed. "We can"t change our future by not risking everything we"ve got."

"What good is that risk if it gets us all killed?" Hilda retorted.

"The way I see it," Raiya interrupted loudly enough for the two ladies to stop and look at her. "Our ultimate end is death. What matters is how you want to die. Do you want to wait for death to come and s.n.a.t.c.h you from your comfortable bed, or do you want to die fighting?"

Hilda looked down at her feet. "I don"t want to look death in the eyes knowing full well it will take me," she said.

"Then fight with us," Raiya said. "Help us find a weak spot from which we can strike. There"s always a way to turn things around. I agree with Lady Vogel, we need to take advantage of the fact that we know it"s a trap."

"What would you have me do?" Hilda asked.

"Tell us everything you know," Raiya answered. "When will they move?"

"Two days from now," Elsa said.

"Then we have plenty of time to prepare," Raiya replied.

"What about Osgar?" I asked. "We can"t leave him with Hartwell."

"About that," Hilda said.

"Did you find out where he is?" Beatrix asked.

"I have bad and good news about him," Hilda said. "The bad news is, he"s in Fort Mercer. I heard Hartwell tortures him every night for fun."

"s.h.i.t…" I swore under my breath. "What about the good news?"

"The good news is, he"s being transferred to your Bodrick"s estate in Moira," she replied. "We can get him if we intercept the men transporting him there."

"When?" Beatrix asked.

"Two days from now," Hilda answered. "The same time as the carriages are to be moved to Fort Mercer from Merinsk."