The Games of Ganthrea Page 5

  He slid the papers over to them. Clicking their pens, they started signing on every agreement line they could find. Finally, seeing no more places to scribble, they looked up. Crestwood was watching both them and Brenner.

  With an eyebrow raised at them he broke the silence: “Aren’t you going to ask Brendon if he wants to go?”

  Albert blustered, “With an offer like this, why in the world wouldn’t he?! Anyone can see how…how important it is to serve our country, and especially when they are going to provide for your every need”—again Brenner read between the lines, that Albert was really talking about having all of their needs met—“How about it, boy? Are you going to step up and do something with your life? I don’t know why they picked you, but you better grab this opportunity!”

  “You heard how it’s free,” said Miranda, “You might as well.”

  Brenner had already made his decision before his parent’s half-hearted comments. It would be difficult, but it would be harder still to let both the amulet and Windelm be yanked away.

  Brenner looked from his parents to Windelm. “Yes…” he said. “I’ll go.”

  “That’s the ticket!” his father said.

  “Good choice,” chimed in his mother.

  Windelm smiled and nodded.

  “So, when does he leave?” Miranda asked expectantly.

  Windelm stood up and, as though talking about the evening’s weather forecast, said, “Right now.”

  Brenner had half-expected this, once he saw how quickly the letter had come, and the date for their meeting. Even though Windelm did not rush through conversations, once a decision was reached, his actions were resolute. Brenner stood, left the table, and picked up his backpack. It’s really happening…

  His parents stood and followed Windelm and Brenner to the door. “Well, good luck then,” his father said, glancing down at him, “and don’t do anything stupid to get us in trouble.”

  “Yes, sir,” Brenner said.

  His mother’s phone vibrated and she looked down at the message. “Have a good time, Brenner,” she said absentmindedly, as if he was leaving for a sleepover at someone’s house.

  “I will,” Brenner said. And then, despite his parents’ absence from his pursuits for the majority of his childhood and adolescence, or maybe because of it, Brenner felt a tinge of sadness. “Well…” he said, “goodbye then.”

  With that, Brenner and Windelm walked over the threshold, then down the sidewalk to the black sedan that started its engine as they approached. Looking extremely pleased with the deal, his parents grinned at each other in the doorway, nodded once to Brenner, and shut the door after them.

  Brenner climbed into the backseat, Windelm into the passenger’s, and a chauffeur drove them away.

  “Brenner,” Windelm said, as they coasted through his neighborhood, “this is Terry.” He motioned to their driver, a stocky, middle-aged man, also in a suit. “Terry, please take us to Culver Street and follow it until you reach Noble, about three miles north of here.”

  Terry nodded eagerly.

  As the car drove on, Brenner watched his familiar haunts pass by, and then the woods. Yesterday, while walking through the woods after school, it started to sink in how he’d be gone for two years, maybe more. He had stopped at his tower, and decided to do something he’d never done before: he stuck one of his trapdoor keys under a piece of tape on the top step. Hopefully someone would discover it, and enjoy his tower while he was gone.

  “Terry,” said Windelm, “pull over by that blue collection mailbox.”

  The car slowed. Windelm opened the lid and deposited a sealed envelope with the words ‘Clemson High School’ on the front. The metal lid clanged shut. Then he turned back to Brenner and said, “That will notify your school that you’re no longer enrolled due to an academic transfer.” Brenner nodded; the last tie to his ordinary life was severed.

  “Carry on, Terry,” said Windelm.

  Terry, who wore a beige colored shirt and an even duller expression, remained mute for the drive, like he was on auto-pilot. This was confirmed later when Brenner saw a fly land on Terry’s ear, and rather than swat at it, he just kept looking straight ahead. As they were driving by another grove of pine and aspen, Windelm said, “Terry, this looks good. You may stop.”

  The car eased next to the trees and green shrubs. Windelm exited the car, and Brenner followed.

  Windelm grabbed something from the trunk, and before shutting his door, pointed his walking stick at Terry. A thin blue streak of energy floated around Terry, then returned to Windelm. Windelm shut the door. Through the window, Terry looked dazed, as though waking from a nap.

  “Come along,” Windelm said to Brenner, turning on the spot, and ushering him along the path and into the woods.

  “Windelm,” Brenner asked when they were no longer within range of the road, “who was that man?”

  “Terry Brocklehurst,” he said, “a fine fellow who was kind enough to be my chauffeur for the afternoon.”

  “What was that blue stuff you directed at him?”

  “A mental spell. I saw him leaving for work this morning and planted the idea in his mind that he really needed a new suit in my size, and that he had important work to do from home in the afternoon.” Pinching the lapel of his black suit, Windelm added, “he did a fine job selecting this one.”

  “Wait, you controlled his mind?” Brenner asked.

  “Of course,” said Windelm nonchalantly. “Magic isn’t just all bursts of fire and enabling books to fly, you know. I merely suppressed some of his other desires and implanted ones that involved being a chauffeur for me, keeping quiet unless spoken to, and doing what I instructed. And as I haven’t the slightest idea how to drive one of your automobiles,” he waved his hand in the air, “I needed a suitable escort.”

  Brenner felt a little guilty: because of him, Windelm manipulated an innocent person.

  “Did it hurt him?”

  “Heavens no. Don’t worry, Brenner, I checked to see he wasn’t a surgeon scheduled for operation, or a parent responsible for watching his kids for the day. He was a salesman for an insurance company, and his afternoon was hardly dashed. He’ll just have to reschedule golf and drinks with managers for next week. With no recollection of the afternoon, his life will continue as normal.”

  Brenner breathed easier, then asked, “When did you have time for that haircut? You look more like a drill sergeant than a wizard.”

  “Oh right, that,” he said, and bent his head forward while aiming his staff at it. The short, cropped hair immediately sprouted before his eyes like tendrils of kudzu vines, and his beard grew until the bristles were thick like the muzzle of a bear. Try as he might, Brenner could not help himself from gaping like an idiot each time Windelm performed another bit of magic. “Much better,” said Windelm, “And I’m not yet a full-wizard, I’m a sorcerer, just one notch below the the highest spellcaster rank.”

  Brenner and Windelm walked briskly for another twenty minutes, then left the path and came to a rocky ledge. Windelm used his staff to levitate and move a coffin-sized boulder away from the others. Behind the rock was a small cavity, where Windelm had stashed his boots, pants, cloak, and tunic.

  “If you don’t mind,” he said to Brenner, pointing his finger away and making a swirling motion.

  Brenner turned and admired the forest while Windelm changed. The last rays of sun were striking down through the thick glen. He would miss the fresh air and peaceful atmosphere of the pine forest. Would Ganthrea have such beauty?

  Windelm walked past Brenner in his cloak and started making a couple marks in the ground. Brenner turned to see Windelm’s former suit, dress shoes and garments scattered pell-mell by the rocks.

  “You can’t just leave them there.”

  “Leave what?”

  “Your suit and stuff. It will look like some weirdo came out here, stripped down, and went on a rampage through the woods.”

  “So it may,” Windelm replied nonplus
sed, continuing with his efforts to draw a few more symbols in the dirt.

  Brenner crossed his arms. “I thought we were supposed to be inconspicuous?”

  Windelm paused and sighed, “If you insist.” He turned to the pile of dress clothes. Shooting a spell at it, he animated the suit to fling itself up from the ground, then grasses zoomed up and stuffed themselves inside shoes, pants, and shirt, and then crunched together into a well-dressed scarecrow before launching upwards and sticking itself onto a pine tree.

  Windelm used another spell from his staff to inscribe a title on a rock standing knee high next to the tree: “Suit Yourself, on Pine #3.”

  He smiled at how absurd it looked, and then said to Brenner, “That should turn a few heads.” A few minutes more of drawing symbols on the ground and he was finished. “You have your backpack and items you wish to take with you?”

  Brenner patted his pockets and backpack, and his hand brushed against a folded photo he’d almost forgotten about. “Windelm,” he said, pulling out the barn photograph he found a few days ago, “what can you tell me about this?”

  Windelm leaned over, and holding it up, gave a soft smile. “That was the summer my father borrowed the neighbor’s Kodak to take a few pictures of farm equipment to sell, and got one of us kids, too: Lester, Laura, and me. I was going off to the river, hoping to catch more smallmouth bass. Lester and Laura preferred staying around home. The last time I saw them was a couple years after that photo…” He gave it gently back to Brenner. “Thanks.”

  Brenner put it back in his pocket, and then checked his necklace to see the amulet. “I’m ready.”

  “Great,” said Windelm. “Now, the next spell I cast is going to be unlike anything you’ve ever seen. In fact, you won’t see it.” He chuckled at himself. “What you’ll hear is the sound of rushing rapids.”

  Brenner steeled himself, and turned to look at Windelm, “So this is it, huh?”

  “Yes, and try not to worry about the pressure. It will be over sooner than you think. Now grab onto my hand, and whatever you do, don’t let go.”

  Brenner took his hand, and Windelm scanned the perimeter once more. He said something under his breath, and suddenly the air in front of them split apart with a loud, low grind, as though two ships collided, scraping their metal hulls against each other. Their legs shook from the tremor of energy.

  In front of them hovered something translucent, the size of a small window, blurring the trees behind it.

  Involuntarily, Brenner squeezed Windelm’s hand.

  Windelm had to shout over the noise that engulfed them, “On my count, Brenner, we jump!”

  Brenner’s felt like he was standing on a wooden plank above an angry sea. The portal had something like a magnetic pull, tugging his sweatshirt and jeans forward.

  “Steady now…” Windelm commanded over the noise, “three…two… one…jump!” he shouted, yanking Brenner’s hand as they leapt headfirst into the abyss.

  And then they were gone.

  The roaring portal vanished, along with any earthly trace of Brenner Wahlridge.

  Chapter Six

  Ganthrea Unveiled

  Moisture pooled in Brenner’s eyes—they were flying at such dizzying speeds, spiraling through the portal toward a distant horizon. Breathing became difficult: Brenner’s body felt squished, like he was diving leagues under the ocean.

  They were traveling away from misty grays and pale greens, flying towards a convergence of rainbow colors, with a white bulb at the center of the horizon, growing and growing like the headlight on a locomotive chugging full throttle at them.

  The pressure magnified against his bones—the light ahead grew to the size of a whale, its mouth open wide to swallow them, its whiteness nearly blinding—Brenner started to lose focus—the collision now seconds away, the white sphere rushing at them head on—

  Then, like twin bullets breaking a pane of glass, Windelm and Brenner shot through the portal and onto the jungle floor. Unlike Windelm, who landed on his feet with the alacrity of a gymnast, Brenner belly-flopped with an “Oomph!” into a tangle of bushes.

  Gingerly, he moved his arms; every muscle in his body felt bruised, as though he had just rolled a car into a ditch. After much effort, he sat up.

  “We should be grateful,” Windelm said, smiling. “At least our entrance portal wasn’t smack in front of an Ironclad tree. Last time through that’s exactly what happened to me. Took five spells to get my nose straightened out.”

  Brenner was wondering how Windelm stood so easily, and flinched as Windelm pointed the wooden staff at his chest.

  “Wait a sec—” he started to protest, but before he could finish, a green bolt shot forward from the staff, wrapped around Brenner, and then returned to Windelm, taking his aches and pains with it. “That’s incredible!” he said, eyeing Windelm’s stick and rising to his feet. “I feel like I could run for miles.”

  “Well, that’s good,” Windelm said, glancing around the immense forest, “because that’s what we’re doing next.”

  No longer focused on his fatigue, Brenner took in the surroundings. “Windelm…where are we?”

  “Thought you’d never ask,” Windelm said with a smile. “Brenner, welcome to Ganthrea.”

  Like a child marveling at the magnitude of the sky for the first time, Brenner’s mouth gaped open as if he could drink in the scenery. Huge, lush, mossy green trees shot up so high he couldn’t see where they ended—making his Cottonwood in Colorado seem like a seedling. Faint tropical birdcalls whistled down from the canopy, and a breeze brought the fresh smell of citrus to his nostrils. Brenner took several steps on the soft forest floor toward the nearest tree. He placed his palm on the thick bark, noticing the strong smell of cinnamon. The trees’ girth was astounding: each was as wide as his garage, and this one, even larger. If someone carved a tunnel through the thick layers of bark and heartwood and then out the other side, two semi-trucks could pass one another with ease.

  “To be more specific,” Windelm said, “we are in the middle region of Silvalo, the healing land of forests, one of the Seven Biomes of Ganthrea.”

  “You…live…here?” Brenner said, staring at the trees, and then at Windelm.

  “I live in a place similar to this, yes, but closer to Silvalo’s central city, Arborio.” Seeming to sense Brenner’s next question, Windelm added, “But I didn’t want to draw attention to ourselves by shooting out from a portal in the middle of a packed marketplace. So, we trek on from here.”

  Brenner nodded, looking at the shimmering beds of vase-like plants around the jungle floor. Even if Windelm showed him nothing else in Ganthrea, he felt he could be content for a long time.

  “Come,” said Windelm, waving a hand in front of Brenner’s eyes, “we have about two hours before sundown, and then we’ll need to make camp for the night.”

  Windelm found something like a deer trail, and Brenner followed. As they walked, Brenner tried identifying the strange noises, what sounded like primates calling in baritones to each other high above, birds chirruping unusual melodies from all heights, and adapting to the colossal size of everything. Windelm pointed out some of the trees, some Brenner had heard of—acacias, rubber trees, mahogany—and also explained new ones: the largest, which smelled faintly of cinnamon, were called oakbrawns, others were ironclads, dragonbarks, and magnayans, which had multiple twisting trunks that braided together like thick ropes. Despite his age, Windelm moved with surprising agility—with one hand jumping over giant roots, the other gripping his staff.

  “Windelm, that wooden staff of yours…is it some sort of wand?”

  “This?” Windelm said, holding up the staff. “It’s called a mirconduit, or mircon, for short. It’s similar to what you probably think of as a wand, but only works when the spellcaster using it has elixir to draw upon.” He pointed to Brenner’s chest. “That’s where your amulet comes into play. When you’ve mastered the physical enhancements of your amulet, you’ll be trained to channel e
lixir into a mircon to form spells, which travel like a loop to your target and back. Learning how to handle a mircon without damaging yourself is one of the reasons why you’ll want to attend Valoria.”

  “Valoria?”

  “Yes. One of Ganthrea’s premiere academies of magic.”

  Brenner had mixed feelings about that. Although he performed well in his classes at Clemson High School, he had failed miserably at making social connections. He could count on one hand the number of people that talked to him. Would this academy be any better? He pulled out the amulet from under his shirt, watching the elixir swirling crimson and green.

  “Windelm…what is elixir?”

  “Elixir is the liquid-like magic generated in the heart of every land. While it’s usually concentrated underground, at rare intervals it swirls up in atmospheric storms, like aurora borealis.”

  “The Northern Lights?”

  “Yes. The storms are brief, and the elixir quickly dissipates into the air or soaks down to a groundswell.”

  “So…this elixir in my amulet is why I was able to sprint, jump and breathe so well—its magic was coursing through my body!”

  “Precisely,” said Windelm, “And usually it takes people several weeks to adapt to the elixir. You developed an affinity for it fairly rapidly.”

  “Thanks,” Brenner said, following Windelm and climbing over canoe-sized roots. He tried to guess just how old these ancient trees were…easily a thousand, maybe two thousand years… Looking up at the oakbrawn’s tree limbs, some forty or fifty stories overhead, he had a sobering thought: What if a branch snapped off? It’d be like a water tower breaking off its posts and plummeting hundreds of feet down, crushing anything or anyone unlucky enough to be there. He shuddered and kept alert for any creaking sounds overhead. Windelm turned and saw him eyeing the treetops.

  “Anything the matter?”

  “No…just, how much do you think the branches above us weigh?”

  “They’re probably several thousand pounds per limb, but they’re very sturdy. You can relax.”