The Breath -Sixth Whale Book 1

*19*

Vern felt familiar dizziness as he was pulled roughly backwards. The speed at which he'd been pulled through had made pressure build up in his ears. It was far more disorienting than his trip with Thandre had been. It had objectively been a smoother journey but being dragged backwards through a fold in space unexpectedly wasn't ever going to be better than stepping willingly into the fold.

His vision had also gone dark as if he'd stood up too quickly as he recovered his footing. He swallowed in an attempt to pop his ears back and blinked a few times until his sight returned. Vern felt extremely relieved he wasn't Shae at that moment. He looked around still feeling somewhat disorientated and understood he was now in a fairly large room. He felt drunk severely so and the room was spinning around him. A hand pushed his shoulder down and he found his knees buckling beneath him, to his surprise he landed on a rather comfortable chair.

" You didn't give him anything did you?" A female voice sounded concerned and somewhat accusatory. He turned to look at the speaking woman and noticed that she was possibly the tidiest looking person he'd ever laid eyes upon. There was something about her that was almost hypnotic. Her brown eyes had this strange lustre to them. No, they weren't brown at all. Her eyes were too brown what Thandre's were too grey. Bronze, they were like the old bronze coins. He's never seen eyes quite like hers before.

He dragged himself out of his daydream and forced himself to face the other way. Stood to one side was a bald man who Vern didn't recognise. A wizard. The man looked fairly calm considering the fires going on outside.

" I didn't drug him, Miss Primm. What would the point of that be?" The man asked, he sounded bored and perhaps a touch offended. 

" I'm not sure why he's here at all Prebble." She sighed. " We already have one deadweight, the warlocks aren't our problem." 

Vern felt like a bucket of ice water had been poured over him. In reality, the water was merely tepid. 

He didn't feel quite so disoriented anymore but his ears still weren't popping back and now he was soaking wet. Some rescue mission this was turning out to be. He felt like he should say something but didn't know exactly what. Where am I? didn't seem to cut it since he already knew that. Who are you? also seemed a bit pointless since he had just heard their names.

 Vern decided to go with the final classic of "What's going on." In a broader term, he knew what was going on, the guild was under attack. However, these people might have some finer details to try and work with.

" We're under attack," Prebble responded and Vern felt a bit thick for having asked at all. The way Miss Primm was staring him down wasn't helping much either.  Prebble had a look in his eyes that scared Vern. Something about the man wasn't quite right. He wasn't sure he'd ever met someone like him before. Vern wanted to get up and run, but his legs had decided that would be a very bad idea.

Prebble wondered if he pulled the warlock through too fast. He'd heard rumours that wild magic users struggled with the trips but had dismissed it as something the other wizards liked to say to make themselves feel superior. Perhaps he should pay more attention to their gossip. 

" What's your name?" Prebble was finding the boy to be a bit frustrating. He kept gawking at Abigail.

" Vern." The young man replied. Prebble nodded. Odd name Vern, not very common anymore. Still, at least that would make it easier to remember. 

" I'm going to get straight to the point. Can you make a barrier? We have a lad but he's taking a break." Vern blinked in surprise. Was his entire life going to be about barriers? Still, he felt like he might have some kind of leverage now. He had something they wanted.