Free Messenger of the Dark Prophet (The Bowl of Souls: Book Two) by Trevor H. Cooley Page A

a door in the back of the hall decked out in a splendid robe colored in each of the elements. Every week the hall grew silent until he raised his staff in the air and proclaimed, “Let the tournament begin!” With a flash, the room would blaze with light and the games began.
     
    To the casual observer, the Hall of Elements would be a chaotic mix of light and sound, but everything was well organized. There were six players at every table and the three with the most points at the end of the game would pass on to the next round. This process continued throughout the night until there were only six players left. The winner of that last game received a free day with no classes and a trophy. The free day was nice, but every player coveted the trophies.
     
    The point totals for the students were posted on the wall outside of the Hall of Elements the next morning and were added up throughout the year. At the end of the year, the student with the highest amount of points received the Grand Trophy, a highly prized possession for any wizard.
     
    It took a lot of coaxing, but after the first couple of weeks Qyxal was able to get Justan to take part in the fun. Even though Justan had started out looking at the card-playing students with scorn, he found himself thoroughly enjoying the game. It was full of complex strategy and the random nature of the game made it a new experience every time.
     
    It didn’t take long before he realized that he had a knack for it. Justan was able to look at the people around the table and tell how good their hand was by their facial expressions and physical stance. Justan found that if he added up all of the information he accumulated from around the table, he could look at his own hand and make a good decision as to how many tricks he could take.
     
    In his first tournament, he made it to the third round. In his second, he made it to the semifinals. Soon, he had almost mastered the game and made it to the final match two weeks in a row.
     
    As the newness of the game of Elements wore off, Justan began to look past the simple joy of playing and pondered the things that Qyxal had hinted at when he first taught him how to play. There was supposed to be something more to the game beyond simple luck and strategy.
     
    The week before the new cadets arrived, Justan won his first tournament.
     
    It was the final tournament of the year and just before he received his trophy, the winner of the big year-end prize was announced. Justan watched a mage named Alurik take home the big prize. He grew determined that the Grand Trophy would be his the next year.
     
    After Justan claimed his prize, Master Latva took him aside and requested that he take his free day on the day that the new cadets came in. It was the last real day of the school year and the wizards that would normally be tutoring him would have enough things to do while preparing for the new students anyway. Justan agreed. That day was as good as any, especially if he wasn’t going to miss anything important.
     
    He received congratulations and a pat on the back from just about every student in the school and he walked back to his dormitory room with a smile. Halfway there, he stopped and looked down, realizing that he was clutching the trophy to his chest like a prized possession.
     
    Justan laughed out loud at himself, surprising the other students who were walking by on the way to their rooms. Somehow he was getting sucked in to the whole Mage School atmosphere. It had come to a point lately where he had to force himself to run and practice in the morning. Justan was looking forward to every class and didn’t want to go to bed at night because every hour that he was asleep was time wasted. A couple of days prior, he had even considered leaving the Jharro Bow in his room just because it seemed to get in the way when he was studying.
     
    How had his priorities become so askew? He wasn’t a true Mage School student, he was a warrior. He needed