Parker was bouncing his leg nervously at lunch. Alexis tried time and time again to get him to calm down and to convince him that everything would be fine.

"Parker, breathe. You're going to be fine." Caleb took his turn trying to calm him down but with no luck.

"The finals are tomorrow, and I don't feel ready. Clearly, you're fine," he said looking at Alexis. "I wonder how Emma is doing…"

They went looking for her to see how she was faring with the finals approaching. She was in the library sitting at a table by herself staring up the tall shelves of the main section. They stood next to her table for several minutes before she noticed that they were there.

"Oh, hey! How's it going?"

Parker laughed a little realizing that she clearly wasn't as nervous as he was. "Oh, you know. It's going."

"Nervous I take it?" She laughed pointing out the fact that Parker couldn't stand still, he was bouncing back and forth from foot to foot.

"You could say that," Alexis added. "How are you doing?"

Emma smiled. "I'm doing well. Ready for this to be over. I figure at this point there's nothing more I can do that's going to help me improve by tomorrow."

"That's a good way to think about it," Caleb said. "Now, Parker, will you trust me and just calm down? You're going to be fine."

"But what do we do if it's the three of us left?" Parker started to sound a little panicked.

"We give each other a true duel," Emma said. Parker knew that's what it would come down to, but he wasn't sure if he could duel Alexis one-on-one if it came down to it. Especially if it was in front of the entire school but he also knew that if he threw the duel, he would never hear the end of it.

"I suppose… I still don't like it though. It should just be a three-way tie if it comes to that." Everyone laughed and they made their way out of the library.

Alexis started talking as they were walking down the corridor towards the main stairs. "Everything is going to be fine. Just try your hardest."

"Why would you want me to try my hardest? You're one of my opponents, don't you want to win?"

She playfully slapped his arm. "Of course, I want to win, but it won't mean anything if you're not dueling at your best." He knew she was right, he felt the same way about it, and he just didn't want it to come down to the two of them.

-----

The entire school had gathered on the eleventh floor and was looking down on the field. The five finalists had joined together in the new ring that had been put on the field.

The ring stood with about a fifty-foot diameter and had a ring of water wrapped out the outer edge. Along the line painted on the floor were five partial circles where each competitor would start.

They stood together in the middle next to the four headmasters. "Are you nervous?" Master Sora asked moving his gaze to each of them. "Just do your best and remember that it took being an amazing Imperial to get to this point whether you come out victorious or not."

"Take your places," Master Keegan said. "When the whistle blows, you will begin."

Parker walked to his spot and made eye contact with Alexis. Her eyes told him to breathe and do his best. He looked at Emma and saw a determined look on her face. Zoey had mentioned that since she was attacked, she wanted more than nothing to prove herself at this time. And when he looked at Rory, he didn't see much emotion at all.

Everyone was standing on their mark waiting for the whistle to blow. The masters walked to four spots opposite each other around the ring. They would be keep a close eye on everyone, even though pretty much anything was legal.

The whistle blew and within the blink of an eye Emma and Rory were launched out of the ring. The ground had shot up from under their feet sending them through the air and crashing to the ground on the other side of water.

Parker and Alexis stared in fear at how quickly it had happened. They wanted to look at each other but were too afraid to take their eyes off of Zoey.

"Are you ready?" Zoey asked.

"Ready? Why didn't you shoot us out too?" Parker couldn't figure out her plans. Why would she leave it to the three of them instead of getting everyone out within a moment like she had with Emma and Rory.

"I want a true duel with the two who rescued me. I should've been able to stop Colton on my own but I couldn't. Then you two strolled up and did it with no problem. I need to prove myself and to do that I need to beat the two of you."

Parker shrugged, unsure of anything else he could add to the conversation. He thrust his arm out in front of his and a blast of air rocketed at Zoey. The ground shot up in front of her blocking the wind.

The wall created a blind spot for Alexis to approach from quickly. Before she could make a strike, the ground shift under her feet and Alexis crashed to the ground. "But... how—" was all Alexis could say.

Parker couldn't figure out how on Earth Zoey had known that Alexis was coming. There was no way she could have seen her coming through the rock.

The ground leveled out and they were standing in the same spots they started in again. Parker and Alexis needed to look at each other to see what the other was thinking but neither of them could take their eyes off Zoey for even a second.

Zoey crouched low to the ground and made a movement with her arms that looked like she was gathering a lot of snow to build a fort. Then, she stood up quickly, pumping her fists in the air. The ground moved straight up forming a protective suit around her made of the stone.

"What in the..." Parker mumbled. "What do we do Alexis?" He stared at the stone suit in front of him waiting for her to make a move. No reply came from Alexis which didn't help his growing fear.

Zoey made a straight line for Alexis. The suit slowed her down a little bit giving Alexis the second she needed to get out of the way. Zoey raised the ground at the edge of the ring to help stop herself from hitting the water.

With her back to Parker he took the opportunity to send blast after blast of air at her. He felt slightly defeated when the air just moved around the suit like he'd just sent a gentle breeze her way.

"Alexis, I don't know what to do. Anything I've tried so far hasn't even fazed her." Still no response from Alexis. He couldn't decide if she wasn't helping him because she wanted to win or if she just didn't know what to say back to him.

Zoey turned to see the two of the standing about ten feet apart. She went after Alexis again by throwing watermelon sized stones at her that came from her protective suit.

Parker hadn't considered her using the suit as a weapon itself. As one of the stones flying at Alexis, Parker threw himself in front of her and took the hit. It knocked him to the edge of the ring, rolling side over side. Alexis looked at him, stunned based on her expression. In the moment of distraction, another stone hit her square in the chest knocking her into the water.

The masters quickly got her out of the water and to a spot where she could catch her breath.

Parker got to his feet, panting heavily. The stone had knocked the wind out of him. Zoey made no move to attack him. He was shocked to see her let the stone suit fall away from her and crash to the floor.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

"I have a request."

Parker was stunned frozen. "A request?"

"Use all of your Imperials. I want as true of a duel as possible."

"No can do. The masters told me only the Imperial of my house."

Zoey grew a scowl. She turned to look at Master Sora and said, "Let him use everything. I want him to."

The masters looked back and forth at each other and came to a silent agreement. Master Sora turned and looked at Parker. "You may, as long as you feel comfortable doing so."

Parker couldn't believe that the masters were going to allow it. And what did they mean if he felt comfortable. His nerves raced for a moment, considering whether or not he would be able to control his Imperials. He thought back to the mistakes he'd made recently and there were very few.

"I'll be okay." Parker said it with a hint of hesitation in his voice. He was sure he could control all of them, but he felt comfortable enough to use the water around him.

Parker stared at Zoey who had a smile on her face. "Good, now it's going to get interesting!"

Parker shot his hands in the air and water rose behind him. He launched ball after ball of water at her that were blocked with equal sized rocks. Picking up the pace it was explosion after explosion of water, rock and dust.

After a moment, they both stopped. Then, Parker did the same motion causing the water to rise again. This time, when he started throwing the balls of water he turned them into ice as they flew through the air.

This caught Zoey off guard, not expecting them to travel as fast as they did. After the first two hit her, she was able to deflect the rest of them. She created the stone suit again and laughed a little. "Let's see you stop this!"

Parker controlled the water and moved it into a ring around her suit. She laughed again. He sent the water in a surge toward her feet and the moment it connected, he turned it to ice, freezing her in place.

Zoey looked at her feet and was met with blast after blast of air and water. At first, it didn't faze her but then she noticed the stone suit starting to chip away. Parker could see her starting to struggle within her icy restraints.

In a split second decision Parker ran at her, with no plan in mind. He saw her wrap her arms around her chest and then through them outwards send all of the stone from her suit in every direction.

Parker formed the bubble around him just as he'd seen Ana do in her duel and the stones deflected into the outer walls of the Aether Field. He ran at her again, bubble still spinning rapidly around him.

As he was about to make contact with her, sending her flying out of the ring, she disappeared from sight. Parker came to a halt, panic in his eyes. She couldn't have a Space Imperial as well, he thought to himself. After a moment of his heart racing faster than it had been, the ground under his feet shot him straight out of the ring quicker than he could figure out what happened and save himself.

He landed hard outside of the moat of water and Zoey appeared in the ring once again. Parker realized that she had dropped straight down into the floor to dodge him.

Parker sat up and clapped his hands for Zoey. She was still staring at him like she wanted to keep going when she heard the cheering from above her. Before she realized it, a mob of students in green robes appeared by her side and began lifting her into the air.

——-

"How are you doing?" Alexis asked Parker as they waited for Master Keegan to arrive.

"I'm fine. Honestly, that duel was amazing and I thought I performed very well. Zoey's incredible, I hope I run into her again so I can congratulate her properly." Parker surprised everyone by not being upset over losing.

Master Keegan clapped his hands together to gain everyone's attention as he walked into the room. "I'd like to congratulate everyone on their duels, whether you won or lost. It takes a lot of courage to step forward and participate."

Chatter broke out around the room as Master Keegan got his things together to begin class. Normally where a student sat in the middle of the room sat a projector that cast images of the four house symbols onto the blackboard.

"What's that?" a girl in green robes asked.

"Those are each of the house symbols."

"Duh!" someone blurted.

"I meant why are they there more than what are they." She corrected herself in a very defensive tone.

"We're going to be talking about some history of the houses and how their symbols came to be what they are today." Master Keegan talked as he walked around the room making groups of students. "You'll read about how around a century after the founders passed away, several different issues between Imperials and the rest of the world began surfacing."

Parker was sitting with Caleb and Alexis when Eliott sat down with them. They listened to Master Keegan go on about the rising conflicts between the Imperials and the Nimps. When he said the term "Nimps", many heads turned sideways and looks of confusion flooded the room.

"Master, what's a Nimp?" Caleb asked. Parker wasn't sure either and was waiting to hear what the master was going to say. When he looked at Alexis, he noticed that she wasn't looking on expectantly like everyone else was.

"Nimps are those without Imperials."

"Oh… so, it's pretty much saying, non-Imperials?" Caleb asked.

"Exactly." Master Keegan continued going on about the conflicts and how they continued to grow. Parker followed along in his book as the master read parts of it out loud. "Nimps began accusing the Imperials from around their homes of practicing magic and that's why they could control the elements."

"They thought we were using magic?" Raelyn asked. Parker saw Zoey lean over and whisper something to her after she had asked her question. He wondered what Zoey had to say and remembered that he wanted to congratulate her still.

"Yes Raelyn. We were accused numerous times of practicing magic instead of being born with the natural ability to control the elements. Magic is a person's reasoning to explain something that they simply don't understand. The Nimps have little to no understanding of what we do, why we do it or how it is possible."

"How is it possible though?" a brown haired boy asked from The House of Kenna.

"That's something you'll learn later. For now, let's focus on where we were." The master continued to move around the room and speak at the same time. "The Nimps referred to our control of the elements as a bit of magic and alchemy."

"What's alchemy?" Parker asked.

The master held up a hand and continued to speak. "Witch hunts had broken out because the practice of alchemy had been deemed forbidden."

"But what's alchemy? This makes no sense since I don't know what it is." Parker was a little frustrated that the master wanted to move on without explaining a key detail of his story he was telling.

"Alchemy has many definitions but at the time there was little true understanding of any part of it. Because of that, they deemed it to be magic because it went beyond their comprehension."

"So what happened with these witch hunts?" Alexis asked as though she already knew the answer.

"They hunted and killed hundreds of Imperials in the name of saving humanity." The mood in the room plummeted. It felt as though the temperature had dropped twenty degrees making everyone uncomfortable.

"Did the Imperials retaliate?" Parker asked. He could tell by some of the looks that his classmates had that they had.

"Yes Parker, they did. That was the start of the first war. In the war, each Imperial wore a different uniform corresponding to their element. On those uniforms they stitched the alchemical symbols for their element. They figured that if they were going to be accused of it, they might as well rub it in their faces." Master Keegan looked around the room and asked, "Was this the smartest thing they could've done?"

Alexis's hand shot in the air. Parker thought that it was supposed to be a rhetorical question but apparently Alexis had an answer. "Master," she said without being called on. "The Imperials should've just defended themselves. Wouldn't putting those symbols on their uniforms just reinforce the Nimps belief that we were using magic?"

"That is exactly what it did Alexis. Can anyone think of an alternative method the Imperials could've used to prove their point?" He gestured for them to talk in their groups.

"What do you think?" Eliott asked.

"I mean, they probably could've just done what Alexis said," Parker responded.

"I don't know… I think war could've been avoided. What if they just tried to demonstrate what they could do instead of being secretive about it? They could've shown how useful we could've been. Imagine a world where we cooperated together. Instead, here we are out in the middle of nowhere at the top of a mountain." Parker could hear the tone rise in Eliott's voice the more he spoke. He wondered if there was something from Eliott's home life that had been affected in some way by the war, but then how could it? The war had been a little over four hundred years ago, there was no way that could have directly affected him.

"Yeah, you're probably right. I wonder what the other groups will say."

"Master?" Parker heard Ana ask.

"Yes Ana?"

"When was the second war? My parents mentioned that there had been two wars but never told me when they were."

"The first war took place in 1583 and the second war was in 1800."

Parker could see Ana writing something down and figured she had the right idea by jotting down the dates of the wars. Then she started talking again. "So they went four hundred seventeen years without war? That's pretty impressive."

"They only went that long because after the first war, both sides had lost so many lives that they each withdrew from the war. The Imperials isolated themselves from the rest of the world, withdrawing to the school and moving their homes into the middle of nowhere. They distanced themselves as much as possible from the Nimps."

Everyone in the room started whispering in their groups. Alexis leaned in to talk to the three others. "Do you think there's only been war between the Imperials and Nimps? Or do you think we've had our own 'civil' wars as well?" All three of them shrugged their shoulders not sure how to answer her question. With no response from her group, she raised her hand.

Master Keegan walked to their group to ask what her question was. "How may I help you Alexis?"

"Has there ever been a war between only Imperials?" She didn't pause for even a second when asking her question. Parker knew that if it were him he would've been hesitant to ask.

"That's a topic for another day." Master Keegan made his way to the head of the room once more and assigned their homework before dismissing them.

Once they were in the corridor and most everyone had cleared out, Alexis stopped Parker, Caleb, and Ana so they could talk. "I think, based on how Master Keegan answered me, that there was once a civil war among the Imperials."