Lost in Mystical Lands

By: Crescentfang

Chapter One: Awakening

	It started off as any normal weekend does for David, Tracey, and Tina. They found a friend to hang out with and play around. This day, the trio siblings met their friend Taleir at the park. The group giggled as they ran around the park, playing on the trees and in the bushes. After tumbling around a bit, David proposes an idea, “How about we go check out the old library?” Tina frowned and stuck her tongue out at her brother, “Why would we go to some smelly old library?” Tracey and Taleir both laughed at the idea as well before David said, “Well, rumor has it no one goes there anymore…and that there are a few books in there that contain magic.” As he spoke these words, he had a sly smile, obviously intending to turn a boring old library into an adventure. Upon hearing this, the three other’s ears twitched, their interest piqued as Taleir answered, “Now that sounds interesting.” The other siblings nodded in agreement as David hopped in excitement, “Alright! Lets go!” Tracey then added, “I’ll race ya!” With that, the four of them took off running for the library that David mentioned.

	Once they arrived at the library in the forest, the sun was high over their heads with a few clouds here and there, a tell tale sign that it was about noon. However the library seemed deserted, as if no one had walked in it corridors for ages. The young group entered the library and began their search together, finding it faster to comb through the large number of books that the cases contained faster than if they were to search separately. They giggled as they joked about what kind of magic the book would contain. Tina imagined tentacles erupting from the cover, while David and Tracey both envisioned an elemental kind of magic to be held within, while Taleir was hoping for one to help with her fertility. Minutes turned to hours as they searched, finding nothing but old, dusty books. Exhausted, the group gave a collective sigh before Tracey said, “Well, we did find a few interesting books, but nothing magical…” Taleir nodded as the group sat on the floor, “Yeah…too bad. If we did find it, I could imagine what we could do.” Tina smiled as she then purposed her own plan with a sly, knowing smile, “How about we go home and have some ‘fun’?” David and Taleir giggled and nodded. The young group then stood and began to walk through the hallway of book cases to the exit. 

	Once they reached about halfway to the exit, the group who had been walking in relative silence, only talking about what a book of magic could contain, they stopped. A figure had stepped out from behind some book shelves about 20 meters ahead of them, turning to face them. David and Tracey stepped in front, the figure was robed, it’s face hidden by a hood. The designs on the fabric were unlike anything from the area, or from anywhere in the world that any of the group could think of. After a brief silence, the figure spoke, “You four…you may…be the key…” The voice was that of a man…it was clear though that he was exhausted by something and his voice was strained and rasped. As the four pondered on the figures words, he had lifted his hands, palms out, so that his arms were parallel to the ground before he began to chant something in a foreign language while his hands began to glow a light blue. Sensing danger, David and Tracey lead a charge  with Tina and Taleir behind them as they planned to subdue the unknown man. However soon after they had started to make their charge, their bodies grew heavy before one by one, they collapsed 5 meters away. Soon as the man began to grow louder with his chants, their consciousness began to fade and a ring of light and runes began to form under each of them before, finally, darkness and silence.

	David groaned as he slowly came to, his vision and mind was still foggy while he slowly picked himself up. He was very curious though…he remembered being in a library, but he now found himself looking at grass. As his ears slowly allowed him to hear once more, the sounds of birds and other creatures that he was unsure of could be heard in the distance. Groggily, David looked around. It was later in the day, the sun ready to set on the horizon past a wall of trees, leading the young wolf to figure he was in a forest…but where? How did he even get outside the library? It was then that the image of the male figure reappeared in his head, giving him a bit of a headache as he remembered what had happened before his gap in memory, “That’s right…” David muttered to himself, “That man…was it just a dream? If not…what did he do to us?” He managed to hold himself on his hands and knees as he did a quick check of the rest of his surroundings, finding that he was alone now…David began to grow worried for the others, getting to his feet as he started to search the immediate area, hoping that they were moved to the nearby area like he was. Soon after panic started to set into the young wolf’s mind when he couldn’t find his friends as worrisome thoughts crossed his mind. David took a deep slow breath to calm himself, he knew panicking like this would do him and his siblings and friend no good, he couldn’t let fear control his thoughts as he thought to himself, ‘Alright…I got to stay calm…I need to keep my head in this situation. First things first, survival…maybe the others have thought the same thing and tried to find a stream…’

	With his thoughts and composer collected, David now began to search for any signs of people near by and listen for running water. After a short walk, he heard a faint stream in the distance, however the sound was soon drowned out by the sound of two girls crying out in fear…the voices were very familiar as David turned to the yells. With a determination to save them, he charged towards the noise. The sight of Tina and Taleir with their backs to a tree with three abnormally large feral wolves surrounding them greeted David as he busted into the clearing. “David!” Tina cried out upon seeing her brother, both relieved and worried that he would get hurt as Taleir chimed in with her own calling of his name. This got one of the wolves to turn and face David before leaping at the young man only to get a stern kick to it’s gut from David, making the feral wolf  wince and yelp in pain as it fell to the ground.

	Upon hearing the feral wolf’s injury, the other two then tried to lung at David, one going for his neck while the other went for his leg while the third wolf staggered back to his feet. David reacted swiftly as he slammed an elbow to the nose of the wolf going for his throat while simultaneously hopping up into the air to drive a knee into the side of the second wolf then following with a crushing blow from his elbow between the wolf’s shoulder blades, making the last two whimper and yelp in pain. As David readied himself again, the wolves slowly backed away…David took notice but didn‘t lower his guard as his sister and Taleir smiled at his brave efforts. David maintained a fierce look until the wolves were out of sight, then his expression changed to one of great relief, with a sigh to match. However he was soon almost knocked to the ground as Tina and Taleir both ran to him and hugged him, “Thank you brother.” Tina said, almost in tears from joy and the fear that she had recently experienced, “Yeah…you’re a real life saver.” Said Taleir with a very grateful smile. David smiled back at them and hugged them both before he asked, “Have either of you seen Tracey?” Both of the girls shook their head, then Tina asked a question of her own, “Where are we?” David shook his head, just as confused as she was, but Taleir gave her guess, “I think…that man transported us somewhere. Those wolves were far bigger than the ones back home…or in our world in general.” David pondered, “Does that mean…we could be in another world?” Taleir nodded, “It’s possible…you saw how his hands had a glow right? And that light that appeared under us…those words of his…” Tina was now more worried than before, “We have to find big brother…what if those wolves find him next?” David nodded, a grim look upon his face at the thought of it before he said, “Yes…we can worry about where we are and that man later…we also need to survive ourselves. We can’t help our brother if we become in poor health.” The group parted their hug as Taleir nodded in agreement, “I’m sure Tracey should be able to hold his own. But we didn’t seem to be widely separated, he should be close by, like you were David.” The young man nodded, “We can only hope so. Tracey will be alright though, he‘s great at camping and was a part of the wolf scouts back home…”

	With the reunion over, the small group now began to search for their missing party member, however being sure to not attract anything hostile like before. As they searched, the sun slowly began to set. Once twilight fell upon the land, the group decided it was best to rest, finding the stream that David heard earlier while he built a small shelter for them. While he constructed, Tina gathered fire wood while Taleir caught a few fish for them. Exhausted from the day’s ordeal, they roasted their fish while they rested around the fire. “I hope Tracey is alright…” Said David, a bit worried for his brother before Tina tried to cheer him up, “Well, he was the one who always did better than us when we went camping. He’s probably made a cabin by now while smoking some venison.” she reminded her brother about what he mentioned earlier in the day, making David and Taleir chuckled while Tina smiled, happy she brightened the mood a little.

	With the fish done, the three ate, then added some more wood to the fire to keep it going for the rest of the night before retiring to David’s shelter of branches and leaves, with leaf mattresses. The three did their best to sleep…all of them hoping that this was just a dream, and they’d wake up back up in the Library. However, reality would soon dawn on them.