Chapter Thirty One

  The Storyteller

  The Storyteller’s door swung open. Freya started upon seeing him sitting at his desk. He was usually sitting on top of the desk, or leaning against his book shelf, or sitting on the floor. Really sitting anywhere except in his chair. He wore his trademark green coat, the soft hazel of his eyes sharply contrasted the hard look on his face. Did she just walk into something?

  “I’m told you’re handling yourself well.” The Gardener peeked her head out from behind the door and gave Freya a wide smile.

  “Gardener!”

  “You’ve been living up to that title of yours, always face down in a book.”

  From so many others, that would have sounded like an insult. But from the Gardener it was high praise. She was just about the last person Freya expected to see here. Wasn’t she bound to the Mind’s Mirror? Or had Freya just assumed that?

  The Storyteller cleared his throat. “Now, what couldn’t wait?”

  Freya swallowed hard, whatever this was must have been important. “I’ve uh…” Looking closer, the Gardener seemed a bit stiff too. “I can come back.”

  “A little late for that now dear,” The Gardener said.

  Freya twitched at the Gardener’s term of endearment. Best get on with it. “Alright, something happened last night I don’t understand. I read a book and I was able to draw power from it. A lot of power.”

  The Storyteller leaned forward. “You are sure?”

  Freya pulled from her stomach, the first page of The Hobbit appeared in her hand, its glow drowned out the light of lanterns on the wall.

  The Storyteller was up in an instant. “May I?” Freya handed the page to him, despite the brilliant light he seemed to be reading it. “A good choice.” He handed the page back. “We need to get you into more of my classes, now.”

  Despite not having made use of the power yet, Freya’s chest swelled with pride. All this time she wished she had been a writer for the power it could provide. But simply reading had filled her with more power than writing two books.

  “You know, it would have been good to know you sent me a reader.”

  The Gardener shrugged. “Not my secret to share.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me I could get power from reading The Hobbit? I would have sought it out months ago.”

  “Not just The Hobbit. You get strength from reading any book you have enjoyed in the Source. The more times you have read it, the more power you get.”

  Wow. Freya thought. She needed to hunt down her old favorites, like yesterday. Plans of how she would go about that distracted Freya so much that she didn’t bother pressing on the question the Gardener so skillfully dodged. It was probably some continuation of the ‘I’m not here for that.’ Bullshit she was given when she first emerged.

  “Based on the stunned silence I take it you read a lot?” The Storyteller asked.

  “So. Much.”

  “You have a favorite?”

  Oh yes. Book talk. “Well the Hobbit is number one of course, but I assume you understood that much. Past that you can slot in the rest of Tolkien’s works. Though I bet a lot of people think that way, so maybe it is basic. Though he really is the greatest, no offense to anyone else if they are writers or anything. But he-”

  “Everyone will always be second to Tolkien. No offense taken.”

  Of course the Storyteller is a writer, why did she not remember that? “Past Tolkien’s stuff though…Elantris. I think it has to be Elantris. It was early for Sanderson, so he had some growing to do. But Hrathen is seriously one of the best characters that has ever been written.”

  The Storyteller cracked a smile at that.

  The Gardener smacked him in the arm. “Be careful with your new abilities Bookworm, The Storyteller will setup a time to meet with you today, but I’m afraid we have some more business to attend to.”

  Freya nodded. “Thanks for seeing me.”

  The Storyteller nodded, then turned back to the Gardener. Freya shut the door behind her, that was certainly unusual. What were they talking about in there?

  #

  “Who can tell me what an artifact is?” The Storyteller asked.

  The young man with jet black hair in the front row raised his hand for the twentieth time since class started.

  The Storyteller gave a tired smile. “We ought to give some of the others a chance Wade. Hardly fair to let you answer every question on your third time through this class.”

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  Wade lowered his hand. An older woman three rows back answered without being called on. “An artifact is a unique magical item.”

  “Correct, kind of. Several of you are carrying unique magical items right now. What makes those different from artifacts?”

  This time only Wade rose his hand. The Storyteller smiled at his enthusiasm. “Power.”

  “You are half right. Power. Most of your magical items are crafted with a few hundred pages at most. While artifacts are often crafted with thousands. The other half of it is a unique ability. When a person creates a magical item, there is a chance some unique circumstance, personal history, location of crafting, or any number of other variables can generate a one-off ability. If that item were created in the exact same place with the same pages by someone else, the effect couldn’t be replicated.”

  Freya thought on Serenity which was lying on the bed in her room. How much had that cost Lorin to put together? The Storyteller threw a glowing illusion of Thor’s hammer from the Marvel movies into the middle of the air. It spun as if it was on a pottery wheel.

  “This is one of the most crafted items in the MythHarbor. Mjolnir, grants the power of flight, control of lightning, and it is keyed to a single user. Each version is just slightly different from all the others. The exact powers of the hammer are dependent on how the pages were interconnected, and the number of pages used.”

  Freya raised her hand. “But why, why create copies of Thor’s hammer when you could just create something tailored to your own abilities?”

  “Excellent question. Not quite related to artifacts, but let me answer it anyway.”

  The illusion of Mjolnir exploded into dozens of separate illusions throughout the room. Some were of small children reading comics, or playing games. Others were of movie theaters full of people cheering as Captain America lifts Mjolnir for the first time. Each illusion had a thread of white light streaming off it and coalescing into a large ball of light. Half the reason Freya enjoyed the Storyteller so much was just how casually he used what had to be immense power within.

  “How many people over the decades have dreamed of being worthy enough to pick up that hammer? A lot. Every single person who thinks of that hammer, gives a measure of power to the idea of Mjolnir in this realm. Just the same as how readers give power to a novel. The more familiar a concept is to this realm, the easier time the pages have molding into that concept.”

  That answered why so many people dressed as characters from popular media or emulated their powers. It wasn’t purely about just looking like the characters they were fond of. It was about harnessing that power. Freya thought on her vast new well of power. How would she handle it? Should she mold it after a certain character? Her powers over earth could just be enhanced, dragging her into full earth bender territory. Toph from The Last Airbender was a popular enough character, she could just replicate that and have so much power leftover.

  But Freya was making an assumption there. “Sorry,” She said, interrupting whatever The Storyteller was saying. “But does that apply to just power in general? If someone dreams of being a Jedi, does that make moving things with your mind easier than it otherwise would be?” Immediately after asking Freya regretted it. She was being a bit rude and she knew it.

  The Storyteller gracefully stepped out of his explanation of artifacts and back into Freya’s question. “Only if someone is trying to create the whole of the Jedi skillset. You can’t cherry pick. If someone was trying to do that, they would also have to take on the limitations the Jedi have. Particularly a vulnerability to the Dark Side.”

  “How can there be a Dark Side? The Force isn’t real.” The voice came from the far back of the lecture hall.

  “The Force isn’t real, but a sort of twisted replica of it is. Formed by our collective consciousness. Too many Fable-Walkers have gotten themselves into serious trouble trying to turn themselves into Jedi. Because who are the two most famous Jedi of all time? Luke, and Anakin Skywalker. Both who were tempted by the dark side, with one ultimately falling victim to it. That skews the public perception of how common it was for a Jedi to fall down that path.”

  That was more than a little concerning. Zora had made herself into a Witcher, what kind of consequences did that come with? Freya found herself growing more irritated as the Storyteller spoke. This really should be common knowledge, presented as soon as people emerged into the Mind’s Mirror. Why bother with the secrecy? Sure the Gardener said it was to maintain a sense of wonder, but if that got people killed? Was it really worth it?

  Freya’s banished the idea of creating The One Ring far from her mind. What kind of damage could that thing do? Moreover, why weren’t copies of them all over the place? Freya felt the urge to interrupt the Storyteller again, but she wasn’t about to be that person.

  “Now, the uniqueness. Each of our pages has a certain style to them that is our own. When we leverage that style, we can create things no one else can.”

  “What are some of the most powerful artifacts?” asked that same voice from the back of the class.

  “Wade, you’ve been through this a few times, why don’t you answer for me?”

  Wade stood from his seat, the man was tall and wearing some kind of steampunk getup. If it was from something specific Freya couldn’t tell, that was never really a genre she enjoyed much.

  “Well, uh. Number one has to be The Mind’s Mirror.”

  Freya sat up straight, the Mind’s Mirror was an artifact?

  “It was founded by The Poet well over a thousand years ago. Second to that…the Hall of Binding. Entering the Source Realm with all the power of MythHarbor, that could be incredible.”

  They really buried the lead with these artifacts, Freya knew it was possible to traverse other Harbors, but to go straight into the Source? It must have never happened before. Surely a man throwing fireballs from his hands would have made the news.

  “Incredible,” The Storyteller said. “And forbidden. The Hall is well guarded in Orodelion, and for all one can say of the elves, they take the protection of their land seriously. Even if it could be accessed, entering the Source would threaten to reveal the existence of this realm. The last thing we need is the U.S. or Russian governments trying to take advantage of the power we hold.”

  Every day Freya learned more that terrified her about this place. So many things could upset the fragile balance that has been struck. The Hall of Binding, if abused would make Sulivar’s activities seem downright playful by comparison. It was for the best that it was in Orodelion hands. Fable-Walkers were forbidden from entering those floatings islands in the mountains.

  Freya looked toward the back of the lecture hall trying to get a look at whoever was asking these questions. They were perfectly positioned to-

  The Storyteller’s voice drowned out into nothing, a figure in a dark blue cloak leaned against the back wall of the lecture hall. After more than a week not seeing the figure, it appearing so close nearly drove Freya to run from the hall. Sulivar had promised to keep that thing away. Why had she trusted that promise so completely?

  There was no way she was going to turn her back on that thing. So excused herself from the lecture hall, and walked as fast as she could without drawing attention to herself. Once out of the hall she sprinted back to her room. Every echo of her own footstep had Freya looking over her shoulder. Upon entering her room she slammed the large locks shut.

  Everything was okay, the figure had never done anything to her before. It wasn’t about to start now. Despite Freya’s reassurances, she was unable to slow her breathing. Her head began to pound as a result of the near hyperventilating. If Sulivar wasn’t going to keep this thing away, maybe the Minister would. As soon as she calmed down, she would head straight to his office. Really she should have done that in the first place.

  Freya leaned her head against the door and shut her eyes. Breathe. Just breathe.