Chapter 14: Badlock
Hope you're enjoying so far, and if you're a perv then check out my new story n the M section. Enjoy.
It's was a beautiful summers day in the north of England, there hadn't been a spot of rain in a whole week and this was the perfect weather that Charlie loved, and speaking of Charlie bone, it had been a whole two years and he hadn't aged a bit, Charlie remembered the day Mathowy explained this to him.
"I remember Amoret telling me that when she time travelled that even though she sometimes stayed for months on end she didn't age, it seems this is the same with you" Charlie was doing his second set of one hundred press ups while Mathowy explained this, so Charlie could stay here as long as he like and not change, at least not physically.
In these two years Charlie's magic had became somewhere near perfection, he was a natural at spells, and the reason why was his blood, he had the blood of the red king and that was a truly powerful bloodline. Charlie had improved not only his magic, his body had become a form of perfection, he could be a pro cage fighter back home and come out on top any time.
Today was the day that Charlie would leave Mathowy's apprentaship and make his journey to Badlock and out of the painting, but it wasn't going to be an easy exit from Mathowy's teachings.
"You ready Charlie?" Mathowy threw his Cloak to the side to reveal his formed body and drew his Red wand.
Charlie had to fight Mathowy one last brutal time, and he wasn't going to go easy on Charlie.
"I'm crazy if I say yes... YES!" Charlie whipped Claerwen from his sleeve and made the first move against his opponent, he pointed the wand and without any word expelled a beam of green light towards Mathowy, this was easily dodged and left a large scorch mark on a rock nearby. Mathowy made his move now.
Mathowy used a strange spell that summoned a torrent of rain; this rain continued falling while the two circled each other. Then as Charlie made his next fiery spell Mathowy jumped into the air and sent lightening into the rain, this sent mud and dust into the air, Mathowy leapt back and charged up a ball of blue fire, he then fired into the clearing cloud of dust.
There was surprisingly no explosion, when the smoke cleared Charlie's feet were noticeable black, he had used his wand to turn his shoes into rubber with blocked the electricity, and he had actually froze the ball of flames, they had shattered all over and made several small cuts on his arms and face.
"Impressive, nice trick with the rubber, but you didn't think about the ice shattering" Mathowy lunged his wand towards the ground and ran forward; Charlie ran too but tripped as he forgot about his rubber shoes.
After jumping up Charlie had to parry and block several kicks and punches from the tall Welsh magician, he was eventually elbowed in the face and sent flying into a tree.
"Your Martial arts are sloppy too, if you don't keep up you'll never win against your enemies" Charlie leapt up and caught Mathowy in the gut with a kick, his foot expelled some flame which were just absorbed into Mathowy's skin.
Mathowy wasn't affected in the slightest by the kick and just used an earlier spell to his advantage, when he had earlier thrust his wand to the ground he had turned to space underneath this area to air, so if his shot at the ground it would open up. He did this now.
The precise beam of light welded a line into the ground and everything gave way, Charlie fell down and hit himself on the rocks hard after a ten foot drop, he was at Mathowy's mercy now, the magician in question stood at the edge of the pit charging magical energy into his wand, he unleashed a torrent of different elements and all Charlie could do was dodge around the pit, while sneakily placing invisible magical edge markers. He managed to place five of these in a pentagonal shape around the sides of the pit, he then waved Claerwen and a sheet of Glass covered the pit.
Mathowy knew it was indestructible but still attempted to beak it, by time he noticed Charlie had already tunnelled away from the pit. Mathowy spun to face him and boom he took a ball of water to the chest. This knocked him into the now open pit and he hit the bottom, Charlie ignited the gas before Mathowy smelled it. Boom.
Mathowy had always taught to plan ahead, when Charlie hit the floor of the pit he already had a plan in mind, he made the glass, filled the chasm full of nitrogen gas and got the hell out of there, it was so easy to knock Mathowy in when he wasn't looking and ignite the gas, it was kind of funny really.
Mathowy was uninjured obviously but when he left the pit he congratulated him on the win.
"If I wasn't your teacher and didn't know exactly what you were up to, then I would most likely be injured and hardly able to battle a high calibre magician like you Charlie, well done." Mathowy shook Charlie's hand and decided to give him a graduation gift.
Mathowy presented Charlie with a small wristband that he was just wearing.
"What is it?" Charlie was confused at why it had significance.
"This wristband is the reason I'm unburned, if you charge it with a certain element, let's say water, then on command it will cover your body in however much you added, when you blew me up I was in water so I'm uninjured" Mathowy put a small amount of water in the band and then with his mind made it cover Charlie who was a bit upset about getting soaked.
"Thanks for the gift... but not the water" Charlie could use this against Manfred if the opportunity ever arises.
"So what now Charlie?" Mathowy wished to hear Charlie's plan to return to the future.
"I'm going to pay Harken a visit, and use his painting of my town to get there, and if my theories correct, I should be able to select the date that I arrive...hopefully" if not then Charlie could arrive when he was 12, and that would fuck things up a little.
Later that day, when the sun was only just setting, there were some painful goodbyes, firstly Mathowy, who was like a father or older brother to him more than a master, then the hardest of all. His ex girlfriend.
Charlie had met Claudia last year and they fell in love rather quickly, he had nearly completely forgotten his girlfriend who wasn't even born yet so why not. They had a great relationship and right on the night when they were going to 'Go all the way' Charlie had to start feeling guilty about Olivia. He had run out and the next day was forced to explain everything about where he came from, that he had to return, and his girlfriend who he no longer had the strongest feelings for. She broke up with him but was cool about it, they were still best friend from then on, she often brought picnics up to him and Mathowy, and they went for walks together a lot.
When he said goodbye they both cried a lot, but eventually he had to go.
Many years later
The Hood nailed the Badlock painting up in the kings room in the cover of darkness, it had now been Three months since Charlie left and he felt it was very soon that he would arrive, Manfred had tasked him with sending Charlie a message, he had chosen that utter destruction wasn't the key, Charlie loved his friends and even his enemies, so he would seriously injure one or two of them and leave them on display in the kings room for Charlie's emergence out of the painting.
Back with Charlie
Charlie set off with a full rucksack and tears in his eyes, he could never return here, and if he did then only Mathowy would remember him anyway, he would lose a lover and many friends when he got to Badlock.
(I have no idea where Badlock is so I'm going to say it's in Scotland)
It was a few days ride by horse to the border of Scotland, Badlock was a region of south Scotland tainted with dark magic, the place was filled with menacing creatures that stopped at nothing to hinder Charlie's path, it took him three days in itself to get any where near Harkens castle.
He finally did arrive though, in a slightly battered state but he arrived, he stood about three hundred feet away from Harkin's main gate and began to make a plan.
He could simply barge in and find his way to the gallery, or he could knock on and ask to see it... as if that would work.
He chose plan A and ran over to the gate, he drew Claerwen on the way and using pinpoint precision, fired poise at the guard, he dropped like a fly. The next step was to use his magic to prize open the thirty foot high wooden gates that separated him from the inside of the castle, he used Claerwen again for this and instead of going to the effort of pulling them open he cut a round hole in the wood and kicked it through.
It was a good thing the hole wasn't made with fire because Charlie came right into a hall with animal furs as the cruel and posh flooring. Charlie avoided everybody he saw in the castle, if he alerted Harken then there would be a tough fight on his hands, and he definitely didn't want that.
Charlie only had limited knowledge of when he came here last time, it was very hard to do so but he eventually came across a place he recognised, the enchanted indoor forest Harken created for Billy, and he wasn't alone.
"Charlie?!" he span round to see a girl his own age, her Jet black curled hair and he sparkling eyes made him instantly remember who she was.
"Matilda!" then ran together and hugged.
"What are you doing here Charlie, is Billy with you?" Matlida also appeared to be checking out Charlie's sculpted body.
"No he's back home, I'm here to use the painting of my town, is it still here?" he saw the disappointment on her face and reassured her "but now we have the painting he can visit"
"The paintings still here, I shall take you" She excitedly grasped Charlie's hand and dragged him up a nearby staircase, it didn't take long for them to reach the gallery, they stood in front of the painting.
"Can you not stay a while Charlie?" Matilda had no friends her and her brother was evil.
"I've been gone from my girlfriend for two years, she's gonna be just a little angry with me" Charlie went to open the portal but Matlida grabbed him.
"At least kiss me goodbye then jerk" She pulled him into a short but sweet kiss, he had now cheated on Olivia twice... oops.
Charlie hugged her with a red face and with lots of concentration set the date as early as he could. Six months after he left.
The journey was different than on the way there, it felt like he was being grated on a cheese grater on his left side, and being frozen on his right, he was spinning for at least five minutes before e span onto the carpet in the king's room with a thud. He was face down and felt really heavy, and he smelled blood, it couldn't be his own.
Charlie stood up to a horrible sigh, two of his friends were on the large table in the room, and they were in a bad state. These two people were Henry and his peculiar fishy friend Dagbert. They were both bleeding all over the place and Dagbert was missing an arm, it was across the room holding onto a chair.
Charlie acted fast, he whipped Claerwen out and healed all of Henry's injuries, and with Dagbert he had to pick up the battered arm and use his magic to reattach it, he was almost sick but it was a success, any injury was easy to heal, even if the body part was burnt to ash he could restore it, the crap thing was that he couldn't heal himself to the same extent.
Who would do this, somebody was obviously sending him a message, and he would ask the tow tomorrow, for now he threw Henry over his shoulder and teleported home, he then threw him in bed and teleported back for Dagbert. The endowed kids would have a field day after this, but Charlie was just glad to be back, he climbed into Olivia's bed, and with just that one cuddle remembered exactly why he loved her in the first place.
Banged this out in an hour, that's 36 words a minute ; anyhow I hoped you enjoyed and goodnight, please review guys.