The continent of Faythander was loosely shaped like the prehistoric continent of Pangaea, but in Faythander, the land was split into five massive kingdoms. Pixies inhabited the southlands, which were represented on the garden map with an L shape and two horizontal lines through the center. The elf kingdom was the largest and took up the eastern and central portions of the map, marked with a triangle shape and a circle in its center. On the western side, the kingdom of the dragons and Wults filled the space with symbols of the Y and a backward 3 shape. The northlands, which until recently had been the territory of the goblins, was left blank.
In the map’s center I found the skull symbol but wasn’t familiar with any kingdom the skull could represent.
I held the box and scanned its symbols, then matched each one to one of the symbols represented in the garden. Six facets of the box, represented by only five symbols—four that corresponded to the races of Faythander, and one that was a mystery.
The shape of the skull was located at the garden’s bottom center, which was loosely where Dragon Spine Mountain stood. Since the witch’s castle stood so close to the entrance of the undiscovered land, I could only assume that the skull was a symbol for it.
Alarmed at the implications, I studied the box and garden, hoping I’d missed something, but I found nothing new. I could only come to one conclusion, and it scared me more than I cared to admit.
The skull was a symbol for black magic.
Chapter 10
I made it back to my room where I found the wraith who had been there earlier. A shimmering blue dress was draped over his arm.
“What’s that?” I asked.
“My Lady wants you to attend tonight’s ball. She has requested you wear this.”
I eyed the dress. “Do I have to?”
“My Lady wishes it.”
Sighing, I took the dress from him. As I hefted the gown, I almost dropped it. The thing had to weigh more than a suit of armor. After entering my room, I locked the door behind me and then inspected the dress.
It was made of several layers of translucent fabric, and each layer was darker than the next. On the outermost layer, the entire bodice had been beaded with diamonds, and I had wild ideas of transporting back to Earth with the thing, selling it, and living the rest of my life as a millionaire cat lady.
Carefully, I placed the gown on the bed. Warm, slanting sunrays filtered through the window onto the floor and bed, making the jewels glow. I stepped to the window and looked outside. Evening was approaching. A whole day was nearly gone, and I didn’t feel any closer to opening the box. I pulled it out of my pocket and studied the symbols again.
The magic was a gentle hum filled with subtle power. After learning the meaning of the symbols—each representing a different race on Faythander—I realized that the odd gray color could have been caused because the magic was a blend of all five.
It made sense. I’d never seen it done before, but that didn’t make it impossible. The only way to know for sure was to test my theory, so I turned the box to face me with the symbol of elven magic—the C shape—on top.
I let elven magic flow from my hands into the symbol. Controlling the magic was tricky as all it seemed to do was bounce off the box, but I finally managed to focus the power directly into the symbol. As I did, the symbol glowed brighter. The magic surrounding the box changed color as it broke apart, creating a rainbow of colors—pink, green, and amber—on the walls and ceiling. The light dazzled my eyes. The swirling magic brushed my skin, an odd sensation with all the magics combined into one, until they finally faded, and all the blue elven magic disappeared.
The C symbol on the box disappeared.
Finally, I’m getting somewhere! I felt like jumping up and down on the bed.
My hands trembling with excitement, I turned to the symbol of the dragon magic, the Y. Although I didn’t naturally possess dragon magic, I had Faythander magic, and since all magic on Faythander branched from one common source, learning to control other magics was possible. I’d been taught many dragon spells, but would they work? Saying the word for magic in the dragon tongue would hopefully do the trick.
“Einoxulus,” I whispered and let the spell flow into the stone.
As before, it took a bit of artistry to get the magic to flow with precision into the shape, and it took a few tries, but finally, the magic united with the symbol. Green swirls of light surrounded the box, intermingling with the other colors until the green faded, and as before, the symbol disappeared.
Sitting on the bed, I felt my head spinning. They were simple spells, but they still needed power, which happened to come from my energy. Two spells down, three to go. I still felt like jumping up and down on the bed, but maybe with a little more restraint.
The Wult, pixie, and black magic spells remained. The only easy spell would be the pixie. Since the Wults didn’t possess magic, I wasn’t sure what to do about that one. Worse, I knew there was no way I could manipulate the spell controlling black magic. But I would worry about that one when I got to it. First, I had to take care of the pixie symbol.
My heart clenched as my thoughts turned to the pixies. Sometimes I forgot that my closest pixie friend, Uli, had died, only to remember that she’d given her life to save
