Field Notes from Diamonds Hadder: On the topic of Zabble and the discovery of Mattix.
(Zabble is crossing the threshold of Medlins Door for the first time.)
As Zabble stepped into the room.. the strange wood knocking noise stopped rather suddenly.. skylark followed close behind.. as well as the klipso fog and some annoying magic books which were happily chasing skylarks tail.. the mysterious room was very dark other than a few oddly illuminated books on dark shelves. The books seemed to have a slight glow to them which became brighter as Zabble entered the room.. it was the same red light as the key and they seemed to know that the key was close.. they were casting an eerie red light in the room similar to a full moon you might say. With this light Zabble could see now that the room was quite large, it looked like an old library.. and smelled like one.. with walls filled with shelves of books and trinkets.. candles graced every shelf and a single desk in a dark corner of the room was cluttered with papers and notes near a half burned candle, dry ink pen and bottle. An elaborate and decorative but very comfortable chair graced the desk.. carved with a dragon sitting in a worry tree.. filled with ravens.. it was a striking chair.. it had a black dragon leather seat cushion beautifully hand crafted that seemed to blend with the patterns on the tree base.. and it looked well worn. A large portrait of Medlin hug on the wall just over the desk.. hmmm.. Zabble thought a moment. He suspected Medlin was placing little portrait windows around the castle, portals perhaps to see back into this world, and this portrait was certainly suspect and added to his theory. He grumbled and whispered under his breath.. “I know what your up to master” As he approached the desk, he noticed dust was collected on the untouched corners of the desk.. unlike the center of the desk which looked quite used and dust free.. a few tiny mouse footsteps could be seen in the dust.. and a few strange marks that looked like someone was scrapping or dragging something on the desk followed by what looked like wooden hammer marks in a row near the mouse prints. They were odd marks. Suddenly a loud crash and boom filled the room.. as a booked seemed to have fallen from a high shelf on its own.. and landed with a loud thud sending Zabble into a strange alert wizard stance, his heart racing as the noise practically sent him and skylark running from the room… followed by that same strange sound again.. a menacing knocking and clanging noise like wooden spoons tapping without rhythm.. Skylark jumped behind Zabble.. he looked at her with a frustrated wizards look.. “some fanglor you are”.. he grumbled under his breath .. he then turned and said.. “go see” Skykarks head turned to the side staring at Zabble and she made a slight groan which roughly translated to “I don’t think so” in fanglorean lingo. Zabble huffed, and turned to the direction of the noise. An eerie silence filled the room as the two peered into the soft red darkness where the noise could be heard. It was softer now.. with more time between the knocks. Zabble turned to skylark one last time, a look of obvious disappointment on his wizard chin, huffed again and turned and headed for the noise.
He came upon the book that fell from the shelf.. picking it up he noticed the title of the book… Kyon Magic: Volume 11.. hmmmm, wonder what that is.. he thought as he placed the book on a nearby shelf and stared up at the higher shelves of the library where the sound could still be heard.. a sliding ladder was nearby and a rail system that was obviously well used and well needed to reach the higher shelves, which he guessed was 50 or so levels high. He pulled it close and started climbing.. Zabble was an inquisitive wizard.. always believing in “wonder over wine”, or so the saying goes. Everything was a puzzle for him.. including this odd noise which he found more interest in rather than fear of. And so he climbed.. noticing a few book titles along the way… "Sleeping Potions", “The Fanglor and the troK”, “Spider webs and insect spells”, “A wizards staff: The art of direction”, “Warmoths: the anatomy of.”, “Europa”.... "How to catch a Fanglor", hmmm... Zabbled looked down at Skylark who was huddled behind Medlins desk... she looked up at Zabble as if to say... "What?", Zabble grummbled under his breath... "hmmm..oh nothing"... Zabbles heart was singing, the power of words and knowledge was like gold to him, he was truely feeling rich as he climbed ever closer to the noise… as he reached the very top.. his eyes were peering through the ladder foot holes between him and the highest shelf.. a few large books were arranged in a way as to create a little cave or hole filled with shadow and darkness.. the sound was coming from in there.. (Knock.. knock… click… clack) it continued but was much softer now as Zabbles bugging eyes peeked through the ladder. Suddenly 2 eyes could be seen in the darkness.. a slight red glow to them now.. a bit sinister like… staring at him.. hovering in the black. Zabbles hands trembled a bit clutching the ladder rails for dear life.. (Knock… knock… knock…) the sound grew a little louder.. the eyes were moving closer and the noise seemed to imitated the movement. A dead mouse lay on the floor of the shelf as well.. just outside the hole that the book house made. And then a head appeared from the dark.. how astonishing.. Zabbles eyes widened.. a wooden cat.. animated.. it moved quite elegantly.. like a real cat.. it slowly walked from the hole, it’s wooden limbs clanging together as it brushed itself against the books.. like a cat might do to itch it’s fur. He imagined it might even purr if it had a mouth to do such a thing, but Perhaps that wasn’t part of the design. He guessed, a guardian of the library books perhaps. From smart mice who love books as much as he does. Another of Medlins spells and a good one at that. As the cat approached Zabble, a closer look revealed a collar with a name, “Mattix”. How wonderful. “Nice to make your acquaintance Mr Mattix, I’m Zabble… and down there.. behind the desk… is Skylark… a fearless castle fanglor.” His eyes rolled as he grumbled the last few words. Upon hearing Zabbles talking and friendly tone, Skylark made her way out from behind medlins desk and was now at the base of the ladder looking up… her front paws on the first few rungs of the ladder shaking it slightly... her eyes wide open… Zabble shouted down to her. “We have a new friend, girl”
Skylark groaned a little anxious groan.. as if to say “What are you doing up there?, who, what, where… come down.. let me see.”
Zabble shouted down.. “Ok.. Ok.. I’m coming down already….” Zabble was smiling and wearing a wizards grin as he descended the ladder. “I hope you like cats” He mumbled under his breath.
(PS If you've come this far... down river.. there might be a link to "Rivers End".. somewhere down on the front page... at the mouth of the river.)