A Tale of Sorcery... Read online

  “Well, this is a pleasant surprise,” said a soft voice behind them.

  Brystal and Lucy turned around and discovered the spirit of a beautiful woman standing behind them. She wore an elegant plum dress that matched the color of her bright eyes and her dark hair was styled beneath an elaborate fascinator with feathers and ribbons. The woman’s smile was so warm Brystal could have sworn the temperature rose a few degrees.

  “Hello, Madame Weatherberry,” Brystal said. “It’s wonderful to see you again.”

  “Holy egg whites—you look fantastic!” Lucy declared. “Isolation has done you wonders! If I didn’t know better, I’d ask for your magic surgeon.”

  Madame Weatherberry chuckled. “It’s nice to see you, too, Lucy,” she said. “I’m guessing Brystal has told you the truth about why I’m here.”

  “Actually, the others know about it, too,” Brystal confessed.

  “I can’t imagine the disappointment I’ve caused,” Madame Weatherberry said, and somberly shook her head. “Finding out I lied is one thing, but learning I was behind the Snow Queen all along is indefensible. I am profoundly sorry and hope you can forgive me.”

  “Forgive you? Madame Weatherberry, I’m here to option the play rights!” Lucy said.

  “Pardon?” she asked.

  “I mean, your life story is a theatrical smash waiting to happen,” Lucy said. “Think about it! The Snow Queen grew inside of you like a parasite, feeding off a lifetime of suppressed heartbreak and rage—that’s every actor’s dream role! And how you unleashed the Snow Queen on a world that hated magic just to prove how much the world needed magic—man, what a genius third act twist! And now you’re stuck in an icy cavern, with a spirit detached from your former body, forced to relive your mistakes over and over again until the end of time—I smell awards! This show is going to run longer than Bats!”

  Madame Weatherberry didn’t know what to say. She never thought her personal tragedies could be so profitable.

  “I’m glad you find my life so entertaining, Lucy,” she said.

  “I’ll draw up the contracts on another day,” Lucy said. “Right now, we’ve got much bigger fish to fry. Go ahead, Brystal.”

  Lucy gave Brystal an aggressive pat on the back that nudged her forward. Brystal’s body immediately went tense and she gazed at the snowy ground to avoid making eye contact. Before saying a word, Brystal already regretted speaking.

  “Madame Weatherberry, do you remember our last conversation?” she asked.

  “How could I forget?” Madame Weatherberry asked. “You told me the wonderful news about the legalization of magic.… You had concerns about your friend Pip joining a school of witchcraft.… You mentioned you had been feeling sad and couldn’t explain why.… And you told me about the unfortunate return of the Righteous Brotherhood.”

  Brystal nodded sheepishly and focused all her attention on the snow beneath her shoes.

  “Right,” she said. “Well, there have been a few updates.”

  “Good updates?” the fairy asked.

  Brystal and Lucy exchanged a discouraging glance and Madame Weatherberry’s bright smile faded.

  “Treat it like a bandage, Brystal,” Lucy said. “The quicker the better!”

  Brystal took a deep breath, straightened her posture, and began her summary of the previous year. She started by telling Madame Weatherberry that her disturbing thoughts had been caused by a horrible curse, but thankfully, she had learned to manage it. Brystal told her she had been cursed by Mistress Mara, the founder of the Ravencrest School of Witchcraft, and how the witch was using the school as a front to create a Shadow Beast to boost her powers. Next, Brystal explained that Mistress Mara had teamed up with the Righteous Brotherhood, and together, they had used the Shadow Beast to bring back the invincible Army of the Dead. And finally, Brystal had the unfortunate task of telling Madame Weatherberry that the Righteous Brotherhood had taken over the Southern Kingdom and turned it into an oppressive Righteous Empire.

  “My word,” Madame Weatherberry gasped. “Even in my worst nightmares I never dreamed of something so terrible.”

  “But wait, there’s more,” Lucy said.

  Clearly, Madame Weatherberry couldn’t imagine how things could possibly be worse. Just the thought of telling her the next part made Brystal feel physically ill. She closed her eyes and clenched her fists, as if she was squeezing the information out of her body.

  “At one point the curse convinced me to surrender to the Righteous Brotherhood,” she said. “They took me to their fortress and… and… and…”

  “And they killed her!” Lucy exclaimed.

  Madame Weatherberry shook her head as if her ears were betraying her.

  “Did you say the Righteous Brotherhood killed her?” she asked.

  Brystal and Lucy nodded.

  “But how is that possible? You’re standing right in front of me!”

  “They covered me in chains made of bloodstone,” Brystal recalled. “I tried to fight it off, but the chains made me weaker and weaker, and I eventually drifted to the other side. I traveled to a big gray field floating somewhere between the world of the living and the great unknown. There were stars and planets and galaxies all around me that I could feel and hear just as easily as I could see them. The field was covered with hundreds of gorgeous white trees. Each tree had the name of a different person and a silver clock that was counting down their time left on earth. It was all so strange and frightening, and yet beautiful and peaceful at the same time.”

  Until now, Madame Weatherberry had been glancing back and forth at the girls as if they were telling her a morbid joke, but after Brystal’s detailed account of the afterlife, her expression became very serious.

  “How did you come back to life?” she asked, almost afraid to hear the answer.

  “Oh, buckle up, Madame Weatherberry,” Lucy warned. “This part makes your third act surprise seem like an intermission raffle!”

  Brystal’s posture sank. “I made a deal with Death.”

  “Death?” Madame Weatherberry gasped. “Are you saying Death is a person?”

  “Yes,” Brystal said. “He looked exactly like I always imagined—and yet, I wasn’t afraid of him. It’s hard to explain.”

  “And what sort of deal did you make with him?” Madame Weatherberry pressed.

  “Apparently, several centuries ago, a woman tricked Death into gifting her with immortality. Since then, this woman—this Immortal—has roamed the earth, making a mockery of everything life and death stand for. Death said if I agreed to find and destroy the Immortal, he would give me back my life. But the only way to destroy her is by using a spell from an ancient spell book. He also said I could use the same spell to annihilate the Army of the Dead. Once I knew that, I couldn’t turn him down.”

  “But,” Lucy said.

  Brystal groaned—whose story was this?

  “But Death only gave me a year to complete the mission. He said if I don’t find the ancient spell book and destroy the Immortal in twelve months, he’s going to take my life back.”

  “How much time do you have left?” Madame Weatherberry asked.

  Brystal winced—she knew this was going to be the hardest part to hear.

  “Two weeks.”

  Madame Weatherberry was just a spirit, but the news was so shocking, even she needed to sit down. Her knees buckled and her body dropped through the air, as if she had sunk into an invisible seat.

  “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?” the fairy asked.

  “For the record, I told her this cave should have been our first stop,” Lucy said. “Brystal didn’t want to burden you with more problems. She thought your plate was full enough with—well, you know—the guilt of unintentionally murdering thousands of innocent people and damaging massive amounts of property as the Snow Queen. Wow, now that I say that out loud, I suddenly understand where she was coming from.”

  Madame Weatherberry studied Brystal’s face with a suspicious gaze—there
was something Brystal wasn’t telling her.

  “Lucy’s right—I didn’t want to trouble you,” Brystal said, and then quickly changed the subject. “We’re hoping you can help us find the ancient spell book. We’ve searched every library and nearly every bookstore in the world, and so far, we haven’t found a trace of it anywhere. Madame Weatherberry, have you ever heard of a spell that’s powerful enough to destroy an Immortal? Or what book it’s in?”

  Madame Weatherberry got to her feet and quietly paced around the frigid cave. Her translucent hand rubbed her translucent chin as she went deeper and deeper into thought. As she searched her memory for an answer, the girls could tell one idea in particular kept coming back to her. No matter how many times Madame Weatherberry waved the notion off, it returned again and again like a hungry pet. Finally, she had no choice but to acknowledge it.

  “As a matter of fact, I have heard of a book that fits that description,” Madame Weatherberry said. “I believe Death was referring to the Book of Sorcery.”

  Hearing the title sent shivers down Brystal’s and Lucy’s spines. They both stood straight up—eager to learn more.

  “What’s the Book of Sorcery?” Lucy asked.

  “Isn’t sorcery just another word to describe magic?” Brystal asked.

  “Traditionally, sorcery is used to describe the most ancient practices of magic,” Madame Weatherberry explained. “And according to legend, the Book of Sorcery is the most powerful spell book ever created. They say in ancient times a group of sorcerers and sorceresses, both good and evil, gathered together and catalogued their greatest enchantments in one manuscript. The book has the power to control all the elements in the universe. There are spells to take life away from the living, spells to give life to the dying, and even spells to resurrect the dead. The book can bestow extraordinary gifts to the weak and strip abilities from the strong, it can take someone through space and time, and it can summon a choir of angels from heaven or an army of demons from the depths of hell. Naturally, if a book like that fell into the wrong hands it could bring about the end of existence as we know it. So the sorcerers and sorceresses hid the Book of Sorcery far away, in the only place it would be safe.”

  “Where?” Brystal and Lucy asked in unison.

  “The Temple of Knowledge,” Madame Weatherberry said.

  Brystal and Lucy were fascinated, but neither had heard of such a place.

  “Madame Weatherberry, I’ve traveled to every corner of the kingdoms and I’ve never seen a Temple of Knowledge before,” Brystal said.

  “That’s because it’s not part of the known world,” she said. “The location is magically concealed from all maps and globes to protect the objects inside it. Just like the Book of Sorcery, the temple contains a vault that harbors other extraordinary objects with remarkable capabilities.”

  “Is the temple difficult to get into?” Lucy asked.

  “Extremely,” Madame Weatherberry said. “Legend says the temple is also protected by a tribe of unlikely guardians who’ve dedicated their lives to keeping it safe from intruders. Even if you get past them, you must survive a series of physical, mental, and emotional tests waiting inside the temple. And finally, before entering the vault you must come face-to-face with the deadliest and most dangerous creature ever to roam the earth.”

  “Oh, is that all?” Lucy said with a nervous laugh. “It sounds like a jazz club I snuck into once. Maybe there’s a bouncer we can bribe.”

  Brystal appreciated Lucy’s attempt to make light of the situation, but just the thought of finding and surviving the Temple of Knowledge made her feel light-headed.

  “We’ve got to get back to the academy and tell the others,” Brystal said. “The sooner we start looking for the Temple of Knowledge, the better off we’ll be.”

  Brystal headed out of the tunnel without saying good-bye to Madame Weatherberry. Lucy cleared her throat to get her attention.

  “Aren’t you forgetting something?” she asked.

  “What?” Brystal asked.

  Lucy rolled her eyes. “The Book of Sorcery and the Temple of Knowledge are a great start, but we need to find the Immortal, too, otherwise you’re toast!” she reminded her. “Madame Weatherberry, do you have any clue who the Immortal is?”

  The fairy went quiet again as she thought about it, but unfortunately, nothing came to mind.

  “I’m sorry,” Madame Weatherberry said. “But perhaps I can give guidance on how to find her?”

  “Fantastic! We’re all ears!” Lucy said.

  “First, I suspect the Immortal would gain a lot of attention if they stayed in one place for long, so I would look for women who’ve lived in many different parts of the world,” she said. “Second, I also suspect the Immortal wouldn’t want to spend eternity working, so I bet she’s found a way to remain wealthy. Keep an eye on women in the upper classes. Third, someone with that much life experience is bound to leave an impression on someone else. I would consult the elders of each village—maybe they have old and recent memories of the same person.”

  “Worldly, wealthy, and wild—got it!”

  Lucy clung to every word of Madame Weatherberry’s advice and started taking notes of her suggestions. Brystal stayed silent and pretended to listen, but mentally, she was focused only on finding the Temple of Knowledge. Eventually, she became so fixated on it, her attentive facade dissolved completely and her eyes darted around the cave.

  “You aren’t listening to a word I’m saying.”

  The voice came out of nowhere and startled Brystal. She looked over her shoulder and saw Madame Weatherberry was standing right behind her. But strangely, when she looked back in front of her, Madame Weatherberry was still talking to Lucy, too.

  “How are you in two places at once?” Brystal asked.

  “You’d be amazed at the things a spirit can do without a body weighing it down,” Madame Weatherberry said. “Now, why aren’t you listening to my advice about the Immortal?”

  “I am listening,” Brystal said.

  Madame Weatherberry raised an eyebrow at her. “Brystal, you’re the best student I’ve ever had—I can tell when you’re interested in a subject and when you’re not.”

  Brystal could feel her heart rate starting to rise.

  “I… I… I just think finding the Book of Sorcery is a better use of our time,” she said. “Finding the book will help us save the world from the Righteous Brotherhood, but destroying the Immortal will only save me. And what are the chances we’ll actually find her in two weeks?”

  “Ah, I see,” Madame Weatherberry said. “You don’t want to find her.”

  “Of course I want to find her!” Brystal lied. “What makes you think I don’t?”

  “Because you always accomplish what you set your mind on, despite how impossible it seems,” Madame Weatherberry said. “So there’s only one logical explanation for why you aren’t setting your mind on the Immortal—you don’t want to find her. And I’m not letting you leave this cave until you tell me why.”

  Brystal took a deep breath and let out a long sigh. This was the moment she had spent the past year trying to avoid. And now that it was finally here, Brystal knew it was useless to hide the truth.

  “There’s no point in searching for the Immortal,” she said. “Even if we did find her, I could never go through with it—I couldn’t kill someone.”

  “So you’re just going to let yourself die?”

  “I don’t want to die, but I can’t justify taking someone’s life to save my own—especially a woman whose only crime is living.”

  “Is that why you waited so long to see me?” she asked.

  Brystal nodded. “I knew it would break your heart.”

  “But what about your friends? They must be beside themselves.”

  “I haven’t told them yet,” Brystal said. “Trust me, I’ve spent months agonizing over this, but I don’t see another option. Even if I did destroy the Immortal, I couldn’t live with myself afterward. I’d much rat
her die twice than kill once. There’s nothing you can do to help me.”

  Brystal expected Madame Weatherberry to passionately object and continue the argument for as long as possible, but surprisingly, the fairy didn’t try to change her mind. Instead, Madame Weatherberry looked toward the back of the cave, somberly staring at the Snow Queen.

  “No, you’re right…,” she said softly. “I wouldn’t wish that kind of guilt on anyone.… It’s far worse than death.…”

  Until now, Brystal had never realized how much pain Madame Weatherberry was in. Being trapped in the cave with the Snow Queen’s frozen body was a constant reminder of all the mistakes she had made and the people she had hurt. Brystal could tell what a tremendous toll it had taken on Madame Weatherberry’s soul. Before she could think of something comforting to say, Madame Weatherberry disappeared from Brystal’s side. At the same time, the other Madame Weatherberry wrapped up her conversation with Lucy.

  “Last but not least, I would search for women who own a lot of antiques,” the fairy suggested. “The Immortal’s collection could be mementos in disguise.”

  “That sure beats chasing old ladies and obituaries! Thanks for all the tips, Madame Weatherberry!” Lucy said. “Okay, Brystal, now we leave.”

  “Will I see you again?” Madame Weatherberry asked.

  Brystal knew this might be the last time she ever saw Madame Weatherberry, but she didn’t have the heart to tell her. Saying a final good-bye to Madame Weatherberry was too painful to bear.

  “I’ll try to come back as soon as I can,” she said.

  “Please do,” the fairy said. “Good luck, girls. I’m here whenever you need me.”

  Brystal and Lucy headed out of the cave and Madame Weatherberry waved happily as they left, but once they were out of sight, her cheerful expression drained away. Brystal’s situation made Madame Weatherberry feel more powerless and trapped than ever before. Her anguished eyes drifted toward the Snow Queen once more, but this time, the sight of the dreadful witch gave the fairy a surprisingly hopeful idea.

  Perhaps Brystal was wrong—perhaps there was something Madame Weatherberry could do to help her.…