Ewa Bash - Crystal Garden

I took a deep breath and opened my eyes. A large red canopy was spread over my head. I looked around and realised that I was lying on a huge bed. Across from me, in a chair, the Mentor was dosing. We were in a small room with panelled walls. A fire was crackling in the fireplace. By the window, I could see a heap of my old books on a desk, and my clothes on a chair. I sat up, and my body immediately started to tingle in response. I looked at the Mentor, and found that he was not asleep anymore, but watching me. I gave a start in surprise. A hint of smile flashed on his face.

“Am I dead?” I asked.

“No,” he said, “you’ve just reached a new level.”

“Does that mean I’ve died physically?” I asked, but then thought what a stupid question that was.

“No, Walter,” he smiled. “You are all right. Go to sleep.”

He rose from his seat and touched my forehead. At this very moment, I closed my eyes and fell asleep.

I didn’t wake up until the next evening. When I arrived in the hall, the Mentor was waiting for me. The table was laid and candles were burning. We dined in silence. Hundreds of questions raced through my mind, but I didn’t know which one to start with. I still couldn’t believe that this was actually happening. From time to time, I cast a glance at my Mentor, but his face showed absolutely no emotion.

After dinner, he took me to his study. It was quite cosy, with relatively new looking leather furniture, a large desk and an old bookcase. Was it the bookcase from the small house? While I was looking around, the Mentor sat down in his chair and started to talk.

“What I am going to tell you, you’ve already known for a long, long time. You are becoming one of us, Walter. I’m sure you’ve heard the stories about sorcerers and witches. People have made up stories about us over the years, but they still don’t know the real truth. But I will tell you.”

He explained that magic is not given to anyone, and not everyone can use it to its fullest. He also told me that magic itself isn’t black and white, but it is divided by Sua – beings that possess and command it. Many thousands of years ago on earth there was only one race, human. The human race grew and occupied more and more territory. Under the influence of natural conditions and a new way of life, ordinary man was doomed to adapt or die, and so he started to mutate. That’s how Sua, dwarves, werewolves, vampires and many other creatures came into being. Once they were folklore, and now they are blockbuster stars. Many of them ceased to exist a long time ago, but the human, having no special abilities or outstanding physical strength, survived. Humans destroyed almost everyone who might be a threat. Everyone who differed, everyone who possessed greater abilities to theoretically achieve superiority. As a result, other beings went into hiding or vanished among people, and those who could not were gone forever.

“We’re living in a wonderful time, Walter”, the Mentor told me. “Now everyone can be anyone. The era of secret societies and ancient mysteries has sunk into oblivion. Now you can shout on every corner that you’re a wizard, or vampire, or wood elf. However, there will always be those who will believe you and not condemn you to a mental hospital. But no one will take you seriously. We are a part of history, and it’s not bad at all. We no longer have to hide. We can live among the people, and they think we are just friendly madmen, or freaks if you like. You choose whoever you will become to them.”

“There’s one more thing,” he said. “There is no absolute evil as well as no absolute good, at least to my knowledge. We choose a side. Some of us will always be stuck at the Crossroads, where there are no sides and all the creatures are equal.”

“Which side are we on?” I asked.

“Let me put it this way, Walter,” he said with a sly grin. “It is much more interesting to be a bad guy.”

Now, I would say that it’s easier to be a bad guy. But despite all the pain he inflicted on me later, and how he treated me and those who were dear to me, I still saw him as a kindred spirit. Knowing the truth about him, I still felt we had the same philosophy – and I still do.

The Mentor told me that our power has different manifestations, though we can all influence the material world and the minds of living beings, but in a different way and to a different degree. My path was to create illusions and the Mentor could control weather, which I witnessed first-hand a little bit later. “You should have a strong body as well as a strong spirit,” he told me.

He taught me to fence and hunt. I studied martial arts and philosophy, languages and history, physics and chemistry. What the Mentor told me differed from what I learned at school, but it was much more interesting. I was rediscovering a world that I always knew, and I realised that I didn’t know anything at all! I felt an irresistible desire to learn more, to know more. More, more, more!

Since the day I became the Mentor’s apprentice, I stopped working for him. I had more free time, which I happily spent exploring my new home. What I had taken for a small one-story burgundy painted farmhouse, was, in fact, a huge medieval castle with towers, stone staircases and passages, and endless rooms, doors and windows. Step by step I was trying to understand this phenomenon, and gradually I began to get used to the idea that in this world even the impossible was possible.

The castle was gloomy and cold. The Mentor occupied just a couple of rooms in the south wing, and the rest were empty or locked. The wind howled through the long corridors with darkened walls and ancient suits of armour covered with dust. Heavy velvet curtains embroidered with gold hadn’t been opened for hundreds of years. The smell of damp, mould and old age wafted from every corner. Hundreds of priceless artefacts were rotten, destroyed by time. I wanted to clean out the debris, to open the curtains and let the fresh breeze into the dark stone rooms. But when I approached the Mentor with this idea, he said, “Why do you care, Walter? This castle has been dead for many years. Spend your time on education. It is more important to you now than raising dust and digging out this junk.”

And so I studied.

Winter was coming. The first frosts fell. Heavy clouds were hanging over the castle. Now and then the cold, drizzling rain painted the already gloomy landscape into depressive black and brown tones. I had no desire to go outside in such weather. Although inside wasn’t much better. Living rooms were heated by the fireplaces, but it was still pretty cold. My fingers and feet were always freezing. I know I’ll never forget that feeling.

I spent all my time in the Mentor’s study. When he was at home, he was sitting at his desk writing something, or giving me lectures. Sometimes he gave me books that I had to study myself. He had lots of books, old and new. Books with notes, comments and bookmarks. He was serious about my education and was strict in testing me. As a rule, that happened on Tuesdays. He took his chair by the fireplace and started to ask questions on whole topics. Our conversations lasted several hours. He made me think, analyse, evaluate, and scolded me when I was just trying to memorise something. We argued, joked and disputed. What a wonderful time that was in my life … I wish it had lasted longer.

As before, the Mentor was often away for a day or two and sometimes for a whole week, but I was never alone. Somewhere in the castle there were servants, although I never saw them. How else could it be explained that every day at certain times the dining table became crammed with fragrant and delicious food? There was always enough to feed a dozen guys like me. And how else was it possible that every evening a hot bath was waiting for me, and my clothes were always cleaned and ironed? And how they could do it without electricity was another question entirely.

Also, I had Alicia. I guess her job was to make sure that I didn’t do anything stupid. But I didn’t. I wrapped myself up in a woollen blanket and sat with a book on the old couch in front of the fireplace. Alicia was lying with her head on my lap, pretending to be asleep. I was stroking her and telling her about everything; some new stuff I’d read or some dream I’d had at night. Sometimes I spoke to her about Sunny, and one day I noticed that it had become easier to think about him. He felt alive to me, somewhere in a past life. Did I ever have a past life? Or had I lived here for hundreds of years, listening to the winds howling in the corridors and the logs crackling in the fireplace.

Weeks went by, but I didn’t notice. I was living somewhere at the edge of reality, and I was lost in my books. I didn’t know the date, the month or even the day of the week. Once, in the middle of the night, some flashes of light woke me. I went to the window and saw fireworks in the distance. New Year had arrived. I leant my forehead against the glass. It was as cold as ice. Alicia stood next to me with her paws on the windowsill and looked out of the window. I felt sad. I remembered last Christmas when Sunny and I were standing in the crowd in front of the town hall and were counting the strokes. I remember I wished then that Sunny would stop taking drugs and that something interesting would happen in my life. Well, sometimes wishes do come true.

Alicia whimpered softly and I closed my eyes. Blood rushed to my face and was throbbing in my temples. My throat was dry, my heart was beating faster and faster, and the tension in my head grew. I put my hands on the windowsill and clenched my fists. I was losing control. The ground was slipping from under my feet. I thought I was going to cry or lose consciousness, but suddenly the glass cracked and shattered into many pieces. Fresh air hit my face and I jumped back. My self-control was returning, but too slowly. My hands trembled, and my legs refused to hold my weight. Alicia looked at me and pricked up her ears. Was she hurt? I examined her from all sides. She was fine, but I wasn’t. My right cheek was bleeding, but in my current condition it seemed so trivial, so I patted Alicia on the head and went back to bed. Alicia lied down beside me and began to lick the wound on my cheek. The pain gradually subsided, and I found that I liked the feel of her rough tongue. Then she buried her nose into my neck and made a soft noise that sounded like “don’t be sad.” I hugged her and soon fell asleep.

The next morning, the chatter of my teeth woke me. Sleeping in a room with a broken window is practically the same as sleeping outside. I tried to fix the glass myself, but to no avail. I didn’t have enough magic for it. So, I went searching for something to fix the window with. I wandered from room to room but couldn’t find anything suitable. Alicia was following me like a silent black shadow. I walked through a room filled with antique cookware and broken china, and into a large hall. The afternoon sun was streaming through the curtained windows, driving away the darkness and illuminating the walls which were covered with antique muskets and swords, maces and spears, rapiers and crossbows.

On one of the walls there was a huge painting of a battle scene. A castle in the background reminded me of the Mentor’s home, but it was engulfed in flames. In front of the castle was a rider on a black steed. His dark armour and copper tinted hair glistened in the firelight. His face was contorted with rage and his eyes… that piercing, cold stare. I saw that same look every time I looked at the Mentor. In one hand the rider was clutching a spear, and its tip had pierced the chest of a knight, who was lying on the ground. This knight’s blond hair and pale armour were stained with mud and blood, but he was not defeated. It seemed that he was trying to repel the attack with his sword. I went closer to examine it. The blade was beautifully engraved with an inscription in Latin, but I didn’t have the knowledge to understand it.