Читать книгу The Chronicles of the Elders Malefisterium. Volume 1. The Ordeal of Freya - Andrew Ognev - Страница 6

Words can hardly describe what Vlad felt when he was writing the farewell letter. You can try to understand the twelve-year-old boy who had to leave home, his warm bed, a hearty meal, and most importantly, his loving and caring family. If anyone asked him about the reason for his doubts, he would easily find an answer.

The boy was always obedient to the priest who was like a father to him. Father Konstantin and the church were his only home and his only family. But there was something deep at the core of his loving heart that made him dream of the place the woman from the magical crystal had invited him to. In an inexplicable way, Vlad knew that the new world was the place where he would find all the answers. Old Fedotya’s tales, the utterances like “This is not the place where you should be” and “You’d better leave”, which he had heard repeatedly, the words of the sorceress calling herself Freya, all of that encouraged him to make that step. After all, he was still a child and subconsciously longed for mysteries.

Vlad traveled light. He set his heart on this: Either he enters the new world with nothing that would remind him of the past or…

Longing for Father Konstantin and his home, he made it to a small bridge over the river before he even knew it. A dark forest stretched beyond the river.

Vlad was standing at the edge of a big forest. With a heavy heart, he looked back at his house, the village, and the church rising above it… The boy was on the verge of tears.

He drew the crystal, which called him for the road, out of his pocket, and squeezed it hard with his hand. To his surprise, the hard gem crumbled into sparkling purple dust and slipped through his fingers.

Vlad thought that he messed everything up. He must have missed something in Freya’s explanations, and now he had to go back, disgraced. The few minutes he was walking from his house to the forest brought a dramatic change in him. Now he saw his involuntary return as a retreat, an unfair punishment.

“Keep your head up!” he said to himself. “Freya told me not to be surprised at anything! I just have to wait; something is going to happen.”

Vlad slowly turned around on one foot.

The surrounding landscape was the same, except for fresh colors that brightened it up: The same river, the village far away, and the dense forest. The wind rose and was now shaking the tops of the trees.

“Look at you!” he heard a mocking voice behind his back.

Where did it come from? There had been no one there a moment ago! And no one could get there without being seen! Vlad turned abruptly.

“Are you really from Molyobka?”

A boy of approximately fourteen years old was leaning against a thick tree, with his arms crossed on his chest, grinning.

“Who are you?” Vlad asked, startled.

“When you summoned me, I thought it must be some kind of joke. We haven’t seen anyone from this godforsaken place for more than eight hundred years,” the boy kept grinning. He stepped out of the shadow of the tree, and Vlad could get a good look at him.

The boy was lean and devilishly handsome. That’s right, devilishly, for that was exactly the word for his arrogant face. He was wearing blue jeans and dark-green long-sleeve plaid shirt. His face was oval, with regular features. He had dark green eyes and a chin proudly turned up. His thick dark hair was slightly disheveled, his pale pink lips were twisted into a shadow of a wry smile. The appraising glance of his vulturous eyes was fixed piercingly on Vlad.

When he came closer, Vlad noticed that the boy was almost a half-head taller than he.

“You look somewhat different than I imagined,” the boy narrowed his eyes, still having the grin that began to irritate Vlad. “I thought you were older and taller.”

Despite the provocative behavior of the stranger, Vlad kept calm. He gave a guileless smile and held out his hand.

“Vladislav,” he introduced himself respectfully. “You can call me Vlad.”

But the boy ignored Vlad’s hand. Instead, he stepped back and slowly looked Vlad up and down once again. Vlad was not a bit embarrassed by that.

“You are from the Academy. They’ve sent you for me, haven’t they?” Vlad realized. A sly smile was creeping over his face.

The stranger parted his lips in a smile, showing his straight white teeth. He clapped his hands three times, making pauses.

“Bravo, young man, well done! Only forty seconds!”

“Forty seconds of what?” Vlad was confused.

“It took you only forty seconds to understand where I came from. Others start asking stupid questions like ‘who are you?’, ‘where do you come from?’, ‘you were sent for me, weren’t you?’. But most of the time, they say: ‘Get out of here!’ At this point some problems tend to arise, but not at my end!”

His eyes flashed as if he was up to no good. He was hovering about Vlad just like a predator, preparing to attack.

“I understood it as soon as you appeared,” Vlad said with a sneer. “But asking point-blank would be inappropriate. I thought you were going to introduce yourself first.”

He thought he had cut off the stranger’s arrogance. However, the stranger didn’t change his behavior. He stopped circling around and was now looking straight into Vlad’s eyes.

“Introduce myself? Who needs such formalities? What if you fail the trial?” the boy asked in a low voice.

“What trial? I don’t know anything about it!” Vlad’s throat became dry with fear, but his face remained calm.

“You were invited to the Academy not for your good looks,” the boy sneered. “You have to prove that you deserve studying there. For that, you need to be able to survive.”

“To survive?”

“Before I take you to the portal, I need to make sure that you are the kind of person we need,” the boy’s pupils dilated, turning into two black abysses with shining stars at the bottom.

Silence hung in the air.

“What do I have to do?” Vlad asked, without waiting for an explanation.

The stranger’s eyes glistened with excitement. He spread his arms wide to the sides as if he wanted to hug Vlad.

“Nothing difficult! All you have to do is to beat me in a fight.”

Vlad thought Peter was joking, and reflexively took a step back.

“You want me to fight with you?” he couldn’t believe his ears.

“These are the rules,” the stranger shrugged his shoulders. “I didn’t invent them! I just have to test you.”

“And what if I don’t want to?”

“Ha-ha-ha! Who cares?”

“Don’t I even get a say in your world?”

“You are not in our world yet,” the stranger said. “And, after all, haven’t you heard the saying ‘When in Rome, do as the Romans do’? We have our own rules. You must follow them. Otherwise, I will leave and you will miss your only chance.”

The stranger looked as if he did not care at all: He talked about a fight in an unengaging voice, as if Vlad was a plant or a bird. He even turned away, staring at a bush.

“So, I’ll be going now?” he asked without a backward glance.

“No! Wait! I will fight!”

“Oh, thank you!” the stranger took a bow, pretentiously. “To make it less frustrating for you, consider this fight your entrance test.”

“Are you serious?!”

“I’m dead serious. You heard me – I didn’t invent the rules! If you pass, you belong to us. And if you don’t…” the palm of his right hand burst into flame.

The orange glow of fire lit the stranger’s face and eyes.

The next instant, a ball of fire was swooshing toward Vlad. He barely dodged it, but his shirt caught fire. Vlad tore it off, the buttons fell down to the ground. Bare-chested, the boy ran into the forest. Hardly had he reached the trees when a wall of fire rose in front of him. He was taken off the ground and thrown right at the stranger’s feet. The fire was still blazing in the stranger’s hand. Hitting the ground, Vlad got the wind knocked out of him. The stranger leaned over him and smiled wryly.

“It looks like there’s been a mistake at Malefisterium,” he shook his head sorrowfully. “Apparently, you are an ordinary human being. But,” the tone of his voice changed, “I like you. I’d like to teach you something myself, but alas!”

He threw his hand up in the air: Time seemed to slow down. A fiery tail flashed through the air. Vlad snapped his eyes shut and thrust his hand out, protecting himself. He knew he couldn’t stop the ball of fire, but was reflexively trying to keep the fire away from his face.

The fight

A flash of blue light.

The flame in the stranger’s hand burst and threw him off.

Vlad opened his eyes.

His opponent was lying nearby, smoke coming from his hand and the right side of his face. Vlad came up to him, staggering, and knelt down. The skin on the stranger’s hand and face got burnt and was smoking. Some of his hair, the right eyebrow and the sleeve of the shirt were gone.

Vlad realized that the boy was not going to live through such injuries.

The tears came to his eyes.

“So many events on one day, and now a murder,” he lamented. “That’s a fine kettle of fish… It’s a good thing that Father Konstantin is not around. He would never forgive me… What have I done? But I didn’t know! How am I going to get to their world now?”

Vlad bit his lip and passed his hand gently over the healthy hand of the stranger.

The next instant he felt he was suffocating. And immediately he realized he was hanging in the air, and his throat was held by the scorched hand of his opponent. He had sprung to his feet swiftly and now clearly intended to break Vlad’s neck.

“You know, I could have easily burned you to ashes,” the stranger hissed out, though without confidence, “and scatter your ashes to the wind. Then, I would say in the Academy that the crystal responded the wrong way.”

Lilac-colored mist began to flow over the scorched arm of the stranger. It covered the shoulder and the injured half of his face. The boy waggled his head, shaking off the heavy mist.

Vlad opened his eyes wide with astonishment: No trace of injuries could be seen, and the skin didn’t have any burn marks. All the traces of fire vanished from the shirt. The stranger loosened his grip, and Vlad felt the ground under his feet. He fell heavily onto the grass.

“I have to give you credit,” the stranger said in a calm voice. “You managed to surprise me. And it means that you’ve passed.”

Vlad was sitting on the grass and rubbing his neck. He looked at the stranger distrustfully. Though he didn’t seem to attack again, Vlad decided that it would not be wise to provoke him.

The stranger held his hand out, offering help.

Vlad took his hand and felt his feet stand firmly on the ground. The stranger was a boy of uncommon strength, though he clearly didn’t look like an athlete.

“Peter Ravenwood!” the boy introduced himself ceremoniously.

“Vladislav Viggin!” Vlad offered his full name too. “Why couldn’t we have started with this?”

“Because very few people know my name outside the Academy. And those who know it say it with a lot of respect,” there was undisguised arrogance in the voice and gaze of Peter Ravenwood.

“And what is Mister… Ravenwood so famous for?” Vlad asked, with a shade of irony in his voice.

Peter’s eyes flashed.

“Don’t push it,” he patted Vlad’s shoulder. “I was given the order to bring you to the Academy. But masters never specified in what condition. So please, be respectful. I am one of the best students of the Academy, and that is all you need to know for now.”

Vlad bowed his head, hiding a smile. When he raised his head again, there was a serious look on his face.

“Now what?”

“Now,” Peter said with an air of importance, “I need to explain some of our rules to you. You will live on the Academy premises until the end of your education. Of course, if you are lucky to stay alive. Don’t look at me that way! Many of those who were as good as you became crippled or lost their lives. Magic is not about fairies, magic wands, and a happy ending.”

“I already got it,” Vlad mumbled, but Peter turned a deaf ear to him.

“Each newcomer has a mentor from among the senior students,” Peter made a wry face. “Mentors look after their mentees, answer their questions and help them with their studies. But they are neither babysitters nor bodyguards. If you think that your mentor is going to watch every step you take and dance attendance on you, you might want to think twice.”

“So, are you my mentor?”

“I need you like a hole in the head!” Peter brushed the question off. “The Council of Malefisterium will appoint your mentor.”

“Anything else?” Vlad asked dryly.

“Twice a year there is an evaluation of students’ progress.”

“Is it some kind of exam?”

“Yeah, though it is administered by the mentor. Trust me, what has happened here is child’s play comparing with the progress evaluation,” Peter summed up.

Ravenwood walked up to Vlad’s burnt shirt lying on the ground, picked it up and threw it to the boy. The shirt was undamaged.

“Get dressed,” he held out his hand again. “Of course, if you didn’t change your mind and don’t want to go back home.”

“I can’t go back home now,” Vlad said quietly.

Peter nodded knowingly. They joined hands and silently vanished into thin air.