21

Oliver traveled for weeks, passing right through the mountains with no struggle. He dedicated some time each day to discovering his Spell Wall. One spell per day was his goal. He wasn’t always successful.

Some spells flared with life automatically, like Shape Wind had. But most required close introspection before he could even begin to glean the methods for casting. Intense study was necessary in order to unravel the secrets of those spells and as a result, his progress was much less than he would have preferred. Nevertheless, he made steady progress both mentally and geologically.

He only had one harrowing encounter. On his second week in the mountains, he and Angli passed by the fallen tip of a mountain that sat apart from the others in its chain. It had a white peak which Oliver thought strange, given that the spire itself sat low to the ground. No snow fell during this part of the year, so he had no idea why it would be covered in frost.

“Keep moving,” Angli told him.

“What’s wrong?”

“That’s not a mountain,” she said.

“Don’t be ridiculous, of course it’s a mountain. Look at the size of it. What else would it be?”

“It’s a dragon, and if it sees us, it could be trouble,” she said.

“A dragon? I can see trees growing on it.”

“No, the top. The white part. That’s the dragon.”

Oliver inspected the broken peak further. It sat alone and far enough from the trail he was walking on that he could make out its bulk. It was massive, even if it was just the peak of a larger rock, but still not the largest in the range. Even so, to think that the massive white part of the huge mass could be alive was not something he could believe. Just as he began to voice his doubt, he saw it.

The giant form shifted slightly. He watched as giant wings unfurled. Oliver was taken aback at the magnitude of what he was seeing. As the wings opened, Oliver caught sight of the gargantuan beast. It was massive, its head had been shielded by its wings, along with most of its body.

There were great horns on its head which looked large enough to impale a mammoth. Its long neck coiled the peak of the spire like a massive snake. Its great eyes, even from the distance appeared old and wise. Oliver was still taking in the form when its head shifted in his direction. He was immediately stricken with a cold sweat. With all of the distance, it was inconceivable that such a small target as him would even garner the beast’s attention.

“You,” a deep booming voice spoke in his head. It rumbled in his mind and almost made his teeth vibrate together from the sheer volume. He was even more astounded that it spoke in the language of humans. Oliver was stricken with terror. A being that size wouldn’t even notice him stuck between its teeth.

“Come to kill me now, have you? I knew you were untrustworthy from the start.” The deep voice spoke again when Oliver remained silent. Again, the words came from within his mind. He mustered his nerve and spoke like he would to Angli.

“You know me?” he managed to ask with great effort.

“Do you mean to tell me you don’t remember me?” The offense in the words was clear to hear.

“I don’t mean to insult you! I really don’t remember you. Have you... always been a dragon?”

“What else would I be?” The offense in the tone only rose.

“I simply don’t believe I have met a dragon before. One so large as yourself would be hard to forget.” Oliver said as respectfully as he could.

The dragon was quiet for a long moment, peering across a vast distance at him with a gaze that pinned him to the ground. It looked like it was trying to determine something.

“I am the appropriate weight for a dragon of my age and size.” It finally said.

“No, I only meant that I’ve never seen a being as old and wise as you. Surely you must have lived for centuries to reach such a size. I confess, I don’t have so many seasons under me as yourself.”

This seemed to confuse the dragon. It cocked its massive head to the side as it pondered him. His words seemed to have made the creature doubt something.

“You are not right,” it finally said.

“Right or wrong, I can assure you that I-”

“No,” The dragon said, interrupting Oliver.

“No?” Oliver was dumbfounded.

“You are not right. You, yourself, are an anomaly. How are you here?”

Oliver didn’t know how to respond. He didn’t want to risk angering the gargantuan. But he genuinely had no answer to give the beast.

“I think you have me mistaken for someone else. Please forgive me, but I need to be on my way.”

“I mistake nothing, Albrine. An aura never lies. Go if you must. If ever we meet again, I will be ready.” With that, the dragon folded its wings and resumed its shape as a mountain peak. Oliver was uncomfortable with its words.

“Is he perhaps talking to you? Could he see inside of me in such a way?” Oliver asked internally.

“Undoubtedly, he can connect with your mind in some way, that’s how dragons communicate. Still, there is little chance he mistook me for you. It spoke of auras. We all have a unique aura. And yours and mine are vastly different. In any case, he couldn’t look beyond your aura and only see mine. I can’t say why he thinks you know him, but it does make me wonder.”

“Let’s just get out of here,” Oliver said before doing just that.

22

The next several weeks passed in a blur to Oliver as he moved from mountain range to open plain to forest land again. It took him well over a month to make it out of the mountains and into the forest. The time was spent in constant motion or relentless training. Angli had him train with the Holy Sword until his arms burned every night. Then he spent time on his unknown spells before exhaustion took him. He made progress at a slow, if steady pace. He spent every day running until one day he passed into the forest just before night fully settled in. When he walked under the canopy of the forest, a chill accompanied him.

“What is that?” he asked.

Angli manifested from a ball of light in front of him. She wasn’t really there, she just allowed his mind to imagine her here, as it served as an easier means of communication than words echoing in his brain. This way, she could make eye contact, point to things, and otherwise make visual allusions which would not be possible from the depths of his brain.

“The feeling you experienced is the first layer of magical protection the guardians placed over the forest to dissuade negative forces. It is a subtle spell, but unless dispelled, the chill you feel will only intensify until every sound you hear will make you jump out of your skin. Compounded with other spells, it makes people generally avoid this place.”

“How do I dispel it?”

“You don’t, I do.”

Oliver felt a calming energy wash over him and he immediately felt at ease with the forest. Just when he dropped his guard, a scream rent the night air. Oliver was on his guard again in an instant. He had heard these screams off and on for the last few nights. Whatever it was, it was following him.

“Do you know what this creature is?” Angli asked him.

“No but I’ve been hearing it for a while now. Do you know what it is?”

“It sounds like a banshee.”

“The same banshee that kill you if they scream your name?” Oliver had of course heard of them, but he had also heard that they were largely extinct in this age. He hadn’t expected to ever run into one.

“Yes. They use their magic to peer into your past and future. It is unknown how they do it, but if a banshee learns your name, they can sever your fate from the world. Whatever your fate may be, if they learn your name and scream it out, your destiny is captured in the magic. From that moment forward you have no future. That is why when a name is screamed, the owner always dies soon after.

“The banshee uses its magic to feed on the energy of the remaining years of your life it stole. Every spell, every exertion of energy, every confrontation, any amorous connection you may have in your life, the banshee feeds on all of the energy expended in any exertion of your life from the moment after its spell is cast until the end of your natural life. Unfortunately for you, the rest of your life would never play out, except for within the web of the banshee’s spell. You no longer have a future to continue into. It is one of the only applications of Time magic recorded in history.”

“That’s terrifying,” Oliver said.

“Indeed. Banshees are a menace that even the Angels would hesitate to fight. None are immune to their divination. Anyone can be targeted. It is true that spells can be cast to shroud the identity, but no spell or shield is fool proof. Given enough time, banshees can see through any attempt to hide. Even an Angel could be undone if a banshee was to glean their name.”

“What do you do about a banshee?”

“You kill it,” Angli said.

A soft keening noise seemed to come from inside of Oliver’s head. It was a lullaby. Oliver had never heard anything so beautiful. Almost instantly the screaming around him ceased. There was silence for a brief moment, but then Oliver heard the banshee pick up the song in time with the voice in Oliver’s head.

A moment later, Oliver had a shock when a ghostly form wound toward him from within the trees. It looked like a woman, only it had no legs. Its body disappeared quickly below the waist. It looked shiny, as if its soul was a beacon for all to see. Its eyes were hollow, save for the eerie green glow coming from them.

“Draw your sword. The song will end soon. You need to kill it right when it does, otherwise you risk opening your soul to its divination.”

Oliver did as he was told. His sword was in position to strike the banshee if it moved any closer to him, but as he looked at it, he paused. It looked miserable. It looked like it wanted to weep. Oliver almost wanted to let it weep. Truthfully, he wanted to weep with it. He lowered his blade and relaxed his grip. This thing was sad and misunderstood.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

“What are you doing?” Angli asked him just as the song ended.

“It needs help,” Oliver said as the dull look it the creature’s eyes flared into a bright luminescence.

“Oliver, No!” Angli shouted.

She tried to take control of his body, but he struggled against her. The banshee was right in front of them as they struggled for control. It looked down on Oliver and tilted its head. Oliver looked back at it and was confused to see its eyes flash several different colors as it peered at him. Suddenly, Oliver saw several scenes flash behind his own eyes in tune with the flashing of the banshee’s eyes. He saw his past, conversations with family, fights, peaceful sunsets.

He couldn’t keep up with the information that the banshee was rifling through. There were several scenes Oliver didn’t recognize at all. He saw himself bowing before a statue. He saw armies clash in front of him as he watched helplessly. He saw himself laying with the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. He saw two kids run at him with excitement and jump into his arms as they both told him how much they had missed him.

Oliver was baffled by the scenes, though he could remember none of them a moment later as they were replaced by the next, and he was unprepared when the barrage suddenly snapped off as the banshee’s eyes locked on a red color. It shuddered as it found the information it had been seeking. Angli was shouting in his brain, and he could feel his arm moving by itself as she used his sword arm to prepare the kill. Oliver saw the whole scene unfold as if in slow motion.

Angli raised the blade even as the banshee took one final lurch forward and with it took an enormous breath. Oliver felt the air being sucked in by the banshee. In fact, it seemed to suck the warmth from the whole world around him. In an instant, Oliver was freezing. He felt faint. His spirit felt sapped of energy.

The banshee concluded its long and dramatic inhale with the slightest of pauses. Angli’s strike was more than halfway to the banshee’s neck when it released its breath in a tooth chattering shriek, louder than anything Oliver had ever heard in his life. It took the remainder of energy he had available with its fury. It wasn’t only the sound itself that made Oliver quiver. The banshee let loose a specific series of noises from its throat. When they left its maw, his spine shuddered at qwhat it said.

“OLIVER!” It shrieked.

Oliver felt his soul jerk inside his body as the final syllable fell from the horror’s lips. Angli held him tight as he uncontrollably jerked within his mortal coil. The strike she still carried fell on the creature and ripped it into shreds. They all swirled around the blade of the Holy Sword and disappeared.

Oliver could feel an immense amount of energy release from the banshee as it died, and the Holy Sword eagerly sucked it all up. Oliver’s body dropped to the ground as Angli’s ability to control it was severed. He could only see what was within his own mind. He had no idea how to regain control of his body, but he saw Angli in front of him.

“What is happening?” he asked her.

“Oliver…” She sounded stricken.

“What’s wrong? Help me!” Oliver was freaking out as his mind grew dim around him.

“I don’t know if I can Oliver. This is beyond me.”

“Nothing is beyond you! You have to help me!” Oliver was not even ashamed of the terror and longing in his voice. He only wanted to live.

“No, Oliver. I can’t fix this. Your body and Soul have been severed from your fate. Whatever future you had was captured by the banshee. When I killed it, all of that was taken by the sword. The Holy Sword has absorbed your potential for a future.”

“What do you mean? You must be able to help me! You’ve never failed me before!”

“I’m sorry Oliver. I don’t think you understand. Every moment beyond this moment in time is a moment which Fate has no hold on you. Your future no longer exists. No one has ever survived a banshee’s scream. If you still don’t understand, then maybe I should put it this way; you no longer exist on Du Varia.”

“That’s impossible! I’m here right now, with you. We are inside my body! How can you say it doesn’t exist anymore?”

“It is gone. We are not a part of the world anymore. I was pulled from the control of your body. As far as the world is concerned, we both just died. We are now stuck in your lifeless body until the end of time.”

Oliver wasn’t so sure, considering his spirit was dimming by the second and he could only make out Angli in front of him. Her spirit was whole and undamaged. His spirit was severely damaged and unstable. He could feel it becoming untethered from his body as his spirit tried to move on. All he could do was surrender to the darkness as Angli grew fuzzier in front of his eyes. Within another minute, all Oliver knew was the blackness.

23

“What a shame,” said a man in an ethereal cloak. The cloak seemed to be a part of the environment around him. His bright blue eyes shone with light as he stood by the body of Oliver Albrine. His heart had ceased beating. His eyes were vacant. Yet the man knew he was not too late.

“It hurts, I know. You’ll find pains worse than this in your long life. I fear you may not truly be able to fathom just what awaits you. Still, without your sacrifice, none can hope to live.” The man grasped the air like a pair of tweezers. He lowered himself to the body and began running his hands over the man.

A white light materialized around his hand, and as he started moving his hand around both the fallen sword and the body, he appeared to be pulling tiny wires of energy away from each. He continued to work, gradually using his spell to work the strands from the sword into every fiber he was able to pull from the body. He worked for several minutes, using his own energy to slowly but surely tie the man’s spirit back to his body. It had not been long since he died, but considering the length of time it took to extract what he needed from within the sword, the man also gradually fed the body oxygen and other nutrients through his spell.

When he was satisfied with his work, the man leaned down close to Oliver and whispered in his ear before bringing a shining palm against his non-beating heart. The man jerked violently as his heart began beating again. Oliver sat up in shock, looking for the source of the voice he had heard, but the man was gone.

“What the hell just happened?” Oliver asked.

“I have no idea. I felt someone cast a spell, and I could see your spirit rebinding to me and to your body. It might even be a stronger bond than the one I tied.” Angli’s response did nothing to ease Oliver’s anxiety.

Oliver couldn’t summon any energy for conversation. He still felt cold. He wanted to sit inside of a fire until his soul warmed. He ached all over, like the first time he had woken from a spirit wound. But his only thought was of the words whispered in his ears just before the light came back.

“Consider this a second chance at life. You are untethered from your fate. From this moment forward you are in my debt. You can never give up. Your journey is a long one. You may never rest until you know the truth of Silas the Divider.”

24

The next few days were surreal to Oliver. His body was sore from head to toe. He felt like he had been beaten all over, drug across rocks by his ankles and rolled over by a wagon before being thrown from a cliff into the world’s thorniest briar patch. Every step he tried to take made his entire being ache. He felt sore in ways he never knew he could.

There was a tightness on the inside of his body and unlike when Angli had saved his life, he didn’t have the Wellspring to instantly heal his aches and pains. Every move he made was agony. He started to envy people who knew healing magic. Angli knew some, but her spells refused to take hold on Oliver. He had no idea why, considering how many complex spells she had already cast on him, not to mention the fact that her spirit was indelibly linked to his own. It was almost like her magic didn’t have a target to cling to.

“Has my existence become intangible?” Oliver wondered to himself.

He made slow progress into the forest Angli guided him through. Each time he stopped, his body cramped in several places, making him scream in agony and forcing him to devote several minutes to individually loosening his cramped muscles. After several days had passed and his soreness and overall health hadn’t improved, even Angli became worried.

“Your body is not getting better. It seems to be declining further.” She said on the second week of travel since the banshee attack.

“I know,” he growled to her. His mood was foul. It had been getting worse with each day just as his soreness had also increased.

“I know you’re suffering, just keep moving. We have already passed the final protections. We should make it into the Holy Land before nightfall.” She told him.

Angli had been casting spells periodically as Oliver trudged on in suffering. She had explained each one at first, but with the passing days and increasing discomfort, Oliver had stopped paying attention and she had finally stopped explaining altogether. She didn’t hold his bad mood against him. She was unable to feel anything but fatigue except in the most extreme cases. She was in no position to begrudge him for discomfort she could no longer feel.

“If we don’t make it by the end of the day, I might just fall apart,” Oliver said with just the slightest hint of levity.

Oliver moved like a man on strings, each limb seeming to be pulled along individually, very unlike the gait of a normal and sound human. His muscles burned and threatened to give out on him with every step he took.

The hours passed more like days or weeks to Oliver as each step seemed to take him an eternity. His body was brittle. He could feel his bones grinding against each other excruciatingly as he crossed downed logs and rounded large oak trees in his path.

Angli made many remarks more to herself than him about the age of many trees they passed, marveling at trees many times the size of any he had ever seen. According to her, many of them had not existed or otherwise were very young the last time she came into the forest, some thousand years ago. When Oliver was on the verge of crumpling to the ground, Angli suddenly exclaimed.

“There it is!”

“There what is?” Oliver asked, exhausted.

“The entrance to the Holy Land! We’re here!’

“I don’t see anything, what exactly are you talking about?”

Angli directed his eyes to a tree more massive than any in the area, which was no small claim for a tree to make. It was a tree unlike any other. It was one of a kind, and also unlike the rest, the tree had a visible aura. Oliver didn’t even have to inspect it to witness the brilliance of it. It glistened with energy reminiscent of the True Wellspring, radiating power even more intimidating than the reserve Oliver carried on his back.

“That’s the entrance?” he asked.

“It is if you know how to pass the test.”

“What’s the test?” Oliver asked, worried. He had barely stayed on his feet this long. If he had to exert any energy, he would collapse right then and there.

“Don’t worry,” Angli said, sensing his fears, “the test is one you’ve already passed. Only those chosen by the True Wellspring are allowed to enter the Holy Land.”

“How is that possible? How do you make a lock based on something as abstract as that? Who could cast such a spell in the first place?”

“It’s called a signature lock. The caster sets the lock to a specific set of guidelines before casting the spell. As for who did it, I don’t know. This lock has existed for thousands of years before even my time.”

“How do I open it?”

“Just walk over and touch it. It will know your intent.”

Oliver hobbled his way to the tree. It was even more massive than he had originally thought. When he got close to it, he could no longer see the curve of it accurately. It simply looked like a bark covered wall that subtly disappeared several feet to either side of him. He couldn’t fathom how many feet thick the tree was, let alone how big around.

He was shocked by the heat signature he felt in the tree. It was so warm; he felt the heat from several feet away. It wasn’t uncomfortably warm, more like walking into a well heated house on a winter’s day. The warmth enveloped him, and Oliver belatedly realized that his aura was being surrounded by the almost tangible aura of the tree. On his back, the Holy Sword hummed in satisfaction when the aura of the tree reached it. Oliver could almost feel the tree embracing him as he neared it, and almost before his hand even reached its trunk, the bark began dissolving before his eyes.

The massive wall in front of him shimmered with every color and hue as it dissolved away. Deeper and deeper into the wood the magic erosion continued until the tree seemed to move forward around him. In the next few seconds, Oliver felt the tree pull him into a strange dimension where everything seemed wrong. He looked behind him, and he could see the glade he was standing in a moment ago. When he looked ahead, he only saw an ever-shifting mass of shimmering energy. With a start, he realized the portal was encompassed by a familiar archway. He had seen this place in the memory Angli showed him.

“What is this place?” he asked.

“This is the nexus between our world and the Holy Land. It exists on a different plane, parallel to our own. I suppose you could say we are standing on the edge of our world. The land we enter now serves as the filling which both separates us from and ties us to the negative world from which we were torn.”

“The filling?”

“It is too hard to explain. Walk forward. You will have help soon.”

Oliver did was she said, slowly approaching the wall of shimmering energy. He stuck a hand up to press against the wall, but he passed right through. He felt no resistance or even the slightest sensation at all as he continued forward, pushing his whole arm into the portal. He still couldn’t feel anything even as his face approached the shimmering wall of multicolored energy. He passed unceremoniously through the wall and before his mind could even register the change of scenery, he was standing in a glorious city.

Towers littered his view left right and forward. Many islands floated here and there, some housing the towers. There were islands floating upside down, at right angles to Oliver, mirroring his own island, concealed from view as the bottom of the island faced him, and many more oddly connected islands which seemed to have no specific format, and all seemed to be strewn randomly in relationship to the others.

Bridges connected most of the islands, but some sat alone, true islands in a sea of interwoven landmasses tied together in a massive web. Oliver looked behind him, not sure what he was expecting, but was still startled to see the same scene behind him as well. It was like his last step had literally transported him into the center of a new world. There was no sign of the portal he had stepped through. In its place was a plain wooden archway about twenty feet tall and half as wide. It looked crafted, as though a massive fallen tree had been used to carve it.

As Oliver was still attempting to digest all of this, his body, which had been soothed by the presence of the golden tree until he walked into the portal, suddenly seized up in several places. His whole upper body spasmed while his lower body locked up. The result was that he immediately collapsed. He fell to the ground screaming in pain as his body convulsed beyond his ability to calm it. He tried to calm his mind but he was constantly accosted by stabbing pain in numerous places at once. Within minutes, Oliver was curled in a ball and his world devolved into darkness once again.