Seventh Talon_Dragonrider's Fury

by James Patton

  The ground came rushing at her as she tumbled off the side of the road. Wind pushed her hard from the side, and she had no chance to balance herself. Aila was laughing so hard that she fell to her knees.

  “Sorry,” a burst giggles bubbled from the short woman’s mouth. “Sorry, I mean it. That was not nice of me, but it's my trickster heritage. I canno’ help myself sometimes.”

  “What just happened?” She asked, brushing herself off and making sure she was not about to go flying off the road again.

  “The Gust spell. I’ll teach ya for being a good sport,” Aila said, and her face was mostly composed. The pixie’s eyes were still twinkling with mischief.

  “I will call that a fair trade.” She replied carefully. “Provided that teaching me does not require I get tossed around again…?”

  Another round of laughter followed the comment, but Aila was nodding her head. “Ok, girl. Observe.”

  The pixie’s hand formed a fist, and then her fingers moved back and forth in a simple drumming rhythm. She could see energy flowing through Aila. Once enough of it accumulated, the short woman brought her fingers into a funnel shape, and the spell started forming. The second she turned her wrist so her palm faced outward wind gushed forth with enough force that it could knock someone over.

  You gained knowledge of the spell Gust.

  Gust – This spell is the Novice ranked spell for the Wind spell line. It creates a single blast of wind. You will find the details of the casting in your Skill Book.

  “Now, before ya go doing that spell, this spell can be focused or affect an area. See how my fingers are in a funnel? That creates a conical blast in the direction of my palm. If I had opened my fingers wide, it woulda been an area blast and not as powerful.”

  It was not long before she managed the spell successfully, but her hand had been pointing down, and dust blasted them. Coughing, they both stumbled forward. Once more she felt a sense of danger all around them.

  You have learned Gust.

  Gust - Wind Spell Line (Novice)

  - Affinity: Air

  - Restrictions:

  - Damage: Indirect Only

  - Range: [See Adjustable Spells] AOE: 5 Feet; Cone: 15 Feet; Narrow: 20 Feet

  - Feedback: 15% per cast

  - Effect 1: Creates a short blast of air

  - Verbal Incantation: Gust

  Adjustable Spells

  - Area of Effect (AOE) – The caster spreads their fingers wide and the spell will blast out in all directions from the target. If no target is designated, then the caster is the target. The range varies per spell.

  - Cone - Shape fingers into a cone with the narrowest part near the palm and the spell will blast out from the caster’s palm in the direction the coned fingers are facing. The range varies per spell.

  - Narrow – The caster brings the tips of their fingers and thumb together creating a small hole between them, and the spell will blast out from the fingers tips in a narrow beam. The range depends on the spell and the amount of Willpower and focus the caster has. It will deteriorate the further out it goes, which will make it lose its shape.

  “Ya are good. That was fast, but ya gotta check Feedback and see how much ya gained. Remember it.”

  The blue bar rose slightly, but it did not match up. “That does not look like 15% of my Feedback, am I not understanding something?”

  “That is 15% of ya base Feedback. Ya have some high aptitude for magic, so ya Feedback may only raise a fraction of what ya think. Checking will prevent ya from harming yaself later.”

  Aila was not like the other pixie she had met and did not seem to have an ulterior motive to help. She found it reassuring that not everyone had an agenda, which also made her miss Midnight even more.

  Her thoughts had changed her mood. It dampened her excitement some and the small woman sensed it. The child-like hand rested on her arm. A simple gesture, one she had rarely felt over the years, the touch of someone that cared.

  “C’mon then. Let’s see some Sparkles.” Aila’s hand turned outward, and the entire forest around them lit up as if thousands of fireflies had invaded their journey.

  The tears beading in her eyes refracted the bits of light, and she found herself spinning as she took it all in. Sometimes this world made her forget that magic is more than a weapon, and the wonderment of magic should never get lost.

  The light faded away, but it had significantly improved her mood. Such a silly spell and time and again she found beauty in its simplicity.

  She was not about to let the diminutive woman show her up. Energy was abundant in this forest, and her fingers moved to draw it all. She held the gesture for as long as she dared, and the energy all around her was rushing into her much faster than she had anticipated.

  Worried that she might have overdone it, she started to form the spell. It formed to perfection, and she took her time to make sure it had no flaws. It was like a different person was casting and as she filled the form with her stored energy, something felt different. Not wrong, just different.

  Energy kept flowing into the spell making it stronger and more powerful than it had a right to be. The power rushed through her as if she was nothing more than a conduit.

  Sparkling light gushed out of her and flooded the area around her. Her eyes closed so she could see the magic shifting to her needs. The darkness behind her eyes was filled with sparkle coating the world around her. Each mote of light emitted magical energy, and she could see everything they touched. A magical world revealed itself to her, and she felt almost as if she could reach out and reshape the things she saw.

  Eyes could never have seen what she was seeing, feeling, and she channeled more and more energy into the spell. The trees, shadows, light, earth, and even the very air she breathed lent her power. She felt it fill her as the spell changed, or maybe she changed.

  Tears were rolling down her face, but she did not notice. Her fingers kept moving, weaving and reweaving the spell creating more and more complex patterns. The Sparkle around her almost felt alive as it rolled outward and then pulled back. She had created a magical ocean that had a tide. The ebb and flow reminded her of the beach at Osprey Harbor, it was unfathomably beautiful.

  The spell had grown beyond her; it was a force of nature that she no longer controlled. It was beyond understanding how such a spell contained so much power. Power over her, over the world around her, and— she wept. A stranger’s touch of compassion awoke something so profoundly broken inside of her that she expressed it by creating an ocean of sparkling light. Waves crashed around her as she wept, each one trying to crush her, but she remained standing, an island.

  No— NO! She fought the sparkling ocean and fed the maelstrom everything that she tried to bury. The grief, the pain, the loss, and even love. Unbidden a verse came to her, it was the song in her heart.

  I will not bend my knee.

  I will take your pain, devour it all

  I do not suffer, for I am sorrow

  I do not stumble, I do not fall

  I am the island that braves the sea

  I exist today and every tomorrow

  I wait. Come. Throw yourself upon me

  I do not break, I do not fall

  I defy you who hide in the dark,

  I defy you who hide in the sea

  I will not bend my knee

  Boh had no idea if the song was sung aloud, it just existed. A small hand slid into hers, and without knowing what was happening, energy coursed through her. The storm crashed upon her as she stood on the shore of her island. She faced the sea, but not alone. In the mists around her others appeared. All nondescript, but there was no mistaking their intent as they all stood behind her, loved her, and sacrificed for her. It was too powerful, too much, and she felt herself wavering.

  People, dragons, drakes, wyverns, and more stood on that shore with her. All of them there for her, supporting her, accepting her and looking for her to lead them. All of them willing to die for her. The dark storm
tried to blot out the sparkling ocean and crush her island.

  STOP! She roared in a voice that was not her own, and Boh felt her self pull away from it all. She could see the woman on the shore, three deep scars ran down her face. The woman that stood on the shore was a warrior, a survivor. Her face lacked pain and fear, and she bore the hell that rained down on her resolutely. The woman defied the shadows in the storm, taunting them. And they feared her.

  The light faded and with it, the imagery faded like a vivid dream. She felt the energy around her dissipating and knew she had changed. Resolve had formed inside of her, and she knew without a doubt that she would fight for this world. She wanted more than anything to be that warrior standing on the shore, defying the darkness.

  This was her world now, her home. There was no more run left in her; there was only fight. If she died, then so be it, she would go down fighting. Defiant to the end.

  “By Rune, ya touched the ethereal.” The hushed voice of the pixie brought her back to he senses. Aila was staring at her, and the look on the woman’s face was enough to let her know she had done something beyond expectation.

  “Beat that.” She said and stumbled to the ground, grinning the whole way down.

  Aila

  Chapter 42

  Larva

  I always felt like the larva we discussed in school. Like my human shell was just my first form and I was waiting to transform.

  -from Boh, Audio Roll 1710

  The pixie felt the raw emotions of Boh wash over her several times over during her magical light show. Once the spell started, she immediately felt the change and knew nothing she could do would help the girl. So much emotion went into the cast that she knew something extraordinary was about to happen.

  Emotion was an influential part of spellcasting, and pixies had a duo nature because they also had Chaotic Magic. Chaos was hard to control, and too much brought out the psychopathic nature of pixies. They would go berserk until they used up almost all their Chaotic energy.

  A pixie did not lack empathy, but at a certain point, the Chaotic energy turned it off. In berserker mode, it did not matter if someone was friend or foe— if they get in the way they die.

  However, Boh’s spell flipped her empathy to the max setting, and she felt the girl’s raw emotion batter her over and over.

  Even as the girl was joking and fell to the ground unconscious, she could barely move from the backlash of it. She was a pixie, and she did not have nurturing aspirations. Becoming a mother or having protective inclinations was not her. Or so she thought. Boh’s still form brought too many changes to her mind that she fled and stumbled into the trees. Putting distance between her and the girl’s prone form.

  In all her years she had never cried, and so her wet cheeks startled her more than her feelings towards Boh. An unnatural calm was filling her, erasing her angst. She almost felt happy and tried to clamp it down.

  Caterpillars lit up all around her, but she had never seen a larva like it. Each caterpillar glowed a slightly different fluorescent color, giving them each a unique appearance.

  She could sense it, the residual power and realized that Boh could not have touched ethereal magic without creating something. It was called creation magic for that very reason, but a frown creased her face. The larva glowed brighter until the furrow in her brow eased.

  “What the hell did you do?” Her soft voice filled with awe. She looked uncomfortably towards Boh’s still form and hoped the girl was alright. As soon as the concern struck, a strong sense of peace filled her.

  “Rune, help us. They sense emotion and manipulate it.” Her chaotic nature wanted to grab one, but she doubted they would let her. She did not understand insects as well as she understood plants, but larva went through a metamorphosis.

  “What are you going to turn into?” She asked and felt a chill settle in deep. If these things survived, then the jacks no longer owned the forest.

  Her mood shifts did not have a lasting effect, but no telling if it was addictive. Despite her curiosity, she did not have time to investigate right now.

  She did remove a notebook from her bag, one she used for drawing plants and describing their nature. Turned it to a new page and started to sketch the caterpillar. They were devouring leaves and other organic matter, but with her calm, they were not glowing and appeared ordinary. Their ability to sense emotions and to calm them was phenomenal. After cataloging every bit of information she could, she moved back towards the road.

  Boh had not moved, and as a fledgling mage, she wondered if the girl had burned out her magic. A lot of power had poured through the her, and she had given the girl some of her chaotic magic to help stabilize her.

  Every time she tried to understand why she was given a choice to help this girl, the less she felt like she had a choice at all. And now she felt connected to the girl in a way she had never connected with another person.

  “What did you do to me?” She asked the inert elf.

  Sighing, she tried to drag the girl off the trail, but the elf was heavier than she looked. A reddish tinge appeared in her eyes as she activated her pixie magic. She pushed her hand outward releasing strands of chaos magic. The rest mist permeated the area around her and she could use it to sense everything around her.

  The area was clear. The chaos threads were absorbed back into her, and they moved through her small frame until she started growing. The skin on her body started stretching as her muscles thickened and the diameter of her arms, legs, and shoulders grew by inches.

  Rage tried to infect her mind, but she knew how to handle it, for now. It was her berserker nature that wanted control. She fought it back as she picked up the girl and continued down the road. It had never been this easy to control the berserker in her, way too easy. She glanced towards the caterpillars and saw them glowing brightly. Interesting.

  Boh weighed next to nothing now, and it only took about an hour of travel to find a good camp. The trek became much harder the moment she was outside the caterpillar's influence, but it was something she would investigate in the future.

  A series of roots that rose above the ground was high enough to create a natural shelter. Placing Boh inside of it, she made sure the girl was comfortable and even piled up some pine needles for a bed.

  The camp had plenty of dead logs lying about, so she moved them to block up parts of the shelter that were exposed. Then grabbed some pine boughs and placed them over it. It did not take much effort in this form, and the shelter was now jack proof.

  Releasing the chaos magic, she shrunk back to her normal size. Her loose skin healed itself as it tightened up giving her the same smooth-skinned appearance as before. Her berserker nature was the reason she exiled herself to this forest, and stayed away from large population centers. There were worse things than living as a hermit in this forest.

  The next hour or so she spent gathering wood, and occasionally spotted a plant she wanted and took the time to harvest it. It occurred to her that she had not seen a single jack all day, and Boh’s light show was sure to have attracted them. Now that she thought about it, she was downright worried about it.

  Jacks kept this forest lively and on its toes, and even other predators knew to be careful around them. The fact she had not seen any other predators had not escaped her notice either. Something was afoot, and maybe the girl was not as paranoid as she thought.

  Using small twigs and some pine needles, she managed to start a small fire. Not many understood that fire was not chaos, but order. It was an affinity because it had purpose and purity, but it those that wielded it wrongly, they brought chaos.

  Chaos was thickest during a war, which is why a lot of pixies could sense war coming. It was why she was on this journey because the war was already here. The girl had practically bathed in it before she found her.

  Her small shoulders sagged at the thought, and she nibbled on some roots while she called up Gust. She barely kept the spell alive, just a trickle of power funneled through it.
The sense of danger had grown quite a bit since this morning, and she funneled the Air Affinity magic to feel. Eyes closed, she rode the currents of her Affinity, seeking answers.

  Aila

  Chapter 43

  Loot!?

  On rare occasions, my father took us on a vacation. Almost always it was a place that had decent medical facilities. As if I was fragile and required constant care.

  This time he took us to Crystal Sands Beach in Destin, Florida. I remember watching some kids with a metal detector running up and down the beach. Every time it beeped, their faces lit up as they discovered one of the greatest things ever: Loot!

  -from Boh’s Journal, September 4th, N138

  The pixie in her felt when Boh woke up. She watched as the girl climbed out of the shelter and she appeared to have changed. It was not something entirely definable, but it was like the elf had grown stronger somehow.

  They were back on the road and traveled most of the morning without talking about what had happened the night before. She did not want to push Boh and was not sure how to ask the girl. Instead, she coached her on how to find various plants.

  Together, they managed to find more berries than they could eat, Amaranth, Asparagus, Chickweed, Fireweed, and Wild Garlic. By itself, none of those things were very filling, but they could take the edge off of hunger.

  All in all, she enjoyed the calm, and Boh was a very apt and attentive pupil. The girl was curious and had a zest for life that was infectious.

  Around noon Affinity to Air sensed a change, and knew that their leisurely stroll was at an end. A hush fell over the forest, and she looked around nervously. In all the years she had lived here, it had never been this silent. The change happened subtly enough that she missed what Boh had heard.

  “Is that an earthquake?” Boh asked her.

  “That shaking is a scaled beastie coming our way. Might explain why the jacks have left us alone. Dragon or drake is not- Rune helps us all!” She whispered the last part as she turned to look down the road toward Minot.