In Oblivion pt 2

We were outside faster than my heart could beat back twelve beats. After catching our breath, we decided to follow the overgrown path that wound through the tall trees.

But first my companion threw a fire flower at the second-storey window, a muffled explosion and flames engulfed the withered wood, the fire devoured the once-tall mansion with a crackling sound, quickly reducing it to ashes and cinders.

After admiring the fire, we left.

I didn't want to escalate, but the ominous silence of the forest made me nervous. I was tempted to ask Grant to stop searching for a new labyrinth. The idea of waiting for two days, sitting in one place and quietly going mad with boredom didn't seem so hopeless any more. But for now, curiosity and the desire to get out of Oblivion drove me on.

It was sunny again when we came to a glade with a pair of huge boulders in the middle. The briars that crowned the stone pillars were twice our height. We circled the clearing until we came to a black hole.

“Is there anything worse in this world than the Labyrinth of Fear?” Grant asked with a chuckle, looking at the dark entrance to the cave.

The steps started just below the stone canopy and went down, the sunlight diffused at around the seventh step, making it impossible to see how deep the corridor was.

I wasn't afraid of dungeons. I had been through so many instances in my life that I could write a survival manual. There were plenty of such locations in Virtul.

The stairs ended and we stepped onto stone tiles with bas-relief patterns carved into them. The labyrinth looked suspiciously like the dungeon in my favourite game, which opened at level 32. Even the lamps burned with a pale green fire, just like the ones in Nunti's Caves.

“Have you been here before?”

Grant shrugged indefinitely, “There are many Labyrinths in Oblivion. And each time they change their location.”

“Why were they created in the first place?” I kicked at a pebble that came under my foot, the impact echoing through the caves.

“My father told me that this land was once used to train mages to serve in the Imperial Guard. But since the change of power in Unica, the dimension has been forgotten. And magic has become unpopular.”

“So the president decided ‘there's nothing to waste’ and started training you here – in case you don't die while subduing the second gift?” I said sceptically, marvelling once again at the cruelty of Rizor Circul.

“My father may have made some bad decisions, but you don't get to judge him,” Grant said coldly. “You know my family personally, but you're not allowed to discuss their actions,” he gave me a contemptuous look.

His words left me cold. I wasn't scared anymore, but I was uncomfortable. I didn't feel safe around him. Emotionally safe. He was a cunning manipulator of people's moods, and he had a foxy spirit in his blood. He was a master at playing on the nerves of others.

Did I have to keep quiet for the rest of my life and not speak up when I didn't like something? I ostentatiously stayed behind him and walked slower, just to keep my distance from him, glad that in this world we weren't chained together and could walk as far away from each other as we liked.

The air around us had indeed grown cold. A mist had settled over the ground, and the deeper we went into the cave, the more it looked like a subterranean forest. Only the moon and the howling of the wolves were missing to create a completely bleak atmosphere.

“It's getting colder,” the young man turned to me, a puff of steam coming out of his mouth with every word. “You can control the air, can't you? Heat it up.”

“I can't do it. I haven't been taught,” I muttered in retaliation.

It was easy enough to call for a warm breeze, but now I was so angry at Circul Junior for his love of rash words, which were now hurting my ego, that even if we'd been caught in a blizzard at the North Pole, I wouldn't have agreed to keep him warm there.

I quickly changed my mind as white snow fell from the ceiling in large, sticky flakes, but there was no time to call for a summer breeze. We had a more pressing problem.

A three-tailed fox jumped out of the tree at me. It landed on my shoulder, scratched it bloody, growled and flew into Grant's face, who turned at my scream.

A few centimetres from his nose, the guy caught the barking beast, snapped its neck with a crunch, and threw the breathless carcass onto the road. The red fur burst into flames and red sparks, which, after a couple of heartbeats, faded and dissolved into dust.

“Behind you!” Grant warned me, throwing his rucksack to his feet and pulling out a stick with metal spikes.

I ran behind Circul, and only then dared to look at what was breathing down my back.

Many grinning animals with red and black eyes looked at us, and how happy they were to see us – their mouths were drooling.

“Hold them with air while I change their emotions,” Grant ordered, retreating towards the river that loomed in the gaps between the trees.

“Can't you just burn them?” I didn't want to use magic. I could hardly handle it when there was danger on the horizon.

“I can't. The fire won't fully obey me until I've used up the second gift,” Circul closed his lids and knitted his eyebrows in concentration.

I looked up at the ceiling and sighed. I was too lazy to save our lives right now, but the thought that if we died here, we'd go crazy in the real world kept me going. And I also wanted to get revenge on the president.

“Come, air.”

The rising wind caught my words, licked my palms in welcome and stood between us and the pack of foxes.

I watched with indifference as the foxes' formation suddenly broke up. Some of them jumped for joy, began to kiss and play, rolling around in the grass and road dust, others fell to the ground and looked melancholy at their fellows, others grinned and lunged at each other in anger.

After a few minutes, a huge cloud of dust had formed, with red sparks flashing from time to time, so you couldn't see anything.

“Run!” Grant grabbed my arm and dragged me into the woods.

We ran until the barking and squealing of the foxes had died down. I sat on a fallen log to catch my breath.

“What are those creatures?”

“No idea,” the guy swept a hand through his hair, which made me want to touch his silky hair too. “It's a good thing that they're susceptible to emotion.”

Circul collapsed onto the grass, closed his eyes, regaining his strength.

“Grant, you don't happen to have any food in that oversized rucksack of yours, do you?” I wouldn't mind a bite to eat.

“We almost got eaten ourselves, and you can still think about food at a time like this?” the young man opened one eye and gave me a reproachful look.

“You know, as my auntie used to say, hunger is not a wolf, it doesn't go into the woods when you drive it away.”

Hmm, I thought we heard wolves howling, so they must be here.

‘If you kill a wolf, will its meat taste good? I can't cook, of course, but I think I can skin it and Grant can roast it on his fire…’

“Interesting statement,” the guy grinned and pulled his backpack towards him. “There were some nut pastilles in here somewhere.”

My hands itched with anticipation, I was ready to eat a kilo of pure sugar, as long as my stomach didn't rumble.

But as soon as I took my eyes off the guy with the rucksack, a knot of horror and fear formed in the pit of my stomach and I immediately stopped wanting to eat.

“Grant, don't make any sudden moves,” I retreated quietly to the tree.

“What?” he raised his head.

“There's a huge wolf behind you.”

“You expect me to believe that? There are no wolves in the Labyrinths, only outside them, in Oblivion itself.”

I didn't try to change the guy's mind, I threw my arm forward, the airflow knocked him off his feet and nailed the wolf to the trunk of the spruce tree. But it was too soon to rejoice, for instead of one defeated predator, ten lights flashed nearby and more wolves sprang from them.

“Okay, I take it back,” Grant said, picking up a dry stick from the ground and lighting it.

I whirled, creating a small tornado, but as more animals died, thrown to the ground or into trees, more new ones sprang up.

One of the beasts leapt towards me, overcoming a gust of wind, and clawed at my shoulder. I screamed, losing control of the spell, and the lifted branches and leaves fell in a shower of leaves.

Circul struck the wolf on the head with a burning stick, causing it to roll its eyes and relax its jaws. I barely managed to get my hand out of its mouth, dodging at the last moment to avoid the teeth of the other two wolves.

I picked up a heavy bag from the ground and threw it into the middle of the pack. The tent perished. It was torn to pieces. I actually felt sorry for it. I've dragged it through the woods so far, only to have it die like this?

“Can you make another air wall?” Grant asked, scorching the grey fur of the beasts with fireballs.

Nodded, but then remembered that I'd seen some dishwashing liquid in the backpack while the guy was looking for pastilles. I didn't know how it had ended up in Oblivion, there weren't even any plates anywhere, apparently for the pot that had been left behind in the burnt-out Labyrinth of Fear.

A green plastic detergent with a coloured sticker on its belly lay almost on top, I pulled it into the light, closed my eyes and tried to remember a spell I had once learnt for fun.

I squeezed the liquid into my hand, concentrated, and soap bubbles flew from my palm, growing larger with each heartbeat. I gave them elasticity and aimed them at the wolves.

Trapped in airy, soapy cocoons, the beasts howled in surprise as their paws lifted off the ground. It was almost impossible to burst the bubbles now. Too much magic had gone into their strength.

A few of these bubbles got stuck between the branches, but most of them soared over the forest, hovering above the tops of the spruces.

Satisfied with my mischief, I turned to Grant, who was holding the burning stick in his hands, dumbfounded. He finally came to his senses, cleared his throat and said as confidently as if he saw wolves in the sky every day, “We should head back to the river. It's easier to find our way along it.”

“Where are the pastilles?”

“I think it was gone when you summoned the tornado. It's a good thing the rucksack was so heavy that even the heavenly forces couldn't lift it,” the guy picked up his bag and walked towards where the sound of water was coming from.

Sadly, I picked up the shabby sleeping bag and plaid and followed Circul.

The snow fell from above again, I wrapped my arms around myself and called for a southerly breeze. Immediately the snowflakes turned into drops.

“So you lied about not knowing how to control heat?” Grant said reproachfully.

I was about to blush with shame and curse myself for being such an idiot, but then changed my mind about apologising for lying.

“I didn't lie. I said I hadn't been taught.”

He snorted, as if he didn't expect me to be honest.

“Does it hurt?” Circul asked, nodding at my shoulder.

Just remembered that my hand was bleeding. I looked down at the sleeve of my shirt, which had already turned a dark scarlet colour. Surprisingly, I didn't feel any pain, as if I had no wound at all.

“It hurts like hell, I can barely move my arm,” I wailed, squinting at the guy.

He came over to me with a worried look on his face, carefully holding the lit fire flower to my wounds, studying the torn strips of skin hanging through the hole in my shirt. There was even a wrinkle between his eyebrows that made my heart twitch a little.

“Boo!” I shouted loudly into his ear.

The guy recoiled, looking at me fearfully, still not understanding anything.

Giggling, I sat down on the floor and laughed at my stunned companion.

“I should have left you in the forest. Let the wolves eat you,” Grant muttered as he adjusted his pack and stepped into the river in his boots.

I looked down at my expensive new trainers. The world was an illusion, but I didn't want to ruin them, even in Oblivion, so I took them off, tied the laces together and slipped them over my sleeping bag strap.

The water was icy, so I reached the other shore before my companion, who, stepping onto dry land, nonchalantly took off his boots, poured out the water and put them back on. Why did he pretend to be cool and not take his shoes off first?

I made fun of the guy, but only until I had walked a few steps. The river bed was littered with sharp rocks that hurt my poor feet.

I felt my stupidity now, limping on both legs, and had to walk on tiptoe so it wouldn't hurt. Surprisingly, the wounds from the wolves' and foxes' teeth didn't hurt, but those from the rocks caused great discomfort.