Chapter Two: Whispers of Ink
Darkness enveloped the library, not a suffocating darkness, but a warm and quiet shadow, pierced only by the golden circles of light dancing on the stone walls from the single oil lamp Lewis had placed on a small wooden table. The air was cold, lonely, and filled with the faint echoes of slumbering books. Lewis wasn't truly alone; he was surrounded by thousands of tales and secrets, but at that moment, his only concern was the secret in his hands.
The ancient manuscript lay open before him, looking even more mysterious under the faint light. The dust he had brushed off it earlier that day seemed to have been replaced by a new layer of ancient mystique. Lewis lifted the lamp closer to the page, his shadow swaying behind him like a silent witness to his forbidden discovery.
"Well..." he whispered to himself, his voice sounding strange, as if it belonged to someone else in the absolute silence. "Who are you? And why did they hide you?"
He started with what he knew, with logic. He brought books on ancient languages and tried to compare the symbols. The lines of the Ancestors' Tongue looked solid and square, while the manuscript's symbols twisted like serpents. The letters of the Church's sacred language were ornate and clean, while these symbols seemed carved in haste, or perhaps with a kind of desperation. Every attempt to decipher the code ended in failure. An hour passed, then another. He made no progress. His mind was wrestling with something greater than his understanding.
He closed his tired eyes, feeling a deep frustration. Then, almost involuntarily, he extended his finger and traced one of the mysterious symbols, a zigzagging line that looked like lightning.
And suddenly.
A faint touch of warmth, like brushing a butterfly with the tips of his fingers. Then, a strange tingling sensation, light as a pinprick, traveled from his finger to his wrist. Lewis jolted back, snatching his hand to his chest as if he had touched an ember. He looked at his finger, expecting to see a wound, but there was nothing. The pulse in his wrist was racing.
"What is this?" he muttered, astonished. He picked up the lamp with a trembling hand and brought it closer to the page. The symbol he had touched looked normal, like any other. But what he had felt was anything but normal. That sensation... it was alive.
He felt his heart pounding hard. It wasn't pure fear, but a mixture of awe and attraction. This manuscript wasn't just a book. There was something else within it.
He repeated the experiment, this time more cautiously. He gently placed his finger on another symbol, a circle with a dot inside. He waited. Nothing. Then he tried a symbol resembling a raging fire. Once again, that faint warmth, that strange tingling. It was reacting to specific symbols.
"It's responding..." he whispered, his eyes widening. "But... how? And why?"
Then came the cost. After several attempts, he began to feel it. A slight headache started in his temples, then turned into a throbbing pain behind his eyes. He felt a strange mental fatigue, as if his mind had been trying to lift a heavy rock. He sighed and buried his head in his hands. The evening had been long, and the night had grown old. He could no longer concentrate. He closed the manuscript, buried his face in his arms on the table, and surrendered to sleep from sheer exhaustion.
---
It was not a peaceful sleep.
He dreamed of the forest. Not the familiar forest of Elderawn, but a denser, darker one. The trees were taller, and the air was heavy with the smell of earth and iron. He was running, not out of fear, but driven by a purpose, as if he was following something. Then he saw it: a dark entrance in the side of a hill, hidden by ivy and moss. It was the cave.
Then the scene changed. He was inside the library, but the books on the shelves were whispering. He couldn't make out the words, but they sounded like a warning. Then, a pair of ancient eyes, sad and wise, appeared, looking at him from between the lines of the manuscript. They weren't evil, but they seemed burdened by the weight of centuries of secrets.
Lewis woke up suddenly, startled. The dream lingered in his mind, strangely clear and detailed. He sighed, trying to calm himself. The faint light of dawn was creeping through the high window, meaning sunrise was near. He had slept on the table all night.
He glanced at the manuscript, still closed in front of him. The dream made him feel closer to its mystery. It wasn't just about power; it was about a story.
He decided to change his tactic. Instead of trying to decipher the symbols, he began to examine the manuscript as an artifact, as a clue to its owner's life. He turned the pages with extreme care, this time searching for anything unusual.
And shortly after, he found it.
In the lower corner of one page, almost hidden under a margin crowded with other symbols, was a small drawing. It wasn't a detailed map, just a rough sketch: a wavy line that might represent the river outside the village, a cluster of circular trees, and an arrow pointing to a place deep in the forest. Next to the arrow was the same repeated symbol: a small circle inside a triangle.
His heart ignited with excitement. This was a clue! A physical hint!
Then, he noticed something else. At the bottom of the page, there was a faint ink stain. It wasn't an ordinary stain; it had small circular ripples, as if a tear had fallen on the page long ago and dried the ink in that spot. He held the page up to the faint light, and he could almost swear he saw the faint shadow of that imagined tear.
He held his breath for a moment. He was holding not just a book of spells, but a witness to ancient human sorrow. To despair. To a heavy secret. Who was this person? And why were they so sad that they cried onto these pages?
"You hide more than just incantations, don't you?" he whispered to the manuscript, his voice carrying a note of pity and awe.
At that moment, he heard a sound.
Whispers. Coming from the hallway outside the abandoned room.
Lewis froze in place, his heart practically stopping for a second. His voice! It was Father Christoph's voice. But he wasn't speaking alone. There was another voice, deeper and rougher, one Lewis had never heard before.
"...We must find it before it's too late, Father," said the strange voice. "It was never just a legend. The former Prior knew it."
"Calm yourself, Brother," replied Father Christoph's voice, and he sounded tense, which was rare for him. "The manuscript hasn't been seen since my grandfather's time. It might be lost, or destroyed."
"Or stolen," said the strange voice darkly. "And if it falls into the wrong hands... you know what could happen. Chaos. Heresy. The fall of everything we've built."
Their voices grew closer. They were standing almost right outside the door.
Lewis sprang into action in a silent panic. He closed the manuscript blindly and looked around desperately for a hiding place. He spotted a narrow gap between two old shelves at the far end of the room. He shoved the manuscript deep into it, then pushed some old, dusty books in front to completely conceal the gap.
Then he jumped into his chair, grabbed the first book he saw ("History of Elderawn: Volume One"), and opened it randomly, holding it with a trembling hand. He tried to make his breathing normal, but his ears were straining to listen.
The two voices stopped right outside the door. He could see two shadows moving under the door.
"We have checked everywhere," said Father Christoph, his voice quieter now, as if he was lowering it so no one would hear. But the silence of the night made every word clear. "We will check again. Do not fear. The Light will guide us."
Then, he heard the sound of footsteps walking away. Silence remained for several long minutes, during which Lewis did nothing but tremble.
When he was finally sure they were gone, he leaned back in his chair, feeling as if all the energy had been drained from his body. He looked at the book in his hand, then at the hiding place of the manuscript.
Everything had changed. It was no longer about a boy's curiosity. He had heard it himself. They were looking for it. It was dangerous. It was real.
Sitting in the fading darkness, as the first rays of sun gleamed through the window, Lewis realized that his quiet life in Elderawn had just ended. And he knew, deep down, that the real adventure had not yet begun.