The Dragons of Ice and Snow (27 page)

“
Invectis
!”
he said firmly and stared into the suddenly foggy mirror.

The
three elementals hurried to cross the table and stand by Simon's
shoulders. He gave them all a nervous smile as they waited.

The
mirror stayed cloudy for several long minutes.

“
I
don't think it's working,” Simon said, looking down at Kronk.
“Either it can't get through or it's being blocked somehow. I'm
sure the elves can do that.”

“
Wait,
sir wizard,” Ana said excitedly. “Look! Is the mist
fading?”

Simon hurriedly looked
back in the mirror. She was right! The mist was dissipating.

All of them waited, the
wizard holding his breath, for the mirror to clear. When it finally
did, Simon gaped at the sight. It was simply one of the most
beautiful things that he had ever seen.

He was peering into a
forest glade. Immense trees, as large as redwoods or bigger, with
pale yellow leaves and white bark, surrounded a clearing. Flowers
were growing rampantly, their colors mixing and flowing in a dazzling
display. In the center of the glade was a round, grassy knoll in the
midst of which a fountain made of silver splashed and gurgled with
clean, sparkling water.

Simon could almost smell
the intoxicating scent of the flowers and a part of him yearned to be
in that place.

And in the middle of all
of this riot of color and movement, sitting on a simple stone bench
next to the laughing fountain, sat an old man wearing a deep blue
robe and reading a scroll. It was Daniel.

As Simon noticed him, the
view in the mirror zoomed in so that he was looking at his friend
from no more than a few feet away.

He paused and looked away
from the mirror, clearing his throat and wiping his suddenly moist
eyes.

Why hadn't he tried this
before, he wondered. Daniel's advice would have been invaluable over
the past year. Just having him to talk to would have been so helpful.

He looked back at his
friend, pushing his self-recriminations to the back of his mind. I
have more important things to deal with, he thought.

“
Daniel?” he
said hesitantly. “Can you hear me?”

The old man looked up
slowly, his eyes misted with age and something like wisdom.

“
Simon? Is that
you?”

“
It's me, old
friend. It's me.”

Daniel put the scroll down
beside him and turned his head this way and that.

“
Where are you?”
he asked. “Don't tell me you've crossed over! That would be
foolishness.”

“
Same old Daniel, if
you'll pardon the expression,” Simon said with a chuckle and
Daniel's face broke into a wide grin.

Suddenly he looked as
young as the wizard remembered him.

“
Don't be smart with
your elders, boy,” he growled. “So, if you aren't here,
you are using a communication spell of some sort?”

“
Magic Mirror,”
Simon agreed.

“
Ah, perfect. Give
me a moment.”

The wizard watched as
Daniel stood up slowly, wincing in obvious pain. He stepped up to the
fountain and made a small gesture. The waters instantly became still
and placid and the man peered deeply into the reflecting pool.

And suddenly Simon was
meeting his friend's eyes directly.

Both of them grinned
simultaneously and then laughed. Simon felt his heart lift at the
meeting and was happier than he had been in ages.

“
So there you are,
my friend,” Daniel said, eyes flicking over Simon's features.
“I see a lot of white in that mane of yours.”

Simon ran a hand through
his hair self-consciously.

“
Yeah, well, you
know. Magic.”

“
Yes, true enough.
Ah, I am so happy that you decided to try to contact me. Personally I
didn't even know that it was possible.”

“
I didn't either,”
Simon said a little shamefaced. “I wish I'd thought of trying
it a long time ago.”

Daniel shook a crooked
finger at him.

“
Now, now. What have
I always said? The past is gone. The future is uncertain. All we
have...”

“
...is now. Yeah, I
remember.”

“
Good.
Self-recriminations are poisonous.”

The man laughed in obvious
delight.

“
I cannot believe
that we are finally speaking. Ah, it's been so lonely here.”

Simon frowned.

“
Don't you speak
with the elves? Surely you've made some friends there?”

“
Yes, of course. But
conversations with elves are, hmm, how can I describe it? Limited, I
suppose. As polite and helpful as they've all been, they are
immortals and I am not. Their perspective is much grander than mine
is. Why, I've met elves who had wizards as friends five or six
thousand years ago.” He shook his head ruefully. “Among
them I feel like an infant, despite my appearance. I don't know. I
just can't seem to get comfortable around them.”

“
What about
Ethmira?”

Daniel smiled gently.

“
Yes, Ethmira. Thank
the gods for her. She is quite old as well, but her youthful
exuberance makes it much easier for me to forget that. She's been a
comfort, I can tell you.”

“
I'm glad,”
Simon told him with some relief. “I'd hate to think that you're
unhappy there, considering that it will be your home until...”

His voice trailed off and
he looked away.

“
Until the day I
die? Oh, come now, Simon. Don't be so morbid. I'm not kicking the
bucket any time soon, I assure you.”

The wizard looked back at
him and they both laughed again.

“
Now, I hope these
calls become a frequent occurrence,” Daniel said.

“
Oh, they will. I
guarantee it.”

“
Good. But I'm
guessing this attempt was made for a specific purpose, yes?”

“
It was.”

Simon picked up the amulet
and held it so that Daniel could see it clearly.

“
I found this
pendant, medallion, whatever, in the home of a dark wizard.” He
hesitated. “Uh, do you know what happened last year? With my
ex-neighbor Heather and the primal green dragon?”

“
Oh yes, I know.”
Daniel scowled. “The elves keep a close eye on things in the
mortal realm, old friend. Very impressive, the way you defeated that
dragon, by the way.”

“
A mixture of
trickery and luck,” the wizard said with a shrug.

Daniel rolled his eyes and
Simon grinned.

“
Yeah, you don't
agree. I know. Anyway, I found this in her old home today. As you can
see, there's a stylized picture of a dragon on one side and some sort
of writing on the other. But I can't read it. I was hoping that the
elves might be able to help with that.”

“
Looking for more
spells to add to your arsenal?” Daniel asked slyly.

“
Always,” was
Simon's grim response.

“
Good. Wait a
moment.”

His old friend reached
into a pocket of his robe and fished out a scrap of paper and a stick
of what looked like charcoal.

“
I'm always jotting
down notes these days,” he told Simon with a rueful smile. “I
find my memory isn't quite what it used to be.”

“
Well, don't chalk
it up to age,” Simon told him reassuringly. “Most days, I
can't remember what I had for breakfast.”

Daniel shook his head,
looking amused.

“
Now, hold that
amulet steady and I'll copy those runes. We'll see if the elves are
as wise as you think they are.”

For all of his apparent
age, Daniel's hand was steady as he wrote and he quickly copied the
writing from the amulet.

“
Okay, got it.”

He examined what he had
written and finally shrugged.

“
Certainly it's like
nothing I encountered on my travels, back in the day. We'll see if
the elders can make something of it.”

He slipped the paper back
into a pocket along with the charcoal and then just stared fondly at
Simon for a moment.

“
I'm going to have
to start carrying a small mirror with me from now on, just in case
you call,” he said. “This standing and looking into a
pool of water is hard on my old back.”

“
Are you all right?”
Simon asked with quick concern.

“
Fine. Fine. Now,
I'm off to speak with the council. It shouldn't take long, one way or
another.”

He stared off into the
distance, lips moving.

“
If my knowledge of
the time differential is correct, it shouldn't take more than an hour
or two to get an answer.”

“
That's great,”
Simon said enthusiastically.

“
Which means you
should call back in about a week.”

“
What! A week?”

Daniel laughed at his
friend's expression.

“
The flow of time is
very different here. You know that,” the man said as his
touched his thick white hair.

“
Yes, I know. But I
guess I hadn't realized how different. Two hours of time there and a
week here. My God.”

“
Crazy, isn't it?
Welcome to my reality. Now, try to be patient. Call back in a week
and I'll have news one way or the other. And we can have a decent
chat. To be honest, this standing and talking is killing my back
right now.”

“
Okay, my friend.
Thanks for this, by the way. I wish...I wish you were here to fight
the good fight with me.”

“
So do I, Simon.
More than anything. But hey, now at least you've found a way to get
me involved. I haven't been this pumped up for a long time.”

“
I'm glad,”
the wizard told him sincerely. “So, I'll let you go and talk
with whomever and I'll call back in one week.”

“
You do that.”

Daniel began to turn away
and then stopped to catch Simon's eye again.

“
Oh, by the way,
there is one thing that I can tell you about that amulet of yours.”

“
Really?” The
wizard stared at him, surprised. “What's that?”

“
That engraving of a
dragon on one side? It's not stylized or some artist's fantasy. It's
a picture of an actual dragon.”

“
You're kidding!”
Simon looked at the snaky figure in his hand. “What kind of
dragon looks like that?”

“
Don't worry,
they're extinct. But I saw an illustration like it during my studies
here. That's a picture of a gold dragon, one of the lost guardians of
the Light. They were betrayed and slaughtered by the evil dragons in
the distant past.”

“
Then what the heck
is it doing on this amulet?”

“
No idea. Let's see
if I can find out. Talk to you in a week, my friend. Take care. It
was good to see you again.”

“
And you, Daniel. I
wish you luck.”

The old man waved and
walked out the image on the mirror.

Simon shook it to break
the spell and put it back down on the table. He looked at the
elementals, aware that he was grinning foolishly.

“
Well, what do you
know?” he told them. “It worked!”

The week that Simon had to
wait to speak to Daniel again passed quickly. He was spending as much
time and strength as he could, trying to lock the Blizzard spell into
his memory permanently, along with as many other spells that could be
used in battle as he could manage.

He was finally able to
keep five in his mind at all times, along with his utility spells,
like Light, Gate and Shield.

They were Blizzard,
Fireball, Steel Skin (he'd improved his Stone Skin spell), Ice Spear
and Magic Missile.

It took four days of
intense practice, massive headaches and several arguments with Kronk,
who kept trying to get him to eat and sleep more, until he succeeded.
After that, he bowed to the little guy's wishes and spent a day in
bed, exhausted.

There was no word from
Liliana, which didn't come as a complete surprise to him. She did
want to be left alone for the moment.

Simon called Clara once,
to bring her up to speed, and she was thrilled for him that he'd
managed to speak to Daniel. He knew she worried that he spent too
much time alone.

Listening to Kronk and
Aeris argue, while Ana tried to play peace-keeper, sometimes made him
wish that was true.

Before he knew it, a week
had gone by and Simon was back sitting at his kitchen table, tea cup
at hand and the elementals crowded around him.

He cast Magic Mirror
eagerly and then waited.

This time, the spell
connected much more quickly and Simon found himself staring into
Daniel's face. Obviously his friend was looking back at him through
another mirror.