Ch. 37

Ch. 37

“Michael, are you okay?” Rosemary asked. She lifted a fallen windowpane, surprisingly, unbroken, off of Michael and helped him stand up.

“I’m fine. Just one question. Where are we?”

It took Rosemary a minute to analyze their hazardous surroundings, but then she saw a door leading outside. She ran to it and looked.

The tower was in the middle of it. At the top of the tower was the room from before. They still could see the shadows of the King and Queen.

“Come on Michael. Hop on my back. We have to get on that bridge,” Rosemary yelled impatiently.

Still confused by what was going on, Michael yelled back, “Who, what? Why?”

“It’s the best way! If we don’t the others will come and try to help us. I don’t want that. It’s too dangerous. All I need is your help. And now we’re going.” Rosemary grabbed Michael, slung him on her back, and started running. She jumped, preparing to enter the bridge, then yelled, “Delish Esaeler!” A thing, yellow boundary disappeared. She landed safely on the bridge and was off.

“How did you know that a barrier was going to be there?” Michael asked.

“It wouldn’t be like my grandparents not to have something there to slow us down. It would have been to easy for us. They know better than anyone that it uses up a lot of energy to cast a spell. That’s why when you’re injured and need all your energy, you can’t cast spells,” Rosemary explained.

She continued up the bridge, avoiding the hole in them. But after a few minutes, she stopped. This caught Michael by suprise.

“Why did you stop?” he asked, alarmed.

“I was running at one hundred and thirteen kilometers an hour. It shouldn’t take this long to get to the tower. We aren’t going anywhere this is an illusion. Close your eyes and hold on tight. This is going to be difficult for the both of us,” Rosemary said. She tried to sound calm, but it didn’t fool Michael. Without choking her, Michael held onto Rosemary as tight as he could.

Rosemary took in a deep breath and exhaled. She raised her arms and started chanting rapidly, unintelligibly. She stood there, with Michael almost strangling her no matter how hard he tried not to, for about ten minutes. When she was done, she closed her eyes and lowered her arms. When she opened her eyes again, she looked around and muttered, “Hmm. So we have been going somewhere, just moving slowly. Michael, look at this. We’ve only gone about two yards so far.”

Michael opened his eyes and gasped. Rosemary didn’t look like herself anymore. She looked more like a vampire than ever. Here eyes were bloodshot, and her features were more pointed, ominous. Rosemary looked at him, observing what he was shocked about, and relaxed. She returned to normal

“I’m sorry about that. Sometimes when I cast spells like that, I lose all control and just let go of myself. It sometimes stays for a while, and I can’t go out in public anymore. Well, let’s go.” Without saying another word, she started running again. This time, she was at the beginning of the tower in about five seconds. Shocked again by the sudden speed, Michael tightened his hold on Rosemary.

She laughed and whispered, “You can let go now. I’m done.” With a little help, Michael eventually was able to let go. At human speed, they walked to the staircase.

“Be on your toes. This is probably going to have more traps than any other place in the castle. They don’t want intruders.” Rosemary smiled at her own joke. She took Michael's hand and together they plunged into the darkness.

Rosemary had been right. As soon as they walked in, the door creaked shut and locked. All the torches that had been lit were immediately extinguished. They heard some clanging, but nothing else.

“Rosemary?”

“Give me a minute. I’m waiting. I can’t see clearly yet. Hold on.” A few moments later, barely enough time for Michael to blink, Rosemary continued, “There. That’s better. Uh oh.”

“What?” Michael stiffened.

Rosemary stayed silent for a moment, and then said slowly, “Well, I can cast a spell on you to be able to see, but it would be very uncomfortable for you. Do you want me to do it? There really is no other way.”

“Can you just tell me what’s going on?” Michael demanded.

“No. Hold still.” Michael did as he was told, with some difficulties because he was confused, and waited. After a few moments he heard Rosemary say, “Ecnahane Ytilibasiv.” He felt a tingling in his eyes, and then it was over. He blinked quite a few times before he understood what the spell was.

Instead of the complete darkness that he had once seen, he could see the tower. A narrow wooden staircase was in front of him, a candle flickering at the top. Dark, wet brick walls surrounded him. And all around the room, was swords. Daggers of all kinds.
They were sticking out of the wall, prepared to stab someone if they moved incorrectly.

“Why couldn’t you just tell me that if I move an inch I would die?” Michael asked calmly.

Rosemary laughed and said, “Because if I did, you would move that inch and we’d all be in trouble, now wouldn’t we?”

“Yeah yeah yeah, now how do we get out of here?” Michael asked. Rosemary gestured towards the staircase, and Michael’s jaw dropped.

Rosemary laughed. “Did you think I would risk going through the window? They’d have all the advantage there. No way. We’re going to go up the stairs. I’ll help you. Don’t worry.”

“How can I not worry when there are thousands of sharp objects surrounding me?” Michael ask, no longer calm.

“Simple. Breathe. Inhale and exhale. In and out. You can do it. You’ve only been doing it your entire life. Now, walk forward and dodge them. I saw you wrestle with Medeleck at human speed. You can do this,” Rosemary encouraged.

Michael gulped and started walking. Along with Rosemary’s encouragement and him telling himself that he was going to make it to getting his driver’s license, he did fine. He only got a couple scratches on his face, and only ripped his shirt seven times. By the time they made it to the top, he was smiling.

“Oh, look at you! Your mother is going to kill me when she sees this! I can’t believe you ruined your shirt,” Rosemary complained. But despite her best efforts, she was smiling, too.

They were standing in front of the chamber. They could hear Lord Batwings and Miss Darkness laughing inside. They were talking about how well their plan was going, and the last thing that they heard before silence was Lord Batwings saying, “We’ll deal with her later. Just because she’s different, that doesn’t mean she’ll leave us. But she will be punished for not killing the human.”

Rosemary stood solemnly in front of the door and knocked.