FirstLineFiction beta

from Contest #7

  "She's a local." I said to myself when I first glimpsed her walking toward me.
   She had that confident stride of someone who was in familiar territory, and knows where she is going.
I was surprised because we were on the waterfront of a port town, mostly populated by drunk sailors off ships and 
the tarts who prey on them, and she was dressed like a wealthy diva.
   It was not a good time to get sidetracked by a pretty face, I was hiding in a dimensional nexus waiting on my contact. 
He was to guide me to a treasure of magical books written by one of the greatest sorcerers in history. 
No one knows what his name was, all that was known of him was from his books of spells. 
   My name is Theo and I'm a half elf Thief/Magician looking for spell to help me enter a certain wizards refuge. It can't be 
found by looking for it, you have to be invited or be able to divine its location. The rumor of the book that my 
contact/guide is supposed to know of, tells of a spell to locate the hidden.
   I suddenly realize the local female had stopped at the rendezvous point and was giving the correct call sign. I focus 
my attention on her and use a reveal spell on her and discover that not only is she not human but is a Dark Elf.
Her disguise is necessary because the dark elves are universally despised and feared. They worship the Spider Queen 
(The Mistress of chaos) and the females are almost all high priestesses. With powers given to them by their deity.
I finally decide to meet her and step out of the nexus to confront her. She is not surprised by my sudden appearance, 
or at least didn't show it.
   Are you ready to go, she asks.
   I am, I reply. I will meet you at the north gate in 20 minutes.	
   I notice as I say this that she is armed with a long knife that is partially hidden under her cloak. 
   She nods assent and disappears into the crowd of late afternoon traffic, as I move toward my quarters to pick up 
my supplies and horses and head for the northern gate.
  I meet her and we head out on the north road toward the mountain pass to the central highlands.
  It was getting dark and I started looking for a place to spend the night.
  She suddenly turned off the path and entered a narrow track that ended in a small clearing, that had obviously been 
used many times. There was a fire ring with a supply of wood near by.
  At first lite we were up and moving, and as we enter the pass, she turns to me and points out a little traveled track 
toward the west that goes deeper into the wild area of the mountains where the Orc's goblins and giants have their lairs.
As a precaution, I readied several offensive and defensive spells and loosened my sword in it's sheath. We are so close 
to populated country that the possibility of a confrontation is slim. But it makes me feel better to prepare.
  The path we are on appears to skirt the worst area of the mountains. After several days we are close to a high plateau
and my companion turns toward it and start up a narrow switchback trail climbing the plateau. About halfway up we
turned into a cleft and traveled for several minutes and entered a tunnel that came out on top of the plateau.
   As we got to the top, my guide turned and said "We won't be able to see the entrance until the moon comes up. There 
are moon runes on the door.
   Sunset was several hours off so we made camp and settled in for the wait.
While waiting she infromed me as soon as the door became visable she was leaving having fulfilled her contract with me 
and payment would be due at that time. I had the agred on price with me and was not worried about that, but wasn't too 
crazy about trveling back to town alone thru these mountains, so I asked her if she would consider staying on for the 
return trip for half again as much gold. She didn't particularly like the idea but finally agreed, with the stipulation that I 
alone was entering the chamber where the books were. She wasn't going to take the chance of getting caught in any 
magical traps.
   We were high enough in the mountains that as the sun went down the temperature started dropping rapidly and I 
built up the fire. The dark elf huddled between the rock face  and the fire, not being used to the cold. It was still several 
hours before moon rise. We huddled in our cloaks waiting for the moon to rise and tried to keep warm.
The time finally came and the moon began to rise, after about 2 hours the moon light finally reached the door and the 
runes start to glow. I now know where the door is but how do I gain entrance.
I use a spell that reveals traps and there are several, they are weak and worn with time but still there. Another spell 
tells me the sequence in which they were set. If I try to disable the wrong spell first they all will activate and I will be in 
deep trouble.
  I back off as far as possible and still be close enough to work the necessary disarming spells, and start. I start by setting
my protections, I drew the signs necessary in the dirt making sure that there were no breaks and set them. The symbols
started to glow as soon as they were set and I knew it was time to tackle the first layer spell.
 There were 10 spells set in layers and I easily removed the first eight spells. The ninth I didn't recognize and it took a long
time to discover its nature but i finally did.
   The tenth spell was the master spell, I spent a long time studying it and going through my spell books. I finally decided it
was a multiple spell. He had combined the effects of several spells to create it. This required me to recreate what he did, 
so I had to discover the spells he combined and there is no room for a mistake. I had been at it for 8 hours so I decided it
would be better to wait till moon rise the next night to continue.
   I broke my protections and retreated to the camp and told my companion that I still had to work on it. and was going to 
get some sleep and asked if she needed any help before i bedded down for the day. She replied that she had everything 
under control.
   When i awoke i noticed she had had some trouble with a small band of goblins. She informed me when asked, that when 
they discovered she was a dark elf they turned and ran as fast as they could, she thought they were probably still running.
Moon rise was close and I started studying the spell again. I had to be extremely careful not to trigger the spell. I still 
wasn't sure what it would do and I didn't want to find out the hard way. I reset my protections and finally decided on the 
approach to take. It involved casting multiple spells at once and I would be exhausted when done. I started casting and 
the last trap started to unravel, and then as i ended my casting I discovered that I had missed a part of the spell and the 
doorway exploded with fire so intense that the ground around my protections started to boil. but it was weakened with
age and my protections held, just barely. As the fire died I passed out from the strain of reinforcing the protective field.
When I awoke, it was getting light and the ground was still smoldering. I looked toward the door in the rock wall and it 
was gone. I wasn't going to enter in the condition I was in. I needed to recuperate and do some more spell casting to 
determine if there were more spells in the interior of the room that appeared when the door disappeared. I sensed 
something was still there.
   My unnamed companion had fixed a meal and we ate and discussed the progress I had made. After eating I got up and 
walked around and cleared my thoughts and prepared to test the room. It required more protections and spell casting 
to determine what traps were still there.
  I started to cast and discovered that there was one spell left but not a trap it was a preservation spell on the room itself 
to preserve the contents. It was a powerful spell, if I had entered it would have preserved me to. I had to remove it before 
  I could enter and find the book or books. Before starting I put protective spells around the rock entrance to keep 
anything that might be released inside the room.
   I broke the preservation spell and was very glad for the protections I set, A pair of skeletons stepped out of the gloom 
and when they hit the barrier I had set, they disintegrated. I illuminated the chamber and saw that there was a single table
with a leather bound book in the middle on a stand. I quickly picked it up and took it out of the room and put it in my
pack. 
I turned to my companion and informed her it was time to leave.
  We traveled back the way we came  and ten days later we arrived in the city. I retired to my rented room and began 
studying. It will take a very long time to get through the book. It is written in Dwarven script.  I will have to translate it as 
I read, and it is many hundreds of pages.
   I guess I didn't have anything else to do over the winter. This will keep me busy during the gloomy winter days.

back to Contest #7