Koletise armastus

“So, Avril Solhat, Luiana Dreik, Philip Alderrick. You are going to the border of the territory. Felix Draxlow, William Schartz, Carin Honal. You are going on a patrol of the Empire. Don’t you dare come back before sunset. As soon as the final training sessions are over, riders were already being sent to a possible battlefield. It was still unclear where the attack took place. They only knew that a squad of Empire soldiers had been killed on the border, but no one could even think where exactly. “As you wish, Your Majesty!” The captains bowed to the King, leading their team members straight to the dragons outside. Philip was chosen to lead two girls from the blue team because they worked best together and Felix worked better with the guys from Philip’s team. You could even say this is the first time they really work as a team and it seems to be like it is the best opportunity to test each other for camaraderie. “So… Avril, how have you found your dragon?” Already in the sky, Philip decided to shorten the long flight to the border with a small talk, asking a rather personal thing. Asking how a rider met or found his dragon is not a particularly common thing. It was something personal for each rider. Asking this question, the person seemed to be asking to open his soul to him, which Avril was completely not ready for, apparently. “You shouldn’t know this, Philip.” Adjusting the mask on her face, the girl put a hood with fur on her head, hiding from snowflakes falling from clouds above them. “Oh… Alright then. And you, Lui? Wanna share how you found your.?” Looking at the second girl, he noticed that she had simply fallen asleep. Always energetic, Luiana just fell asleep. Get up at six o’clock in the morning to be at the King’s by half past seven and fly out into a blizzard. Not everyone wants to experience this, and she doesn’t seem to want to either, so wrapped up in her cloak, she fell asleep. Unlike humans, dragons did not suffer from frosts and had been growing their special layer of warming scales since the beginning of autumn, so it turned out that with the onset of severe cold weather, they were ready for any storm. “So we fly in silence… Great.” “Phill, down!” They achieved their goal surprisingly quickly. Either the tailwind helped them, or the dragons decided to give their best to get to the border of the Empire as soon as possible. However, Avril called out to the captain not so that he could see the border, but because of something quite more important and scarier. There was a huge destruction in one clearing. The clearing itself was not small, but now it was huge, and all thanks to the tremendous fire attack that was probably made not so long ago. The whole clearing was burned out, and some of the trees around it were even felled if not burned to the core. The dragons landed on the snow, which miraculously remained clean even with such damage to the surroundings. It was not clear exactly when the battle took place in this area, but the snow was still melting as soon as it fell on the scorched grounds. There was no grass, not a single casualty left in the attack radius of the probably rather big fireball. In the center of the scorched clearing there was a deepening that went underground for about three meters exactly. It was necessary to check what was in the center, because there might even be someone there, unless, of course, that someone is already dead. — Dang… Did some kind of explosion happen here? — Luiana woke up just as she was not violently shaken upon landing. Her dragon was more of a wyvern, so landing on the ground was extremely tough for such an elegant creature. Each rider descended from his dragon, but did not intend to enter the affected clearing. At least two out of three thought so. — Let’s look around first, and then… Hey! Avril! Come back here! — Philip, as the captain of the team at the moment, could not help but look around to protect not only himself, but also his team. However, one person was not going to wait for him at all, because Avril had already gone to the clearing. She made her way to the center quite quickly, and stopping just for a moment in front of the deepening, jumped right inside. — Avril! — Neither of them even thought about it, they immediately rushed, but had to jump back right away, because their feet were badly burned, even through the sole of pretty good rider’s boots. — Ri! Are you okay? — Putting her hands to her mouth, Lui tried to shout to her friend, because she did not get out of that deepening in any way, and they absolutely could not see her. Only, less than ten minutes later, the girl herself got out of the recess, calmly shaking off the dirt and approaching the team. “You scared the hell out of us! How did you not get burned yet?” “You’ve been too slow. The area doesn’t smell like traps at all, and the magic has already worn off.” Saying this rather softly, Avril put a hood on her head, which fell off when she jumped into the recess. The wind was cold after all, even in such an area. “Avril, I’m your captain for today, so please listen to me. " Philip rubbed the bridge of his nose. This behavior from the seventh rider was completely unusual, but she turned out to be careful even when she was near them. “Did you find something?” “- Yes. Some kind of piece of armor. It’s not our metal, not even one of the rare ones in the Empire”. She took what she found out of her pocket, handing it to the captain. He just looked at the piece and chuckled. “Meh, Nothing special. An ordinary piece of armor from some guardian or warrior of the Shadow Empire. At least now we know for sure that they got into our Empire, and even destroyed such a beauty around.” He folded his arms across his chest. Even though he was older than both girls and was the captain, his speech was quite young. “This place must have been beautiful before. Maybe it was even a forest, but the warriors burned the trees.” Not even deciding to take a piece and examine it better, Lui shivered, walking away to the dragon, since it was warmer and safer next to her dear winged friend. “The forest? There is not an ounce of burnt bark in the middle.” Putting the armor back in her pocket, Avril turned around, carefully scanning the area with her eyes. Two minutes later, something clicked in her head, forcing her to sprint to her dragon to pull something out of her bag that she needed at the moment. Her guesses about the area bothered her a little and now, they fully justified themselves, because she found what she was looking for. “Philip, come here, please!” In the hands of the girl there was a book that every captain of the guard, the army and even the captain of the riders had. When Philip saw this book, he frowned. “Where did you get …” Before he even had time to ask a question, the girl answered the unfinished question. “This book was given to me by His Majesty before we set off. You don’t look at books and your memory is not good enough to remember important parts of the Empire, according to him, so he entrusted this book to me.” Let it be rude words, but she answered the truth, turning over the leaves of the book. “I found it. It wasn’t a clearing. This was the location of the South Tower.” “A tower? Here?!” Lui, hearing a surprising thing for herself, immediately ran up, wanting to make sure of her friend’s words. And she hadn’t lied, hadn’t even exaggerated. Right on the site of the scorched area, there used to be a tower, which was one of several parts that supported the defense of the Empire. “Yeah, well… But if it was here, then… Where is it now? “Its destroyed…” Philip turned slowly, looking at the place where the tower should have been. “It’s impossible. Each imperial tower is protected by the strongest protection spells. How could someone destroy it so that no stone was left?” In just a second, he frowned even more. “We need to fly up. I have to make sure of something.” “Make sure of what?” Closing the book and putting it back in her bag, Avril climbed into the saddle, as Philip and Lui did. Less than two minutes later, they hovered over the clearing and saw absolutely not what they expected. This was completely different from the usual destruction of the tower, if there was any before. The tower was destroyed to the core, it’s scary, but the scarier thing is what they saw when they flew up. There were various symbols around the circle that were intended for a pentagram and these symbols were perfectly in a circle from the middle. “Philip? What does it mean?” “We must return to the castle immediately!” That’s all the captain said, immediately directing his dragon in the direction from which they came.

***

Philip did not answer the questions that the girls asked at all. He flew ahead and did not let anyone lag behind him. He acted like they had something or even someone on their tail and he didn’t stop even for a minute. It was only when they reached the castle that they were able to land, and even then, they continued to move, descending from their dragons and going straight to His Majesty. Philip is the only one who entered the hall to His Majesty, and the girls stayed outside, just waiting for them to be called, or for Philip to come out. “Ri… What do you think he remembered?” Lui was standing in front of Avril, who was staring blankly at the floor. This was the look she had when she was thinking about something, and whenever someone asked her a question, she immediately answered, even without coming out of a state of thought. It happened so now, but with some delay. After a minute, Avril finally answered. “Philip is a calm person, he is not so easy to scare. He always pretends to be scared, but the real fright is hidden behind stress. If he’s acting tense, it means it’s something serious.” Folding her arms across her chest, Avril sighed, lifting her head and looking at the ceiling, from which hung the most beautiful chandeliers. “I don’t like all this.” “You haven’t liked everything in the last few months. What do you mean” Lui came closer and looked at her friend’s eyes. They expressed nothing, and she never heard an answer. Avril didn’t want to lie to her, and she couldn’t, so she kept quiet. “You don’t need to know that, Lui. Just be on the lookout every day and every night.” That’s all she replied, turning around and walking away. This whole situation… Everything was very strange. The warriors of the empire did not prepare the way the riders prepared. They had less training than the riders. There was a feeling that the war was only between the Shadow Empire and the Dragonriders, but not the entire Empire as a whole. Something was wrong, and Avril wanted to know what it was. Taking out the part of the armor she found from her pocket, the girl looked closer, noticing how neatly the patterns on the piece were drawn. If it was the ordinary armor of some warrior of the Shadow Empire, then why was the work so neat? Philip got nervous when he saw the symbols on the border of the attack and hurried away. Yes, perhaps he was afraid that the one who destroyed the tower might be nearby, but Avril said shortly before that the particles of magic had eroded, which means no one could be there. If it really was some ordinary soldier or warrior, then why did Philip hurry to get out of there as soon as possible? There are three of them and their dragons are also three, so what’s the problem with defeating some soldier, even if he was there? Something was obviously wrong. She clutched the piece in her hand, quickening her pace. There was one place where she could find the answers to almost all the questions. She was a dragon rider, so there was no problem entering that place. Soon she reached the place and, having given her permission, went inside. It was a huge library and it was very difficult to find the only book you wanted if you didn’t know what was there and where. However, this was not a problem for someone who has been studying the library personally for many years. Avril received her permission at the age of fourteen, when it turned out that she had found a dragon egg and had been growing it for several months. At that time, she was still young, but smart, and the first thing after gaining access to the Empire’s library, she went to study information about dragons and everything related to them. At that time it was only an interest, but later it became a hobby and she spent all her free time in the library. By the time she was twenty-two, she already knew where and what she was. She didn’t know the order of the books, but she knew on which shelf she could find a book. She knew what she wanted to find at the moment and having already reached the goal, she took a dozen books in her hands, heading to the table. “All this is not for nothing, there must be a reason for all this …” The girl muttered to herself, putting a piece of armor in front of her and opening one book after another. She was smart and perhaps even smarter than many, and she was looking for some kind of meaning in everything, never calming down until she found it or until she was answered honestly to questions. Solhat couldn’t just leave what she didn’t understand without answers. First, some secret negotiations with the King and their captain, after that the start of a war, the change of teams, this incident… Something was clearly going on and they weren’t told what. To be honest, Avril did not trust the King at all. He was afraid of her knowledge, he also showed this when he asked her what she knew. But what can he be afraid of? What does she know that she shouldn’t know? After a couple of hours, the girl searched and searched for at least some information that related to the Shadow Empire and what they used during the war, but she found absolutely nothing. It’s all a story, a story that has never changed in any book and seemed to have been licked off all the books at once. The books did not differ much from each other and did not carry any useful information. Realizing that it was useless, the girl closed the books, lowering her head into her hands with a sigh. “It can’t be that nothing was written about their weapons! The war was rough, couldn’t they just throw away the knowledge of how to defeat the enemy?” Muttering this to herself, the girl thought that no one else was in the library, but she was mistaken when a familiar male voice was heard from the side. “Of course they didn’t throw it away, how could they?” When she heard the voice, she raised her head, fixing her gaze in the direction of the person who spoke. Standing next to the next table was none other than her captain, Felix. “As I heard from Philip, you have discovered the location of the tower, which has now been destroyed. Are you and Lui hurt?” “Felix… No, we were not injured, at most we got dirty and cold a bit.” Getting up from her chair, she was seated back by the hands of the captain, who came closer. “It’s not worth the formalities. Lui said you could be here, so I came to check on you. Are you looking for information about this thing?” Felix picked up a piece of armor on the table, examining it. A positive hum was heard in response. Unlike Philip, Felix did not perceive the piece of armor as just some random find. Felix was the oldest of the riders and had more experience, so he considered any find as a possible clue. “I’ve seen it before somewhere. Let’s go.” Turning around, the captain headed towards the far wall of the library. Of course, Avril followed without asking any questions. He was her official commander, captain, boss, and just the main one, because she did not question any of his actions, but in recent months, she really began to distrust her surroundings more and more and it is unknown what exactly this is connected with. Soon they stopped in front of a small bookcase. Just one click on one of the books and a secret door in the closet opened, letting visitors in. It was a restricted area, as the girl realized, because they also faced a grate, which was quickly opened by her captain. If it is forbidden, then it means that there is something in it that others should not know. “Captain, am I even allowed to be here .?” looking at the bookshelves that were in the walls, the girl kept noticing new inscriptions, sections and book covers. They were all some kind of… Not so ordinary. “You’re with me, so you can be anywhere.” The man turned and smiled at her, handing her a piece of armor. “Those shelves over there are about the equipment and weapons of the Shadow Empire.” He pointed to the right side of the room they were in. “And those over there are about the history of the Shadow Empire. After the conclusion of peace, strangers arrived in the Empire, telling the story from the Shadow Empire, so you will find something new in the books for yourself.” “Thank you, Captain.” Nodding her thanks, the girl went to the books on equipment and weapons. Her priority was only to find information about the armor, and then the story. “Just be careful, what you may find out may be dangerous for you in the future.” Finally, the man said, leaving. It didn’t make the girl think about his words, just smile. Their captain has always been like that. He spoke ambiguously, not always clearly, but he was caring and kind. Behind the mask of seriousness and severity that he always wore, there was a caring man who wouldn’t hurt a fly if he didn’t have to. He was good at fighting and leadership, which was amazing for his gentle nature, and he was always in a hurry to help someone in need, even if not always openly. Everyone talked about him without hiding their admiration. He is smart, remembered a lot and remembered many little things, which earned him a considerable number of victories in bank. The ability to control a dragon only added charm to his description and never caused any wariness in his direction. Avril could be called paranoid towards everyone and everything, but it never went in the direction of her captain and her friend. She believed only those who were close to her, and not just acquaintances like Philip or the King of the Empire. “So the necessary information is in these books… It’s strange that they didn’t decide to show them normally to the whole Empire.” Taking one of the books, the girl opened it to one of the pages on which it was written about the military armament of the enemies. When she saw the contents, she was surprised, because it was written in the book about a completely different type of weapons than in their empire. “The Shadow Empire has always been distinguished by strategies and, of course, weapons…” she read. “Every armor was enchanted, every sword was tempered, every bow was made of the strongest types of wood.” After reading just a couple of lines, the girl frowned, lowering the book. “If their weapons and armor were of first-class quality… How could our empire win in the first half of the war?” Thinking about this question, she continued to go through the lines in the book. Increasingly, the description of the Shadow Empire’s military forces raised questions in her mind. So many things didn’t add up, everything seemed strange and there wasn’t a single answer. Truth… There was one way to find out where the truth was in what was written and where the lie was. Taking a book from her bag, which she had brought from the saddle, Avril opened it to the first page, looking at the cover from the inside. The cover was covered with a cloth that kept the book intact and the name of the author of the book was written on the fabric inside, as on all other books that had similar covers in the Empire. After reading the author’s first and last name, something clicked in her head. Vohrid Karalis. This surname was the surname of the royal family before the change of ruler after the war. After the death of Emperor Karalis, no one even had the right to mention this surname. The name of Emperor Karalis was unknown, or if it was known, no one dared to say it out loud, always a surname or status, never a name. Anyway, in the book for riders, everything was confirmed by the King himself, which means everything was true. All you had to do was read the information about the weapons and everything would fall into place. So the girl did, starting to read those chapters that talked about weapons, but everything was different. It almost didn’t add up. Only the lines “The armament of the Shadow Empire was really considered slightly better than the armament of the Empire.” Yea, for sure, “slightly”, the enemy’s armament was several times better! “This makes no sense …” After closing the book with information about the armament of the Shadows, which was the name of the armament of the Shadow Empire, Avril remembered one thing. If there is no accurate information, then you can contact the author of the book or his descendants. If the books were in the castle, then surely the information about the author must be somewhere in the Empire. Opening the library book on the first page, the girl glanced at the name and surname of the author, and was stunned. “What… Vohrid Karalis here too?” It turns out that the author of the book of riders and the author of books about Arming Shadows were the same person? Could it have been Emperor Karalis? Could it be that, as if having passed away, the Emperor did not die, but began to write books for the future? Could it even be like that? If so, why was it necessary to announce a fake death if it was possible to simply transfer the throne to another? If it happened before that, then where did so much information about the Shadow Empire come from? Before that war, there were constant battles for territories and one Empire or another was constantly winning or losing, so where does so much information come from if the Empires never got along before the war? And if they did get along, why is it never mentioned in books? Only about the war itself or about what happened afterwards. Everything was strange and unclear. The author contradicted himself in his own books. Why was it necessary? “Thats just…” “I’ve always believed in your courage, young lady, but I’m afraid there’s a limit to everything, and so is your desire for knowledge.” Out of nowhere, a man with monocle on his nose appeared. He came up to her quite quietly from behind, looking at what she was reading there. When he suddenly spoke, the girl’s reflexes worked as unexpectedly as his very appearance, but fortunately, he managed to intercept her heavy hand, which flew straight into his throat in order to get rid of a possible enemy in case of anything. “Well-well, no need to react so violently, I’m not going to kill you.” “You must be the librarian, I’m so sorry for the attack!” Getting up, the girl bowed her head slightly, apologizing, but the man only laughed lightly, releasing her hand and patting her shoulder. “I didn’t think anyone else would come in here. My captain, Felix Draxlow, allowed me to enter and look up for some information.” “No worries, no worries, Felix himself found me not so long ago on the way and said that there might be a cute little bird in my archives.” The man smiled, adjusting his glasses on his nose. He looked very young in person, but his clothes were completely out of his age and even made him look more mature if not old. If he had been wearing more ordinary clothes, he could have been called a “guy” and not a “man”. “So this is not a restricted area of the library? Are these the archives of the Empire? " After looking around, the girl really just noticed that the place is quite old in appearance, not as neat as the whole library behind the secret door. The room was dark, and even slightly damp, but even in such conditions, the books were in perfect order and shape. “Indeed, these are archives. And I’m not a Librarian either. I am His Majesty’s Advisor and his personal Archivist.” The man said everything with a smile, never taking it off his face for a second. It didn’t seem strange to the girl, many people in the Empire smiled like that when they talked to acquaintances or strangers, but the soul seemed to speak for itself that this smile was not real at all and for some reason her heart squeezed. " So you’re an Advisor? It is an honor for me to speak with you. Let me introduce myself, Avril Solhat, dragon rider of blue team number seven.” Still smiling, she bowed formally, soon straightening up. “Can I stay here for a while longer? It takes me about half an hour to find the answer, if there is one in those books.” She picked up the book on Arming Shadows and looked at the Archivist. “Why look for it? I’m here, so why not ask?” As if hinting that she wouldn’t be able to stay here for long, he tilted his head, waiting for a question. After thinking for just a moment, the girl finally decided to ask, closing the book and putting it first on the shelf, after of course, picking up the thing about which her question was. " I wanted to know who can wear armor with similar patterns and what might be the strength of this or any person?” She showed him a piece of armor, and the man froze when he saw it. “I think you already know that my group flew on a mission today. We were at the border and saw a large burnt-out clearing where the tower had stood before. There was no tower or anything else within a radius of ten or even fifteen meters. Everything was burned down, and not a stone was left of the tower.” “I would leave this thing where it is if I were you, young lady… These patterns are very neat, and the neater the patterns of Shadow Warriors, the higher their status and power in battle.” Taking a piece, he examined it completely, even running his fingers over the patterns a couple of times, which left light cuts on his fingers, without blood, but still cuts. “Such armor… Can be worn by a Warrior of the highest status. For example, an army general or even a servant of the Shadow Emperor, if not the Emperor himself.” “So, there can still be such a strong enemy in the Empire, and he just destroyed the most protected object?” This information was completely different from what Avril would like to find. She was very far from what she was thinking before and not in a good way. “I must report this to His Majesty, if it is true.” “No need. I’ll report it to him myself. If he finds out that you were in the Archives, there will be problems. After all, the archives are separated from the library so that outsiders do not set foot here.” He gave her a piece and nodded as he left. “I expect you to be outta' here in ten minutes! If you want to take some books, take them, but no more than five, young lady!” “Thank you, Adviser!” Nodding goodbye, Avril breathed a sigh of relief, sinking into a chair next to her. One of her pointed ears twitched. The counselor turned out to be surprisingly kind. Even though his smile was fake, he helped her find the answer and even let her borrow some books from the archives. If theres a chance, you need to take advantage of it…