-Vela
I woke up as soon as the blinding light hit my eyes. I forever curse these damned 'curtains', they were always being chewed on by some king of bug. Just my luck.
I grabbed a small hand mirror that rested on the side of my bed. It was my mother's, since she was but a child. It had been her mother's as well, and even my grandmother's mother.
I looked in the mirror, and, like every other day, saw a horrendous tangle of hair, either sticking out in all directions or tangled in great bushes.
I looked over to where my tattered, old brush was. It's all the way on the other side of the room. But that's so far away!
As I was prepared to get up, a thought crossed my mind.
"Telekinesis." I whispered, laughing at how easy everything was made by magic. I directed my mind onto my brush, and simply willed it in my direction.
Soon enough, the brush was in my hand as I was trying to tame my ever-wild hair. I, on occasion, swore, in an elven tongue known only to my brother and I (just in this city), when I tried to go over a particularly knotty area.
Within a few minutes, I had my hair looking somewhat presentable, which, in my case, still looked like I had only just woken up.
I made my way out of my room, when I bumped into Draco along the hallway. I unceremoniously bounced of off his muscle (an odd amount for ten years), and fell to the floor.
"Watch it." He grumbled, offering a helping hand, which I gladly took. He had a face like thunder, which quickly changed to a smirk as he looked down at my hair.
"You look more like a witch every day."He smiled, and made his way to the dining area.
"If your not careful, I'll get my familiar to eat you alive!"I shouted, following after him.
"Do you even know what your familiar is?" He scoffed, taking a bite out of a sweetroll.
"No, but I'm hoping it's a bear, you'll be food for sure." I smirked as I took a sweetroll and made my way back to my room.
A few minutes later, I was off to the Silver-Blood inn, mentally preparing myself for a days work. That almost never worked, however.
The first half of the day went quickly. There were a few brawls, three people passed out, and Frabbi threw yet another knife.
After my first break, things got a tad bit interesting.
I was collecting up a few of the tankard's people left on the table- dirty beggars – and was on my way to the counter when a particularly noisy customer decided to take a brawl further.
He had drew his sword, and he was trying to kill the Orisimer that he was brawling.
He dealt a particularly harsh blow to the Orc, and as the steel from the sword left the green body, a glass-shatteringly beautiful flash of crimson blood flew out of the Orc as he fell to the floor, a river of flowing crimson escaping the dam that was his body.
I paid no attention to the detail though. As this particular thug went to deal a finishing blow, I quickly whispered Lightning bolt, not having enough time to think of a better spell.
I directed the resulting bolt at the thug, who's blade was just inches away from the Orc. I aimed at his head, hoping to knock him out.
The thug raised his sword, swinging it in an arc-like motion, going straight over his head, as if to slice the Orc in half.
Just as the sword was level with his nose, my bolt hit the sword.
The two collided with a terribly beautiful explosion of blue. The bolt seemed to have parted into hundreds of mini-bolts, the brilliance of their blue illuminating the entire room in it's beauty. As the mini-bolts made contact with the floor or the wall, it left behind tiny soot marks, as if scorched by a fire. As for the sword, its silver shine had, for the most part, been replaced with a scorching red, outlined by a brilliant orange. The sword was heated so much, that the sword simply snapped in mid air, colliding with the floor with an audible clatter. The hilt of the sword was still tightly wrapped in the thug's hand, as if a babe clinging to it's mother.
The thug looked over at me, with an expressionless face. He stopped to examine me, the remains of his sword tossed aside.
"That was my best blade." He stated simply, showing no grief despite his loss. He pulled out a dagger, similar to his steel sword but with a blood-red hilt and an odd jewel of the same colour imbued in the handle.
As he advanced towards me, I prepared my next spell, a new spell developed by the University called Glyph. It was a difficult alteration spell, made for changing the direction of a certain object or being that made contact with it. There were several variations of this particular spell; the Symphis, or Move Caster, designed to move the caster in the direction of their choice, be it up, to the side or down; the Malphis, or Move Other, a spell designed to move a person of the caster's choice in any direction, but that person must be willing; the Calphiris, or Trap Enemy, a glyph that you set on the ground, much like a rune, but it remains invisible until a hostile walks into it, where it traps them in a thin barrier mid-air; and the Obsterixis, or Move Enemy, much like the Symphis, but forces a hostile in a direction.
Each of these glyphs have a certain colour to each of them. White for Symphis, Red for Malphis, Blue for Calphiris and Purple for Obsterixis.
I had used the Calphris on this occasion, imbuing the now invisible glyph on the ground. I readied myself as the thug was almost upon me, attempting to dodge his blade and make him fall into the trap.
Just as he was swinging the blade to try to cut me, I dodged out of the way and stepped backwards, making him stumble onto the glyph.
As soon as he did this, the once invisible glyph lit up with a brilliant light blue. Its shine illuminated the room, just like my lightning bolt from earlier. As soon as it lit up, the thug was suspended mid-air, held up by an invisible barrier.
His eyes lit up with recognition, as if he had experienced this before. He looked over to me, his expression still remaining blank.
"How can one so young know such advanced magic?" He asked me, not struggling against the barrier that held him up.
As soon as he had said this, I thought back to the time Draco and I had discovered the old library hidden underneath the guard's tower.
-Three years Earlier
-Vela
"Come on Draco! I want to see what's inside!" I shouted at my brother as I ran around in circles, not being able to control my excitement at out new found discovery.
Draco and I were adventuring around Markarth when we noticed a tiny concealed door hidden by the Guard's Tower. We were only just able to fit in, Draco had more trouble getting in than me.
The door contained a library of some sorts, a small but cosy room filled with at least twenty bookshelves. These bookshelves were quite high, and held a lot of books on them.
As my brother and I walked around in fascination, I noticed that a lot of these books were extremely dusty. These must have been here since Markarth was founded, and maybe even before the Snow Elves were destroyed by the Atmorans.
I stopped as soon as I noticed a few books out of character. These books were all lined up neatly, unlike most other books, and had little to no dust on them, as if these had only just been set here.
I grabbed the lamp my brother held, one we took down here just in case there was no light. I put the lamp down next to the books, and examined the cover of a particular book that caught my eye.
It was called "The Incarnate of Magicka". It had an odd looking symbol on it, it looked to be a mix of the Imperial flag, with the symbol of The Mage's Guild. I opened the book to look inside, and was shocked to see that it was in near-perfect condition.
I began reading it. It explained how magic first came into Mundus, and how mortals were able to harness its power. I paid no interest or attention to this part, and skipped ahead to something more interesting; How to use Magic.
It was filled with a vast amount of spells. Incantations. Even Alchemy. I was looking around the spells, as I always had been able to control Magic from a young age.
I noticed a particularly interesting spell, namingly the Glyphs. I was looking through them. They were exceptional! Being able to move people, or animals, with just one word!
"Symphis!" I shouted, deciding to try out one of the spells.
As soon as I uttered the incantation, I felt a tremendous amount of energy leaving my body. The floor was lighting up white with a mysterious glyph, expanding all the way to the walls of the room.
"What have you-" Draco was cut off as a maleficent blast of magic sky-rocketed us in the air.
We reached the top of the room, where Draco had bashed his head with a resonating smack. As the magical energy left the room, we began to fall towards the floor, slower than our travel up here.
Only now had I noticed how big the room was. The bookshelves that were once towering over us now seem like the books that they contain; small and dark.
As we were falling with an ever greater speed, layers of décor flying past us, I noticed that Draco was unconscious. Now panic really set in. I didn't know what we could do. The floor was almost upon us, and I did the only thing that I could think of.
"Malphis!"
A red glyph, exactly like the one from earlier, appeared in front of Draco and I, imbued on the floor.
Just before we were only a hair's breadth away from our death, the red glyphs started glowing and were were suspended in mid-air.
As I breathed a sigh of relief, I accidentally deactivated the spell, and we fell the remaining distance to the ground. Seeing as it was only a hair's breadth, the only damage was a slight stinging sensation on my nose.
I crawled over to Draco, who managed to fall onto his back. A quick Healing Hands and he was conscious again.
"Whatever that was, don't do it again." He said in a weak, croaky voice as he sat up, slightly dizzy from the blow to his head.
I walked over to the book I had read earlier, and picked it up to stow beneath my clothes.
I would read this later...
-Present time
-Vela
I had plenty of time since that day to study the book in a much greater detail. Not only were there spells in there, but techniques on how to use spells of a greater complexity at an earlier stage, strengthening spells that you can already use, and even some lost spells from the Third Era, and in contrast spells that had been discovered only recently, like the Glyphs. It said that there were a total of three other books about the secrets of magic, but no information on where to find them.
I noticed a certain change of energy in the room as the glyph I had cast earlier dispelled itself and set the thug free.
Ice Spike! I exclaimed in the depths of my mind, and summoned a ball of ice in both my hands. I threw them, as if to through the ball itself, but the changed mid-air into the blade-like ice spike it was named after.
The thug had managed to dodge both of them, and swung the blade at my neck. I ducked just in time, and I jumped back a soon as I could, trying to make some space before his next attack.
He was already running at me by the time I landed. With only one thought on my mind, I set my thoughts on the table right beside me.
Telekinesis!
The table in question had flew at the thug, clattering into him and sending him across the room.
As I recovered from the spell – it's tiring to move an entire table with your mind, after all -, I noticed that the thug was already on his feet, but something had changed about him.
The cowl that he was wearing on his head was now tattered and torn, revealing his face.
Or rather, his lack of face.
He had no eyes. He had no nose. He had no mouth. His ears were pointy, like an elf's. His hair was jet black. On his face was war paint, in the particular design of a red skull.
He shrieked once he realised what had happened, and bolted for the door. Just before he could leave, he turned back,and, with a smirk somehow appearing on his face.
"Hi fen alok, zeiniin-dovahkiin, wah transcend Kriis Hrothgar."
And with that, he made off into the streets of Markarth.