Sealing the Darkness

It was said that in times of great danger that the strongest mages of each of the elements would band together to fight whatever evil endangered their land. The elements are Earth, Fire, Water, and Air. But the mages are divided. The mages of Earth were concerned only with themselves; with emotions as hard as the stone they manipulated. They cared only for what they could gain from the world around them. The Water mages were peaceful and kind. Caring for others and providing aid wherever they could. They were content to take in strangers and happily convert the newcomers to their way of life. Mages of the Air were peaceful as well, but unlike their water brethren, they preferred to keep their interactions with outsiders to a minimum. It was rumored that they were wise and calm, but little was known for sure because they intentionally chose remote, extremely difficult to reach locations to settle. Finally, the fire mages, whose fires were fed by the depth of their emotions. Some were quick to rage, but their flames passed as quickly as their anger. Others allowed their rage to build and when they got angry whole villages could be burned to the ground in a matter of hours. Notwithstanding, even though fire was fuelled by rage, it chose it’s mages from among the most passionate and strangely, the most protective.

Almost 300 hundred years ago, a darkness had swept across the land destroying everything it touched. It caused crops to wither and die, animals became more ravenous, and creatures of darker times started to appear more frequently. The darkness also effected how some people thought and corrupted those who had ill intentions at heart. It was discovered later that the source of the darkness was a demon spawn that went by Avarice. No one was sure where he originated from, or who had summoned him. All that was known for sure was that for seven long years he grew exponentially and his evil spread without cease across the land. Together the mages set out to track the demon and rid the world of his evil. They faced many challenges along the way, fighting wolves, goblins, and dragons, but worst of all was the fighting amongst themselves. The mages were by no means friends, their societies did not get along, it would be more accurate to say they were openly hostile. Sometimes the violence simmered under the surface as small boarder disputes and other lowly crimes, occasionally, it broke through and led to unabashed violence and even open warfare. However, it finally happened that the mages finally reached Avarice’ keep. A tower perched on the edge of a cliff with a contingent of ogres guarding the entrance.

“How are we going to approach this one?” Dosar whispered as the mages hid in the bushes.

Dosar was one of the physically stronger Earth mages, amongst his people he was a great builder and his eye for detail in the stones made him even more popular, he was also the undefeated champion in the athletic games that the earth mages held every five years.

“Ogres are known to be slow and stupid.” Talla said as she eyed the Ogres.

Talla was one of the smartest and fastest Fire Sorcerers in the country, amongst her fellow mages she was known as a grandmaster, at the age of 10 she had already mastered the advanced studies and at an early age was given a position in the halls of teaching where she stayed learning and teaching fire pupils.

“And resistant to fire” Zadra whispered with a smirk on her face, “looks like your useless Talla.”

Zadra was one of the Water mages best healers, known for miracle cure of kings daughter people from all across the water country would come and see him for their medical needs.

“Enough! We don’t want to kill each other before we rid the land of this evil, lets save the bickering till afterwards.” Aidria said in a low tone as the wind picked up into a howl as Aidria grew more frustrated.

Aidria was a Grandmaster Sage of the Air Sorcerers one of their brightest and strongest, everyone looked up to her and respected her, even the tribal leaders of the Air people sought her help on diplomatic matters and their own people’s affairs, and when she wasn’t helping the tribal leaders she was helping the young achieve enlightenment and focus their abilities.

“Dosar could you shift the rocks from under them?”

“Yea sure… why don’t I just take the whole cliff side down with them?!” Dosar said angrily, “moving the earth isn’t easy you know…”

“Forget it!” Zadra said as he jumped out of the bushes and cast a title wave of water towards the ogres. Aidria jumped out and created a water funnel out of the remaining water before it went over the cliff dragging one of the ogres with it into the sky.

Dosar stood up and summoned his familiar which appeared next time him in the form of a giant bear. Familiars were animal representations of the human soul, the animal that appeared had the same traits that the mage had, mages didn’t get their familiars until they passed the trails into adult hood on their 18th birthday, once the familiar is summoned for the first time it bonds with the mage for all of their life, linked telepathically and have the desire to protect one another.

“You really should go help them.” The bear told Dosar.

Dosar grumped and moved out into the open and watched as Zadra and Aidria attacked one of the final ogres, he watched before deciding the bring the earth up around the ogre with a wave of his hand and crushing it by making a fist. The only person who didn’t contribute to the fight was Talla, she laughed as the final ogre fell.

“The way is clear for now, but it is surely expecting us now.” Talla’s familiar said as it appeared next to her, a phoenix that burned brighter the angrier it became.

“We no longer need to worry about being stealthy tonight we either ride the world of this evil, or we die ourselves.” Talla said.

The four mages entered the tower with their familiars behind them Zadra’s familiar was a snake and it had wrapped it’s self around Zadra’s body well Aidria’s badger just followed behind her walking around her always looking for things that could endanger it’s master. They didn’t meet much resistance walking through the tower but they could feel the darkness getting stronger the higher up they went, they passed what looked to be a torture chamber and saw several disembowelled bodies of other mages throughout the land. Aidria stopped next to one of the bodies and noticed the tribal tattoos on its shoulders and she started to cry. Knowing that the others were going to ask what was wrong she blurted out.

“This was once my brother, he disappeared a few years ago, and we never knew what happened to him… until now.”

Talla was the only one who approached her and placed her and on Aidria’s shoulder. “We’ll make this demon spawn pay for what it has done.”

Dosar dropped to his knee’s as the darkness surrounded them the sheer evil of the land was getting to him and he felt it slowly driving him insane, even his familiar was starting to act up.

“If we don’t do something soon none of us will make it out of here alive, this evil is becoming too much to handle!”

The others agreed and started to climb the steps once again, Talla was helping Dosar along since he was having difficulties walking. It had taken the mages about ten minutes to climb to the top of the tower and once there they could feel the evil in their very bones, it was difficult for them to resist the temptation that the evil was imprinting on them to strike each other down. They broke through the final door and saw the demon spawn floating in the air, it was covered in a cloak made of shadows that left no part of its body exposed, it didn’t appear to have any armour on it at all nor any weapons in sight.

“I have been expecting you for some time young Mages,” The voice that came out was that of a man but much deeper then it normally should have been. “but I do fear you are too late to stop me!”

Avarice started to laugh as he lowered himself back to the ground.

“We will not allow you to poison our land any longer you hell spawn!” Dosar yelled and without a second’s hesitation charged into battle with his familiar right behind him, he drew his hammer and swung at Avarice’s head but Avarice just reached up and grabbed Dosar’s arm sending him straight to his knees. The familiar arched in pain as Dosar let out a scream and fell to the ground when Avarice let go.

“I told you, you are too weak to face me.”

Talla grew infuriated as she watched Dosar get taken out so quickly, she also knew that even if Dosar hadn’t already been in a weakened state he wouldn’t have been a match for the demon spawn by himself. “We much work together to defeat him, he’s far too strong to fight individually.” Talla told the others, she couldn’t lose her cool, she didn’t want to risk injuring the others around her.

Aidria nodded her head and pulled out a short sword that was engraved with runes that were glowing white. She swung the sword over her head and then right towards Avarice, and watched as a funnel of air was sent at him but split into two as it went around him. At the same time both Zadra and Talla had drawn their weapons and sent their own elements at Avarice to the same effect.

Avarice just laughed louder as the elements didn’t affect him, “This just tickles! My wards are unbreakable, now just give up and I will make your deaths painless.”

“Not yet we won’t!” Dosar mumbled as he got to his feet and grabbed a hold of Avarice, he wrapped his arms around the body and held on tight. “Now try!”

Before the other mages could react, Dosar’s bear and the other familiars charged forward and attacked Avarice draining his protective wards. Finally Dosar had to let go but his bear wasn’t done yet, it charged Avarice into the nearest wall nearly knocking it down.

“ENOUGH!” Avarice yelled as he grabbed a hold of the bear and shoved his hand through its chest cavity, “Your familiars have become a nucense to me and now they will all pay the price.”

Dosar yelled as his bear fell to the ground and slowly disappeared being reabsorbed back into his body, Avarice removed his hood and smiled at the mages, his face was pale with scar’s crossing every section of his face and down his neck and his eyes were blood red and he started to laugh maniacally as he moved towards the other familiars. Talla jumped forwards and brought her sword down on his arm and watched as his robes caught fire, but that didn’t stop Avarice from grabbing her phoenix and snapping its neck. Talla dropped to the ground in agony and tears as Avarice moved onto the badger which had charged forwards and was now clawing at Avarices stomach, well Zadra’s serpent wrapped its self around his neck.

“We’ve got to do something soon or else all of our familiars will be dead!” Aidria yelled. “I have an idea but we all have to attack him at once!”

Talla got to her feet and watched as Dosar did the same and prepared herself to do whatever it took to finish Avarice off.

“Everyone attack now!” Aidria yelled as she sent another funnel towards Avarice this time it struck right on course, along with the torrent of water and sustained blast of fire and then finally a tomb of stone.

“I’m going to seal his soul inside that tomb Dosar make sure it holds until I’m done!” Aidria yelled again.

“Make it quick!”

“In the darkest hour we call upon you, spirits of the land, we ask for your strength to seal this evil that endangered us all for ever in this tomb.” Aidria began, “Halla mence inish tao!”

A scream was heard from within the tomb as a blinding flash of light came out of the cracks, when the light disappeared and everyone was able to open their eyes they noticed that the rock tomb was floating in the air but was completely sealed.

“Thank god that’s finally over.” Dosar said.

“Yes, Dosar will you be able to find a place to bury this tomb? We don’t want anyone to ever find it and release it ever it again.”

“I shall, and I shall place a warning on it to tell any who do find it to leave it shut.”

“Thank you.”

“Vena, Vena where are you?” Zadra started calling out as he tried to find his snake. It took him a moment to realize what had just happened. “They never got away did they?”

A tear started to roll down Aidria’s face as she shook her head.

“What about our familiars? Our duties to protect them as well as them protect us!?” Zadra yelled as he drew his weapon in anger.

“I’m sorry there’s nothing I can do, it had to be done well he was held otherwise he could have escaped.”

“My Vena was in there!”

“You think I wanted to sacrifice my beloved Fluffy! No I didn’t I’m going to regret this for the rest of my life knowing that she is locked away with an evil spirit and that I’ll never get to see her again until I die!”

Zadra and Aidria stared each other down as they prepared to attack each other both were extremely upset, but neither had time to do anything about it as the tower started to shake.

“We need to leave.” Dosar said as he knocked down the wall that his bear had nearly destroyed and moved the tomb outside.

“I’m sorry guys but we did what we had to do, our familiar’s sacrifices weren’t in vain.” Talla said as she pushed Aidria towards the hole. “Zadra come on!”

Zadra looked at them and in a yell of anger sent of a torrent of water their way pushing them all out of the tower as it collapsed in on its self. Aidria forced the air beneath them to slow their decent but they realized that Zadra wasn’t trying to kill them he saved them from the tower collapsing and sacrificed himself in the process.

“Let’s hope Avarice never appears again, or else our Familiars and Zadra all died in vain.” Talla said as she bid good bye to her fellow mages and started her journey home. Dosar hid the tomb in a faraway place and remained in isolation ever since to keep its location a secret. Aidria never made it back home, her grief was too much to handle and no one has heard from her since. The events of that night slowly passed into story, and then it became a mere legend. The nations still remained close to the brink of war, unaware of the evil that grew once again.