~~~~
His first call came two days later,
he was in tears. One of his experiments with the book went awry, and he had
burned his left arm with an unknown liquid. The pain was so great he was afraid
he would lose his arm. I'd heard of this before, a classic mishap with common
potions brews. This was an easy fix.
First I told him, "In order to
treat this wound you'll have to do exactly as I say. Don't question anything I
ask or tell you to do, understand?"
He screamed out a mangled yes.
"Good. First, take some pain
medication." Truthfully, no over-the-counter medication would be strong
enough to numb the pain. The hope was a placebo effect would calm him down
enough to follow the rest of my instructions. "Don't bother with
ointments," I told him, "they can't help the kind of burn you
have."
He continued to panic and scream for
a while until he managed to find some pain relievers. As expected they didn't
help much, but now I had his attention. "Next, do you have any oak trees
on your property or are there any nearby?"
"Why?" he managed to say.
"Answer the question," I
yelled at him.
He nearly descended back into his
pained screams from before, but still managed to answer, "Yes."
That was what I wanted to hear,
"Excellent, now for the next part you'll need a knife..."
~--~
"To make a long story
short," she explained. "I talked to him through an old healing method
that used oak tree bark and leaves to heal his burns. It was a basic remedy,
but the mighty oak is a holy tree. Perfect for countering the unholy liquid
that burned him in the first place. Thankfully, he had a white oak in his front
yard, I don't think a red oak would have been enough."
You roll your eyes.
"Regardless," Valencia
began again, "after I helped him with this little incident, your friend
seemed to warm to me."
You tilted your head.
"He would call often, and began
to take my advice very seriously," she played with her cigarette. "I
had made some honest progress with him over those first few weeks. His panicked
calls where he asked me how to reverse his latest mishap were slowly replaced
with inquiries for genuine advice. I never met him in person again, but I could
tell from the tone of his voice he had begun to reverse his affliction."
Your eyes lit up but quickly
deflated as you realized where she was going with this.
"However," she sighed,
"just as he began to turn himself around, his temptations got the better
of him."
~--~
It was a little over a month after I
had begun to regularly dispense advice to your friend. He slowly began to slip
off the deep end once again. I first noticed when he'd rebuttal some of my
advice with the material he'd read in his precious book. The first time it
wasn't egregious. I provided him with basic advice for one of his experiments
and he told me he already learned that elsewhere. It didn't reach the point of
concern until a certain experiment about four weeks ago.
You see, after a month under my
guidance he felt ready to move onto a more complicated endeavor. The creation
of a small barrier. Barriers are by no means the most complex magic. However,
for an absolute novice with no prior experience they can seem insurmountable. So,
for his first experiment with barriers he started small, and attempted to trap
a common housefly within one.
He had me on the phone as he prepped
the experiment, in case he "trapped his hand in it or something." It
was a simple set up really. Draw a sigil on his kitchen table, release the fly over
it and activate the barrier with the sigil as the base. I thoroughly described
to him the proper way to draw a sigil and what materials to use. A very
important step, as failure to draw the sigil properly could result in any
number of horrible outcomes.
I had told him, "Since this is
practice don't bother drawing the sigil in your own blood. Red paint should be sufficient.
Be sure to use as few strokes as possible when drawing it. Even small
variations can change the barrier's behavior. If you screw up, wipe up the
paint thoroughly and start over. Lastly, when activating it distance yourself
from the table and touch the edge of the sigil with your finger.
Understand?"
Then he for the first time in over a
month he questioned my advice, "Can't I activate it verbally? Wouldn't
that be safer and easier?" He wasn't wrong, it would be easier, but not necessarily
safer at his level.
In turn, I warned him, "And
what happens if you misspeak? I told you never to question me didn't I?"
He coughed, "You did..."
I was more than a little frustrated
he'd suddenly doubted the validity of my advice. I expressed my displeasure thusly,
"Where did you even learn of that anyway? I never told you anything about
incantations."
He remained silent for a few moments
before he answered, "I read it in the book. It recommended activating
barriers verbally so you could maintain a safe distance."
Admittedly that was decent advice,
but not something he needed to worry about at his level. The experiment
continued from then on without incident, but I was suspicious. I wondered where
in his book he had read such advice and what it could mean. I had this deep-seated
sensation in my gut he was about to do something foolish. His future experiments
only reinforced this idea.
His barrier experiments quickly
progressed each night. From houseflies to spiders, to mice, a raccoon and eventually
a deer. He also dabbled in potions again and even managed to turn a crow into a
familiar. The last one was particularly impressive to me as he didn't even
consult me for it. So, it was quite the surprise when he called me to ask about
the proper care and feeding of his new companion.
The situation with the crow finally
prompted me to ask him, "What else have you been doing without consulting
me?"
He made a meek reply of,
"Nothing much, nothing serious at least."
I pressed further, "Oh really?
If it's nothing serious I'm sure you can tell me, I want to know how well
you're progressing on your own."
He mumbled a bit before answering,
"Mostly reading through the book..."
I almost had him, "Really? What
chapters? What content?"
I could almost hear him sweat at
this point, "Just stuff like advanced potions and um...familiar training
um...s-summoning..."
Suddenly his hesitation began to
make sense, "What kind of summoning?"
He didn't answer for a long time,
"N-nothing major, just basic stuff like, like..."
I knew what his plan was and again I
warned him, "I can't believe I have to repeat this again, but it seems you
didn't get it the first time. If you continue down this path, you will die.
Stick to the simple parlor tricks, you actually have a talent for those."
I received a familiar response,
"But, I'm so close..." and with that, he hung up on me.
~--~
"And that's the last I heard
from him," Valencia put out her cigarette, "I hoped he would come to
his senses. I even called him a couple times, thinking I could scare him
straight again, but he never picked up."
Your gaze drifted to the floor.
"If you want my professional
opinion," she left her cigarette in the ashtray, "your friend is a
victim of his own hubris. He overestimated his own mastery of the dark arts and
attempted something he was not capable of and died for it."
You winced.
"I cannot say for certain what
your friend attempted to summon, but I can guess," Valencia leaned back
into her chair, fingers clasped together under her chin. "It was something
that defied human understanding. The indescribable monster that lurks in your
nightmares."
You refused to meet her gaze.
"As for the why," she
turned to look out at the moonlight view behind her. "Maybe he wanted
power, maybe he wanted to prove something or perhaps he wanted answers. It is
also possible he didn't even know why himself. For whatever reason, he bit off
more than he could chew. He will eventually fade from memory as simply another
mysterious, unfortunate death."
You shot her a frustrated look.
"If you want my advice,"
Valencia turned back towards you, "for your own sanity it is best to let
this rest. Return to your life and leave this unfortunate accident behind you.
The alternative means ending up like your friend, another mess that people like
me will need to clean up."
You glared at her before you realize
the full implication of what she said.
"Also, be sure to avoid your
friend's old property for a while," she continued. "At least until I
can give it a thorough cleaning."
You gave her a confused look.
"Well, I've explained what
happened to your friend. I hope you're satisfied," Valencia rested her
arms on the table. "If you have any more questions tough luck. Walter,
please show them the door."
Before you could even respond the
man from before appeared beside you, as though he was always there. In a few
swift motions, he yanked you out of the chair and rushed you to the door.
Within what felt like seconds you found yourself outside, with your back to the
front door. You looked up to the still-lit window and saw the light fade away.
You turned back to your car, the night was dark and the moon still hung in the
sky. You don't know how long you were in there, and part of you is afraid to
hear the actual answer. You shook your head and returned to your car, you
needed time to think. You switched the car on and drove off into the night.
~~~~
So, there you go, my longest story yet. This was fun to write, it took me a long time, but I probably could have written it a lot faster. As for the magic in this story, I deliberately suppressed its presence to give it a mysterious air. Honestly, it was half made up and half inspired. For example, the white oak bit from the first part. The white oak is considered a holy tree and water drawn from the tree is believed to have healing properties. However, other stuff like the barrier and potions were mostly created as I wrote the story.
Regardless, I'm really happy with this story and I hope you people enjoyed it to. I've got more quality stories ready for the next few weeks, especially for October.
Until then Read, Comment and Enjoy.
No comments:
Post a Comment