Evergreen Academy and the Golden Club Chapter 5 The golden club
Daniel found that both he and Kerri were in the clairvoyance class. There were very few people in the class. Apparently clairvoyance was not a popular course. The professor was a very fat man. He had three chins and a big belly. That day's class was about stargazing. He let the students read through the chapter and identify stars on a chart for most of the class. Then he asked everyone to put the books away.
"What you've read in the book is not very accurate. You see, stars do not tell you exactly what's going to happen in your life or here on earth. Stars are stars. They have their own orbits and own lives-do they have effects on our lives? I believe they do, but they are more like the effect of weather on a person's mood. There is nothing specific about them...It's just another example that there are many misconceptions in clairvoyance. You have to use your own judgment to find out what is genuine."
He then dismissed the class. "You two," he pointed at both Daniel and Kerri, "Stay."
For a moment, Daniel thought that he had done something wrong, but he soon realized that it had nothing to do with that.
"I really don't like it when professor Alverdine tries to add to my workload, bringing in new students like that after the beginning of the semester all the time." Professor Baldred was talking to himself as if no one was around. It made Daniel feel uncomfortable, not for the reason that he added workload to professor Baldred, but for the reason that professor Alverdine was blamed for his sake.
"I'll go through the first few classes as quickly as possible," said professor Baldred. "Now listen and don't interrupt." He went on to talk about clairvoyance. He apparently had quite a large chip on his shoulder because of people's misunderstanding of clairvoyance and some people's abuse of it.
"Clairvoyance means clear view of the future and unknown. It's different from so called fortunetelling or psychism. It has a logical basis and limits. First there is no sure way to predict future. You can tell what already happened-now, I know that you are going to say what's the point-but what if you can tell that a tornado is coming. It's not prediction. It's happening and is moving your way. What if you can tell that someone's hurt, and you can fly there to save the person without delay? The signal and information are already there. People with the gift can pick them up."
"I'm not saying that prediction isn't possible. There are causes and effects. If you have all the information, you will know what's coming. When it comes to a person's fate or something bigger, there are so many ever-changing factors. Only people with the most powerful mind can decipher the signs. And even so, nothing is for sure. Remember a person can change his or her life. No one can take a look at you or your palms and tell you what your future is going to be. They have to experience what you have experienced and are experiencing to make a prediction."
"Now, that's it. Think about it. You are dismissed." He left the class as fast as a schoolboy.
Kerri looked like someone had just shoved a big amount of food down her throat.
"You understand everything professor Baldred just said?" she asked, looking quite tense.
"Kind of," said Daniel, but he realized that Kerri just wanted to make sure that they were at the same level.
"No, not really," he added. What he said seemed to relax Kerri a bit.
On his way back to the dorm, Daniel met Owen. He looked very excited: "You've got to see this."
He drew out his sword: "Hop on."
"Where are we going?" asked Daniel, jumping on the sword.
"The beach."
They flew over the lake and passed the small hills at the other side of the lake. The land fell down to a valley full of trees. Water from the lake dropped down in a waterfall and cut through the valley.
"So what are we going to see?" asked Daniel, wondering what could make Owen this excited.
"The legendary Golden Club," said Owen with a dreamy look. "It's one of the few most powerful magical weapons in the whole world."
The sword carried them through the middle of two high peaks. They were now flying over a long white beach that led to the sea. On the beach were a group of students. The boy in the middle was holding the Golden Club. He was very good-looking. He had deep blue eyes, very strong nose, and full lips.
"Make it big again," the other boys were cheering him on.
"Get out of way."
"Daenlarma," he shouted, throwing out the club. It flew in the sea. Everyone waited. After a while, Daniel saw one end of the club sticking out of the water. It was as big as a tree trunk. It kept growing and growing until the boy commanded it to stop. The club was now the size of a table. The boy flew on the top of the club with a perfect flip. He then jumped off the club. Daniel heard him cite "Onenfini." One end of the club shrank to the size of a normal club but the other end remained as big as a table. He got hold of the club and started stirring the sea. A huge vortex appeared in the middle of the sea. The boys on the beach were all yelling and shouting. The vortex also generated a whirl of wind that almost knocked Daniel off his feet.
A couple of merpeople jumped out of the water and shouted at the top of their lungs: "Stop it. What the hell do you think you are doing?"
That didn't stop the boy. The merpeople were quickly dragged back into the water by the current. That created a few laughs. Daniel was glad that Owen didn't join the other students.
Even though he had to admit that the Golden Club was quite impressive, the whole incident made him very uncomfortable; but he kept his mouth shut. He didn't want Owen or the other students to think that he was a jealous baby or something.
The boy only stopped when Michelle flew out and threatened him that she was going to tell Professor Alverdine if he didn't stop. Daniel learned that his name was Jared from the shouting between him and Michelle. Reluctantly Jared commanded the club to shrink. It shrank until it disappeared into his palm. He didn't fly down to the beach but flew back to the school. And the crowd scattered.
"I would give up anything to have that weapon," said Owen on their way back to the school. He was totally mesmerized by the Golden Club, which didn't surprise Daniel. Owen's power was combat. He was naturally attracted to great weapons.
From the sky, Daniel saw most students were on their way to the dinning hall. Two people however, walked in different directions. One was Kerri. She was walking to the library. The other was the monkey man. He was also walking alone. When he was at the edge of the school grounds, he jumped on a tree, and at a surprising speed, disappeared behind the hill.
"Do you know what his name is?" asked Daniel.
"Tao, I guess," said Owen. "He never really talks to anyone-I have no idea where he is from"
"He's like the new girl, only she is close to you," he said with a mischievous smile.
"No, she's not," said Daniel, feeling his face burning up.
"She only talks to you."
"All she talks about is the classes and the homework," said Daniel but realized that Owen was joking.
On Tuesday, they were in the classroom for the transformation Class. Professor Nolte had not arrived yet, and students were chatting with each other.
"Birdy, talk to any of your sisters and brothers?" Daniel heard a chubby boy call out to another boy. The boy, however, didn't look like either a bird or a rat, even though he was small and skinny. He was clean and well dressed. Daniel remembered that the boy was also in the clairvoyance class. It seemed that he was in as many classes as Kerri was.
"I'm an only child," answered the boy. Daniel heard some other students giggle.
"I mean your furry siblings," the chubby boy saw the giggling as an encouragement.
The small boy was not amused. His face turned red, and he looked like he was trying very hard to think of a cleaver rebuttal but finally settled on "Sod off."
Daniel almost fell off his seat when he saw himself walk in the class. His mirror image gave him a small wink and signaled him to keep quiet. It was an eerie feeling, even though Daniel knew it was professor Nolte. The whole class quieted down when they realized that there were two Daniels. They had seen professor Nolte change his body like it was made of rubber, but never seen him as another person before. After a while, the whole class burst into heated dispute about which one was the real Daniel. Some said the one sitting was the real one, because Daniel always sat with Owen; but others argued that it wasn't supposed to be that easy. If professor Nolte wanted to make it difficult, he could have easily detained Daniel somewhere for a while.
"I know the answer," Owen finally stood up and whispered so quietly that only the real Daniel could hear. He walked up to the other Daniel.
"What did I just say?" asked Owen. There was a baffled look on the other Daniel's face. Then he broke into laughter. To Daniel's amazement, the face changed back into professor Nolte's face. The whole class applauded.
"That's the third law we are going to talk about today: it is impossible to reproduce something or someone exactly by transformation. There are always differences. People can always tell the real thing from the fake ones if they have trained eyes."
"The reason I transformed into Daniel was because I didn't want to run the risk of being closely examined by his eyes," said professor Nolte with a smile. He was a young man with black hair and small brown eyes. "Owen could tell I was the fake one, because he knew I could never acquire Daniel's power."
"That was incredible!!!" said Owen when they walked out of the classroom, "-are you going to the library again?"
"Yes," said Daniel. He had been looking for the charms that could suck the heat out of a place.
"Be careful, you are going to turn into a bookworm," joked Owen.
Daniel had told Owen about Colossa the book fairy and was told that book fairies fed on bookworms and other book-eating insects.
"Come here to take a nap?" joked Miss Leventis when she saw Danile. Daniel believed that Colossa had told her about the incident. He gave her a half-hearted smile and found a seat far away from the checkout desk. Then he entered the side wing. He hadn't had much luck finding the charms. Last time, he searched the freezing charms. They turned out to be the charms that made something or someone motionless. Daniel was tempted to learn the charm, but there was warning against learning it from the book: "severe damage would come to both parties if not properly executed."
"Need any help?" Colossa appeared on the top of a shelf. Since the incident, Daniel had been trying to ignore him, but he just wouldn't give up.
Daniel found a book titled Advanced Charms. He was about to take it down from the shelf, but stopped on second thought. Colossa was smiling and nodding his approval. That usual wasn't a good sign.
It took a while for Daniel to find another book that looked relevant. It was title How to Keep Your Pet Cool in Summer.
"If I were you, I wouldn't want to open that book," said Colossa with a frown that looked very strange on his baby face.
Daniel stopped again because that could be Colossa's way of tricking him into taking the book. He knew Colossa liked to play mind games.
In the end Daniel got so frustrated, he almost gave up. Then an idea came into his mind.
"I want you to leave me alone," he said very clearly.
"I'm just trying to help," said Colossa with an innocent look.
"Did you hear me?" said Daniel calmly. He pulled out a book randomly from the shelf, opened it and held one single page between his fingers.
"If you don't leave me alone, I'll tear this page off."
"You wouldn't dare," said Colossa, but he looked extremely nervous.
"Try me," said Daniel. He pulled the page a little harder.
"Stop," screamed Colossa. "OK, OK, I'll leave you alone." He looked totally defeated.
Daniel went back to the shelf containing Advanced Charms. He listened carefully to see if there was any sound inside the book. When satisfied, he carefully took the book from the shelf. He closed his eyes before opening the cover slowly. Nothing happened. He leafed through the book. The book itself seemed to be protected by a charm. Only the general information was visible. The real charms required a password. None of the descriptions, however, seemed to fit the criteria. How to Keep Your Pet Cool in Summer did even come close. It was a book about herbs to be used for bathing pets.
On the weekend, many students flew to the beach. Now that Daniel had learned to fly his sword. He and Owen flew on separate swords. Every time he flew alone, he had this sense of freedom. It made him feel like he had achieved something, and he was truly an immortal like everyone else in the school.
Daniel really liked to swim. He had spent a lot of time in the river in his hometown. Swimming in the ocean turned out to be a very different experience. He could feel the force of the sea, strong and persistent. It was like the ocean had a life of its own and wouldn't answer to anyone else's command.
"I wonder what the Golden Club did to the bottom," said Owen. He had been talking nonstop about the Golden Club. Daniel could understand his fascination about the Golden Club. But after a while, it was just getting old. There were only so many times that he could say, "Yes, it's fantastic." After all, it was just a weapon.
"You want to go down and take a look?" asked Owen.
"Sure," answered Daniel, trying not to show his lack of enthusiasm.
"Don't swim too far away," said Owen with a grin, and then he dove in.
Daniel took a deep breath and followed him. When his head went underwater, he felt that his heart rate slow down, and his whole body seemed full of oxygen. The sea was more peaceful from within, but it was also full of life. Fish of different colors and shapes swam slowly. He could also hear dolphins and whales talking far away. He followed Owen to the bottom of the ocean. It was however a very different scene. It was like a hurricane had just torn through. Seaweeds were pulled out and floated lifeless above the bottom of the sea. Broken coral could be seen everywhere, and even some parts of the rock bed were chipped. Daniel could feel anger boiling inside. He took a look at Owen. The typical joyful look had gone. It was replaced by a gloomy frown. They kept swimming in silence. An underwater village came into view. The houses were built with small rocks. Most of them were round and short. The roofs of some houses were torn off. A couple of houses were now just piles of rocks.
Many merpeople were working hard to repair the houses. Some merwomen were sitting by the houses weaving seaweed for the roof. Most of them looked stressed. The only people unaffected were small merkids. They were swimming around chasing each other. Some of them stopped when they saw Daniel and Owen. A few of the adults also spotted them. They stopped the work on hand and stared at them with hatred.
"Get out of here, you filthy sharks," a man shouted at them.
Daniel and Owen turned around and swam away from the village in silence.
"I'm running out of air," said Owen when they were a safe distance away from the village. With a kick of his legs, he swam to the surface.
Daniel still had plenty of air, so he didn't follow Owen right away. The shouting was still ringing in his ears. It made him feel quite despicable. It saddened him to see the damage done to the merpeople. He remembered what professor Alverdine said on the full moon night. He couldn't help but wonder what he could have done to stop Jarred. There was actually very little he could have done. Even if he had tried, it probably would have only brought trouble to himself. On the other hand, he knew that he should have tried to stop Jared, however feeble his attempt could have been.
He kept swimming like a dolphin. Staying underwater helped him think. There was much less noise. Then he heard this paddling sound. He was surprised to see Owen swim towards him, his face showing fury. Owen grabbed him and pulled him out of the water.
"What did you think you're doing?" Owen shouted at him when the reached the surface. "I thought you were drowned."
"Why?" Daniel was confused. He was doing all right underwater. If he had felt out of air, he would have came up.
"Most people can't stay underwater as long as I can," shouted Owen. "Why didn't you tell me you have whale blood too?"
He turned around and swam back to the shore without waiting for Daniel.
"Sorry," Daniel had to run to catch him up on the beach. "I didn't know either."
Owen picked up his robe and soon flew out of the sight. Daniel didn't understand why Owen was so upset. Never had anyone been so upset about him, not even his father. He wasn't trying to hide his power from Owen, so how could he be mad at him for something he hadn't known of?
The book is available at barnes and noble, amazon online bookstores. Search by the title. Author's blog: 360.yahoo.com/gcgustopher