The Cursed Blood, стр. 21
During which, Gramps negotiated the treaty of The Packs (known simply as: The Pact). That regulated and relocated the Were-beasts to the Adirondacks in exchange for being left alone and protected (hunting them was once deemed as the epitome of trials to prove a young Elvish hunter’s skills, who took their kills’ fangs as trophies that were often worn on cords about their necks). Which incidentally was all the Packs had wanted in the first place. An end to the hunts.
All that sounded horribly barbaric to me, but evidently the teeth and pelts the Elves collected from their kills had special properties that were highly sought after. Still though, that’s gross and wrong, and nothing will change my mind on it.
Seriously, going out and killing people to wear their teeth and skin is very serial killer like, and just gives me the willies. Sadly, back in those days some still tried to poach them and are themselves hunted down if their intentions and crimes become known. By Gramps and Manx if they were lucky.
The Were-beast packs if they weren’t.
Next, we went on a hike of the grounds. By hike I mean White Owl, never one to walk more than he had to, led me about the lodge’s grounds and pointed out some rare and useful indigenous plants that grew wild through the Park.
I admit this was a bit of a snooze fest for me who, despite being told that this could be essential for survival, had absolutely no interest in knowing the difference between witch’s hobble, mandrake, and icecap vine and their hundreds of different useful applications in everything from cooking, field medicine, alchemy, to herbology. Happily though, for my later years, I did manage to remember most of it, if only accidently.
Just as the day was getting colder and darker, White Owl started his talk about always trusting one’s gut, and never letting anyone force me into second guessing my instincts. He advised that this could very well save lives as we stomped the goopy filth off our feet on the porch.
I was quite happy for the boots Gramps had gotten me at this point as the Master had decided to traipse us through a veritable mire of inch deep sucking mud to show me a blooming icecap vine.
Which also just so happened to be hung with bunches of very ripe, tastily tart pink colored berries that he harvested a hatful of, and he was munching quite happily on. He even shared a few, advising as he stuffed a handful of them into his mouth that they were best taken in moderation.
Between juicy mouthfuls of berry, he sagely advised that next to our senses (which become quite enhanced after our Ascension Day), a Darkling’s best weapon is our instincts, stressing over and over how important that was for me to remember. I’m pretty sure he lived to regret that well-meant advice. Pretty much everyone did. At least for a long while.
That evening, after my lessons and a heavy meal of a large mushroom and pepperoni pizza from Sall’s Pie Emporium (the local Feyish Pizza parlor that’s really more of a local institution than a mere local slice and wings joint) delivered by an extraordinarily grumpy Dwarf on a green motorized scooter. I decided it was high time I spent some time studying.
We had eaten way more than we should have, and I had settled into the sofa, intent on reading. Manx curled at my feet as I flipped pages in one of the books Gramps had left for me. Honestly, it was interesting stuff and the enchantments in its pages, bindings, and ink did a lot more than help me understand words and subjects far beyond the average thirteen-year-old human’s comprehension—it literally showed me things in my mind, almost like a tv or film.
Each word added bright strokes of a brush in a vividly living moving horror of experiences. Absolutely free of bias, singular perspectives, lies, or sugar coating (the magical ink allows for only complete and absolute honesty, which is quite handy at times, and also quite humbling).
I vividly remember at the time that I was reading a chapter about Wizard genealogy that was a bit confusing. Particularly a paragraph about the peculiarity of their becoming, as they are an oddity among those gifted with magic in that their power manifested so conditionally and only after another Wizard’s death.
It tended (as many Feyish or Arcane gifts do) to be inherited and passed on to blood relations but wasn’t always limited to such. It unhelpfully summed it up by stating that: ‘Wizardry and the Weave works their wills in mysterious ways.’
It seemed there wasn’t much really concretely known about the process, as Wizards, who tend to be excessively private, insular, and obsessively secretive; All desperately fight tooth and nail to keep such vital information exclusively private.
Obviously (and rightfully) fearing that such dangerous knowledge could one day be used against them. And, when they perceive it necessary, protect their secrets with outright terrifying and impassioned intensity.
Hence, all that’s truly understood by the unwizardly of the races is that the Chosen would have survived a brutal trial or ordeal culminating in a great sacrifice of some kind, to earn the mantle at the time of one of The Five’s powers release.
At this point my head hurt. My throat was dry. I was confused and my eyelids were becoming as heavy as the huge book I was reading, so I closed it and sat it down and thirstily slurped down the last