The Shadow Thief
Part 1: Arrival to the Academy
“Everyone ready?” Martin asked everyone. Mathurin sighed. Another year in the Academy will go by as boringly as ever. But his brothers Martin and Sam would try to make it more interesting. They always failed and so far things were as completely ‘normal’ as
the Academy could possibly be. Terran yawned.
“Did you honestly have to wake us up at four in the morning? We’ve got two hours left to sleep! And Mum and Dad are still sleeping!” Terran complained.
“You did say you wanted to get an early start, remember?” Martin responded in his annoying we’re-going-and-you-can’t-do-anything-to- stop-us voice.
“Where’s Matt? I haven’t seen him near the horses lately. He said he would get them ready,” Sam said.
“Perhaps they are already ready,” a voice replied from the second floor that they recognized as Mathurin’s, “you go on ahead. I’ll meet you at the Academy.”
“I wonder why he spends so much time locked up in his room?” Martin wondered.
“I wonder why you spend so little time outside?” Terran said, not intending to answer his question.
“Still, we’d better get going. Remember the last time your mom tried to shove us out of bed to go to the Academy?” Sam asked,
“and the fact she probably woke up two whole villages while she was screaming and banging on the door of a certain someone’s room that was obviously empty?”
“Don’t talk about my mom that way!” Terran snapped.
“Don’t talk about my mom that way!” Martin mimicked, “it’s not our fault that we all think parents just get in the way of having fun and are unnecessarily bossy. We have no parents remember? I still remember the night where your parents rescued us from the boring, dull orphanage. Madam Carell was delighted to get rid of us! Your parents said we were to keep you company, and guess what? We ended up with a secretive, elusive prankster for a brother.”
“What’s your point, Martin?”
“Terran, it’s your parents who chose to bring Matt along when they could’ve chosen not to! If they hadn’t, he would not have come here, he would not have gone to the Academy, he would not have developed his magical skills and he would not be using them to annoy the heck out of us and Valian.”
“And he would not have gotten us angry letters from his teachers about breaking every rule you could think of. He doesn’t just put a toe out of the line, he puts out the entire foot!” Sam continued angrily.
“True, but at least he’s not one of them!” Terran retorted.
“Them? Of course he’s not one of them! He doesn’t practice Dark mag-”
Martin suddenly clamped his right hand over Sam’s mouth.
“Don’t even THINK about saying those two words, not if Terran’s parent can hear!”
“Why?” Sam tried to say, but it came out as a “mmmph!”
Martin still got the message.
“Why? Do you remember the rumor?” he hissed quickly.
“What rumor?” Sam managed to say.
“That rumor, you dimwit.”
Terran shot a nasty look at Martin. It was not often but unpleasant that Martin would insult Sam. Sam, however, didn’t mind.
Martin’s smile returned.
“Well, time’s are wastin’.”
The other two groaned disapprovingly.
“Can’t we get just five more minutes of sleep?”
“Nope.”
The three boys went to the stables to see that the horses had been ready for some time already. Their stuff had already been moved there. Now the horses were eating more of their before-we-go-to-the-Academy breakfast and of course watching them while lazily chewing.
“I sure wish horses weren’t the only way of transportation besides feet,” Sam muttered as he mounted Daisy, a brown and white horse, one of Terran’s best horses.
“I wonder what transportation Matt uses to get to Academy. I’ve never seen him ride with us since my second year, and that was two years ago.” Terran wondered as he and Martin loaded their stuff onto the horses.
“Pr’aps he has magic shoes or the ability to teleport long distances,” Martin’s joke wasn’t funny, but it did give something for them to think about. How did he manage to get to the Academy before them?
At this point Martin and Terran had had already finished loading their (including Sam’s) stuff onto the horses.
“Everything’s ready,” Terran told the other two, “let’s go.”
Terran and Martin mounted and soon they were heading to the Academy.
Meanwhile, Mathurin was busily shoving papers and books into his trunk and his bag. Even though his bag (through a spell he put on it ages ago) could hold more than its size would allow, it still would not fit in all the things he was required to bring. A school notice and equipment list lay forgotten on his desk. He had nearly memorized the contents.
Mathurin Devail,
We are proud to say that you have passed the End of Year Exam and are able to attend
this year at the Academy. We have sent your equipment list along with this notice. You
must be at school by August 29. Term starts August 30. We await your confirmation
letter no later than July 31.
Sincerely,
Alexander Celestil,
Headmaster
The equipment list was just as faded and forgotten. It lay just next to the school notice.
Academy Equipment List
Fourth year wizard/witch/mage generalist students will need:
Uniform:
-At least three sets of work robes (preferably white, but can be yellow if necessary)
-One white winter cloak
-One white light cloak
-One pair of white winter gloves (optional, for snowball fights)
-One pair of boots and light shoes (white)
Schoolbooks:
-The Guide to Plants (by Snap Quaggleworth)
-Transfiguration for Fourth Years (by Turna Stone)
-1001 different Potions for Fourth years (by Diana Denral)
-The Nine Planets (by Luna Betrand)
-Foreseeing the Future (by Sybil Trotty)
-Level four spells for Fourth Years ( by Mark Sarin)
-Boring History (by Michelle Dessan)
-The Idiot’s Guide to Defense Against Dark Magic (by Tom Harris)
-Dark Creatures: How to Recognize, Find and Destroy Them (by Hilda of Lavender Town)
Other:
-1 wand (only for human students)
-1 cauldron, standard size, we don’t care what kind it is
-1 telescope
-You may bring a pet, but keep him under control.
-1 standard set of Anti-Dark equipment
-1 deck of Tarot cards (minor and major arcana)
-1 crystal ball
-10 notebooks
****BE REMINDED THAT FOURTH YEAR STUDENTS ARE NOT ALLOWED TO USE THE ANTI-DARK
EQUIPMENT OUTSIDE OF SCHOOL UNLESS ABSOLUTLY NECESSARY!****
Mathurin sighed to himself as he shoved all his stuff into his trunk. Textbooks… okay, they’re in. Uniform… a bit wrinkled but also in. Crystal Ball… telescope… tarot cards… cauldron… in… wand, in my pocket… notebook … in. What did I miss?, he thought. He glanced at the equipment list. Oh, right. Anti-Dark equipment. Arsando will kill me if I show up without it. Now where is it?
He looked frantically around. The clock was ticking, so he had to hurry. Desk drawers, no, it isn’t there. Bed… no. Sheets… no… Then it struck him. Closet! Quickly opening the closet door and digging through a small pile of belongings he found what he was looking for.
“I really should stop putting it there to forget about it,” he said as he squeezed it into his trunk. He closed and locked the trunk. Grunting, he dragged the trunk downstairs. Terran and his brothers were already gone. With some difficulty, he managed to get the trunk outside.
“Sapphire, it’s okay to come out now. They’re gone.” Mathurin whispered.
A navy blue shape then came out of the bushes. It had navy blue scales, bright blue diamond shaped eyes, long, narrow bat-like wings, a long tail and thin, long legs. This was, in fact, Mathurin’s dragon, and one of his few friends not counting family (Terran included). Somehow, he had a feeling that Sapphire wasn’t entirely dragon. He read that dragons never stop growing and can be HUGE when they are old. Sapphire stopped growing when she was big and strong enough to be ridden.
“About time you got here. You do realize I’ve been waiting here for hours,” Sapphire said.
“Yes, I do. We’ll need to go now if we want to get there before them. I hope you don’t mind the luggage.”
“Not at all.”
“I’ll try a shrink spell anyway to lighten the load. Reductus tal!”
He pointed at the luggage and soon it shrank to the size of pocket dictionary which he put into his bag.
“Your skills have improved a lot since last year,” Sapphire commented, “last time you could barely do it.”
Mathruin grinned.
“Thanks. I’ve been studying more during the summer holidays.”
He climbed onto Sapphire’s back. “Let’s go. Hopefully we’ll be there before Terran and my brothers.”
Sapphire spread her narrow wings and lifted into the sky.
“You do realize that someone might see us between the one hundred miles or so in between the Academy and our home.” Sapphire said.
“Sorry, almost forgot the cloaking spell. No Voiles ne Enoires.” Mathurin muttered.
“Are you sure that worked? I can still see myself.”
“Fly over some of those villages. See if they notice you.”
Sapphire flew over a small village. None of the few people outside noticed them and continued with their business as usual.
“See? My spell worked. They can’t see us or hear us.”
Mathurin was enjoying the journey to the Academy. The small forests went by one by one as Sahira’s River flowed beneath them. It’s crystal clear waters sparkled in the rising sun as it would eventually tumbled down a huge waterfall known as Queen’s Falls up north. The Queen’s Falls was the second largest waterfall in all the North-Western Realm of the Other World. The largest was King’s Falls to the south. The river was an awesome sight to look at. The West Mountains were to their right and were seen for many miles. Their snowy peaks gleamed as they towered over the forests. The wind swept past them at higher speeds, cooling him down from the summer heat.
“The sun will be rising soon. I expect Terran and the others are still a long way from the way. Terran has fast horses. It will take them more then two and a half hours to get to the Academy.” Mathurin said.
They fell silent, enjoying the sight from above Sapphire’s back.
“Let’s land. We’re not that far from the Academy.” Sapphire said.
They landed near the school’s courtyard surrounded by the magical Enchanted Forest whose trees surrounded the huge courtyard like a wall. This forest was magical but was forbidden to all students. Arsen Senter (or Arsen as called by everyone) was the one of the two caretakers in the school. Arsen kept watch over the grounds and the forest day and night meaning that no one (besides Mathurin) had ever been able to go into the Enchanted Forest without his permission, and that was never given except for very serious punishments. He hated all students, and especially those who teased and pranked him. Of these, he hated Mathurin the most ever since the ‘it’s raining chicken feathers’ prank in which he had the job of picking up all the feathers. Arsen was fairly old and surly, but the other caretaker (Marson Senter, brother of Arsen Senter) was grumpy, even more surlier, older, bad-tempered to the extreme and not exactly the kind of person you would want for a friend for he loved giving punishments much more than his brother. Marson could easily get anywhere in the school by the hidden passageways and shortcuts and there was no way to tell when and where he would appear next. He knew the passageways and shortcuts better than anyone (besides Mathurin, who found and knew all of them thanks to the Seeing Stone).
Sapphire landed in the Enchanted Forest near the school grounds.
“Watch out for Arsen, I think he’s in a rather bad mood today,” she warned him.
“I’ll try. Thanks for the ride,” he said.
“It was my pleasure,” she answered, and disappeared into the bushes of the Enchanted Forest. He stumbled through the dense forest until he came upon a very large clearing, which was also the school courtyard. As soon as he stepped out of the forest and was about to go walk across the courtyard, he felt the pressure of two eyes watching him. He slowly turned to see the one and only Arsen Senter. Arsen was leering at him as hard as he could. It was hard to not be intimidated by his angry stare.
“Well, well, well. If it isn’t my hated prankster and troublemaker, Mathurin Devail. How did you manage to get past me near the forest without my permission?”
“I really need to get going now, because my friends are waiting for me at the front door. So I-”
“Not until I find out how you got past me, you little twit.”
“Not until I shut you up,” he pointed to Arsen’s mouth, which turned into a zipper that closed itself so all Arsen could say was “mmm-mmmm!”
“Much better.” Mathurin sighed. He was about to go when Arsen grabbed his arm and pointed to his zipped mouth.
“Oh, so you want me to remove the spell? Okay, whatever you say.” Mathurin pointed to the caretaker’s mouth which unzipped, and turned back into a normal mouth. It only remained only to turn into a zipper again and zipped itself up again so Arsen couldn’t talk.
Arsen seemed to become more angry by the second as his face was red with anger and he started pointing at his mouth.
“I said I would remove the spell, but I never said I would put the spell back on you again. Sorry. Anyway the spell will wear off eventually and you’ll be free to insult me again whenever I step in your territory again.”
He left the courtyard leaving Arsen to deal with the Zipper Mouth spell.
He proceeded to the boy’s dormitory. Near it was the girl’s dormitory and the common room, which was completely deserted.
When he got there he sat down on one of the beds and took the luggage and supplies out of his pocket and laid them on the floor. He pointed to the luggage and supplies and said:
“Retornal regulara.”
Everything soon returned to it original size. He opened a chest and took out the Seeing Stone. In the Stone he saw that Terran and the others still had one hour before they could reach the Academy. It was all he needed to know and soon the Stone was back in the chest. He then took out a book that had a negative aura about it. It had a black and purple cover without a title. The book was old, but still in good condition. It’s pages were yellow and fragile but he turned them easily without ripping them. So far he was almost finished reading it. Only a few more pages and he would be on the last of the three books, which contained advanced magic.
He needed a bit more practice before moving on to the next book. He opened the book to page 335, Chapter 10, Creating Chaos.
He read:
The first thing you will learn will be how to cast spells from a distance and creating chaos and mischief, but not getting caught. You will not get caught if you are not seen or heard by anyone
but yourself while performing the spell.
No, that was just the introduction. He had already read that a long time ago. He flipped through the next few pages looking for a spell that would be the best spell to try. Eventually, he found it.
“The Wood Spell. One of my favorites. This should speed up their progress.”
Checking to see if anyone was in the dorm, and seeing he was alone he easily performed the spell using the correct hand\arm gestures and words. Immediately a barely visible puff of smoke appeared and headed north-east.
“W-what’s happening?” Martin screamed as the pleasant forest they were crossing suddenly turned dark and foreboding. Harmless looking trees that stood young, bright and colorful became hideous wood-demons. Their trunks were carved with many swirls and their leaves fell out, leaving their branches bare and naked. Their branches became gnarled like the trunk and two of the lower branches were made into arms and hands that grabbed for the three boys. Blood-red eyes and a black, horrifying mouth appeared on the now hideous trunks. Their horses panicked, speeding forward with unbelievable speed, nearly throwing their riders off their backs. The wood-demon trees grabbed at the terrified (or petrified) boys and their horses. They sped on through the wood-demon forest until they came out with only a few scratches from the wood-demon’s claws.
“What kind of forest was that?” Sam asked.
“A wood-demon forest. These wicked forests exist only in dark regions. Someone must have cursed it.” Terran replied.
“Question is, who?” Martin asked.
No one answered his question and they continued to move as fast as they could as all of the forests they passed became wood-demon forests, which sped their progress and terrified them more. They would have quite a few people believing their story.
But little did they know that the wood-demon forests soon turned back into the pleasant forests the boys were used to after they passed.
“They’ll be here in fifteen minutes,” Mathurin muttered as he closed the book and put it back into the chest which he hid under his bed. He rushed down the halls to the stables, for horses were the main way of transportation, since there were (and are) no trains in the Other World. He was careful not to trip over his white wizard robes like Dannan did. He remembered how clumsy Dannan was in potions class last year, where he tripped over his own cauldron and he stepped on Celine Castin’s foot. In the hallways, Dannan was more annoying (and clumsy) as he constantly tripped over his long robes when he ran to get on time for classes.
He got to the stables in time to see Terran and his brother in the distance, and their horses looked absolutely panicked. He could see they were riding as fast as they could to the Academy.
“Um, what happened to you? You looked as if you’ve just been ambushed,” Mathurin asked the terrified trio.
“You mean ambushed by wood-demons who terrified both us and the horses. Someone cursed the forests to turn into hideous wood- demons. I could see a barely visible puff of smoke coming from the south-west of were we where, the same direction we were heading. I saw it land somewhere, and all the forests we passed turned into wood-demon forests,” Terran shuddered to even think about it.
“So, who do you think did it?” Mathurin asked, knowing that revealing the truth at the wrong time would mean trouble.
“Probably someone who wields extremely powerful Dark Magic, and who knows how to use it,” Terran guessed. Little did he know that his guess was right and that the one responsible was standing right in front of him.
“And whoever did it will pay. Performing that kind of magic is against the law. If the culprit is caught, he will face the White Council of Wizards (and witches) and undergo some serious punishment. Remember the last Dark that Lin Siphillus caught?” Sam added. He probably knew every famous person that existed.
“You mean the famous Light and Dark Hunter Lin Siphillus? She caught seemingly dozens of Darks!” Martin commented.
“I’m wondering when the war will stop between the White Council and The Dark Council. They’ve been fighting for centuries,” Mathurin wondered.
“Probably never. Pr’aps it’s because their leaders are, like… archenemies. Then there’s the rumor about the downfall of the last leader of the Dark Council. They say now that the current leader is none other then a Necromancer. I’ve heard that that leader is evil to the bone, and that a few centuries ago one of his Necromancy spells backfired, splitting his soul in pieces. A few of his Darks, who were rumored to be completely loyal to him, gathered his soul. They are preparing for his resurrection and the Authorities won’t inform the public what’s going on. It’s easy to know if you listen to all the rumors that are flying around,” Martin replied.
“Then there’s all this talk about someone called ‘the Shadow Thief’ who can steal almost anything and work for almost anyone. They say he strikes at night, taking valuable things for who-knows-what purposes. He knows where everything is, and there’s no use hiding it from him, they say. They also say they saw him once disappear into the shadows,” Terran said.
“What does he look like?” Sam demanded eagerly.
“From the very few sightings of him, they say he is tall and appears to be about fifteen or sixteen. He uses a bow and magic (and sometimes ordinary) arrows as a weapon, and many say he’s an excellent archer whose arrows have surprising effects like disrupting magic. They can’t tell who he is, since he wears a very black cloak with a hood that conceals half his face,” Terran replied.
“Who is he?” Sam asked.
“As I said before, his identity remains a mystery. If the Authorities knew his identity, they could easily catch him. I suppose that’s why he keeps it secret. But how does he seem to know where everything is and what’s going on?” Terran said.
“And then there’s how he gets around the entire North-Western realm,” Martin finished.
“I dunno how he does it, Martin,” Terran said, dismayed.
“Hurry up or you’ll be late for the Beginning of the Year Banquet ! It starts in half an hour!” yelled Arthur, disturbing their conversation.
“You’d better drop off your stuff and supplies up in the dormitory. I’ll meet you in the Great Hall,” Mathurin called as he ran to one the main entrance to see how many had arrived. It turned out that many of the students were already there and the freshmen were talking about either what would happen this year or what already happened. I can easily predict what will happen, he thought to himself, but I hope it’s not as bad as it seems.
It was when Terran came running up to him saying “Come on! You’ll be late if you don’t hurry!”
It was then Terran dragged him (or tried to drag him) to the Great hall.
“Let me go, I’ll find my own way to the Great Hall. You honestly don’t have to drag me,” he protested to Terran.
“Only to have you wander somewhere else again like last time? No way!” Terran shot back.
Mathurin somehow managed to free himself from Terran’s iron grasp.
“Hey! What was that all about?” Terran said, but he lost Mathurin in the crowds.
“Where’s Matt?” Sam asked.
“Lost him in the crowds,” replied Terran.
“Then why didn’t you look for him?” Martin asked.
“The Banquet was about to start, so I let him go. Besides, he’ll come,” Terran replied.
“Are you kidding? He didn’t attend it last year, so why not this year?” Martin pointed out.
“I wonder why he stopped attending. Everything was fine before the trip to Horizonal Alley two years ago. Funny thing was, the Old Fortuneteller died the day after we left.” Terran said.
“We’ll just have to wait and find out,” Martin said.
“And we’ll still have fun attending this school,” Sam continued.
“With him running amok?”
“Well at least it’ll be interesting!” Sam retorted.
“Interesting?”
“Valian’s coming to learn at the Academy this year.”
“Really?” Martin said excitedly.
Sam nodded, smiling.
“Yeah. It’ll be fun.”