Overcooked Duck

Greetings one and all,

Here I am writing again. I’m not sure who is reading this, but I hope it makes sense and that you like it. It’s been a rather difficult month around here. There are Sentries everywhere since the Warlock’s Plague – something the Guardian insisted upon. The Sentries are guards from the Southland cities, like Everstay. Most of them don’t like the orphans, especially Sentinel. He’s the worst! They examine our belongings and check our rooms looking for anything suspicious. The Guardian says it’s for our own safety and protection, but I don’t like it. And neither do the rest of the orphans. I don’t see them checking the rooms of the royals like this!

Speaking of which, I had a talk with Dyllin and Halriette the other day while I was cleaning their rooms. I found out that Festrel isn’t my only cousin. He has a sister who is my age. Her name is Siturna, and apparently she might come to Darklyn Moat shortly. Great. Wonderful. I think we’ll be keeping a close eye on her.

I got a letter from Aunt Patrice yesterday. She is doing well, but apparently there was an attack on the Tower of Celest in the middle of the night. She suspects they were looking for something. She indicated that she might come and visit some time soon. Her cat, Pringles, has been acting a little strange lately - especially around Kelvin. And he’s been acting weird around Treena, like he doesn’t trust her or something.

I had a few lessons in sword-fighting a week ago. It was awesome! Master Gregorian said I’m a natural. And Yssi was really impressive with the halberd – it’s like an axe. Even with one hand, she was amazing to watch. Of course Treena and Shivaughn were not very good at all with the weapons, but they’re quite good in magic. Wish I could say the same. The drawbridge was up yesterday and seemed stuck. None of the orphans could get out of Darklyn Moat to go back to their rooms, so I tried an incantation with the dragon rod. It went something like this:

Drawbridge before me, drop to my feet,
Before I burn you, like a piece of raw meat.

If you guessed that it didn’t go well, you’d be right. Fire flooded out of the rod, spiraled above the castle and flew straight into the kitchen. Orlanda Kennelworth suffered a few minor burns and let’s just say that dinner last night was a little overcooked. Okay, it wasn’t just a little overcooked, … it was burnt to a crisp!

I got stuck with extra chores for that. I have to clean up the kitchens for the next week and put ointment on Mistress Kennelworth’s feet. Ugh. I think she has warts.
Shivaughn and Treena say that I should be more careful when commanding fire. They’re going to spend more time working on my spell-casting. To start, they got me a few books on poetry.
Well, off to more chores now.

Bye for now!

Rudy Doyle

P.S. Shivaughn says to say hello. She has no idea where this is going, or who is reading it, but she wanted to send her greetings anyway.