Chapter 81 – Hair-raising and Bloodcurdling Places(2)

Back to their pre-shrinking size, Elizabeth, Alexander and Johnny strolled through the crypt, past the eternal resting places of the first wizards. That crypt was built on several levels, being joined together by quite narrow stairs, following a spiral pattern.
At the lowest levels were the graves of the oldest wizards ... the pioneers of human witchcraft.
Through the dim light in those corridors leading to the rooms that housed the remnants of the wizards, the same little shadows could be seen climbing down those rows of steps.
'I'm scared," the girl said.
"Stay calm, I take care of you," Johnny whispered in a voice broken by the fear that came over him because of the journey among the lifeless.
They stopped again, as they heard several heavy steps, specific to the guards of the school rooms, those rock elves.
The heavy footsteps' sound slowly faded away, so the three children continued on their way.
After other two levels towards the heart of the Earth they stopped, as the steps led up to a wall.
"I think the Lost Lane is behind this wall," Alexander said, holding a candle in his hand. 'We just have to go to the other side. But how ...?"
Alexander looked at the other two to see if any of them had an idea.
'I saw in those books, more suppositions about this lost corridor design. Ideas wrote down about how the tunnel under the castle could be built. I guess we could get inspired from these notes and ..."
The girl stopped, because Alexander's gaze was like "do you know what you're saying?"
'That's what I read in books," she continued. 'And by translocation we could get right there."
'Didn't you say there are too many versions when it comes to the place where we can get? We could get to a place where there isn't enough space, there is no air ... and we'll be lost forever. Dead for good."
As Elizabeth's idea didn't turn out to be good, Alexander looked very briefly at Johnny. But, the best idea Johnny could have at that time was to open his mouth bored and tired and say nothing.
"Yes, I expected something like that," said the other boy. 'You're lucky with me," he said, proudly. 'Follow me ..."
What to follow, where to go? Elizabeth and Johnny looked at each other in confusion, but in a moment everything got clear. The wall as thick as the three of them altogether opened.
Alexander grabbed a bar that a long time ago was probably used as a torch holder and a hellish noise was heard as the wall moved out of the way.
The three listened for a few moments, as they thought the loud noise might disturb someone. But as nothing happened, Alexander started to move forward lighting the path with a candle, followed by the other two. They entered a corridor, took a few steps and stopped in front of another obstacle. It was a ... mirror.
'Why is this mirror in this basement?" Alexander said, annoyed. 'I haven't read anywhere about a mirror here ... And why is it here? Sure it's a spell, a magic mirror, but how could we activate it?"
Alexander began to inspect that wall that exactly reflected their image and which was huge, joining the ceiling to the floor and the wall on the left to the wall on the right. He wanted to say something, but a frightening noise stopped him.
Johnny, the genius, took a stone and threw it with full force at that mirror, so that it cracked from top to bottom, making a hellish noise as if the windows of a skyscraper went boom at the same time.
In the blink of an eye, all cracks disappeared suddenly, being absorbed by that mirror, which later became a living mirror. Its surface acted like a lake after a stone was thrown into it.
Alexander stretched a finger onto that surface that started moving when touched. It looked like a shivering puddle with the reflection of the children in it.
A creature's face and body came out of that mirror. It was a creature with the face of a beautiful woman, a lovely fairy with long wavy hair. The only difference from the fairies we were used to was that this woman had huge eagle wings. Her body from the neck down resembled that of a lion, including the creature's "hands" ended with retractile claws like cat's.
'WHO DARES GO PAST THIS GATE?!" the lion-woman asked in a thunderous voice.
But when she saw the children, she smiled, sly.
'What are you?" Elizabeth asked stunned at that glamorous creature, whose body from the waist down was submerged in that trembling mirror.
'I'm a sphinx ..." the lion-woman smiled in a way that didn't foresee anything good.
'I thought sphinxes lived only in Egypt, only by the pyramids," Johnny said without being frightened at the sight of that beast so beautiful.
But what he found out changed his mind.
'The Sphinx's role is not to let anyone go into magnificent fortresses, mysterious pyramids or to pass through magic gates and doors ... Anyone who tries this, has only a chance not to become ... food. So your chance is to answer the question:
‘I have a house. When you enter it, you are blind, but when you go out of it, you can see. What is it?'"
She roared like a lion. Her beautiful hair turned into sharp, long swords that almost touched the three children, ready to tear them apart in a single movement of the creature's head. And the beautiful mouth became huge, full of tyrannosaurus rex kind of teeth.
Alexander relived significant moments of his life, while Elizabeth thought she had such a nice life at the Elmbridge Magic School ... but so short.
'The school", Johnny said.
The other two kids looked at Johnny with a "you killed us" gaze, then the Sphinx started laughing. Her body grew longer and longer getting out of that mirror, approaching the three kids to blow them to pieces for the courage to face her.
It's just something that nobody expected happened... except Johnny who was calm.
Before Alexander looked into the Sphinx's eyes, which would normally meant thousands of swords feeling through his body, the ferocious monster became that beautiful, sweet lion-woman, with a roar able to wake up the dead in the crypt.
'How did you know?" the Sphinx screamed, angry.
The creature headed towards Johnny hatefully, but when she was at a few steps distance from him, the mirror fell apart in front of the children, turning into sand, without doing any harm to the children.
'ARE YOU CRAZY?! You could kill us!" Alexander had to let go the fear in him.
He looked at Johnny angrily, gasping for breath, then continued, calmer:
'How did you know?" Alexander asked in awe.
'Dad kept telling me all the time that I'm a blind man. I know nothing. And that only school can make me open my eyes ... so ..."
'Anyway, you shouldn't have answered that way. You had to talk with us first ... you could kill us if you made a mistake," Prince Soimesti scolded him, instead of congratulating him as anyone else would do, for saving their lives.
Johnny winced as he knew Alexander had to do it too. Still, unlike Elizabeth, because the girl hugged the young boy so tight almost tearing him apart, as if she wanted to do what the Sphinx failed. But at least a handshake or a 'Well done, Johnny". Yet, he was pleased with Alexander's reply, because Johnny knew Alexander couldn't do more than that.
'You still can't see well," Alexander tried to joke, but it was obvious he was happy and they were very lucky Johnny had come with them.
The children went on. The three kids felt a cold and strong air stream, carrying moisture as if it were a sea breeze beneath the earth, when they turned away from the mirror-sphinx. Besides, something was very foul-smelling there. Two silhouettes, looking like ghosts popped up instantly. They stared for a few moments at the children, which meant they were not used to being visited by people, then they disappeared through the walls of the lane.
'Have you seen?" Elizabeth asked, more amazed than scared. She saw so much weird stuff since she came to Elmbridge School of Magic, that few things might seem impossible to her.
'It was cold enough anyway. These ghosts came to freeze my blood even more."
'Come on, stop whining. There was a time when ghosts roamed the castle. And it was natural then. Dad says something like this will happen again ..."
"I hope not," Johnny shivered, obviously unhappy about this idea.
The children kept moving, looking for directions to tell them how to get where they needed to be, looking chaotically at the walls of that corridor, as if they should see a sign saying "go there to find dry poplar root sprouts". Nothing ... just a corridor with stone vaults here and there and in many others there were large piles of stones that made those vaults, so in some areas the corridor was about to collapse completely or that really happened.
Holding a burning torch, Alexander led the way in that lost passage. The further he went, the more he noticed the air was getting thinner, as the flame of the candle was getting smaller and smaller.
"The air is getting harder to breathe," the boy said. 'Let's look for another way."
Elizabeth understood what this meant, as for Johnny, his face looked as if he needed explanation.
So Johnny was helped by a hard sleeve pull to take another route and follow the other two.
Noises that only in the depths of the Earth could be heard, scared the three kids. And that awful feeling that anyone would have thinking that mountains could collapse over them at any moment, gave them even more thrills. As for the air ... every breath of them was a real struggle.