A Darker Shade of Sorcery - - (leveled readers .txt) 📗

class="calibre1">After a heart-stopping moment, he released her.

“I can’t believe I was scared when I first saw you,” Brooke admitted. “Well actually, when I first saw you I couldn’t believe such a human could exist.” She blushed as she realised what she'd said.

She hurried quickly on. “Did you-I’m sure you did something to me to make me follow you from the club that night?”

Arantay’s face was expressionless. “Perhaps. I have certain abilities other Venators do not. Like drawing others to me and calming them with my touch.”

“How come you have these abilities?”

Arantay coughed. “On with the training.”

Brooke frowned. She wanted to know all about him, unveil the enigma, but she didn’t want to push it either.

“Lastly, is wrestling.”

“Wrestling?” she giggled.

“Well when arms and legs fail, use both.”

Arantay moved back, spreading his arms as wide as his grin. “Try and take me down.”

Brooke took a second to compose herself, before attempting to tackle him like her old schoolmates did in American football.

Arantay didn’t budge, his body seemed as heavy as the marble statue he resembled.

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Suddenly she felt his hands as Arantay lifted her up, flipped her over and laid her smoothly on the ground. Both of them laughed, Brooke giving in after pretending to be annoyed.

The atmosphere changed as she their eyes met, their faces only inches apart.

He was so close she could feel his warm breath tickling her face. Again, Brooke was struck with the almost overwhelming urge to bring her lips up to meet his own.

But then Arantay stood upright, holding out his hand to pick her up.

She took it reluctantly. Perhaps the disappointment showed on her face, because he gave her a curious glance.

“Well, another good training session.”

“Yeah, thanks,” she replied, still unable to keep the disappointment from her voice.

“Same time tomorrow,” he promised.

As Brooke considered whether to tell him how she felt, she discovered she was alone in the courtyard. He had already melted into the shadows.

*

Evan smiled as he walked through Castle-Coterie, making his way back to his room. It had been a long, but fantastic day.

Apart from the nightmare which awoke him, (the same recurring vision of the beautiful but terrible purple-eyed woman,) it’d been his best day of training yet.

He’d invented a trick with his sword, casting his own green flames on Ruaden’s emerald crystal so the whole blade was alight, and looked awesome too. Zeke was so surprised by the trick, that Evan bested him in sparring for the first time. Evan was skilled, but considering the Yurod aliens were renowned for being great warriors who

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craved physical activity, (a fat Yurod didn’t exist,) Izekiel was the best Novice with weapons.

Training had finished for the day, but many of the clubs were still going on. Evan passed through the corridor where the theatre and magical music chambers were situated. A sign on the door to the theatre read: Rehearsals for the play: Werebear on a Cold Castle Battlement, in progress, whilst the strange tunes of the musicians were so loud they blared through the stone wall beside him.

As he turned the corner and stepped on to the illuminated escalator, the music faded and the castle fell silent. Evan was relieved he could finally navigate his way around the castles, well, he hadn’t gotten lost in three days at least. He’d quickly learned walking through the Fortress was a mini-adventure itself, even without getting lost. Almost every corridor had statues and Realmers were forever jumping when one of them moved unexpectedly. A golem in Titantower actually made it his job to jump out and scare Venators several times a day.

Almost as bad was the statue named Proffesor Brainberg, who always asked everyone philosophical questions in the hope of a lengthy debate. There was a horrible Hobgoblin statue who insulted anyone who walked past his perch and threw food at trainee’s heads. Statues of white knights were stationed in the bathrooms, demanding that Venators wash their hands before leaving. Then there was Manox the Mannequin, who jumped round corners to steal things. Two days ago he’d snatched Evan’s banana and ran down the hall, slapping Xavier across the face with it as he went.

Some of the doors were alive too. One door snored loudly, another whooped when you opened it and a third door constantly told knock-knock jokes. Even the plant-life

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joined in. Yesterday Jed had walked by a sunflower who felt it opportune to head-butt him. Evan had to drag Jed away before he destroyed the flower and got in trouble.

Evan’s favourite castle creatures were the pack of Droges who lived in Castle-Coterie. He was thrilled when he first met one of the half-dragon, half-dog animals.

They were as big as medium sized dogs, but otherwise appeared as a dragon would, except for the lolling tongue, excited panting and the tiny spouts of flame that accompanied their bark. Whenever Evan saw one of the Droges it bounded up to him, licked his hands and rolled on its belly so Evan could stroke its scales.

As he arrived on the fourth floor atrium, Evan guessed the time was around eleven, as the majority of Venators were in bed.

Other than Xavier on cleaning duty and Padrake, who stood on one of the balconies smoking a pipe, no one else was around.

Evan waved to Xavier before starting down a route he'd discovered was a shortcut.

The series of narrow corridors were dark and silent, but it would lead him straight to the Novice rooms. Halfway down the final corridor Evan felt sure someone was behind him. He turned sharply, but there was no one there.

He chuckled at his nervousness, and then began to choke as his air supply was cut off.

Evan clawed at his throat as the invisible vice squeezed tighter. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't breathe. As he staggered into the wall, he saw the figure in the distance, walking purposely towards him.

The stranger was covered by a hooded white robe. Whoever it was weaved their air magic so tight around Evan's neck that he sank to his knees, convulsing.

He was suffocating, he was going to die.

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Chapter 15- Paranoia

Evan’s fingers scrabbled at his throat on instinct, as if he could rip the choke spell away with his hands.

Abruptly the silence was shattered by a chorus of laughter. The hooded figure froze before sprinting down the corridor and out of sight. As his attacker disappeared, the invisible vice at his throat snapped and Evan collapsed, gulping and spluttering.

“Hey, are you all right?”

Evan managed to look up, it appeared a group of Apprentices, (the source of the loud laughter,) had appeared at the other end of the passageway and scared the strangler off.

Evan lurched to his feet without speaking to the group, running down the corridor in the direction his assailant had fled. When he reached the fourth-floor atrium however, it was empty.

*

“Neither of you saw anything?” Tarensen demanded of Padrake and Xavier.

“I told you, I went up to the fifth floor to scrub Greg the gargoyle clean, seconds after I saw Evan,” a wide-eyed Xavier replied.

Evan had done the only thing he could and told Tarensen what had happened.

He must be in shock, it had happened so fast, it didn’t feel real.

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“I only went to the balcony outside my quarters for a quick smoke,” Padrake said meekly. “I saw no sign of this hooded figure Umbra describes.”

Tarensen's face twisted in fury. “Right under our noses. And you say it wasn't a demon this time, Evander? It was one of our own people?”

Evan nodded. It couldn’t have been a demon. He’d seen two human hands beneath the robe. He felt like he was having heart palpitations. It was bad enough demons were hunting him, now he couldn't trust the Masters or even the other Venators.

“Now, let’s not be hasty,” Padrake stammered, “just because Umbra was attacked in the castle doesn't mean a Realmer was the attacker. Someone must've got into the city and travelled here afterwards. If Umbra is correct and his attacker was human, it must've been a Rakarn.”

“Rakarn?” Evan asked.

“The official term for a Dark-Realmer,” said Padrake. “In demonic language it translates to child, named so by Akirandon as she considers them her children.”

“Whether it was a Rakarn masquerading as one of us, or a traitor, I will find him,”

Tarensen snapped. “Umbra, did you see your attacker's face at all?”

“No, nothing. Their face was covered. Their hands were pale, but that's all I know.”

Tarensen cursed. “Padrake, tell the Masters to question every Venator. Find out if anyone saw someone wearing hooded white robes tonight. I will station orc guards from the city throughout the Fortress and place two outside your door. We will root out this attacker, I promise you.”

*

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Tarensen was true to his word. The Novices in Evan's corridor awoke the next morning, shocked to see two huge orcs outside his bedroom door. Brooke and Jed were gobsmacked when Evan told them. Then they quickly became like his very own orc guards.

“I can't believe something like that could've happened dude,” Jed kept repeating.

“We'll have to make sure you don't go anywhere alone again,” Brooke vowed.

“That means you even have to go to the toilet when Evan does, Jed.”

“Oh, do I have to bathe with him too?” Jed replied as they entered their first training session of the day.

Evan's mind had festered with fear and paranoia all night. But at last he'd convinced himself the hooded stranger would be stupid to attack again. Not with the Fortress on high alert now. Still, Evan couldn't help himself from worrying. He hoped training would take his mind off it.

In Alchemy and Enchantment class they created augmentation stones that once bound to a weapon, would permanently make it sharp enough to slice through brick.

Extended Sorcery was next, where they were learning an incantation to make language universal.

“From Russian to Romanian, Dragyr to Orcish,” Master Balzabar proclaimed,

“you can understand them all temporarily. This spell is especially convenient on missions, dealing with races who wouldn't understand human languages. The Fortress is enchanted with this spell so all of us, no matter where we come from, can understand one another.”

“I wondered why I could understand those sexy Mediterranean chicks in Ethanc’s.” Jed grinned.

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After that, Brooke had Healing training as the rest of them headed for an early lunch. As Evan picked his food, (roast cockatrice,) Elijah appeared and immediately gossiped with Emillia about other Venators. Some Evan knew vaguely, whilst many others he'd never heard of. It seemed Elijah knew everything about everyone.

“And between you and me,” Elijah leaned in as if to reveal a secret, although he didn’t bother lowering his voice so everyone still heard. “It’s only a matter of time before Tyrell and Casselle get together.”

Elijah and Emillia continued gossiping as Evan finished his lunch and they made their way towards a rec room. They walked down one hallway where a gargoyle was discussing Twinsphere tactics with a Plant.

The recreation chamber was packed with Venators and the buzz of their chatter.

Blake and Tristan played a