"You can cast strong spells. Not too long ago, you basically did the same thing in the valleys. You opened portals and forced thousands upon thousands of goblins back into the dark realm. Could someone have done the same thing here?"
Jure considered the question, but only for a moment. He didn't wish to seem hesitant in his assessment or appear to be withholding information.
"Is it possible? Yes. But is it probable? I don't know what to say. It would take a great deal of magic. When I did it, I had an enormous reserve of energy available to me. If that much magic came together again, I think I would have sensed it."
"Maybe you did sense it," Holli posed. "You said you felt something come from the forest, an echo of powerful magic. Maybe you did not isolate the initial spell because it was originally cast in the dark realm, but the echo might have reached you in Connel. Could it be that is what you noticed?"
Again, Jure wished to answer quickly, to aid those who looked to him for advice, but he needed to consider the memory of past magic, a tremor that was felt quite some time ago that reverberated through his own magical spells. Isolating it was difficult. It was only a pulse through time and space.
"Give me a moment," Jure requested.
The wizard looked down upon the ground as he cleared his thoughts. He focused beyond the current flow of magic and beyond the remnants of the illusions cast by the swallit. He tuned in to the trace memories woven into the land around him, the distant remains of spell fragments and the past intentions pressed into magic that could never be destroyed, only harnessed or absorbed.
Jure stepped over to the clearing near the center of the abandoned elf camp, to the exact spot where Ryson noticed the strange wind driven patterns on the ground. Jure looked about as if searching for something hidden behind some door that no one could see. He held out his hands and waved them through the air, at times fanning it back into his face.
"I'm not sure if this has anything to do with the magical pulse I noticed, but there was a portal opened here not too long ago," Jure revealed. "It was opened and closed fairly quickly."
"That supports the swallit's story," Holli noted, her expression growing darker as it matched the unease in her spirit. She might have accepted banishment for the good of the camp, but she could never completely disconnect herself from her previous life, her role as an elf guard sworn to protect the elves of Dark Spruce.
"There are traces of teleportation spells as well," Jure continued. "A massive discharge actually. Maybe that's the true echo of the disturbance I felt. I can't ignore the existence of the portal, but the vast energy dedicated to teleportation still lingers here. It was quite a release of magic and it still resonates throughout the area."
"So the swallit was telling the truth?" Ryson asked, but he already knew the answer. The elves were gone and Jure was confirming what had happened exactly as it was told to him by the dark creature.
Jure was not ready to confirm the swallit's account. He remained guarded in his inspections of the elf camp, and he continued to concentrate on the echoes of the magic. Something deep within the remnants of the spells separated the sensations of energy from the surrounding magic. Even as a distant memory, it stood out with much greater vibrancy.
Holli noticed the wizard's concern.
"You sense something else?"
Jure responded quickly to the question, offering what knowledge he could.
"Not something else, but something within the magic that was used. I don't know how to explain it, but it is very… concise. The echo of energy was not only created by its vastness, but also by its makeup. The spells themselves were clearly very potent, but the magic was not only vast, it was also extremely distinctive."
Holli's skills as a spell caster were growing, and though she could not match Jure's sensitivity to the energy, she understood the subtleties of his explanation.
"Is there anything within the magic that may reveal who, or what, is responsible?"
Jure paused, as if trying to compose his thoughts, and then spoke almost apologetically.
"I'm having a hard time connecting with the magic."
Holli did not wish to challenge the elder wizard, but the statement left her confused.
"That seems to contradict everything you have said so far."
"Not really. The shards of spent magic stand out for me, but I'm having difficulty absorbing the loose residue. Spells do more than leave an imprint in the magic, even well after they're cast. Spells shape the magic, give it purpose. When the purpose is fulfilled, the majority of the magic is freed back into the land, waiting to be reclaimed, but the energy of the actual casting-the essence that came from within the spell caster that is separate from pure magic-falls away on its own. Sometimes it will hold to a small amount of the magic. Normally when I absorb that magic, I can analyze it beyond its basic intentions and gain greater insight to the spell as well as the caster."
"You are unable to accomplish this here?"
"It won't let me, and that's what makes it so strange," Jure admitted. "Most teleportation spells leave a trail. They can be followed, sometimes even days after they are cast. There's almost always a path due to the way magic condenses the effect between time and space. It's like a lingering memory and I can almost grasp each one… almost, but even the residual traces of the spells seem to be forcefully rejecting me, as if the energy used doesn't want to be a part of me. That's why it's so distinctive. It's like it's repulsed by my presence. I can tell it's there, but it won't let me take a clean hold of it."
"What of the portal?" Holli questioned.
"The portal was large, but almost insignificant in comparison to the energy used to teleport the elves to this spot. Still, I can follow the path of the portal, for it's not just the magic that leaves the trail but the distortion created between planes of existence. It was definitely here, and it definitely led to the dark realm."
Holli accepted the information from the wizard without reluctance and began to set a new path for their investigation. Before she revealed her intentions, she requested an opinion from the delver.
"What about you, Ryson? Is there anything that concerns you about what Jure has told us?"
The delver placed everything he learned together. He considered information obtained from the goblin, Okyiq, as well as what he was told by the swallit and Jure. Most of it fit together as a series of events, but the process itself and the reasoning behind it left him confused.
"Not so much about what he told us," Ryson admitted. "There's no contradictions I can find, but I just don't understand the logic behind any of this."
"We have seen many things lately that defy logic," Holli responded.
"Can't argue with that, but there always seems to be some reasonable explanation. I guess what I'm trying to say is I don't understand why someone would abduct a camp full of elves."
"That is beyond my understanding as well," Holli revealed. "Perhaps we will understand it better when we know who is behind it."
"It has to be someone who can cast powerful spells," Ryson added. "We know that much. But even with that, things still don't make sense. Maybe Jure knows." The delver then looked to the elder wizard. "One thing that bothers me is the teleportation. Why teleport elves into a portal? I'm not an expert on magic, I admit that, but I've watched enough to get an idea of different spells. These teleportation spells basically compact space, create paths from one place to another by using magic to remove the constraints of time and distance. Right?"
"That is a very good way to put it," Jure responded.
"Then that's what has me confused. The portal was right here in the middle of the camp. Most of the elves were very near it. Using teleportation doesn't make sense to me. Why not use the magic to bind the elves and then force them into the portal? Wouldn't it be more difficult to teleport all the elves at once?"