The Second Prophecy (Part 1 of the Dragdani Prophecies)

Prologue

The
days of
Lord Salith, Dark Wizard and master of Dempmage and the dark lands
therein, are long over.

Said to be
the most powerful Wizard ever to walk the lands of the long
forgotten world of Dorminya (pronounced Dormanya). The Dark Lord’s
downfall came at the hands of the Wizard-Elf, King Dragdani (son of
the first-born Wizard-Elf Thoucil), of the lands of
Opredanas.

Salith’s ruin
came just in time to save Dorminya from falling into eternal
darkness, though he has an heir, a daughter who is herself a
Wizard-Elf but only because her father made her so. He wanted her
to have what he himself had searched most of his life for,
immortality.

When the Dark
Lord’s end finally came, it was believed by all that she would take
his place; however, she had secretly longed to be free and had no
intention of taking over the regime that her father had spent so
long building and securing. Her refusal only brought around a
chance for Salith’s apprentice to take his place. Also a
Wizard-Elf, Lord Ulicoth took the throne of Dempmage all too
willingly, and sought to destroy the Order of Lanisic once and for
all. He succeeded in destroying King Dragdani, though failed in
ending the Order itself. It survived and thrived, if only for the
reason that Ulicoth fell prey to the last spell that Dragdani cast
before his untimely death. The curse was designed especially for
the Dark Lord, and as soon as it hit him, he was severely weakened
and stripped of most of his powers.

Since, his
powers have slowly returned, so he is now as powerful as an
ordinary Wizard, but he has and will continue to look for a way to
bring himself back to full strength. In addition, he has been
patiently waiting for the day of the Second Prophecy, which was
written by none other than Dragdani. It is said that on that day
Lord Ulicoth will face his own destruction. Still Ulicoth would do
anything –
anything –
to stop this day of his ruin from coming to
pass.

Chapter One

It
was the first of July and a normal morning on
Weston Road, which was the cleanest and newest street in the
neighborhood, with its patches of beautiful green grass between the
footpaths and the road. These patches of grass had small flowerbeds
planted right in the middle of them. Some had small thin trees;
with round black metal fences guarding the tree trunks. The entire
street was extremely tidy and very well-kept.

The sun had
risen and was shining brightly; it was the start of a warm day in
the street.

At the middle
of Weston Road, on the right side, there was a big cream-colored
house that was two floors high and, one could say,
spacious.

It was 10:00
am on a Tuesday morning, and at this time; the radio alarm on the
bedside cabinet in the master bedroom of number eight Weston Road
sounded. The man that lay on the left side of the King-sized bed
let out a short groan of discomfort as he hit the clock several
times trying to hit the off button. When he finally accomplished
this, he rolled back over and instantly fell back to sleep. His
wife, on the other hand, jumped out of bed and stood there in her
red silk pajamas and had a long stretch. “It’s time to get up,
sleepy head,” she said as a yawn caught her.

“
Just another
hour or two.” said her drowsy husband’s voice.

“
Don’t be so
lazy,” she said cheerily.

But the man did not answer; he had fallen
back into a deep sleep.

The woman
walked to the bottom of the bed, took hold of the bedclothes and
pulled them clean off. Then she crawled onto her side of the bed.
She could still feel a little warmth were she once lay and felt a
small desire to lie down again and join her husband. However, she
leant over and put her hands on her husband’s side then pushed with
all her might and rolled him off the bed and onto the floor. He
landed with a dull thud and before jumping up.

John
Stark
exclaimed, “What the heck was that
for?”

“
For being so
lazy,” said Helen Stark as she started to laugh.

“
Is that
right?” John did not sound the slightest bit amused. This only made
his wife laugh more. He got up, went into the bathroom and locked
the door.

“
What are you
doing?” Helen asked.

“
I’m about to
take a shower,” answered John.

“
You know I
like to use the bathroom first in the morning, because every time
you go in it stinks afterwards.”

“
Go use one
of the other bathrooms.” he said crankily.

“
If that’s
the way you want it fine, I’ll use one of the other bathrooms,” she
said as she laughed quietly to herself.

A short while
later John came down the stairs, headed for the kitchen and started
to make breakfast. It seemed that he was now in a better mood,
which was probably a good thing, as not long after that Helen,
wearing a red hoodie and black tracksuit bottoms, came down the
stairs. She could smell the eggs and bacon that John had made and
as she got closer, she could hear the sizzling of the frying pan as
he put it in the sink and turned on the hot tap to cool it a little
so it wouldn’t spit at him when he switched to the cold.

She went into
the kitchen, which comprised of a cooker near the far corner and
benches running round the wall, with a sink in front of the wide
window facing Helen
. There were also
cupboards overhead on the walls running the distance of the
breakfast bar. There were cupboards running opposite closer to the
floor, and between them and the breakfast bar there were also
drawers. A tall cupboard sat at the end, which housed their dinner
and lunch plates, glasses and cups. After seeing all those familiar
things, Helen also saw that John was not there, so she turned her
gaze to the dining table, and there he was waiting for her to join
him. She sat down and looked at him. He was wearing a grey T-shirt,
blue jeans, and his hair as always in the morning was messy. She
found herself trying to determine if he was still angry.

“
I take it
that you’re not cross with me anymore John?” she said.

“
Cross with
you?” John asked blankly. “Why would I be cross? I was just being
lazy.”

Helen grew
suspicious.
He must have found
a way to get back at me,
she thought. She
looked about trying to see anything that he might have done, but
there was nothing. “You’re up to something,” she told
him.

“
I’m not up
to anything,” said John. “I’m not as immature as you.”

Well
, he was being a
little lazy
, she thought.
Maybe he’s seeing things from my
point of view.
Remembering what she did
brought a smile to her face again. Then she picked up a piece of
the toast from the plate in front of her. She was about to put it
to her lips when she just happen to look down at it, and when she
did she saw a small spider humbly standing on it looking right back
at her. She froze on her seat. This immobility changed as the
eight-legged creature suddenly grew to at least three times its
original size. Helen screamed and threw the toast onto the table.
To her surprise, the spider vanished in an instant.

Helen is
terrified of spiders, and John knew it. She looked over at him. He
had one hand over his mouth, obviously trying to stop himself from
laughing. In his other hand was a wand.

“
Not as
immature as me?” asked Helen.

John laughed
aloud. “Now we’re even.”

“
Fine. Just
so you know mine was better. I didn’t cheat.”

“
Using magic
isn’t cheating where I come from. Besides, you wouldn’t say that if
you had seen your face.” John laughed again.

Helen said
nothing. She just stared at the clock on the wall that sat to the
left of the window, which said that it was now 10:38 am.

As always
they were acting like children but soon calmed down and sat
comfortably at their dining table. They sat facing one another.
John was reading the newspaper with his back to the dining room
window, and Helen was staring out of it, watching the white puffy
clouds as they calmly blew past.

Suddenly,
smoke began to rise up from the floor, but it did not spread around
the room. It twirled and twisted into a thick, man-sized column.
Helen sat staring over John’s right shoulder.

“
What’s
wrong, Helen?”
inquired her curious
husband. She didn’t answer. She just kept
staring.

Then there
was a whooshing sound and John knew it, although he had not heard
it in seven years.

A tall shadow
began to form in the smoke.

John had just
begun to turn his head to look and see if he was right in his
assumption, when he heard the voice of a man, and that, too,
sounded very familiar.

“
What very
strange dwellings these Normals have,” said the man as the smoke
cleared.

John was less
than happy to see an old Wizard standing there.

The Wizard
stood tall with a rough build and a white beard that was at least
six inches long. His face was very thin, and he had sharp
cheekbones. His nose looked a little too long, for his face was
quite thin, with the left nostril being smaller than the right, as
though his nose had been broken and had not been set properly. On
it, a thin scar ran from the top right side to the bottom left
side. His mouth was wide and his lips were thin. He had large hands
and long fingers, and he was wearing turquoise robes and an indigo
belt. And over the robes, he wore a dark blue cloak with a hood.
The hood covered the top part of his face. John and Helen could
only see his nose mouth and beard, but John knew who it
was.

“
Delsani!”
said John, unmoved with the appearance of his old friend and
mentor.

“
Indeed,”
answered the Wizard, and he removed his hood from his head. His
beard made him look old and worn. He looked kind but worried, and
his eyes were dark. Just dark.

“
What are you
doing here?” asked John crossly.

“
Are you
feeling so hurt that you can’t welcome an old friend into your
home?” asked the old Wizard.

“
Friend.”
John sounded very hurt. “Ha, that’s funny. I thought a friend would
visit before the end of seven years.”

“
To you seven
years, and for the rest of us it has been fourteen. I am sorry
about that, John, but those of us who still consider you a friend
thought it was better that you didn’t see or hear from us, in case
it would stir up bad memories or make you home sick,” said
Delsani.

“
Not having
any of you visit when the dust settled made it worse.”