| |
“Orthimin!”
Rui’s screech halted the shadow, and it moved about in a confused state, until it remembered who it had come for.
Leave the elf, she is a traitor, and you may feed on her Light if you wish, but bring the girls to me. The Lady’s instructions were clear, short, and to the point, as all instructions given by her were. Though it did look forward to feeding on that Light. It hadn’t had any for a while. Time had really no effect on it because it did not know age, though it had hunger for Light. Always Light, there was always time for Light. It was like a shadow come to life, feeding, and blocking Light, but never satisfied, because it always grew dark again.
The Orthimin, the Shadow in Elvanueto, resumed the quest. The small being, she was brimming with Light. The Orthimin was almost driven crazy by the sight, but it knew that duty came first.
It gave off a chilling shriek, and headed straight for Karen, who was frozen in place by the shriek. The shriek had bound her with chills, and she couldn’t move. She could only watch helplessly with eyes full of fright.
Something inside her rebelled. She would not be destroyed by this…thing. She would resist and stand strong. With tremendous effort, she tried reached for her magic. She scrabbled around her mind, despairing to find only thoughts and memories. The orthimin was coming closer, mere yards away.
The others were also bound in place by the shriek. It was as if the shriek had turned into a living creature and bound them with chains. It tore down their throats and took away their voices.
Suddenly, a light burst out of Karen, engulfing her, unbidden, and she was surprised, strengthening the light, shaping it thin and straight. A white arrow swiftly buried itself inside the orthimin, giving it a burst of wind, rearranging its innards, whatever they were. It screeched with pain and fury, breaking the spell of the bone-chilling shriek on the other girls. Amber yelled her fury at her friend being attacked with her newfound voice, and unintentionally sent an aqua-colored shock wave, accidentally hitting Karen with it. She glowed with a deep azure. The shock wave also crashed into the orthimin, slicing it cleanly in half. Karen’s ball protected her from the worst part of the wave, but it was enough to knock her unconscious. Karen’s ball started to fade, but Rui was able to place another ball around her body. The orthimin’s two halves scurried about, trying to find one another, as Jenna powered up. She yelled as she shone like a living fire, before it settled down. Jenna found herself with a sword in one hand, a sword that was ruby red, and glowing as though it was just out of the forge. She felt her power rushing through her veins, and grinned wolfishly and almost let out a hysterical laugh. Her power, though she knew it would burn anyone else, gave her nothing more than a slight tickling feeling, whereas if anyone else had it, they would have burned from the inside out. She swung her sword, towards one half of the orthimin, and a colossal wave of fire, twice as tall as Jenna herself, and four times as long, came to meet, and burn that half of the orthimin, which screeched, then disappeared. It’s other half went berserk, and sent out its own wave of glittering, black light. The fire wave was much bigger than Jenna intended, and she tried to take some of it back, but she couldn’t, nor could she change its course. It was all she could do to actually sustain it as it crashed into the orthimin’s wave. The shock of the impact was as if Jenna herself had taken the wave of darkness upon herself, and she screamed with pain. Rui was busy placing reinforcements on Karen and Amber, and sent her own magic to attack the orthimin, but she still threw another wave her magic to save Jenna. She let the strength of her wave flow into Jenna, but she was almost fainting with the effort of trying to maintain four spells at once. Jenna received the magic, as well as Amber’s, who could not bear the scream of pain her twin had given. Amber sent a streak of aqua to Jenna, and it was all Jenna could do to absorb both Rui’s magic and Amber’s at the same time. She poured the strength into the wave, and it was enough to sustain it for another minute, before she fainted with exhaustion. Amber swayed, and she didn’t faint, but Rui almost did, and Karen was recovering, as was Jenna.
Rui was panting, and staring at the girls. Karen was dressed in, not her pajamas, but a white tunic with swirling golden embroidery, and tan breeches. She wore a brown belt with a golden buckle, and she wore a white bow, unstrung, but with a beautiful design carved into it. The bow design was the same as the tunic, and was real gold. She also wore an empty quiver of high quality. It was large enough to carry arrows as long as Karen’s arm, and could hold roughly fifteen to twenty arrows. A sort of tiara was sitting in her curls, which were no longer dirty blonde, but a deep shade of yellow. The tiara did not completely circle her head, but came to a rest in the middle of her forehead, the two ends gracefully curved around a white mark that was the shape of a many pointed star with a spiral in its center. The star was also hanging off of a gold necklace, and small studs in her ears. Her eyes had turned clear grey with a silvery sheen. There was a sheathed sword at her left side, the same clear grey as her eyes, with the same silvery sheen. There was a large gem that may have passed as a diamond on the hilt. She wore soft, white, leather shoes that laced up from her big toes to her ankles.
Amber wore deep blue shorts that stopped, and wrapped themselves like breeches, around her knees, and light, aqua-colored, knee high boots. She also wore a shirt that was similar to a tunic, but less full, but had the same golden design as Karen had. She had an identical sword, bow, and quiver, but they were blue, and the sword’s gem could have passed off as a large sapphire. The design on them all though, was golden, just like Karen’s. She wore blue earbobs in the shape of teardrops, and an identical necklace that hung on a fine, golden chain. Her green eyes had turned to a light shade of blue, though her chocolate hair was the same. She wore a similar tiara like Karen’s, but it was azure, and at the ends, they curved like an ocean wave. They seemed move just like a wave, and land on the teardrop symbol that had appeared in the center of her forehead.
Jenna wore similar breeches like Karen and Amber, but they were a bright orange, and seemed to almost glow against the black night of space, and they reached down to her ankles. She wore a scarlet tunic which had the same golden embroidery, and laced with a golden twist at the top, and five small flames dangling off of a chain-link bracelet. She wore a ring on her left hand that seemed to be made from fire, and a necklace very similar to the other two, but with a single flame on it; the same shape a candle gave off. She had no earrings. Her tiara was identical to the ones that Karen and Amber had, but it was red, and the ends looked like flames that were licking at the symbol in her forehead. It was just like the one that she wore around her neck. A large gem that could have been a ruby was in the hilt of her sword, and she also had a bow and an empty quiver. Her reddish hair had turned to a rather dark, even shade of maroon, and her eyes were still chocolate.
But the most obvious change in all of them was just them. Their air was different, more proud, and sure of themselves. The kind, sweet, and perfectly regular trio was gone. Now they were the girls were warriors, and seemed ready to take on everything.
~*~
But Rui knew that it would be a while before the girls were ready to take on anything. They could barely take on themselves, as they had just demonstrated. Amber couldn’t control that shock wave that she sent out; not its’ power, or when she wanted it to come out. Karen couldn’t access her magic or send it out at will. Jenna was almost half-dead after expanding so much energy into just one wave, no matter how large it was. Rui sighed. All three of the girls needed to learn how to control their power, how to harness it, and bend it to their will. As of now, they could barely control their magic, and needed to learn how to control their emotions. Emotion was the base for magic, so if they could learn to get a firm harness on their emotions, then they would have an equally strong harness on their magic, but then they would have to acquire a strong discipline that would not be easy to attain. Another problem was just their sheer power. It was very strong, and if it got out of control, they could destroy themselves, and the Elements were always unpredictable. No one before actually could control fire without a lot of safety precautions, or hold a tornado in their palm and bend it to their will, or be able to summon and control a tsunami with a single thought. That was exactly what her friends had to do though. Rui sighed again. They really had their work cut out for them.
There was considerable confusion that had settled in. Karen was just blankly confused, while Amber kept whirling her head to look at Jenna and Karen in turn, and Jenna was on the edge of hysteria, giggling while a thin film of tears was slowly thickening in her eyes.
“What…what just went on here?” asked Amber.
Jenna let out another hysterical giggle, before calming herself.
Karen was blankly staring at the sword in her buckle.
Rui sighed again.
They all lifted their heads and looked at her, questioning looks, except for Karen, who just fixed Rui with a blank look.
Rui said in a resigned voice, “We can’t talk here, not in the middle of space. Let’s go to my world.”
With those few and simple words, the girls realized exactly how much their lives had changed. They had no more place that was home. There was nowhere to call home, and no one to call family besides themselves. They didn’t even have a home on the planet they loved. Their planet was molten balls of rock floating somewhere out there, in the dark, empty, unforgiving nothingness of space.
But it’s not really nothing,, Amber realized. Maybe space itself, this abyss, is dotted with millions of worlds, billions of more lives. Maybe there’s a planet that’s just like Earth somewhere out there. A world that has cats and dogs and trees and rainforests, and everything Earth had... Then the reason why she was thinking this struck her. I want a place to call home again. I want to go home. I want Mom, even if she did get drunk, and Dad, even though he LET Mom get drunk. I want someone, like Mom or Dad to hold me tight and tell me that this is all just a dream. I want my cow-face-pillow that Jenna won for me at the fair last year. Then an iron thought struck her. But no matter where I go, I won’t ever find those things again. There’s no more family, except me and the others, and if there are others out there, they won’t be the same. It just wouldn’t be home. Oh sure, maybe when I die one day, but no matter where I go in the world…the universe I mean, nothing will ever be the same ever again.
|
Help Us Stop Plagiarism -
Nearly all works at PnP are original. However a few people choose to plagiarize.
To check, choose a phrase from the work, then either drag and drop to the search box or copy and paste.
click on search and works at Google will be shown which match. Just to be sure, please do this before
you recommend or rate the work highly...
|
 |
|
|
|
Select a Random Book
|
|
Welcome !
