Note: This story was dynamically reformatted for online reading convenience.
 
 Silver by SupMario

   Chapter 6

   I pulled up a chair and sat down across from Grevlok and he continued
puffing on his pipe, waiting for me to ask my questions.

   "Arianna tells me that you may have a way for me to find Raven, is that
true?"

   "Why yes, dear boy, it is.  I am going to help you create a homing
amulet which will lead you straight to her.  You must be the one who
actually makes it, however, because you love her, and that love is what
will lead you to her.  To do this, I must teach you some fundamentals about
magic."

   I let that sink in and then thought of Arianna.  "What about Arianna? 
She was acting strangely."

   Grevlok looked beyond me, as if he were thinking of something.  "She
blames Raven for almost killing you.  And while its true that she did
indeed gravely injure you, she did not do it with malice.  We both know
this.  Arianna is a dear child.  She loved her brother dearly and grieved
terribly when we learned of his death.  Arianna and Silver were quite
intimate before Raven came into the picture.  They had a very unorthodox
relationship to say the least.  Arianna was ever jealous of Raven when she
stole Silver's heart away from her.  And now, when Raven almost killed you,
Arianna didn't want to deal with losing you a second time."

   "Ah, okay.  Well what about magic?  You say you'll teach me?"

   He puffed away, studying me for a few minutes before chuckling a little
and answering me.  "Yes, Paul.  I'll teach you some basic magic that you'll
need on your quest to find Raven.  I'm afraid you'll be going it alone on
this, I dare say Arianna will not be going with you on such a quest of
love. Go up the stairs and the door one flight up from Arianna's room is
yours.  Your room is there and everything of Silver's is in that room.  You
may find some useful things in there.  Get some rest and I will join you
there in a few hours to begin your lessons."

   With that, he bade me leave and I went up the stairs thinking of
everything he'd told me.  My quest to find Raven.  Arianna and Silver's
relationship.  Things were starting to become clearer.  That was why
Arianna didn't want to help me find Raven.  I stopped at Arianna's door and
knocked.  I got no answer so I continued up the stairs until I came to the
nest landing and found the door Grevlok had told me of.  I opened it and
walked inside.

   I was in a small study with bookshelves lining the walls and comfortable
chairs and low tables finishing the place.  A small glowing sphere hung
from the ceiling giving off a soft light, enough to read by I see.  I
looked about the place and then headed through the opposite doorway and
found myself in a small laboratory like Arianna's, except mine had little
vials and bottles with eerie liquids in them on the long table along with a
variety of large books, about the size of dictionaries.

   I picked up one of the large books and it was titled `Potions and
Elixirs for the Practical Sorcerer.'

   Okay, whatever.

   I put that down and picked up another.  It was titled simply `Ghastly
Deaths.' That one sounded interesting.

   I went through the opposite doorway and found the bedroom.  There was a
small bed on one side of the room, and a large walk-in closet next to it.
There was a small bookshelf next to the head of the bed and the books there
looked much more delicate and personal than the big ones in the lab.  I
spotted a large wooden chest at the foot of the bed and a closed door that
just begged to be opened, so I opened it and peered inside.  To my total
amazement, it was a bathroom.  Toilet, sink, shower, the whole works. 
Weird.

   From Raven's reaction when she had visited my home, I had thought. 
well, anyway it was a surprise.  A pleasant surprise!  I used the
facilities with relish and took a long, hot bath that felt marvelous

   After the wonderful bath, I dried off and headed for the closet,
determined to find something suitable to wear.  I found a silver and blue
robe that looked similar to the ones Grevlok wore and put it on.  It was a
lot more comfortable than it looked, and I added the black boots.  I
flopped down onto the bed and looked at the bookshelf where I found a small
diary-type book on top.  I took it and thumbed through it.

   It was filled with archaic symbols and strange writing.  It looked to be
in a different language or something.  It looked fairly organized, but he
couldn't make anything out of it.  He heard a knock on his door and went to
the study and opened the door.  Arianna was outside the door, with a
hopeful look on her face.  "Can I come in?  I'd like to talk to you."

   I let her in and closed the door, then bad her sit down so we could
talk. "So what's on your mind, Arianna?" I sat down in an easy chair and
got comfortable.

   "Well, I'd like to apologize for my attitude towards Raven.  I know how
much she means to you.  If you'd like, I'll help you look for her; she's my
friend too."

   "Thanks.  I would appreciate your help.  Grevlok tells me that he's
going to teach me some basic magic.  It sounds great.  I found what I think
is Silver's spellbook in the bedroom but I can't read a word of it."

   She looked surprised at this.  "You found.  show me!!" She snapped up
out of the chair and headed for the bedroom where the book was.  I followed
her in and showed her the small volume resting on the side of the bed where
I had left it.  Arianna opened the book and leaf through he pages, her eyes
growing wide.

   "He was supposed to have kept this with him.  This is his private
spellbook.  Wizards always carry a small one like this with them containing
just the spells they think they're going to need for the trip.  This is the
one he made before going on that quest.  I don't get it!  There's no reason
for him to have left this here.  He would have been at a distinct
disadvantage without a spellbook.  Even the greatest of wizards can't
memorize all the spells he or she'd need, so we keep small spellbooks with
us." She continued flipping through the pages, noting which spells he had
copied into it.

   I had an inspiration.  "Maybe he brought along a different spellbook?"

   She answered without looking up from the spellbook.  "Well, maybe.  See
if you can find any more books shaped about like this one in the bookshelf
there." I bent down and began hunting and sure enough I found two more
small spellbooks.  I showed them to Arianna and she went white.  "He only
had three!  And the larger volumes are right there on the bookshelf!  He
left without a spellbook!  No wonder he perished!  The fool!  No offense of
course."

   "None taken.  But I was wondering.  It'll still be a few hours before
Grevlok comes up here to give me those magic lessons.  Do you think you
could teach me the language these spellbooks are written in?  I'd love to
be able to read them."

   She looked up at me and grinned.  "They're written in Elvish.  Silver
and I were taught to read and write elvish as kids even before we learned
common.  That's why you can't read any of them, I forgot." She giggled to
herself for a minute or two and then nodded her head.  "Yes, I'll teach
you. It shouldn't take long.  In fact, there's a spell here somewhere just
for this purpose.  It'll teach you Elvish in a flash.  She flipped through
the big book on the bottom shelf, found the spell she wanted then put the
big book away.

   She raised up and placed a hand on my head and gestured with her other
hand over my head and mumbled something and then took away her hand, opened
her eyes and grinned.  "Try it now." She handed me the small spellbook and
I could read its contents!  The book was divided into sections like
offense, defense, controlling weather, healing, and supernatural.  I
thumbed through the `defense' section and found a spell called `shield from
missiles.' That might be useful.

   Each spell was sorted into two sections: symbols and chanting.  You just
had to make some kind of symbol in the air and say the right thing and
presto.  Sounded way to easy.  Of course, I was wrong about that.  It took
quite a bit of concentration to make anything happen even if you said the
right things and made the right gestures, you still had to visualize the
exact affect your spell was supposed to have.

   Arianna gave me some good advice and some pointers and I was glad she
was here to help me.  I didn't want to seem like a neanderthal when Grevlok
came up here.

   After an hour or two, Arianna bade me good night and left.  Grevlok came
after a few minutes and he seemed pleased that I had gotten Arianna to help
me read Elvish.  We went into the laboratory and he proceeded to give me my
first real lesson in magic.  I shall not write of it here, for it would be
disrespectful of me to do so, so let me just say that he taught me the
fundamentals that I would need to study and learn more and newer spells. 
As he put it, I had to walk along the road myself, he had simply shown me
the correct road to travel.

   I studied almost all that night, learning more about the weird system of
magic that they practiced.  It wasn't easy.  I was beginning to see why
Arianna was always `studying' now.  It took a long time to get to a level
where you could actually cast these things easily.  Some of the easiest
spells were easy to memorize because they were simplistic, like `light.'

   I went to bed exhausted and awoke the next morning to find Arianna
waiting for me in my study, breakfast waiting for me.  "Good morning, I
brought some breakfast for the two of us.  Hoe you don't mind."

   "Not at all, that's very nice of you.  Thanks, sis." I smiled my best
toothy grin at her and she smiled back, pleased that I appreciated her
efforts.

   "So how did your lessons go last night?" She asked as she munched on a
roll.

   "Great.  I didn't realize how hard it is, but I'm getting the hang of
it. Now I know why your always wanting to study." I sat down and began
eating with her, aware, maybe for the first time, of her splendid figure.
She was wearing a simple silk robe that looked more like lingerie than a
robe.  It showed her body off magnificently however.  She is your
half-sister, dammit!  Stop thinking these kind of things.  I was mad at
myself for even thinking about having sex with her.  But then I remembered
about Silver's relationship with her and suddenly it occurred to me that
she may just be trying to get my mind off Raven.

   "I can't wait to find out more about this amulet that Grevlok is going
to help me build so I can find Raven.  It sounds intriguing."

   She looked up at me and smiled curtly.  "Yes, amulet making takes
patience but it can be very rewarding."

   We finished breakfast and I got dressed, ready to face the day.  Arianna
showed me a few tricks that helped my studies a bit and left to do her
studies.  I studied for a while and quickly started to become a tad bored.
Sure, it was exciting to learn magic, but it was like getting a video game
for Christmas and then being told you can't touch it.  Frustrating.

   I went down to see if Grevlok was in the mood for a chat.  I was
impatient to do whatever it took to find Raven.  Grevlok was in his study
reading, as usual.  I was beginning to wonder if he ever did anything else?

   When I entered the room he looked up and smiled warmly.  "Good morning.
Arianna told me how fetching you look in Silver's robe.  She's right, you
look exactly like him like that.  I see you are ready for the
amulet-making. Yes, you want to find Raven, I know this.  You don't need to
tell me, dear boy.  I was a young man, once too you know." He grinned
mischievously and bade me follow him into his laboratory.

   He led me to a large table in the back of the room that had strange
tools and books lying on it.  He picked up a small ruby and held it up to
the light for me to look at it.  It was shaped like a sphere and the size
of a gumball and looked extremely expensive.

   "That must be worth a fortune!  Can you just conjure those out of thin
air?" What a neat trick that would be!

   Grevlok put the ruby back onto the table, chuckling.  "Oh no, dear boy.
It doesn't work quite like that.  Yes, I can conjure up a handful of gems,
its an easy spell, but it only lasts an hour and then poof they disappear
back into the void where they came from.  No dear boy, for working this
type of magic you need the real thing.  Luckily I have quite a number of
connections that keep me in stock.  Mind you, I'm not rolling in them, but
I have a few for spell-casting.  Now where was I?  Oh yes, yes.  Now you
see, the ruby is for love.  Now Arianna provided the second ingredient
which we need, and that's a lock of Raven's hair.  She recently brushed her
hair so she had it.  If it weren't for her quick hair brush, you'd be
stuck. Now just wrap the hair around the gem and I'll tell you what to do
after that."

   I took the few strands of black hair and wrapped them around the gem as
tightly as I could and then tied them around it securely.  I looked up at
Grevlok, ready for part two.

   "All right, now you need to add a drop of your blood to the gem.  Just
prick your finger with that dagger there and drop two drops of blood onto
the gem."

   After I did that, he had me set the gem down onto a small crystal stand
and showed me the spell I had to cast.  It was a complicated one.  I
stumbled through as best I could, and Grevlok helped me with the
pronunciation of some of the spell.

   After we were through, I was holding a small ruby that could lead me to
Raven, at least in theory.  Grevlok explained.  "The gem is set to operate
like a compass.  It'll show you what direction to follow by glowing when
your facing the right direction.  Its primitive, but it should work.  Now,
we just need to get you ready for your journey."

   He led me upstairs to my bedroom and helped me pack for the journey.  He
gave me a small sack of gold coins for money and took an ornate silver
dagger that I could use to defend myself if I needed to.  He left, telling
me to go through Silver's main spellbook, now mine, and make a traveling
spellbook with the spells I might need.  I asked him what kind of spells I
should choose, and he told me to trust my instincts.

   That didn't answer my question, though.  I took out the huge volume from
the beside shelf and thumbed through it, hoping to find some kind of index.
And sure enough, there was a rather nice index in the back of the book!  It
took two hours just to go through the entire thing, writing down the page
numbers of spells that I thought I might need and by lunch time I had
serviceable spellbook prepared.  I had even found a spell that protected me
from other wizards, a sort of anti-magic field that would surround me and
keep spells out.  A magic umbrella, I thought to myself, grinning.

   Once I was relatively certain I was ready, I walked down the steps and
found Arianna talking with Grevlok.  Arianna asked me of I was ready.

   "Yeah, I suppose so." I was still uncertain as to exactly how I would be
traveling.

   "Well, have you ever ridden a horse?" I said no, I hadn't.  They both
frowned at me.  Grevlok muttered "well that blows that idea" under his
breath and then Arianna grinned.  "Guess you'll just have to hoof it."

   I grinned and said walking was fine.  With the ruby to guide me, I
wasn't too concerned.

   I set out immediately wanting to get a good start on things, and walked
around in a circle, getting a bearing with the ruby and headed off in a
southerly direction.  I found the road and began following it, whistling a
happy tune as I traveled, enjoying the afternoon despite the seriousness of
my quest.  It just felt good to get out of that tower and get fresh air.  I
don't know how Arianna and Grevlok can stand being cooped up like a bird in
a cage.

   I passed a group of elvish children playing in a nearby field and they
seemed to recognize me, waving and yelling greetings in the elven tongue,
which thanks to Arianna, I could understand now.  I called back a friendly
hello as I walked past and soon found myself at a fork in the road.  I
checked the ruby and headed down the right fork, wondering how far Raven
had traveled.

   I walked down the wide dirt road for several hours before coming upon a
small village that seemed to be populated mostly by dwarves, although I did
see and elf or two here or there.  Since it was going on evening, I stopped
for the night at a inn I saw a little ways off the road.  I walked inside
and the place was crowded.  There was an open dining hall where dwarves and
elves alike were drinking and laughing and doing some other things which
surprised me.

   You just don't walk into restaurants and find couples screwing!  At
least not on my world.  I usually sat at the back of these types of places,
but that was where the copulating couples were, so I sat near the entrance,
feeling uneasy in the place.  Shortly, a barmaid appeared and smiled at me,
and winked.  She looked me up and down and her smile grew wider.  "It's
great to see you.  You haven't been here in a while, you want the usual?"

   Perplexed, I agreed.  Hey what the heck, I thought to myself, go with
the flow.  She left and came back with a large mug of some kind of alcohol
and gave it to me and left.  I took a tentative sip and it tasted good
actually.  I sat back and drank slowly and presently the barmaid came back
carrying a bowl of what smelled like chili.  She sat it down in front of me
and warned me it was hot.

   After I had eaten, she came back and told me to follow her.  We went up
a flight of steps and inside a small chamber that was filled with young
woman of all shapes and sizes.  She told me to pick which ever two I
wanted. I was confused by this.  I thought she was going to show me to a
room where I could rest for the night.  I thought I'd better humor her,
because this world undoubtedly had strange customs I wasn't aware of yet.
Most of the woman were elvish ladies that looked like they were in their
mid-twenties.  I picked the two youngest looking ones, a short brunette and
a busty redhead.

   They were both extremely pretty, but I wasn't sure what I was picking
them for.  Boy, was I thick-headed.  The barmaid led me to a room where I
could sleep and left me there without as mush as an explanation and two
elves looking at me expectedly.

   I asked them their names and they both smiled and uttered not a single
word.  They slowly started undressing and I just sat on the edge of the
bed, shocked.  They were both very beautiful, but I'm a one woman guy.  I'm
on this journey to find Raven, not to screw every female that opens her
legs for me!

   The young elven ladies, now stripped nude, stood before me proudly
displaying their ample wares.  It was time to bring this little game to a
halt, but how to do it?  Well here goes the direct approach.

   "Ladies I must say you are both extremely lovely, and I appreciate you
keeping me company tonight, but I have a confession to make.  I didn't
realize the nature of this place until we got here and you started
undressing.  I really came here for dinner and rest, not much else I'm
afraid.  Would it offend the two of you very much if we just slept?  I'll
pay whatever is customary in the morning, for I do appreciate the company.
How does that sound?" That sounded so corny, I thought, as they looked at
each other and grinned.

   I was prepared to simply go to sleep, but the two young ladies had other
ideas.  They lay down together and began kissing passionately, seemingly
not bothered by my presence.  The brunette began kissing her way down her
partner's body, paying ample attention to the large breasts that seemingly
begged for her attention until she found her way down to the awaiting
vagina of her ecstatic lover.  She turned herself around, until her own sex
was presented to the impassioned red-head.  Soon they were eagerly feasting
on each other's cunt and I was thoroughly enjoying the show unfolding right
in front of me.

   My hormones got the better of me and soon I had my cock out,
masturbating furiously.  This had been my sole means of sexual release
until coming to this world, and found it ironic that I felt I couldn't
indulge in any hanky panky just because Raven had claimed me as her own. 
Now however, my lust had overcame my senses and I wasn't thinking about
anything beyond the two beautiful creatures happily making love to each
other right in front of me.

   The two ladies were moaning and thrashing about as their orgasms took
hold of their bodies, and they slowly came back to their senses.  The
red-head noticed my frantic masturbation, smiled lewdly, and reached over
and engulfed my erection into her mouth, sucking happily.  The brunette
didn't sit there however, she laid down beside me and she plunged her
tongue into my mouth, kissing me with enthusiasm.

   I couldn't take much of the red-head's furious sucking and my climax
burst from me like a volcano erupting, my semen being swallowed as quickly
as it escaped my body.  The brunette kept kissing me through the whole
ordeal and the next thing I knew, my cock was buried in a warm tightness
that I had never felt before, and I broke the kiss to look down my body and
the red-head was pouncing on my cock, facing away from me, her back arched
and her head thrown back as waves of pleasure assaulted her senses.  The
brunette climbed on top of me and presented her dripping cunt to my idle
tongue.  I clamped onto her protruding clit and eagerly sucked on it,
making the brunette crazy as orgasm after orgasm rocked her body.  I came
violently, pumping my seed into the voluptuous red-head's sopping pussy. 
She laid down beside me, sated, and the brunette took my wilting cock into
her mouth, coaxing life back into it.  After my erection was standing
proudly again, the brunette impailed herself upon it, pistoning herself up
and down for a few minutes and then she curiously stopped, and she slowly
impailed my cock into her butt, whimpering a bit as it entered her fully,
She sat there, with my cock fully buried in her bottom for a full minute,
and then began slowly moving up and down the length of my cock, giving me
some of the most pleasurable sensations yet!  Her butt was much tighter
than any cunt I had fucked so far, and it felt unbelievable!  I couldn't
take much of this and quickly climaxed, sending my seed deep into her
belly. We collapsed together and fell asleep, all three of us totally
sated. In the morning I paid them both double their normal fee and left the
brothel, for that's what it was, for the open road and a new day's
adventure.  It all sounded glorious at first, and indeed the going was
swift and a pleasant experience, until it started raining.  Boy, did it
start raining.  It was raining buckets and here I was in the middle of
nowhere on a dirt road without so much as an umbrella.  I huddled my cloak
around me and walked swiftly down the road hoping to come upon the next
town or village or even a farm or something.  Anything to get out of this
downpour.  The funny thing was, I distinctly remember reading my large
dictionary-sized spellbook and seeing a whole section on weather-affecting
spells.  Silly me didn't think I'd need any of them, so I hadn't bothered
writing any down into my small spellbook I had with me.  Good thing it was
water-proof!  I checked the ruby and it pointed to a spot deep in the
woods, off of the road.  I shrugged and entered the woods and mistakenly
thought the woods would provide some protection from the rain, but nope, it
didn't.  In fact, it seemed worse, with the leaves of the trees dripping on
me as well as the rain coming through the branches.  I went in the general
direction that the ruby indicated and the terrain became rougher and
rougher.  It seemed pretty obvious that Raven had, at this point, assumed
her tiger form because of the increasingly difficult path she was taking,
if you could call it a path, that is.  The woods soon gave way to a low
hill and I could make out a cave that looked inviting.  I didn't even mind
if I had to share it with a beast as long as I could get out of this god
forsaken rain.  I walked swiftly towards it and was glad when I stepped
inside.  The cave was much bigger than it had looked.  In fact, it looked
like the entrance to some mine or something.  I walked further into the
cave and found myself in a large chamber with tunnels leading off in all
directions.  I did indeed look like a mine of some kind.  I saw various
digging tools scattered about on the ground.  I looked about and heard
something coming down one of the tunnels.  I flipped quickly through my
spellbook and made myself invisible.  It was an odd sensation, looking down
and not seeing myself, but before I could really appreciate it, a small
furry fellow came charging through one of the tunnels, looking tired and
scared out of his mind.  He stopped as he neared my general location and
sniffed around, as if he smelled me.  "W-who's there?  Please help me!  The
witch is after me!" At that very moment, a leather-clad female came
charging up the tunnel the disheveled guy had come from.  She was dressed
head to toe in form fitting black leather.  In fact, the parts of her that
showed was her face and mid section.  She spied the little guy and screamed
triumphantly, raising the whip she was carrying.  She didn't see me either,
of course.  I braced myself and caught the end of the whip when it came
down and yanked it hard.  She fell hard onto the ground, emitting a "oomph"
on her way down.  That was the good news, the bad news was my invisibility
ended the second I touched the whip.  Before she could recover, I helped
the dwarf up onto his feet and introduced myself to the two of them.  "My
name is Silver, I don't know what the story is, but I just wanted out of
the rain when I came upon this little fellow.  He seems to think you mean
him harm.  Do you?" I directed my questions to the lady, who was getting to
her feet and dusting herself off.  She answered me directly.  "I am Fyre,
and this is my dungeon.  All who enter this place must pay my price.  Those
who don't pay get whatever fate I see fit to deal them." I was still
uncertain as to whether she was really a spell-caster ofd some sort as the
dwarf had hinted at.  I decided not to take any chances and cast the magic
barrier that I had memorized.  As soon as I started casting the spell
however, she zapped me and the dwarf with some kind of wand and the world
went black.

   **********************************

   Comments, flames, suggestions,

   complements, etc.  should be

   directed to demon@ih2000.net **********************************