FrostBurned (SpellShocked Saga: Book 2)

Chapter 1 - No Touching The Potentially Dangerous Fragile Magical Objects!

I stood in front of the enormous stone tower, shivering as the snow fell around me. The island's weather was magically controlled, so someone had obviously decided that it was the right time of year for snow.

"Do you remember the Runes for unlocking something?" Az asked from beside me.

"Yeah," I replied, "I just hope there's something in there that can actually help us find him."

"There better be," Olivia muttered darkly. She had been particularly keen to get into the tower since her ability to divine Hunter's whereabouts had failed her. She had been unable to see visions of him, see his future or even scry for him - a skill which involved channelling divination magic through an Erzite crystal on a string above a map, whilst thinking about the target and holding a personal object belonging to the person to strengthen the connection. We didn't know if her magic was being blocked by Hunter - who we suspected didn't want to be found - or by something or someone else. Either way, we were all deeply worried about him.

I stepped towards the tower door, and using the Vinculum I had made, I began to scrawl the Runes for opening onto the surface. When I had finished, the Runes glowed bright purple and then disappeared. I was about to ask if I had done it wrong, when the door suddenly dematerialised, leaving an open archway leading into darkness.

"You first," Zac said, chuckling nervously.

I took a couple of tentative steps into the darkness, my footsteps echoing around me, when the room suddenly illuminated with small floating orbs of light spread throughout the room.

I don't know what I had expected, but I was actually disappointed. The room was large and hewn from stone, but the only thing contained within was a series of Rune Circles, arranger in a circle around the room, with a different symbol in the centre. Nine of them contained the symbols for the eight Foci, as well as Merlin's Foci symbol. One Circle contained a large triangle, and within that triangle was a large pentagon shape. Another contained three thin, diagonal lines. The final Circle was empty.

Zac, Olivia and Az followed me in, and Zac whistled, the sound echoing around the room. "Well this is neat," he said, looking around the room, "What are these for?"

"Teleportation," Olivia said, kneeling down and pointing to a few Runes within the Circles.

"I get it," Az nodded, "Much quicker than a staircase."

"Do we just step into them or do we need a Rune code?" I asked, assuming they would work like most other teleportation Rune Circles.

"I don't think so," Az mumbled, kneeling down to examine the Circle containing the Evocation Focus mark. "There's no room for us to enter a Rune code into the Circle."

"Then maybe we just have t-," I broke off; I had walked towards the Circle and the mark inside began to glow bright red. The light faded almost as quickly as it had appeared when we all staggered backwards, shocked by the suddenly flash of light. I took a tentative back towards the Circle and it illuminated once again.

"Charlie, your hand," Olivia said, pointing at me. I looked down and saw that my Focus mark was the same bright red as the Circle.  I stood away from the Circle and moved my arm back and forth, the Circle and my mark illuminating when they were near to each other and fading when I moved them apart.

A thought occurred to me and I moved towards the Circle with the Focus mark for Abjuration and repeated the action. Sure enough, each time my hand approached the Circle, my mark and the mark in the Circle glowed blue. Then I moved towards the Circle containing the Divination Focus mark. Nothing happened as I approached the Circle, not even when I stood in the centre.