CHAPTER VI
Time To Run
Anika felt a boom of dread splash and ripple through her entire body, and then settle in her stomach like a stagnant puddle.
The Empire had followed her? She had gone so deep into the cave. The Empire never usually sent more than a single drone after fugitive common folk like her and her family. Why was she being so heavily targeted?
She stared in terror at the imperial soldiers, clad in blackish-green armour with no identifying features of any kind, methodically but rapidly searched for her, their hard boots clomping and echoing throughout the library.
She had only ever seen a handful before, patrolling the perimeter of the construction site, and that one seemed to be less heavily armed than these ones.
These ones had giant laser blasters that were cranked up so high she could hear the electronic whine from her hiding spot.
Something bad is going to happen, thought Anika. I’m about to get caught. I’ll sneeze, or knock something over, or-
“HELP!!” Screeched the lyrebird.
All helmeted heads immediately snapped in Anika and the lyrebird’s direction.
A flurry of incomprehensible radio chatter echoed through the halls as the clomping of boots got louder and louder.
“NOW look what you’ve done!” Anika growled over her shoulder at the lyrebird as she took off running.
“sHuT uP!!” It replied.
Anika dodged this way and that, knocking over pedestals, hurling some of the strange objects on the shelves, anything she could do to slow the troopers down.
But they were much faster than her.
She rounded a corner at the same time as a soldier did on the other end.
As she spun around and ran, four metal darts lodged into the bookshelf behind where her head once was.
Darts? She thought as she puffed and panted along.
Why use darts? The Empire only uses darts when they’re trying to put someone to sleep so they can be taken alive. Why am I being taken alive? I’m resisting arrest! The punishment for that is death!
Almost crying now from terror and exhaustion, Anika came to a dead end.
She looked around wildly in all directions for an escape.
Right? NO.
Left? NO.
Forward? NO.
Backward? NO.
Down? NO.
Up? …Maybe…
It was her only option.
Wiping her sweaty hands on her shirt, she began to haul her exhausted frame upwards.
She aimed for an overhead bridge that assumedly led to another floor.
She tried not to look down.
Only 10 metres to go.
CHAPTER VII
K4-X7
The imperial soldiers reached the foot of the bookshelf.
A reverse-rain of darts bore down on Anika, whizzing within inches of her face.
She then realised that despite everything, she was still holding onto the journal she found earlier, the one with the beautiful compass embedded in it.
Normally Anika hated damaging books, especially such pretty ones, but now she had no choice.
She stopped climbing and tried to shield herself with it, holding onto the ledge with one hand.
No sooner had she lifted the book had a dart sunk into it with a dull THWUNK, followed by a few more.
“Go AWAY!!” She shrieked down at them.
However, Imperial Soldiers do not take orders from 13-year-olds, and they kept firing.
Unable to climb any higher and unable to relax her arm, Anika was stuck.
She cried out for help…but nobody came.
“Oh! What a shame!” Smirked a voice beneath her.
Anika looked down. Normally, the sight of Captain X4-K7 would send her mind reeling in horror, but now all she could do was sink even lower into the depths of despair.
The heavily-built man wore armour similar to the other soldiers, except this set was much more bulky, with shiny metal plates covering his entire body except his head, which was given even more authority by a flowing dark red cape.
His left eye and the skin around it was cybernetic, and the pupil was faintly glowing a harsh electronic blue.
His oily blond hair stood out starkly against his red-tinged face.
His name was a product of the Imperial Army; once you passed the vigorous training, you shed all remnants of your old life, including your birth name, which was replaced by a number.
Anika had only ever seen him once, barking orders and patrolling the construction site, but her parents had told her all about him.
He was not a nice man.
“Listen, kid.” He said, motioning for his comrades to cease fire.
“All your life, you’ve been a red flag. The Empire has always suspected that something was different about you. With the last test, it created such a disturbance it awakened the magic within you. Our satellites detected it.”
Anika frowned. When he said disturbance, did he mean the massive storm that just swept over the land? And the storm was created by a “test”? What test? Did something happen in the Construction Site? And now…she had magic???
X4-K7 peered closer and Anika’s expression.
“Oh…oh my. Oh no…” He burst into a bout of hysterical laughter.
“You…you seriously don’t understand ANYTHING I just said?!” He thundered, all traces of mirth evaporating instantly.
“You HAVEN’T learnt any spells? You DIDN’T know you were a magical being??”
Anika stared back with a shell-shocked expression.
“Shoot to kill.” X4-K7 snarled.
The guns made a whirring-clicking noise as they were recalibrated.
It was now or never.
Anika frantically scrambled up the bookshelf, flinging things down in the general direction of the Imperials, almost quivering with exhaustion.
Below her, X4-K7 was screaming his lungs out at the soldiers to recalibrate their guns faster.
With his red face and stomping feet, he looked like a 2-year old who was being forced to eat his vegetables.
“YOU IDIOTS! SHE’S GETTING AWAY! SHE’S GETTING-“
Suddenly, a rather chunky book fell from the heavens and clocked him on the head.
He made a grumbling noise and fell over backwards.
The X4-K7’s goons finally finished recalibrating their guns and bolts of red-hot light began erupting out of the guns and exploding into the wood around Anika.
But she was already almost at the top, and within 5 seconds, she was on her feet and running for her life once again.
CHAPTER VIII
Incantation
After running for almost five minutes, Anika came to another dead end. She slowed and collapsed on the floor, the book she was still holding (which was now covered in darts and resembled a porcupine) spinning forward on the floor, falling open, revealing a page.
The page was very messy. It was covered in what appeared to be a bunch of passages or paragraphs that were either scribbled out or had an “X” next to them.
The crossed-out passages were readable, but Anika’s panicked eyes were drawn to the most prominent thing on the page: “I’VE DONE IT! I’VE FOUND IT! THE INCANTATION TO WIND BACK TIME IS AS FOLLOWS…”
Suddenly, the hairs on the back of her neck stood up.
She could feel something behind her back.
She slowly turned around, dreading what she would see…
“YOU IDIOTS! SHE’S GETTING AWAY!!” Squawked the lyrebird.
“You!” She spluttered.
“HELP!!”
Anika was dumbfounded. The lyrebird had followed her all this way…
“I think she went this way, move, move, move!”
Despite the situation she was in, Anika chuckled.
“Wow. You really are good at mimicking people.”
It took a while for her to realise that it was not the lyrebird who spoke.
“Oh, no-“
Captain X4-K7 rounded the corner.
“THERE SHE IS!!” He screeched, jabbing a finger at her.
Anika tried the same trick as before, and ran to the bookshelf and started to climb.
But she was so exhausted that she fell down painfully almost immediately.
X4-K7 laughed and swung his massive gun around and around, taunting her.
“Looks like you’re all tricked out. No more running. No more hiding. You’re dead.” He snarled as he aimed his gun.
Anika looked at the incantation in the journal again. It was her last hope.
X4-K7 guffawed.
“Aw, getting a bit of reading done before you die? Ha! Books are for nerds!”
“SCARBOROSS EXIDUS, DIARNO DOMINUS, TEMPUS ITINERANTUR…” Muttered Anika.
X4-K7 blinked.
“You what?”
“ANGORION ARGON, VENEFORIS VERNICUS…”
Fear was bright and recognisable in X4-K7’s one human eye as he realised what Anika was doing.
Anika’s frame was shaking and her eyes glowed a brilliant green. She was completely consumed by the incantation’s energy now.
“FIRE!!!” Screamed X4-K7 at the soldiers, but the blasts were just absorbed.
“XANDLEX INCURIS, XANDLEX INCURIS XANDLEX TEMPUS!!!” Anika completed with an otherworldly roar.
Her body glowed green, showing her silhouette, and then she was gone, leaving behind a scorched area on the floor and the smell of burning rubber.
X4-K7 stared at the dark spot on the floor.
“That lying little TWERP!!” He exploded.
“She knew! She must be incredibly powerful to have just disappeared like that!”
He turned to his troops.
“Tell the guards to double their shifts around the construction site! I want it completely LOCKED DOWN!!!” He screamed.
And with a swish of his cape, he stomped down the corridor.
There was a pause.
“How the heck do I get OUT OF HERE?!” Came his furious voice somewhere around the corner.
CHAPTER IX
The Past
In the blinding flash of light, Anika was ripped away from reality as if the ground had simply vanished.
She fell, unable to move, as swirls and flashes of green light whizzed past.
She felt herself accelerate, falling faster and faster until…
Anika’s eyes flickered open. Her vision was blurry, and points of green light still danced in front of her eyes.
She felt as if she was lying on the surface of a body of water; the ground was drifting up and down and rippled when she moved.
She felt he hand rub against the journal. It felt warm to the touch and a little singed, as were her hair and clothes, which were now more ragged than ever.
She sat up, and immediately regretted it. It felt like she had just smashed her head against a brick wall.
X4-K7 and his goons were gone, and but now she could hear hundreds of other people.
She peered around a corner to see a vast central room, filled with people of all shapes and sizes, some wearing robes and others wearing uniforms, but they all had one thing in common:
They were performing magic.
Anika could feel it now. Her magical instincts pumped and squeezed happily, the same feeling one would get from meeting a group of people that all liked the same TV show as you, except much more deep-rooted.
Anika almost instantly felt at home, although she was a it confused, and quite worried.
How far had she travelled back in time?
Why didn’t she have the option to choose how far she wanted to go back in time, or forward?
Was she still in the same place as before?
Would she be able to get back to her original time period?
She picked up and opened the journal again and flipped through it to try and find the page with the incantation.
Her already anxious-looking face changed dramatically.
With growing stress, she flicked through each page faster and faster until she slammed the book shut and breathed in deeply.
It was gone.
The page with the incantation was gone.
Just blank paper.
Along with almost half of all the other pages.
Suddenly, Anika realised something.
She flipped the book over and over in her hands.
It felt new. (Except for the singe marks)
It looked new. (Except for the singe marks)
It even smelt new. (Except for the singe marks)
Anika clicked her fingers.
Of course! She thought. I must have travelled back in time to when the journal was still being written, and this journal from the future is linked to the other one! Or something weird like that!
The author could be anyone in this room. She just had to find them.
She scoured the room, searching for a journal that matched the one she was holding.
Two children, both about 8 years old, ran past Anika laughing and zapping each other with little electric charges.
They managed to hit her with a few zaps.
She was about to tell them off when they screeched to a halt, turned around and ran away, not smiling.
It seemed they were running from a man haunched over a desk, writing in a book.
He didn’t look very intimidating; quite the opposite in fact. With his soft blue eyes, brown, bushy beard and total disregard for the world around him, Anika couldn’t see why the young kids were scared of him.
Her heart leapt into her throat as she realised.
Writing in a book.
Could this be? Could she have found the author so quickly and easily?
Not wanting to make contact just yet (maybe the kids knew something she didn’t) she tried to casually walk past him and peer at his book to see if it resembled hers in any way.
Anika was naturally terrible at pretending to be normal, so when she walked past it looked like she had suddenly been possessed by a giraffe, stretching her neck and craning her head like a lunatic.
She made several more laps of the table like this until the man tired of it and huffed, “Can I help you?” In an exasperated tone.
Anika yelped, and spluttered, “Yes. Hi. Book?”
The man stared at her for a moment, his eyes cutting into her like a sword…until they softened again, and partially-obscured mouth broke into an amused smile.
“By that I assume you mean, “what book am I reading?”
Anika, not sure what else to say, nodded.
The man lifted the front cover and Anika stifled a gasp. It matched her journal perfectly.
“It’s a book I wrote myself. Am still writing, in fact. It is a compendium of all the most significant and powerful spells that I have thus far learned. Unfortunately, I worry that I will never finish it, as the most special and ancient of all spells are locked up in the vault.” He sighed.
“The vault?” Asked Anika, intrigued.
“Yes, The Vault. The current head librarian here, Eryx, is selfish; he keeps all the most powerful spells for himself because he doesn’t feel like the rest of us are fit to use it. Any request at just a peek of the oldest spells known to humankind, is denied. I’ve made so many of them that i’m on the verge of being forbidden on these premises permanently, he has such a short temper.”
“What kind of spells would be kept there?” Anika asked, leaning forward.
His eyes lit up. “Oh, so many. Healing spells so potent they could bring a man back from the brink of death within seconds, being able to summon water over parched lands afflicted with drought, hypnotism spells to convince the criminals and evil peoples to behave, and even-“He looked around to make sure no one was listening, leaned in and whispered, “Sacred incantations to travel through time!”
Anika’s eyebrows shot up visibly.
“Is there any chance that, I dunno, someone like me could get a glimpse of that time trave- I mean, those spells, and not the time travel ones specifically…? I need it for, um, er, a school assignment.” Said Anika, her voice getting higher and higher as she cringed at how suspicious she sounded and how terrible her cover story was.
Luckily, the man didn’t seem to have noticed. Instead, he leaned in further and whispered in her ear.
“Tonight, I am staging a break-in. I will…borrow…a spell and document it in my journal.”
Anika gulped. She could feel his anticipation. He wanted her to help him.
Anika was used to living a life of following the rules or facing harsh consequences, but now this man was being so trusting, so vulnerable, and this Eryx guy seemed like a jerk, and she really needed to get home. Her family could have been prosecuted by the Empire.
Her stomach dropped at the thought.
She said confidently, “How can I help? I’m Anika, by the way.”
“Nice to meet you, Anika. My name is Edwin.”
CHAPTER X
Breaking, Entering and Borrowing
“I have made the necessary preparations. It is time. Be ready for when the barrier opens.” Said Edwin.
Several hours had past, and it was the dead of night.
“Remind me again of the plan?” She spluttered.
Edwin sighed, but his demeanour remained benevolent.
“I will break a hole in the magical barrier sealing off the vault, which you will crawl through, being careful not to touch the sides or you will get burned. Then you will enter the vault, pick out the spells we need, ESPECIALLY the antique wooden chest, and then return. You will find the specific spells we are looking for in aisle 8, section 2B.
“I will only be able to hold the hole open for 60 seconds, so you must hurry. Once it closes, I will not be able to open it again. Understand?”
Anika’s face was screwed up as she processed this. The spells were in aisle 60 section 8, and he would only be able to hold the hole open for 2B seconds.
Wait, what?
Eventually she gave a nod and a weak smile.
“Good.” He said.
He closed his eyes and pressed his palms against the invisible barrier. The area around his hands glowed orange, and then a section of the barrier shattered suddenly like glass.
Like freezing frost feathers, the barrier began regrowing itself.
Edwin leapt into action, his palms glowing a bright orange and his face strained to prevent the barrier’s regrowth.
“Go!”
Anika went. Dashing through the darkened room, after counting 60 aisles, she screeched to a halt.
She stilled her breathing, tensed her hand and fingers into a grasping motion, and then squeezed her eyes shut, just as he had showed her.
She felt her hand grow warm, and then with a small chime, an orb of light materialised in her hand, levitating and emitting a glow that illuminated the surrounding area.
“I did it! My first spell!” She spluttered, overjoyed.
“Nice. You’re naturally…t-t-talented. Now get those scrolls!” Grunted the strained voice of Edwin, whose tone greatly contrasted Anika’s.
Still bubbling with excitement, she ran over to section 2B, double checking in her head it was the right one, and with a sweep of her arm, snatched all the scrolls, books, and the wooden chest off the shelf.
Some of them seemed as new and fresh as the first second of the new year, and some looked older than an immortal jellyfish.
“Come…on!” Gasped a voice.
Anika raced back to the barrier at full pelt, the contents of the chest clicking and clacking under her arm.
Edwin was sweating and his knees were trembling.
Finally, he collapsed onto the ground, and the barrier immediately began regrowing again.
Anika tried to drop down and slide under like a baseball player, but she just plomped down onto the ground really hurt her butt.
She quickly got up and crawled awkwardly under the barrier, just as it fully reformed.
“Excellent work.” Chuckled Edwin.
“You are a very gifted young lady. For most children, it takes several hours of trying to cast their first spell. But you only needed the proper tutoring.”
Anika smiled, flattered, and looked away.
Edwin sifted through the scrolls, looking at each one.
“Yes, yes…it’s all here…” He muttered excitedly to himself.
Suddenly, Anika stood up and whipped around. She could hear footsteps.
But, it seemed, there was only one person approaching.
For some reason, this seemed to worry her more than if it was a squad of soldiers, and she urgently shook Edwin’s shoulder while saying,
“Edwin, Edwin, it’s time to GO, SOMEONE’S COMING!!!”
Edwin grabbed her hand and gave her a glare so icy it shut her up immediately.
“I’ll deal with this.” He snarled, all manner of benevolence disappearing instantly.
“Edwin, I know that’s you.” Came a rather-old sounding voice from around the corner.
“Eryx! How lovely to see you.” Edwin sneered sarcastically at the old man.
Eryx wore light brown robes, several rings on his fingers, and his long yet well-kept white beard almost reached the floor.
He was bent over a long wooden staff that had bands of colourful jewels around its ends.
Despite his obvious age and the fact that it was the middle of the night, his eyes were bright and burning.
“I have warned you multiple times, Edwin. Not a soul is to view the forbidden texts without my permission. They are too d-“
“Too dangerous to fall into the wrong hands, because if they do, the whole world will explode, bl-bl-blah, bl-b-blah bl-bl-blah…” Edwin interrupted.
Eryx sighed.
“This is the third time you have attempted to break in to the vault. I’m sorry, but you are banned from the library for life. You have pushed this too far, Edwin. If you do not leave now I will remove you with force.“
Edwin smirked, and pulled out the chest.
Eryx’s face immediately changed. “You…you found it. But…I hid it! I hid it so well you never would have-“
“Did you hide this specific chest, or perhaps a different one that was cleverly switched out just before you hid it?”
Eryx, his face awash with alarm and fear, brandished his staff, which began to glow, and shot a bright yellow bolt of lightning at Edwin, who easily dodged it.
Edwin opened the chest, and a loud boom rung out through the halls.
This was not a typical, noisy explosion, but rather an enormous magical disturbance as the chest opened for the first time in what could be hundreds of years.
“Edwin!” Bellowed Eryx. “I beg you! You’ll unleash powers that will tear the universe apart! You don’t know what you’re doing! You’ll…“
From out of the box, three brightly coloured gems, blue, red and green, levitated and formed a circle around the hand that Edwin held up.
His opened hand twisted around to form a fist, and with a noise that sounded like the agonised screaming of a thousand souls, and the jewels shattered into a thousand pieces.
Still floating midair, they briefly formed the outline of a terrifying-looking humanoid with draconic wings, long, arching horns and large spines on its shoulders, and then they were absorbed into Edwin’s hand.
“No.” Whispered Eryx in dispair.
It was clear to Anika that whatever was happening was very, very bad.
“Edwin?” She squeaked.
Edwin’s form rattled and shook. His body coursed and flashed with the colours of the stones he had just absorbed and his eyes rolled back into his head.
And then, quiet.
His eyes rolled back to look at Eryx. His pupils shone with a brilliant golden-yellow, lined with a sickly green and a shade of blue that was so dark it was almost black.
He lifted a flattened hand to his opposite shoulder.
Within a second, his fingers lengthened, sharpened, turned black and merged, creating a long, jagged spear that connected with his arm.
It shot forward, straight into Eryx’s chest.
Anika clapped a hand over her mouth and eyes, and heard the now deceased Eryx slump to the floor.
“NO!” She shrieked.
Edwin slowly turned around and gave her the most mock-surprised, condescending look that anyone had ever given her.
“You said…You said that you would use the forbidden spells just to write in your journal…” Her voice trailed off as she realised how stupid she sounded, and how stupid she was for believing this man.
Edwin smiled.
“Initially, I didn’t believe that particular cover story would fool anyone. But I was so taken aback by how much of an idiot you were for believing my story, that I decided to continue on with it.” He said as if he was fascinated by the fact that he was so good at manipulating people that he didn’t even have to try.
“I spent years of trying in earnest, and then it happens with almost zero effort on my part. You should have taken the warning signs from those children when they ran away from me. My plans and hijinks have earned me a reputation here. Although I do hope that you are able to complete your assignment.”
He chuckled. A cold, icy chuckle.
“You children come up with the worst lies.”
Anika snatched an armful of the scrolls, reverently hoping that one of them would help her get back to her own time, and then ran.
CHAPTER XI
Home…?
You know the feeling you get when you mess up so bad you feel like you left your stomach on the ground behind you?
Well, that’s what Anika felt like.
She ran and ran and ran. Today was turning into a sort of run-a-thon.
She flipped through the scrolls and books she had snagged, scanning haphazardly for anything to do with time travel.
She almost screamed with relief when she found the incantation again.
But hold on, she thought.
Edwin wrote the journal. So the time travel incantation was probably copied off one of the scrolls he found in the vault. But…I’ve got that scroll right here. So how could he have copied it into the journal if I’m about to take it with me into the future…
Her blood ran cold as she realised: If he had written it down in his journal, then he was going to get the scroll back at some point-
Suddenly, the bookshelf to her right was smashed in, sending books and potions flying and burying her under a pile of musty, dusty tomes.
Edwin leaned closer and closer to where Anika was buried.
“You know what I want.” He said softly and calmly.
Anika was lifted out of the pile of books and into the air, unable to move.
“You’ll never get them! I’ll…I’ll…”
“You’ll what?” He snarled, his hand forming a terrible black blade again, which was pointed at Anika’s throat.
“Master the most powerful spells known to man in a few seconds? Use one of the incantations to, hmm, I don’t know, travel FORWARD IN TIME, BACK TO YOUR HOME?!” He snarled.
“Yes, that’s right, I KNOW. Thanks to these magic stones, I now have the ability to command next to infinite power. I could end your puny, insignificant life with a TWITCH. OF. MY. FINGER.” He roared, the blade trembling with rage.
Steadying his breathing, retracting his blade and dropping Anika, his eyes softened.
“But I’m a charitable fellow. I will send you back to your original time period. After all, you are the reason I now have this power. I couldn’t hold the barrier open and rob the vault at the same time, no—I needed an accomplice stupid enough to help me. And there, you, were! And who knows…you just might be useful to me later. So off you go. Oh, and I’ll take that…” He said, snatching the scrolls Anika held in her arms.
He opened the scroll and read out the incantation.
“SCARBOROSS EXIDUS, DIARNO DOMINUS, TEMPUS ITINERANTUR…”
Anika felt her body dematerialise and the bright green light swallowed her vision again. She opened her mouth to protest, but she was already gone.