Chapter 37 - Teaching

  Jack stood outside the Trial entrance with everyone. He tried to use the leaf that Arbour gave him to enter but got a message that the Trial was ongoing and could not be entered. He had gotten the same message when he tried it when Sylvian was taking a while. Proof that Elizabeth had entered the Trial. Now they were all staring at the door wondering what to do.

  “What is the issue?” Savgar asked. “She made her choice. Might even do her some good.”

  “She isn’t ready yet,” Elaine said troubled.

  “Maybe it will be fine,” Jack tried to say convincingly. “The Trial difficulty changes on the person.”

  “Regardless,” Sylvian said. “There is nothing for us to do now. She will have to manage.”

  “We should have paid more attention and stopped her,” Elaine said.

  “We can’t control her,” Jack said. “She was planning on doing this for a while. I thought I talked her into waiting a little longer, but I guess it was taking too long.”

  “How strong were you when you took the trial?” Daniel asked.

  “Level two I think,” Jack said. “I think I gained a few levels during the trial as well.”

  “She might be fine then,” Daniel said. “We can speculate all we like, but in the end, all we can do now is wait and hope.”

  “As I said,” Savgar said. “She made her choice. Now she must survive it.”

  *~*

  Elizabeth scrabbled across the floor, dodging another slash of a sword from one of the skeletons. Not that it would matter soon. There was nowhere to hide, and the skeletons never stopped their pursuit. Just the constant creaking of bones and the flashing of steel.

  She didn’t even have a weapon to defend herself. It was just like when she had first encountered the goblins. The same thought kept echoing in her head. She was going to die.

  She screamed as another slash from the skeleton came within inches of her. She didn’t know it was going to be like this. Jack said he did at level two, that wasn’t much stronger than level one. She should be able to do this as well, but every time she saw those skeletal faces in the fog she just wanted to run away.

  She scooted across the floor trying to get away, but the skeletons crowded around her, cutting off her escape. They stared down at her with those empty yet piercing eyes as one thrust its sword down at her. In desperation, she raised her good hand to block in a move Teresa had shown her. Her hand reached out to meet the skeleton’s arm diverting its thrust to her side.

  The blade cut into her arm, but she avoided it from stabbing her. Grimacing against the pain, she grabbed its hand and kicked out at the skeleton’s leg. It fell to the ground on top of her as the other skeletons brought their swords down as well. Their strikes landed on their fallen comrade as Elizabeth used its body as a shield.

  It didn’t take long before the skeleton on top of Elizabeth crumbled to pieces. Their comrade’s death went unnoticed by the other skeletons. They continued to attack her, but the skeleton’s armor was still covering her, blocking their strikes. She hid under the armor to protect her, but she could still feel every blow. Grabbing the sword dropped from the fallen skeleton, she struck out at whatever she could reach without leaving the safety of her newfound shield. She was mostly only able to attack their ankles, but she kept at it, bringing them to the ground as their legs gave out.

  This lasted for several minutes until the attacks from the skeletons began to slow and then stop. She continued to wait, not sure if it was safe yet to leave. She knew that some of the skeletons had crumbled apart but she couldn’t be sure that all of them had. But after several minutes of no noise or attacks, she cautiously began to peek out.

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  Once she was sure that there were no more skeletons left, she crawled out from under the armor. Bits of bones were scattered around her. Their armors and weapons lay in heaps on the ground.

  Not sure what else to do, she collected all the swords, putting them in a pile away from the skeletons. That way, if they were to reanimate they wouldn’t have their weapons. That in mind, she looked back at the armor they wore and then down at her own clothes.

  Picking up one of the smallest armors she could find of the five skeletons, she removed the broken bones from the armor. They quickly turned to dust as she did. Once the armor was empty, she inspected it and found that it was unnaturally clean as though it hadn’t had a dead body rotting in it for probably centuries.

  She pulled the armor over-top her current clothes. The armor was like regular clothes but heavier and she was able to pull it on almost as easily. It may still be big for her, but it was better than her current clothes and strong enough to stop a sword. She stood there for a moment looking at the baggy armor covering her, unsure if it was a good idea when she started to feel the armor began to shift around her.

  At first, she was surprised and scared but soon realized it was changing shape to fit her. After a few seconds, she was staring at a beautiful work of chainmail that perfectly fit her. But there was something more to it than that. She felt stronger, safer with the armor, and she vaguely wondered if it was enchanted to do more than just fit and stay clean. Probably.

  Turning to the door that started all this, she approached the riddle once more.

  *~*

  Jack spent the rest of the night trying to teach the others his Shadow Shifting spell. Unlike his Mend or Simple Flame spell, it wasn’t a spell that could be visualized easily. Jasper and Ciao helped to instruct where they could but the spell required Darkness Affinity to be compatible and not everyone had that.

  Throughout the whole night of teaching, only two managed to learn the spell. Zajowle and Elaine had the right Affinities for the spell and picked it up after only a few hours of practice.

  “It’s nice that some people were able to learn it,” Jack said. “But I was hoping more people could at least use it to some level.” He sat on the ground resting. He had demonstrated the spell hundreds of times throughout the night including taking people with him as he did. He was hoping that experiencing the spell might help the others learn it, but it didn’t appear to have much of an effect. The only other good thing that came out of all the effort was a new skill.

  *Skill gained: Teaching (Beginner)*

  Hands on instructing usually comes from an Expert. Novices teaching Beginners, what could go wrong?

  -Increased chance to teach other skills or spells you have reached Novice or higher with.

  -Caution: Any skill or spell taught before reaching Expert rank, has the chance of the individual learning an altered or weaker version of the skill or spell.

  Jack wasn’t a big fan of the warning attached to the skill. An alter version may be interesting to see, but a weaken version wouldn’t help anyone.

  “At least the ones on the infiltration team managed to learn it,” Zajowle said. “We can try working with the others later to help them learn it.”

  “It’s not worth spending too much time on,” Jasper said. “Relying on a non-compatible or untested skill can be more dangerous than not having it at all.”

  “It would make what we are trying to do easier,” Teresa said. “But perhaps we would be better at focusing on what we are already good at.”

  “It would be nice to have a few more spells to fall back on,” Daniel said. “But I already have my mist form. I might be able to teach that to a few people. But we are just trying to cause as much chaos as possible in a short amount of time.”

  “The Wizard’s right,” Savgar said. He had joined them in their exercise to try and learn the spell which felt odd to Jack. He remembered Savgar telling him that he had no real talent for spells and never expressed an interest in them before. Yet now, he was actively trying to learn some. “We just need to distract long enough for you three to get the elves out of there. After that we can make our plans on dealing with Clayton.”

  “You are more concerned about saving our people than dealing with Clayton?” Rayne asked.

  “I’m not saying if we get the chance to do something about Clayton, we shouldn’t take it,” Savgar grunted. “But I agree that it might be too much to expect to take on a camp this size with our merry band. A quick surprise attack is one thing, but if this gets drawn out, we will be in trouble. We will need a small army at least to finish this, and right now that’s your people. That is unless you are willing to wait a couple months to go to Methal and bring down a proper dwarven battalion?”

  “No, we don’t have that kind of time,” Sylvian said. “And the dwarves…”

  “I know,” Savgar finished for her. “But eventually it will have to be dealt with it and the fallout that comes with it.”

  “What does he mean?” Reuf asked.

  “Not sure,” Jack said.

  “We will,” Sylvian said not explaining further.

  “I think things are only beginning to get interesting,” Zajowle said.