Kendall's POV
Once we were in the Artarak lobby, the portal behind us closed without Kevin going through it. "Where is he?" I asked before I was interrupted.
"Masters, get to the conference room, Elder Finn Galahad is waiting for you," Jeremy's voice sounded over the speakers in the walls.
"Isn't that the dwarf guy?" Jacob asked.
"Yes and it looks like we are just four again, there is no time to start thinking about that. Armensia needs us," Ciara said taking control. We all agreed with her, but something deep within my gut told me that there was more to this than meets the eye.
"Kevin wouldn't just abandon us," I argued.
"Then what does this look to you? As much as I want to believe what you believe, I cannot ignore what I see with my own eyes. Here we are with no Siege when he clearly said he would be here without fail. I see no other reason for him not being here," she said. I kept quiet because I could see that she was indeed very angry with Kevin leaving us at a moment such as this one, but there was nothing we could do about it.
We made our way to the conference room immediately to meet with the Elder. Normally it was Jovenor who we met with every time we came to Armensia, but his absence made the situation all the more frightening. We finally made it to the esteemed conference room and found the usually jolly dwarf seated at the table with a focused expression, his eyes fixed on the map that lay right in front of him. He almost didn't notice us come in when we did.
"I'm glad you came. It's worse than than I could have thought," he said.
"Where is Jovenor?" Ciara asked.
"The Mage Society is under attack. So naturally he stayed there to protect his people," the dwarf explained, "is there something you can do about it?"
"We will do everything we can," Ciara replied before opening a portal and letting the dwarf reprogram it. 'Kevin, where the hell are you?' I thought to myself uttering a silent prayer that nothing wrong had happened.
Once the portal was open, we all went through it and once again wound up in yet another new environment. I half expected that we'd be surrounded by nature when we came through the portal, but that was besides what happened. The only form of vegetation that was here was yet another tree stump that lay secluded in the centre of a very large paved compound. The stump was enclosed in a small mini garden so some plants and grass grew around it. But from that point on the entire compound was paved white with walkways that later distributed out throughout the entire town which comprised only of white buildings.
These buildings stood out since they were made out of stone and the layout was so organised it was like nothing was out of place. I looked around and so that many of the people who lived here dressed in robes and were all currently running to shelter themselves, no they were running away. Trying to get as far as they could from the town as possible. Something told me that they all did this because even the stone buildings could do nothing to protect them from what was coming.
One other look at the stump and I noticed the staff that it, like the other one we had guarded in the forest of Alm, also held at its centre. This one had a bear standing on its hind legs ready to strike carved at its top. So far I noticed these staffs were designed in the most ferocious way the animals on top of them could look. Personally I would have gone for calm but deadly approach but who wanted to anyway. A group of wizards finally approached us. This group was dressed in purple robes unlike the white ones that we saw fleeing the town. The person leading this group was none other than Jovenor himself and right beside him was a familiar face I had last seen at Travas' cave. Kalifa… the mage who had rubbed our alpha the wrong way by repeatedly asking about the Siege….
"I wasn't so sure you'd make it," Jovenor said.
"The Siege was true to his world and stopped time on our world so we could come to assist in this matter," Ciara said.
"So where is he?" Kalifa butted in. I had to cover my mouth to muffle my laughter. Waves of magic could instantly be felt coming off the alpha, but soon enough she suppressed them.
"He's running a little late is all," she said, "what's the situation?"
"An eagle..no, the Dark Eagle was seen circling the town a while ago and that is when the alarm was sounded. From that time, we have only sensed whispers of dark magic, you came right on time." That said, Jovenor started barking orders to position the mages in the best way possible to fend off an attack.
"So Isaac, do you think you have an idea where he could be or what's keeping him?" I asked.
"No, I have to go with Ciara on this one, he chickened out," Isaac said.
"Why rush to such a conclusion?" I asked him.
"I'm only using my common sense here. There is no other reason I can find for why he did not come with us. You know how dangerous these guys are and yet again we are on the defensive. He is also the only one who can lift the totems so that we can protect them at the Artarak," he said.
The air went still against my skin and the place became dead silent. I would say even the birds weren't making a sound but this town had no plant nearby for them to live in. Was that even healthy? We all knew what the silence meant. A wave of dark magic magic swept through the compound announcing the arrival of our "esteemed guests."
Footsteps were heard coming our way and we all turn in the general direction. The metal sound of armour clattering as someone walked could also be heard. My guess was that this was a combat elf that had graced us with his presence. No one would have simply waltzed in clad in armour without proper announcement. "Identify yourself," Jovenor spoke up. The armoured soldier finally came into view. He held his helmet at his side tucked under his arm. Several gasps could be heard throughout the mages that were scattered around including me.
"Come on, Jovenor. That's no way to speak to an old friend," Caspro spoke up when he was sure he had everyone's attention. We watched carefully as the former elder scanned the crowd until his eyes landed on us. "Looks like we have some unwanted visitors," he said.
"You were told to retreat if our informant was wrong and artras were indeed present," a voice rumbled through the sky snapping our attention upwards. We hadn't even noticed the Eagle in the sky. I hadn't heard of stealthy flight before. This was going to take a turn for the worst really badly. Last time we had dragons on our side who were able to subdue the Eagle before Kevin showed up, but this was different.
"We can beat them," the combat elf yelled at the eagle.
"You dare to speak back to me and against the orders issued by our dark lord himself," the eagle's voice boomed even louder through the skies.
"The dark lord is being overly cautious. He has lived for eight hundred years and yet he is afraid of mere children. How pathetic? I'll crush the little pests here and now and prove that this is our land to conquer. There is nothing for us to fear here," he yelled. Several footsteps could be heard all over the town along with the sound of metal. In a few seconds we were all completely surrounded.
"He came with part of the Elven Guard that defected sir," one of the mages pointed out.
"If you lose this battle, you know what will happen," the Eagle spoke more calmly, "you're lucky the Siege is not here yet."
There was a period of silence before Jovenor spoke, "Take them down."
I was about to spring into action only to be stopped by a gesture from Ciara telling me to stay right where I was. The mages sprang into action with the exception of Jovenor and Kalifa. The mages began firing magical attacks of every nature at the army that was around us. The soldiers began charging towards us at top speed. Kalifa got down on her knees in a similar way to an athlete setting off in a race as vanished right before our eyes. This act was followed by the tumbling of nearly half the soldiers that were attacking. They lost their confidence after that. The mages were holding their ground against them. Soon enough their spells began hitting and taking damage.
"Why were they missing earlier?" I asked curious at how so many mages could miss so many targets at once for so long.
"They weren't missing. The protection magic the soldiers were using is merely wearing off," Jovenor said.
"How is this possible?" Caspro asked, horror set in his eyes.
"You all ran to the Dark mages when you felt you had lost instead of training so you could protect yourselves. Now we don't even need the artras to take care of your sorry lot," Jovenor said.
"No, this cannot be happening. Get up soldiers, how can you call yourselves members of the Elven Guard when…" Caspro was stopped short.
"Correction Caspro, they are no longer members of the Elven Guard and neither are you. Capture him," Jovenor said, angered evident in his voice as he said it. Before any of the mages could make an advance on the combat elf, the Dark eagle swooped in and grabbed him using its talons.
"Put me down," he struggles against its hold.
"Foolish elf, I overestimated you. We'll see each other soon artras," the Eagle's voice went again before it flew away.
We spent the next twenty minutes making sure all the soldiers who were left behind had been captured and bound. Something was still bothering me about what the Dark mage had said. They didn't expect to find us here and this was raising so many questions in my head. Jovenor finally made his way back to us while I was still going over my suspicions. What the eagle had clearly stated was that there was an informant who had notified the Dark mages of our activities and they had used that judgement to strike while there was no one protecting the Mages Society. "Glad your presence is a breath of fresh air," Jovenor said.
"I am a bit suspicious though. The Dark mages are being very careful. Except for Texan, none of them have taken any drastic measures," Ciara said. I guess I wasn't the only one who had noticed how odd this was.
"You're right Ciara. I also think they are being too careful. Thankfully, your presence was most helpful. Whatever they were planning must have been hinged on the fact that you were not going to show up. I wonder, was your Siege ever planning to show up," he asked.
"I don't know, I'll have to speak to him," Ciara said, "considering he is not here, I wonder if time on earth is still frozen."
"Then if you are in a hurry, I won't stop you from going back to your world," he said, "come by later for a tour." He said walking away to tend to his mages and handle the rest of what was going on.
"Did he just officially invite us to the Mage's Society?" Jacob asked.
"For such an uptight guy, that was unexpected," Jacob mused.
"Yeah, now let's get back to the library and see what kept our Siege away from a fight," Ciara said opening a portal right in front of her. Whatever Kevin was thinking was going to get him in a lot of trouble. The one thing that worried me now was just what reason could he might have had for not following. Was this some sort of prank? I was about to complain that we needed to change out of our combat suits first when I noticed the were being replaced on our bodies just Ciara opened the portal. 'Never mind…' I mentally face-palmed. Magic could really be convenient. It explains why people from Armensia couldn't survive on earth.
We all went through the portal making it through to the library only that we weren't met with the absolute silence we left behind. This was wrong, time was not frozen at all and there was noise in the library signifying that there were students moving about probably the bell had just rung since that was the one time when the librarian could not. I felt magic come off Ciara and I could tell she was searching for him. "That doesn't make any sense," she mumbled.
"What is it?" Isaac asked.
"He's not here."
"Then where could he be?" Jacob asked.
"I am not sure," she said. She turned to us looking at something behind us. We all turned back and noticed the portal was not closing at all.
"Aren't you going to close that?" I asked.
"I already did," she said startling all of us. Our attention was immediately drawn to the portal now. I almost decided we leave it there when it began moving backwards steadily. I got my magic ready for whatever it was that was going on, but soon we noticed the portal was spitting out something. As it continued to move it was leaving behind something, or more like someone. Soon it was done and it closed just as was expected from it. None of us had the nerve to care about the portal that had just vanished for what it had left behind was an even bigger mystery. Kevin stood in its place, bruised all over and looking paler than one could imagine. He looked a little malnourished but yet heavily beaten at the same time. His clothes were torn at random places and his skin was covered on small cuts and wounds. Not to mention how dirty he was and the fact that his clothes were a bit dump. Sweat littered his face and the sound of his laboured breathing was nothing any of us could deny. He looked absolutely terrible and just as he saw us, his eyes rolled backwards and his legs gave up on supporting him.
Ciara rushed just in time to catch him before he fell to the ground, "What the hell happened to him?" Jacob asked but had no way of knowing as Ciara immediately vanished along with the Siege.