Academy of Light Page 8

  “Why don’t we use the Memor to remember all the ingredients for us?” Venir suggested.

  I was so thankful for his cleverness that I did not only make one bracelet laced with Memor energy, I made two. One for me, and another for him. I saw the blush creeping up over his face when I gave him the bracelet. Then shyly, he handed to me a white bracelet.

  “You made me one too?”

  “I was trying to replicate your necklace with a bracelet to give it to you. And then I added the Memor after I learned how to make one.”

  Then it dawned on me why he was looking haggard after going to the garden.

  “So every time you went there by yourself, this is what you’re doing?”

  “I’m not really good with the energy-wielding thing, and I wanted to surprise you with it,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck with his hand.

  Venir had a way of making me lose any self-restraint I had left. So because of that, I blamed him for it. I blamed him for the loud thudding in my chest and in my ears. I blamed him for this irresistible urge I felt, which I expressed by hugging him so tight. I blamed him for the urge to kiss him on his lips. And when he kissed me back, I blamed him for making the kiss last a little longer. My heart was racing, my body tingled, my stomach fluttered—all of these I blamed him for.

  When the kiss ended, he chuckled and I felt offended by it.

  “Why are you upset?” he said, confused.

  “Because you’re laughing.”

  “Because I’m happy?”

  Oh. And so I started laughing with him. We were still laughing when we flew up to Rebu, the fourth sphere.

  Using our system of reading, we read a lot of books and advanced quickly. When we finished the third wall, we decided to take a break and go to the garden.

  Venir and I strolled in the garden, enjoying the soft and unobtrusive air while throwing furtive glances at each other. I caught his glances more than once. And when his face turned red, I giggled in amusement. Because he wore his emotions on his face, I could easily tell if he was upset, confused, or embarrassed. So I knew that he was confused as to why I was laughing at his embarrassment. What made it a lot funnier was that the flowers with their vibrant, glossy textures and seemingly innocent beauty mimicked my laughs.

  My teasing might have been unnecessarily long and the flowers may have made it worse, so much so that Venir stalked away from us.

  “Hush!” I reprimanded the flowers and they quickly quieted down. I then followed where Venir went.

  Most trees in the garden were huge and bulky, and they sprawled on the ground heavy with kalaskig. They were always crowded with angels wanting to taste their fruits. But there was a section in the garden where angels rarely traversed, for it had a copse of scrawny and kalaskig-barren trees. You could barely see it if you were standing at the center of the garden, for it was blocked by tall bushes.

  It was here where I found Venir. With his back toward me, he was looking at a tree and was so enraptured by it that he did not even glance my way as I walked near him.

  “What are doing here?” I asked, curious at the tree that fascinated him so much.

  “I think I found it,” he said, and this time he turned his head toward me. His grin was huge.

  “What did you find?” I asked as I stepped closer to stand beside him. I examined the tree and saw nothing but a scrawny bark with a couple of leafless and dry branches.

  “Look at the ground,” he instructed pointing at a spot by the foot of the tree.

  I peered down and saw leaves covering the ground.

  “Look harder. Focus your eyes on that spot,” he said.

  And I did. I stared at that same spot, a few inches from the foot of the tree. The leaves still looked the same…but as he instructed I kept my gaze trained on it. And then something happened.

  It first appeared as if the leaf-covered ground was the bottom of a clear pool of water. It took me a while before I realized what I was staring at.

  “It’s the door,” I said. My voice was filled with awe.

  “I think we should start the trade now before it disappears,” he said.

  “How do we do that?”

  “Look at the leaves.”

  The leaves on the ground did not make sense. They were not dry or dead. They still had the luster and vibrancy of life. But why were they on the ground as though they had fallen from the branches? I turned my head to him and grinned. Together, we both said.

  “Rulmond.”

  Rulmond was a token object that recorded pledges or promises. Now that I knew about Memor energy, I believed any object could be a rulmond as long as you laced it with Memor.

  Venir bent over to collect a few leaves and gave some to me. I started speaking to the leaf the knowledge that I thought worth trading. Venir made his own pledge as well. And then we put the leaves back to the ground. They sparkled before they vanished. But the door did not open.

  “It might not be enough,” he said.

  I used my knowledge of the Navi and its author’s name to trade. But it didn’t seem enough.

  “The more the knowledge is shared, the more its value depreciates,” Venir explained. “Is there something you read from one of those hard to read books that you haven’t shared with me yet?”

  “Have I shared with you about the different dimensions?”

  He looked surprised before he shook his head. And so I picked up another leaf and started discussing what I knew about it. When I was finished, I dropped the leaf; and as soon as it hit the ground it disappeared. The water reflection started glowing.

  Venir thrust his arm to the glowing light and the part of the arm exposed to the light disappeared and then reappeared as he pulled his arm back.

  “I think the door is open.”

  “So does it mean we have to jump?” I asked.

  Venir answered my question by jumping into it, and the glowing door swallowed him in. With my heart throbbing louder in my ears, I too jumped.

  CHAPTER 12

  I found myself flying in the sky and below me were several glittering spherical-shaped buildings made of gemstones—ruby, sapphire, and emerald.

  “Ori!”

  Venir was flying toward me. I grabbed his outstretched hand and together we descended into the Metropolis.

  I could not contain my excitement when we strolled along the streets. There were several angels who did not pay us any mind as they went on their businesses. The round-shaped buildings turned out to be stores that sold items made by angels: diamond-memory frames where happy memories were displayed; floating kalaskig holder, which followed wherever one went; a crystal ball as a communication device; and several more.

  “Do you think that beats air messaging?” Venir asked as we stared at the crystal ball in awe.

  “Do you two want to try it?” the vendor said.

  At our nod, he showed us how the device worked. The vendor gave Venir a stone that said ‘kilo’ and then told him to go outside of the building. The vendor then turned to me and instructed me to say the word ‘kilo’ to the crystal. As soon as the word ‘kilo’ left my mouth, Venir’s head appeared inside the crystal.

  “I can see you!” Venir said to me.

  “I can see you too. Your head is inside the crystal!”

  Although we found the crystal device very entertaining, we both agreed that air messaging was more efficient. This was just one of the interesting items we found in the Metropolis. There was one that really took our breath away. This one came from a different store.

  “What is that?” Venir asked the vendor.

  “It’s a flying house,” the vendor said.

  “Really? Can you show us how it works?” I asked.

  The vendor pressed the front of the little box and it expanded into one big house.

  “Get in,” the vendor said, which we happily heeded.

  The house started floating before it flew out of the building. We were giggling the whole time and were so eager to engage the vendo
r into trading it with us as soon as we arrived back at the store.

  “You all looked like you’re still fledglings at the academy,” the vendor said. “So there’s no way you could reach us here at Tertium by flight. That means you used the back door located in one of the academy houses.”

  “Which also means that we have valuable information that might interest you,” Venir said, winking a little.

  The vendor snickered. He freaking snickered, which was really rude if you think about it.

  “Whatever valuable information you have, consider it worthless here, for that door over at the academy would collect all your valuables before giving you access to it. A measure in place to discourage trading with fledglings.”

  It baffled me that the academy would engage itself in such a trifling endeavor like this. What would they get for taking the fun away from its fledglings?

  “We understand. We’re sorry for assuming it’s okay for us to trade,” Venir said. The sincerity in his voice and face elicited a grimace on my face. As though he was not done being subservient, he continued talking. “And… if you don’t mind, could you tell us how to get back there?”

  The vendor raised his brows as though he just heard the stupidest request. “We don’t run a free market here, fledglings. You’ve had your fun. Now you need to go find your way back there on your own.”

  We walked out of the store embarrassed but not enough to wipe away the smiles on our faces.

  “I don’t care what that vendor said, this is still fun,” he said.

  “I agree,” I answered.

  It took us a while walking along the streets with our overwrought faces before we saw a tent with a big sign that said: Lost Academy Fledglings Here. There was an arrow sign pointing to go inside the tent.

  I rolled my eyes. I was right, the Academy was my mother, an overly-protective mother with a great sense of humor.

  We entered the tent and found ourselves back in the garden.

  After eating some more fruits, we went back inside and continued our education. Although my reading of the books was easy and unencumbered with unintelligible language, I deliberately slowed down to match Venir’s progress. And when we finished the last book in the house, together we flew to the third house—the House of the Terrestrial Knowledge.

  Here I learned that Earth really existed. It was a world where mortals lived. I found the books a lot easier to read than the previous two houses. The information I accumulated felt familiar to me like I had known them before. I described it to Venir and asked if he had a similar experience. As usual, he said the books were hard and the information was new to him.

  Using the system we developed back at the lower houses, we found out that most of the books here were difficult for him. So I ended up reading a lot, which I didn’t mind.

  Another thing that I noticed as we progressed from one level to another, accumulating more navi, was that our energy-sleeps had become fewer and farther between.

  The garden in this house was the most deserted so far compared to the other houses. Angels seemed to be in a hurry to leave this house as they took fewer breaks. I noticed Venir doing this too and confirmed what I long suspected when I asked him about it.

  “I just wanted to finish this house so we can move on.”

  The books were easy to me so I ended up strolling in the garden with my lonesome self. In the garden, there was a well that contained a kind of water that when you touched it you would see images of what it was like on Earth.

  Eager to see it for myself, I hovered above the well. I dropped the bucket and with my basic knowledge of controlling energy, I manipulated it into filling it with water and then summoned it back to me.

  Instead of peeking into the bucket, I dipped my hand into it. The moment my hand was drenched with the water, I was immediately beset by thousands of images in my head. I might have passed out, but I was too far gone to remember what was going on with me.

  Venir found me on the ground beside the well, sitting instead of floating. I did not know how long I was like this, but my awareness came when I felt his tap on my shoulder.

  “Are you okay,” he asked.

  I shook my head. I clenched my jaw so tight to hold back my tears. But the moment I saw Venir’s concerned face, I flung myself into his arms and cried on his shoulder.

  “I was on Earth. I saw a boy. I saw him grow up. I saw a girl who talked to me like she knew me, like we were friends for a long time. I saw a woman who smiled at me with a loving face. I think the woman was my mother, the boy my brother and the girl my friend. I was there. I could feel it like it just happened to me,” I said, sobbing.

  He pulled me off his shoulder to look into my eyes.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “There.” I pointed at the well. “I saw my life in there.”

  The more I talked about my life on Earth, the more concerned and worried Venir looked. So I showed it to him. I told him to go get some water and touch it, which Venir did. But when I asked him what he saw, he narrowed his eyes on me.

  “Ori, I saw glimpses of wingless people, but I don’t know them.”

  “You have to wait…wait for the flashbacks. You’ll see.”

  With his hand in the pail, he waited. And waited. I did not know how long it was until he pulled his hand out of it and dropped the water back into the well.

  “Ori,” he started. When I did not answer, he continued. “There’s a lot more we don’t know, but this is the academy of knowledge. You’re in the perfect place to find all the answers to your questions.”

  Venir was right. We only covered the third house and there were seven more houses to go. But this did not appease me as tears continued falling down my face.

  “What is it?” he said, kissing my forehead as he put his arms around me, protecting me from my own memories, for that’s what they were. My memories.

  “I was inside the burning building. I was on fire, but I felt no pain. But the others, they were screaming in agony as the flames consumed them. I could feel it, Venir, their pain, but not mine. It was so…” I paused to gather my thoughts. “It was confusing. Because when they’re dead, when the life was extinguished, severed from them, I felt….” I paused again and averted my eyes from Venir, for I could not stand to see his eyes while I confessed it to him.

  “What did you feel? Tell me?” he urged.

  With my gaze fixed on the well, I said, “When they died, I felt…” I gulped. “Blissful.”

  He touched my cheek and made me turn my head to him.

  “It wasn’t you,” he said.

  “But what if it was me?”

  “We don’t know anything about it, Ori. Do not assume it was your experience. Let’s look for the answer here.”

  I wiped the wetness on my face. “We already have a quest, the darkness and the Focus Room, remember?”

  “Then let’s add it to the list. The more the better,” he said, smiling at me before he leaned in and kissed me.

  We went back to the library. A new sense of purpose was born inside me. I now thought of the academy as a Mother who had been keeping secrets from me. And I would find out about those secrets. Where else could the Mother hide it?

  So instead of slowing my reading, I read as fast as I could and infused as much information I could get. If the answer was not here, then maybe it’s in the other house. I was ready to move on. But I could not leave Venir behind. When our eyes met as soon as I got back to him after I finished the last books he set aside for me, he sighed and then said. “Alright, help me out with the books.”

  We flew to the fourth house. Venir decided to try to fly again, and though he was a little slow, he became accustomed to flapping his energy wings steadily as he rose to the air. Halfway to the fourth house, I glanced back at Venir and saw the fear on his face.

  “You look scared,” I said.

  “Because I’m not sure I’ll pass the test.”

  The fourth house was the Trial of Knowledge.<
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  “Relax, I’ll help you.”

  “I cheated to get to this house, Ori. I’m quite certain, I’m not ready for the trial.”

  I changed course and maneuvered myself into a position where I was facing him as I flew upward.