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Why have the demons come to our world all of a sudden?
I look up at the pictures that are hanging on the wall. Weirdly, most of them are untouched. I stand up and move to them, adjusting them. A few of them are crooked. I can’t clean up Luther’s home. There’s simply no way. I can, however, make sure that his pictures are left unbroken and undamaged.
One of the pictures catches my eye. It’s of a much-younger Luther and he’s with someone I recognize: a much-younger Martin. Together, the two of them are standing side-by-side and they’re grinning. They look like they’re on top of the world. I don’t know if Luther is ever coming back to his home in Dark Falls. I would venture a guess that if he’s not already dead, he’s about to be, so I lift up the picture. I can take it back to Martin. At the very least, it’ll be something he can remember his teacher by.
As I pull the picture down from the wall, it catches on something. I tug and the picture comes free, but then I realize that there’s something on the wall behind it.
A little knob.
How peculiar.
Curious, I reach for the knob and tug. It pulls open to reveal a tiny hidden space behind the picture.
Could this be what the wizard wanted me to find?
I reach up and grab the book that’s hidden inside the space. It’s old, covered in dust, and leather-bound. Yeah, I think it’s pretty safe to say this is what he wanted me to find.
“Oh Luther,” I whisper, looking at the book. “What have you gotten yourself into?”
Chapter 5
Edward
The problem with being King is that nobody really likes authority figures, so managing a group of people who really don’t want to be managed isn’t easy. I spend the afternoon working in the library and trying to come up with a plan for getting the demons out of my city.
My first step is to find out where they’re co
ming from. I’ll start sending out scouts who can patrol the borders of the city, as well as the neighboring towns to Dark Falls. Surely one of them will be able to come back with more information as to where the demons are from and what is luring them to our city. Monsters don’t just wander around looking for food. They only come when they’re called or summoned somehow.
The second step is going to be to find more either more cures for demon bites or to increase production of the potion currently used to treat the bites. The Dark Wizard, Luther, is perhaps our best bet at defeating the demons in our city. He discovered an incredible potion called anquan that essentially works as a way to remove the demon’s venom from the wound. Demon bites are fatal to fairies, but death generally takes a few days or even a week. Sometimes a fairy can survive for two weeks, but that’s rare. In normal faes, the bite always results in a fatality. Dark fairies have known to be able to hold off from dying for slightly longer, but I’m not sure why. There are legends that dark fairies – the fairies whose wings aren’t a glittery white but a deep, midnight black –have angel blood in their veins. Perhaps that has something to do with their inner strength.
I don’t know.
Satisfied with my progress and happy with my decision to face this problem head-on, I leave the library and go off to find Wyatt. My advisor will know exactly how we can get started with the next steps.
Only, Wyatt isn’t in his office.
Or the kitchen.
Or the study.
He’s not anywhere in the castle, I quickly discover, which is strange. Wyatt generally spends a few hours each afternoon in his office in order to do things like deal with citizen problems and to work on correspondence with our neighboring towns. Where is he?
I grab a fairy who is hurrying past.
“Have you seen Wyatt?” I ask her.
She shakes her head and keeps on moving.
“He’s in the dungeon,” another one says.
“Why?”
She shrugs and moves to go past me, but I stop her.
“Is that any way to show respect to your king?” I ask her. I cock my head, curious. What’s with the disrespect today? It’s not often that I pull the “I’m your king” card, but it seems like everyone is giving me the runaround today and I’d like to know why. I don’t think that’s too much to ask, either.
“No, sir,” she says. “My apologies,” she ducks her head in a sort of half-bow, but then she hurries off before I can say anything else.
