Page 37 of Legends of Sorcery
“Sure, sure,” he said. “You’ll, of course, have your chores and training, but you’re not a prisoner here, Arion.”
“I know. We’ve just been so busy that I was losing track of days.”
“That’s easily done when you’re stuck in the basement doing research. By the way, any new developments?”
“Actually, yes,” he said, reaching into his back pocket and finding it empty. “Oh no! Where did it go?” he asked himself as he began frantically looking all over and retracing his steps.
While he searched, he filled Zallon in on his find.
Once he had combed through every possible place he had been and exhausted all options, he sat down in a chair feeling defeated.
“I’m so sorry, Zallon. It was right here. I swear it.”
“Tell me again exactly what it said.”
Arion retold the description from the page.
Zallon sighed. “That definitely sounds like what we’re dealing with. If we had the page, I could have run a simple spell to track down the book it came from. Without it, I’m afraid we are back to square one.”
“My first assignment and I failed you. Maybe I’m not cut out for this apprenticeship after all.”
Chapter 15
Still feeling down over the missing page, Arion sought out Valaria to cheer him up. He confessed what had happened and when asked, he told her everything he could remember from the page.
“Maybe we don’t need the page. I mean, now we know there are two cures. We just need to find one of them ourselves.”
“And how do you propose we do that?”
“I don’t know. Think hard. There has to be something odd or out of place that stands out. A clue of some sort.”
“You know, there is something that’s been bothering me,” Arion said.
“What’s that?” Valaria asked.
“Why aren’t the unicorns at the falls? I mean that’s always seemed like their place. Wouldn’t they want to be there for comfort? It doesn’t make sense.”
“I have a theory about that.”
“Okay? Are you going to share it?”
“Well you probably won’t like it,” she admitted.
“Just tell me.”
“A place like that didn’t get its name for nothing. I mean things were named with purpose. Healing Waters has to mean something then, right?”
“Maybe. I don’t know,” he said.
“Well, say it does. Remember when you tried to use your magic to heal Callia?”
Arion rolled his eyes. “I’ve told you a thousand times, Valaria. I do not have magic.”
“Humor me and say you do. When you tried to use it against the dark magic…”
“My hands literally burst into flames. Trust me, I remember,” he said interrupting her.
“Exactly. So what if the Falls of Healing Water got its name because it literally is magic that can heal. And just like you couldn’t penetrate the dark magic without getting hurt, maybe the falls are pure enough that even being near them hurts the unicorns as it rebels against the dark magic, so they are staying away from it. I know it’s stupid. I told you, it’s just an idea that I had.”
