I jolted awake just as a migraine hit me, signalling a vision. Clutching my forehead, my vision went black, and pictures formed in my mind, until I could see the message clearly.
“Let me go, they’ll find you and they will make you suffer!” I promised.
“You’re a fiery little pixie, aren’t you?” Colonel Delano mused.
“Fiery and little, huh? I’ll show you little!”
My eyes turning grey. Colonel Delano screamed in pain as he fell into pieces as if being chopped up by invisible blades, blood puddled on the floor as the pieces fell, making a sick thud sound.
I looked around the room. Spirits of tortured creatures were everywhere, missing limbs and bloody. Smirking at the ripped apart colonel Delano, I had never been afraid of spirits before, but these were terrifying. I looked around for Ela and Karm, but did not see them. I was completely alone.
My vision slowly returning to normal, my migraine eased as sweat dripped down my brow and the colonel's scream echoing in the back of my mind. I shivered at the gory scene my abilities had showed me.
My element is Spirit and one of the first abilities I discovered was the ability to read the fates of the people around me, grasping the silver thread of life that clung to everyone of us and read it like a book. Because the ability was so vivid and clear every time fate showed me glimpses of the future, the migraines I suffered lingered longer, as well as losing my vision. As you can imagine, in a fight, not being able to see can be quite debilitating. Luckily, my visions are spaced out and I maybe get one a year, but unfortunately I had no control over when they would come.
My sister Huricana could foretell the future as well, but less clearly. Her element being air. She could hear messages from the wind, but they usually came as riddles and puzzles that most of the time would be solved too late. We were getting better at deciphering them, so hopefully in the future these foretelling will be usable.
Our abilities had a price whereas I would suffer from migraines and loss of vision at inopportune times, Huricana’s mind was becoming more and more jumbled turning more to riddles like the wind she listened to, this side effect would eventually fade, but like my loss of vision the time frame increased with the frequency of the visions. I guess that was the toll (as heavy as it may be) of being able to foretell the future.
My vision returned. Although still blurry, I checked on my sisters. They were all still fast asleep. I exited the cave, careful to check and make sure no one was around, and headed to the nearby creek. My sister chose our hideout well.
Kneeling at the water's edge, I scooped water with my hands and splashed my face, washing the tiredness away and enjoying the cool water hitting my aching head. As soon as everyone was awake, we would need to keep moving. It will only be a matter of time before the Goblins find us. Drying my face on my sleeve, I stood and headed back to the cave.
I paused and looked at my surroundings. The area was deadly quiet. No birds sang and the scurrying of animals in the forest seemed to cease as well. Gia must be up, I concluded. Animals reacted strangely to her.
I Pulled the vines aside, my suspicion was right: Gia was awake, and she appeared to be in a mood.
“Where were you?” She demanded.
“I went to the creek for a minute. Why? "
“I had a feeling something was wrong, and I woke up and you weren’t here.” She accused, “I thought something happened while I was asleep.” She finished as she looked over at me, scanning for injuries.
Rolling my eyes, I replied, “I’m the oldest. Leave the worries to me. Nothing happened, although I did have a vision.”
“What was it about?” she ordered; her red brows furrowed in worry. “You know they are never wrong.”
Ela appeared with a worried look on her face, I turned to face her, “what’s wrong?”
“The Goblin Army is back tracking and heading here, you need to leave.”
“How long?”
“I’m not sure, maybe an hour, if not a little more.”
“Thank you, Ela.”
She nodded and disappeared.
“I don’t want to discuss this right now; can we just wake them and leave? Like now.” I gestured to our slumbering sisters.
Gia’s honey brown eyes swirled and changed to emerald green, a sign that her power was slipping. It happens a lot when she’s frustrated.
Her long red hair falling in curls to her waist, the green of her peasant dress making her eyes stand out sharply. Taking deep breaths, she gained her composure, her eyes returning to their honey brown color. Like all pixies, she had wing tattoos on her back; hers were vivid, shades of greens, pinks and browns, the colours of the earth element she controlled.
“Well, obviously it hasn’t come true yet and we have time to prevent it from happening if we get out of here now.”
“If you don’t tell me, I can’t help prevent it.” She countered.
“We… need… to… go!” I emphasized, annoyed, the longer we remained immobile, the faster they would find us.
“Guys, we need to go. Get up!” she yelled as she narrowed her eyes at me angrily, while causing an earthquake that scared our sisters awake.
“What the hell was that for?” Ari yelled, shooting to her feet, eyes turning orange as flames shot from her palms at Sunama, who half asleep doused the flames with water like she’s done a thousand times before.
“Watch where you are aiming.” Sunama yawned as she stretched her arms above her head. “Every morning you try to set something on fire.”
“Huricana, can you dry our clothes… again?” Gia asked, annoyed.
“Sure, I do every morning anyway.” She laughed as she cracked her knuckles in preparation.
Ari grumbled, sitting on the floor, trying to go back to sleep. Huricana’s eyes turned white as the wind picked up inside the cave, drying everything and everyone, as well as forcing Ari to stand up.
I watched the scene play out; every morning was the same. You’d think that recent events would have changed them, but they were still the same. I smiled to myself.
“Guys, come on. Akasha had a vision. We need to leave. Now!” Gia stated sternly.
None of my sisters would pack up to leave until I told them about my vision. Bloody manipulators, so after a lot of arguing, I caved and shared what I had seen with them. They sat speechless after I finished explaining.
“Are you sure that it was a vision? You do not have that ability.” Sunama pointed out.
“The pounding in my head says it is.” I answered as I rubbed my temples, then added, “I don’t think it was just me, I think I was controlling the spirits or giving them the ability to go into corporeal form.”
“Scary.” Sunama mumbled.
“You haven’t left yet?” Ela appeared and scolded me with Karm right behind her.”
“No, my sisters wouldn’t listen until I told them my vision.” I told her.
“Oh, a vision do tell.” Karm stated, sitting on the ground. Ela slapped him.
“We don’t have time right now, geez,”
“What are you talking to the spirits about?” Gia asked, curious, only hearing my answers to them.
"Can we finish talking about this later? We really needed to be going." I told everyone.
They nodded and gathered the few belongings we saved and headed out into the forest.
We led the Goblin army away from their target as planned. It also took a lot longer for us to lose them. Their tracking abilities were uncanny, at least they fell for our trick. By morning, we were finally able to lose them and circle back to where we had left the targets. Ezryn knelt beside the tracks we had found and studied them; "it looks like they are heading this way." He deduced as he pointed upstream. Nodding, Mohan and I followed as he led the way. Eventually, the tracks led to the river. “What now?” Mohan asked, slightly annoyed. “We can assume they went upriver and look at the banks and travel upriver as well, and hope we find their trail again.” I suggested. “If that doesn’t work, we can always come back here and do the same the opposite way.” Ezryn shared. “Okay, it’s settled.” Mohan agreed. We headed upriver scanning the banks for tracks. A few miles up, we found what we were looking for. Heading in that direction, we zigzagged back and forth through the forest, ha
The chill of the morning dissipated as the sun reached its zenith. We had been walking for around two hours when Ari broke the silence that enveloped us. “Do we even have a plan? Where are we going?” Ari snapped, annoyed. “Simple, we are going in… this direction.” Huricana laughed, pointing in front of us. “I’m more concerned about putting distance between us and the big green if you know what I mean.” Sunama whispered, worried. “They could be right behind us.” “Big green?” Huricana spat with laughter. “We should head toward one of our allies. We need an army if we are going to stop the Goblins.” I suggested casually. “An army?" Ari stared blankly, "What do we waltz up to an allied king and say?" Making her voice high pitched and whiny she said, "Please king sir, give my sisters and me control of your army so we can fight the nasty goblins and fulfill the prophecy." Her voice returning to normal, she glared. "They’ll laugh in our faces and lock us up." “Do you have a better idea
The nymph had just finished shifting when a spear flew by Ari’s head, her eyes turned orange and she accidentally the nymph on fire. The nymph shifted back in a rush as she let out a blood-curdling scream and frantically tried to put the flames out. Sunama, with her eyes flickering turquoise from her power, doused the fire with water that she called up from the earth. “Great, you gave away our position?” Ari yelled as smoke rose from the nymph. “No, the smoke from the nymph did.” Sunama yelled back, “Because you set her on fire!” I walked over to the nymph who was lying on the ground and helped her up; she was already healing. “Stay away from me.” She snapped, getting up off the ground. “This isn’t helping matters!” Gia spoke calmly, as an arrow flew past her nose. “That’s it, I’ve had enough.” Her eyes turned emerald, green, and she tried to create a void in the ground, but ended up creating a small crack. Sunama was holding her stomach as she laughed hysterically, Gia slapping
After the Goblins left, the elf man turned to face me. “I am Tyr. Did they hurt you?” he asked after he introduced himself. I shook my head. "No, they didn’t. I’m Akasha and these are my sisters, Ari, Huricana, Sunama and Gia." Each of them nodded as their names were spoken. “It’s nice to meet you all.” A man from the elf army walked towards me his dark brown hair was long and braided down his back, but the sides of his head were bald, he had the same high cheekbones and pointed chin that Tyr had but he had broader shoulders and was a few inches taller than Tyr his eyes were a pale blue that almost looked white. “This is General Moon.” Tyr introduced him. “Call me Frey,” he smiled at my sisters and me. “Why are you running from the Goblin army?” Tyr asked me. What harm would it do to tell them who we were, after all, we're trying to get help from their king? “They burned down our village and we are the only ones that made it out. Or at least I think we are.” I replied as Tyr mad
The soldiers were relaxing, visiting, and joking amongst each other, that is aside from the ones on guard duty. After recreating the anchor with Ela and Karm, I walked around as my sisters rested in the tent, all except Ari, who had seemed to vanish. Karm and Ela went to search for her on the outskirts of the camp while I was walking around the camp looking for her, a little worried because she wouldn't just up and leave. I was about to give up on my search and return to my tent to get my other sisters to help when I heard Ari yelling about fighting tactics, following her voice, I found her and Frey behind one of the tents. “I’m just saying strength trumps speed any day.” Frey boasted as he smiled down at her. "Typical man saying that, I know for a fact speed would win." She argued, crossing her arms. “Are you guys really fighting about this?” I laughed as I walked towards them. They turned to me, “Well?” Ari asked angrily. “Well, what?” I asked, hoping they wouldn’t drag me in
I was glad we had found Akasha. I didn’t realize the extent of her abilities, but everything I discovered about her made me want to know her more. She was beautiful, but not in the normal sense. Her long white hair flowed to her waist and shimmered in the most dazzling ways, like diamonds lined every strand and her bright blue eyes were full of wisdom, yet I could see she had another side she didn’t show people. She’s the oldest of her sisters, yet short and petite with graceful curves and the white and gold peasant dress she wore just accentuated it. Half the damn army couldn’t keep their eyes off her and she seemed oblivious to it. She had the telltale characteristics of a pixie with her little claws and petite pointed face with pointed fae ears the stars that lined her neck and shoulder proved just how much power she held, her and her sisters had many tiny stars of differing colour I’m assuming to match their elements. I escorted them to the fire where dinner was being served a
My sisters were sleeping by the time I got back to my tent, I looked at their sleeping forms and moved around them to my spot, trying not to wake them. I quickly changed into a white nightdress, setting my sword on the ground beside me. I sat cross-legged in my spot and went into a meditative state. This way I could rest my body while guarding my sisters, when we reached the kingdom, I would get a better sleep. It also helped prevent the nightmares I had been experiencing of late, some of them being my visions recurring over again and others of the goblins killing those I love most. My sisters. In my meditative state, my body could rest while my spirit observed my surroundings and communicate with the spirits that were around, usually they were more than willing to help. I had to be careful though because evil spirits were dangerous; they were like a poison that could corrupt those around them, there are ways to protect yourself, or cleanse the poison away, but it was a lot of work
We were still a distance away from the Elf kingdom, but you could already see the tall castle. It was made completely out of white marble and, as we approached; it seemed to grow in size, looming over everything that surrounded it. As we got closer, you could see a large moat surrounding the exterior castle walls, as we walked over the drawbridge, I glanced in the water seeing different types of fish and creatures swimming around. Everything was amazing, it was like the whole place sparkled, there wasn’t any dirt or mess to be found, it made our village look so small in comparison. As we walked through the village leading to the main part of the castle, I looked at my surroundings all the homes were made from white stone. The roofs were thatched, and in behind each home were vegetable and herb gardens. Every house looked exactly the same. Where there weren’t cobblestone pathways or roads, there was lush green grass, flower gardens, and trees. It looked as though the scene had been