19: And the Troubles Continues
1027 Words
“...my halfwizard.”
“...your dark side...”
Those were the thoughts that kept going round and round in my head even as I laid down on my bed and tried very hard to stop them. It was almost as if they were stuck on a repeat or something. I knew very well that Trichloris’ words were just a bunch of crazy man’s talk but that was also where the problem was. Not once did he sound insane; in fact, he sounded... true.
“And what is it that has gotten the valorwizard on edge?” asked Victoria as she hugged me from behind. I knew I should be all concerned about the fact that she was in my room when it was clearly against the school rules but I had learnt a long time back that Vic never got into trouble unless she wanted to.
“I’m just thinking about Francesca’s million per second questions,” I lied.
Actually, I wasn’t entirely being a liar. Francesca’s questions did bother me but- as we all know by now- not top priority. I just wished there was a way I could let everyone in on the secret and not suffer the consequences. Unfortunately for me, that wasn’t the way life worked.
“No one was expecting Francesca to question you like that, that’s for sure. It even caught Oliver by surprise and I can swear she tells him everything,” Vic said to me as she took a seat on my reading table and took my hands in hers; rubbing them affectionately. I noticed that she had opted for a grey off-shoulders T-shirt, nice blue jeans to match and white boots to complete the outfit- really nice digs in my opinion.
“Speaking of which,” I said, “did she look like she had something on her mind before she came down to the pass?”
“I don’t know,” she replied, “Stan was the one who went to get her and I was still frightened for you to see anything else.”
I was as sure as hell that Francesca was on to something and it involved me. Did Trichloris tell her something about me? I couldn’t put it past that old weasel to do something like that.
“Don’t too much worry about Francesca’s questions, Troy,” Vic finally said, proceeding to stroke my cheeks. “We’re all entitled to have our secrets.”
“Yes,” I replied with a little smile. Although some are darker than others.
Being on the top of a mountain in the morning of a very cold day should be next to freezing but the anger boiling in me made me numb to that feeling. I was angry at Trichloris, angry at myself, angry at everything!
I just learnt that morning that Francesca had employed the assistance of a set of wizards called the trackers in order to find that evil, cheating, manipulating, life-ruining Trichloris’ ‘accomplice’; which, as we all knew, was me.
By the way, the trackers- as I had already explained, for those that were listening- were a highly trained group of wizards who specialized in hard-to-find things- couldn’t understand why they didn’t dedicate their lives to finding the bestow instead, if they were so good.
The real problem here though was that trackers didn’t have a reputation for being discreet; and so, if they were to discover that Trichloris had used me as an escape route, there would be a bigger scandal than the whole house of Sanders can handle- now, I believe you understand why I was so furious.
“You better have a good reason for bringing me up here, Troy,” said Mr. Garvin as he made his way slowly to where I stood. He looked a lot less like himself out of his usual suit and tie and dressed up in a furry jacket.
“There was nowhere else that I could talk to you without the risk of being overheard,” I explained.
“This is about what you told me before, isn’t it?” he asked as he took a seat on the rock next to me. I should probably have warned him about the freezing temperature but he did seem to get the message anyway as he quickly stood up and decided to remain standing instead.
“Yes,” I replied. “Please tell me that you found something useful, Mr. G.”
“Unfortunately Troy, I can’t. There was no mention of your kind of situation anywhere, not even in the archives,” he replied, very apologetic. “Besides, you didn’t give me any tangible detail to go on.”
He was quite right about ‘no tangible detail to go on’ part and I admit that it was entirely my fault. But the thing is, I wasn’t sure if I could trust anyone with my secret yet. So, I decided to go for, “How far have the trackers gone in their investigation?”
“They are yet to arrive but it is said that there is no one who has more capability than this particular group.” Great! More problems for me. How the hell was I supposed to get around the world best trackers? I knew then that it was so over for me.
“Can I trust you with a secret?” I asked again.
“You did trust me with the first one, didn’t you?” he replied with a gentle smile. But I was very sure that Mr. Gavin was already sick and tired of my constant questions that didn’t get anyone anywhere but just had to play along ’cause he was my guardian/private counsellor.
Well, here comes something you can go on, Mr. G. “The truth is, I’m the accomplice everyone’s looking for.”
- Writer
