Aldwyn's Academy by Nathan Meyer Page B

half-orc’s wand appeared in his hand as he warily eyed the monsters. “Go,” he repeated. His voice dropped to a whisper. “I’ll distract them just long enough for you to get away and then I’ll go back for help. Trust me. I can handle this.”
    One of the bugbears, a grizzled old male with a shock of white hair framing the top of a scar that ran down his face like a river, spoke in a voice like gravel spilling down a chute.
    “Look at this, Grimek,” the scarred bugbear sneered in the Common Tongue. “This little cross-blood wants to engage in frivolities.”
    Grimek stepped forward so that his face was visible. Rubbery lips twisted into a jagged semblance of a smile, revealing a broken lower tusk.
    “I’m hungry, Slake,” Grimek growled.
    His voice was a deep rumble down in his massive chest.
    “I acquiesce, dear comrade,” Slake said.
    He glided forward but stopped when Caleb lifted his wand threateningly.
    “Hungry,” Grimek repeated.
    “What are you doing, little cross-blood?” Slake purred. “Why are you helping out a juicy morsel like that pale skin? You think their kind”—he jerked his blunt-featured head back toward Aldwyns—“is ever going to accept you?”
    “She said we could eats
these
ones,” Grimek growled.
    The half-orc student lifted his wand, and thunder sounded directly overhead. Lightning cracked.
    “You’re gonna die alone and friendless,” Slake snarled.
    “I’m not friendless anymore,” Caleb said.
    His wand came up.
    Dazzled by the flash, Dorian turned and stumbled forward. He felt the ground turn upward sharply under his feet as spots spun in his eyes.
    His breathing was ragged and the cold burned the inside of his nose. He looked back but he couldn’t focus his eyes, couldn’t find Caleb, couldn’t see the bugbears.
    “Run, Dorian!” Caleb screamed. “For the love of Avendra, run!”
    Blinking back the blindness, Dorian pushed himself up the narrow trail toward the cave ahead.
    The words of the ghost in the maze echoed through his thoughts again, like a fresh peal of thunder; she must not get the girl.
    Who was “she” anyway?
    Something big was happening this night, and the mystery behind it was so deep it felt timeless, but if the bugbears caught him, Dorian knew he would never be able to alert Lowadar.
    He had to stay free, to keep his wits about him, to be brave … to make us proud, his mother’s voice finished for him.
    Behind him, he heard a long, triumphant roar, and his heart lurched in his chest as he wondered what had become of Caleb.
    Slake and Grimek would be on him now.
    He drew his lips into a tight line and darted into the mouth of the cave.
    Three steps inside and he threw himself back against the rough wall of the long, narrow cavern. He bent to slide deeper into the shadows and suddenly froze.
    Around him, dark forms crowded close together. Something rustled up ahead. He heard a low keening. It was the very place Helene had nagged him about during his tour, the Cavern of the Quivering Mushrooms.
    As both Helene and Professor Fife had made so abundantly clear, this wasn’t a place for a first year to go blundering.
    When agitated, the giant fungi released a dust from their spores that could put even the most accomplished wizard into a magical sleep that lasted hours.
    A bluish tinged flash of light split the sky outside the cave as a lightning bolt landed nearby. For a brief instant the inside of the grotto lit up in brilliant relief.
    Dorian’s eyes bulged.
    On the far side of the cavern, he saw a slim figure suddenly disappear into the round, black mouth of a tunnel set up in the rock wall.
    Helene!
    Dorian gasped and stepped forward as the thunder rolled in and extinguished the lightning. A rounded shape taller than an adult loomed above him, and the boy stopped himself just short of racing directly into the mushroom.
    He froze.
    Slowly he reached out his hand until it came up against the cold, uneven surface of the rock wall. He