A Wizards Beginning: Part Six

The street was even worse when you were out there than when you were inside. It was a wreck and that's the only word Ramek could use to describe it. The paved street was cracked and filled with holes the size of a room. Many metal parts were scattered along the street. Old issues of the Neopian Times flew across the sky and rummaged through the streets, comics and articles rolling past. Buildings lined the streets and most of their windows were broken in and some glass lay scattered across the street. Other buildings looked perfectly normal despite the fact that they were rundown and uninhabited. Ramek also saw some stray pets walking slowly down deserted alleyways that led in between buildings. Some looked back at him, eyes longing for something; others just ignored him and walked past, trying not to look needy.

     The Draik had been standing there for a good few minutes, looking and observing the ransacked streets and buildings, going closer to check out a few unusual looking things. He hoped that something on the street would lead him up farther than he was now. He could attempt to climb the large building which housed the lobby he was once in, but the building itself was at least fifty stories high. Climb it? He knew the spell to stick his claws to the surface, but it was very risky and inaccurate. Guess there was nothing else he could do...

     He walked towards the wall and put all his claws atop the cold wall. "Stick it once, stick it twice, thrice the hour, till the night." He had to make small adjustments to the spell, calculating that the shortest time he would use it is for three hours and the longest would be by nightfall, which he predicted was about six or seven hours away. He felt his claws plant into the wall and he moved his left hand, leaving his right below and started to crawl up the wall.

***

     It was difficult. Every time one hand would go up, the other would hang below, leaving Ramek hanging from the wall on only one hand. Once he got his other hand up on the wall, he'd repeat the grueling process all over again, flailing when heavy gusts hit, knocking him back and forth against the wall, cutting his lips and face as they will into the pebble-like wall. It was hard to look up, though Ramek liked to get a good idea of where he was going. He didn't seem to be getting any closer, but he felt sure that eventually he would reach his goal.

     "Got to...keep...going," he muttered to himself as he maneuvered his hands on the wall, praying all the way along that he'd make it to the top safely.

     Sweat poured from his forehead and covered his face. He was panting heavily, trying to catch his breath. His lungs wouldn't inflate to their full capacity, forcing him to have short breaths, only giving him the amount of air he needed if he was sleeping.

     A crash alerted him from his deep thoughts. He looked to both the left and the right. He gasped and tried to move faster when he saw a hand flailing around outside a broken window. Ramek could hear a loud screaming from inside. The scream chattered his teeth and made him want to jump off and never hear anything again. But he kept moving, hearing footsteps seemingly following him from inside. His adrenaline kicked in about the same time his panic kicked in and he moved even faster than before. But that energy boost only lasted so long. Before long, he had to take a short rest stop. Hopefully whatever was out to get him wouldn't be able to tell that he had stopped moving. Maybe it wasn't as smart as it seemed...

     Ramek made sure he wasn't near and windows and then leaned into the wall, breathing deeply. He was exhausted and wasn't sure if he could make it the minimum of two hours to the top. He calculated he had been going up the wall for at least two or three hours. He could see the top of the building, but it was still looming in the distance, far out of reach.

     He then felt a strong grip on his hand. His head swung around to see who had grabbed his ankle. Nothing was there. He was starting to imagine things. He slowly turned his head back and his ankle was grabbed again. This was no hallucination. He was feeling the touch. The cold, scaly hands that grasped his ankle.

     Ramek started to run up faster on the wall, but he couldn't. The hand was holding him tightly, not letting him move at all. "What are you?" Ramek yelled, looking down at the invisible form below.

     No one answered at first but then he heard a raspy answer. "Shut up and come with me." Something about the voice sounded...normal.

     Ramek wanted to run away, but he was instinctively drawn to the voice, feeding off every word it said. "Yes..." came Rameks reply, in a slightly more hoarse voice than normal. "I will come with you..."

     "Good," it replied. The rasp had gone and Ramek was snapped out of his trance. "Now, hit it before the Dark Power finds that I escaped. He says I'm the 'good seed' and keep a steady eye on me. I heard he was going to kill you. I'm not like everyone in the Closeby. I'm not...evil."

     Ramek listened intently. He sounded truthful but...he had tried to kill him, right? He was chasing him... No, he was trying to catch up to him to save him. I think... Ramek was confused.

     "Now!" the voice shouted, grabbing his ankle even harder.

     Ramek slowly moved with the invisible creature, somehow trusting his gut and saying he was good. He was dragged to a broken window and slowly dragged through, landing on a soft carpet.

     "Where did you bring me?" Ramek asked, looking around for some sign of the person who had carried him inside.

     Ramek almost jumped back as he saw a Zafara seem to come out of nowhere. "Name is Delor."

     "Ramek."

     Delor nodded. "Dark has been talking about you a lot lately. He says that you are a powerful Wizard and said that he wants to challenge you. So, he caused a crisis right when you were to go on the Journey. And now you're here. He wants to lure you up there, proceed you into a real duel, and then kill you with a single blast of powerful magic."

     Ramek had some of his questions answered, but a few still remained. He figured now was a time better than ever. "Why did you come and get me?"

     "I don't follow the Dark Power. He isn't the true Power. I secretly practice Wizardry behind his back. I was caught once and he called me his 'good seed'. This would mean he wants me to be evil, but I refuse. And since that time, he's been keeping a very close eye on me. He's sent his Minions to try to capture and kill me. So far, I've killed most of them but quite a few of them are still on the prowl."

     "What exactly are Minions?" Ramek asked. As she continued to talk, more questions started to form in his head.

     Delor didn't answer for a minute and stuck her head out the door, looking to both sides. "Minions are creatures made by the Dark Power," she started as she came back into the room. "They were created over six thousand years-"

     "Six thousand years?" Ramek asked, surprised.

     "Wizardry has been going on for much longer than Neopia has existed. You should know that if you read the 'History' section in your Manual," she commented. "Anyway, he made them as a way to capture invaders and either kill them or bring them back to the Dark Lord. And...they know my scent. They track it and find me. But I've set up a spell to confuse them. So, if they find me it'll be by accident."

     "Wait, wait. You're a Wizard?" Ramek asked. There was no way she could complete a spell without being a Wizard and practicing the Art.

     "Kind of," came her reply. "Wizards grant people they call Trustees a certain amount of power in the Art, but no way near the capability that a Wizard would have. They chose me simply because I had access to the Dark Power and would be able to report them on his plans. But, ever since the Dark Power caught me practicing the Art, he kept everything quiet around me. Now I learn things only from word of mouth. Some other people here hate the Dark Power and feed me information when they find it appropriate. I was able to grant them very basic Wizardry, but only a few simple ones. Even less than you know."

     Ramek nodded. The information was coming at him fast. He hadn't learned anything about this in either what he'd read in the Manual or Tyvek, but he assumed it was true as he could of sworn Tyvek mentioning something about trusted people who had a tad bit of magic in them.

     Delors' nose crinkled up and poked her head outside and turned both ways. "We have to move," she whispered.

To be continued...