The Adventures of Avery Dameron

This is the first complete psuedo-novel I ever wrote while in high school. I've been meaning to dust it off and rewrite it in a setting completely my own for possible publication. I am going to print it as it was written some 20+ years ago. Maybe you can give me your opinion on whether its worth the time to salvage or if I should scrap it and start over.

P.S. As I am editing this for publication here it has come to my attention that I seem to have written the Forrest Gump of Fantasy. I dont know if any of you have ever read the book Forrest Gump but I personally found it to be one of the worst books I've ever read. The film bares little resemblance to the book. I've always wondered how they were able to turn that book into an academy award winning movie but they did. So even though this isnt a great work it shows theres still hope for it.

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The Aventure's of Avery Dameron

Chapter 2
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During the first year of his training, Avery had a vivid dream of a creature of an unknown species of humanoid. The creature stood seven feet tall, with pale gray skin, and a dragon-like tail. It's body was hairless. It's enlarged head had two mouths and a single set of totally white eyes. It's ears had the look of an aquatic creature. The creature spoke with both mouths at the same time, one voice was male, the other was female. It told Avery, that one day they would meet, and that Avery was gifted with several powers that he would discover over time.

"The name Avery Dameron will be synonymous with greatness." The man/woman had said. That wasn't the only time he would have a dream like that. More would come in later years.

After that dream Avery began developing a few mental powers. One was the ability to talk to people mentally, and with this power he didn't need to speak the other person's or creature's language. He found out through trial and error that even though distance made it harder to do, there seemed no distance too great to contact another's mind to speak.

He used this power to make friends with the creatures in the underground world around the city that would have normally been his enemies. One of which was a mature adult deep dragon, that he named, Z'ress, which meant, "power" in drow. They became constant companions. Z'ress could change into a drow so he could enter the city without suspicion.

Another power, was the ability to probe another's mind for any information he desired. He found out that through trial and error he had to be no farther from the person than two yards. He used this power to find out everything about his teachers, and to discover that Chalithra, was secretly being taught to be a priestess of Lloth, with hopes of over throwing their mother and taking over the city.

That is how he found out, that Sho, was also a master of a secret art known as ninjitsu. After he confronted Sho with the knowledge, he agreed to teach Avery in return for his silence. From that day on, Sho secretly taught the Avery to be a ninja. He also taught me to be a Master Bladesmith.

Avery never used his powers on Dirk or Jakkar. He believed that there was nothing that they were hiding like Sho was. From them he learned to be a bard and continued to train as a warrior. Avery combined, what he considered the best of everything he was taught.

Avery had gained the respect of Dirk. Jakkar on the other hand considered him a good friend, as Avery did him. But with Sho it was different, they had more of a father/son relationship. Sho taught him honor, and that his knowledge of the secret arts were never to be used openly, and never for evil purposes. He taught him how to make all the weapons and other necessities to complete any mission that he took.

One day when Avery was eight, while exploring the Underdark with Z'ress, a patch of ground gave out under Avery. He fell down a tunnel to another cave, that held what looked like centuries worth of non-magical relics, all laying under the skeleton of an enormous dragon. Z'ress said, that it was possibly the lost horde of Ktarr the Great, a legendary deep dragon that once roamed the surface world. He was last seen over three millennium, and everything that he had gathered was lost when he disappeared. It was said that, the deep dragon that finds the hidden horde would become the king or queen of the deep dragons. In the corner of the cave, laid a long, clear rectangular box, that held two men in it. Both Avery and Z'ress tried to open the box, but nothing worked. After a while Z'ress gave up and started looking over some of the books that laid in another corner of the room.

After several hours of going through tomes, he came acrossed a large tome. At first he thought might be the Codex of the Infinite Planes, one of the few existing artifacts left on Malinta. But once he opened it, he discovered that it was a journal that belonged to Ktarr, it told about when the gods chose to take magic away from Malinta to punish the inhabitants of the world. It spoke of his two friends who like him would die if they had to go without magic. So he prayed to Nom, one of the supreme gods and asked for his spell to work through the impending demise of mortal magic, in return he offered himself in trade. In the back of the book, he found the spell, that Ktarr created, based on a human spell, that puts creatures into suspended animation. At the end of the page was a single word with a note next to it. The note read: **Saaruuka** (This is the reverse of the above spell. It will release my friends from their eternal sleep. But it will only work for someone who uses magic.)

Z'ress stood with the tome in his hands and spoke the magic word. The people in the box glowed so brightly that they illuminated the entire cave. When the glow ceased the two men stood where the box laid. The man in the brown robes raised his hands and in an instant the entire room was lit. The two men looked at both Avery and Z'ress, then they turned to Z'ress. The younger man, who was in his mid thirties, and had strange adamantite eyes, spoke.

"Thou are a deep dragon, are thee not?" He look intently at Z'ress. "Did ye know Ktarr?"

As the man spoke, Avery suddenly saw a ghostly dragon looming above the man, when he turned to Z'ress he noticed, that he also had a ghostly dragon looming above him. He noticed that the two dragons were different. He took it as another of the powers that the dream man spoke of years ago.

"Thou are very perceptive, but no, he died long before I was born. In fact he disappeared over three millennium. Who are thee?

"I am Alexander, and I am also a dragon, but of a different species." He pointed to his companion. "This is Nosrevi Ransonver. He is a human magic user. How long before the gods allowed magic to return?"

"About four centuries after they took it away. But, by three centuries after it was taken away, several generations had been born with out it, and those who had known of it first hand died suddenly. That left one century of total lack of magic. After that out of no where came several magic users and then those who had before been born with magical power, had offspring that again had those powers."

The men talked for many hours. Nosrevi told Avery that when ever he needed him in the future, he would be there. Avery invited them to return to the city with him and teach him to use magic.

Over the years Avery with the help of Alexander and Z'ress, Avery secretly acquired spells that no humanoid had ever been able to use. Nosrevi cast a spell on Avery that gave him the strength of a storm giant, then he made it permanent. Once he started to learn about magic he found that he also had spell like powers. He had the ability at will, to read any magical inscriptions. Another is the ability to not only be able to tell everything about a magical item as far as it's powers but also the history of it and it's owners. His spell like powers were never wrong but they were at times unconclusive.

Fifteen years had past since that fateful night between Chalithra and Avery. Chalithra and Avery hadn't spoke in all that time. Avery dove fully into his lessons, a way of life, that he would follow all of his life.

Today was Avery's final day in Eryndlyn, and so his mother wanted to see him perform an expedition of his combat skills. Everyone gathered to see him put on his expedition. Several of the guards were picked to compete against him. Avery entered the courtyard wearing all black except for a white vest and a white sash around his waist.

His medium length crimson hair stood out against his outfit. Avery carried a bundle, which he brought over to a table that held the other weapons he had been openly train with. He unwrapped the bundle and pulled out the Katana that he had made under Sho's supervision, a weapon of supreme excellence. Avery turned, and bowed to Sho, he then turned again, and walked to the center of the courtyard. Three warriors walked out to meet him.

The warriors surrounded him, one faced him while the other two stood behind him. They made an inverted Y formation. Avery smiled. He took two steps forward and did a flip over the one in front if him. When he landed, he pivoted, and kicked the warrior in the back before he could turn around. The kick sent the warrior toward the other two. That set the pace for the rest of the combat. After he took out two of the warriors, by way of knocking them out, Avery allowed himself to be disarmed. He then quickly finished off the last warrior using the martial arts that Sho had taught him. Avery always believed that a subdued opponent was a possible ally, where as a dead one was useless.

After the physical combat, Avery showed his skill with the composite long bow, and then, they passed around a set of chain mail, and some of the swords that Avery had made. One of the swords was the katana that he had used in the expedition.

After everything was done Avery's friends threw him a surprise "going away" party. All of his friends wished him well and all of them including Valas and Z'ress offered to go with him, which readily accepted.

The next morning Avery went to Malice and his mother and told them of Chalithra's plot and to be careful. Afterwards Malice and Avery met Avery's friends in the palace courtyard. She said goodbye to Jakkar, who wanted to see his family.

As everyone was saying goodbye to Malice, Avery noticed Chalithra watching them from her bed room window. Avery spoke to her in his mind.

I know everything about you. I know what you are planning, and I have already stopped you. If you ever hurt mother or Malice, I will make you beg to die.

Avery immediately cut off his link, not giving her a chance to respond. He then said farewell to Malice, and they left.
With Z'ress as a guide they traveled on foot, through the labyrinth of tunnels to the surface. Thanks to Z'ress and Alexander their voyage was totally uneventful.

After they reached just below the surface, Z'ress said his farewell and returned to his underground kingdom. That night, they came out to the surface, they made sure that no one saw them leave. Then they traveled northeast to the town of Vallar, there they bought horses and then travel along the main roads to the city of Shadow Gate. It was there that Jakkar said farewell and traveled west to his home town.

Shadow Gate was a small providence that was ruled by Emperor Jeremiah Blaid. It was Emperor Blaid who shaped an Empire that was made up of eight countries, each of which had it's own type of ruling body. Each ruling body had absolute rule in their country. All but one country had a solid ruling body. The one that they had traveled through's ruling body was currently falling apart.

It was only five minutes after they arrived in Shadow Gate, that they found out all about it from some of the more friendlier citizen's.

The first day that they were there, Avery found a sage school that was looking for both students and teachers. Avery brought the news back to his friends. Neither Sho or Dirk were interested, but Nosrevi and Alexander took it as a chance for a new experience. Dirk chose to head south and adventure more, and Sho chose to go back to his village to finish out his remaining years in peace and anonymity.

Before saying farewell Sho gave Avery his katana, which was an intelligent magical item. It spoke many languages, two of which were common and elven. Using elven it told Avery that it's name was Sara. Sho also gave him the ninja-to that had been in his family for over two millennium. Sho had decided that since his only child had died years ago, Avery should have it as his adopted son.

Avery, Alexander, and Nosrevi, spent the next twenty years at the sage school. For the first ten years, Avery learned about the arts & music, legend & lore, languages, and the psychology of the humans in the Blaid Empire. The second ten years Avery learned about the Outer Planes, Medicine, Magic, Astrology & Numerology, and Heraldry, Signs & Sigils.