Fall
Skylar Indra
“Alright, eat up while it’s still hot.”
“Ha.. thanks, mom.”
“Oh right! After eating, we are going to set out earlier than usual so let me know when you’re ready and we’ll get going.”
“Will do, thanks.”
After reluctantly shoveling the food down my throat, I ran back to the sleeping area and packed my bags. I hopped onto the carriage and while waiting for my mother and father, I heard a rustle in the bushes. Thinking nothing of it, I leaned back against the back of the bench seat to get some rest as I didn't get much sleep the night before. Fading into a deep sleep, I could hear my mother and father climbing into the carriage silently to not wake me. Drifting farther into my sleep, I could feel the carriage suddenly lurch forward causing me to shake awake from the sudden movement.
“Hmm? You’re awake. Did you have a nice beauty sleep, my little princess?” I didn’t like the sound of that in the slightest.
“Ew! Gross, don’t call me that!” I barked in a half-horse voice.
“Yeah, yeah. No need to be so harsh.” My father, making a waving motion with his hand, while looking away.
“Ah, look at the sun, it's almost lunch!” Mother remarked, peering up at the close yet so far sun. Beckoning the driver to stop, we got off the carriage and prepared lunch, which turned out to be leftovers from breakfast. I’m not sure why, but it was somehow better than it was for breakfast. “I just remembered, once we head out after lunch we are going to have to be extra careful. Bandits have often been found roaming these points.”
“They’re just bandits.” My father retorted cockily. “There won’t be any issue.”
“Thanks for the heads up, Mother. I'll deploy some sensory spells so we can tell if something is coming.” I said, glancing at my father as he spoke. I wonder how the sensory spells work as they are an extension of your five senses. I can understand sight and hearing and can extend them to the point that you can hear someone whispering from up to one kilometer away. But touch is not something I understand right now. “I’m sensing some movement in the bushes but it seems to just be a little rabbit or small child. I don’t know, something small.”
“Just leave it, I don’t think it will do anything. If it tries something, just capture it.” mother stated looking back over her shoulder.
“Was planning on it anyway”
“I’m going to start on my mana training, I want to develop a scout spell,” I stated to the two of them while pulling a piece of parchment out of my bag, I started to circulate my mana focusing on my index fingertip. Tracing a border around the parchment with my finger I designated the area for my new spell circle. Tracing a near-perfect circle with my index fingers, the parchment started to glow, giving off a faint orange glow, symbolizing that this was a fire spell I was developing, placing geometric runes around the edges while envisioning what I was doing wanted the spell to take the shape of. As I finished drawing runes around the edge of the circle another circle manifested itself on the inside of the ring of runes I just drew, inside this circle, I started by drawing a rune to help with mana distribution, a rune to help with casting speed, a rune to help with range, and finally a rune to allow the fire summon to communicate. After completing the runes another three circles appeared inside the circle of runes making a triangle shape with rounded edges. Inside the first, I applied the first characteristic of the summon, flight. In the second I drew in sharp talons to melt through iron. In the final circle, I drew a mana conduit throughout the body of the large phoenix allowing it to use low to mid-tier fire spells.
“Hey, it’s done! We can get going now!” I called out to my father waiting in the carriage peering over at me with a hint of curiosity in his eyes.
“Alright! Hop in and we’ll get moving!”
“Coming!”
“Oh, just thought I would let you guys know, we have to travel through the night as we are a little behind schedule, will that be alright?” His gaze out the windows as we passed by countless somewhat normal trees.
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The sky was dimming fast just like the night before, as the carriage was moving along, we hit a small bump in the road. Thinking nothing of it, I went back to leaning on the back of the carriage, taking another look around, and out the window, a faint orange glow was emitting from the bottom of the carriage.
FWOOM
A large fire erupted from the bottom of the carriage causing it to go flying into the air, as it came crashing down wood splinters were flying everywhere. Still in a daze from what happened a hand grabbed my neck and pulled me out of the carriage, letting out a small yelp as I tumbled to the ground, still not fully aware of the situation and my ears still ringing from the explosion, I rolled over to seal the head of the driver rolling across the ground with the eyes wide open and blood still seeping out from just under the jaw where the neck was severed. I let out an ear-piercing scream as I crawled away from the bloodied head, backing into a pair of hard burly legs that did not belong to anyone I’d seen before I looked up at the owner of the legs. The owner’s face was looking down at me like I was trash on the side of the road with the most evil ear-to-ear grin I have ever seen in both my lives.
The large leg cocked back and kicked my spine, almost knocking me out from the pain and completely knocking the wind out of me. Rolling from the inertia of the kick I came to face the carriage where I could see the sight of my father being dragged out. His face was full of ugly tears, wondering what he was crying about. I looked around and shortly found the answer. I found my mother impaled through the chest and stomach by a piece of wood standing upright. It looked like something you would see outside of a mass murderers camp, with the heads stuck on the wooden steaks. Truly a brutal scene.
Too shocked to say anything I started to scrabble away, to where? I don’t know, just not there. The burly hand belonging to the bandit grabbed the collar of my shirt and pulled me up to his eye level. I tried flailing my legs but to no avail, all they struck was air. Casting magic in the current situation was impossible as my head was too scrambled to do anything. Finally letting my limbs hang limp, the bandit spoke.
“Hey sweetheart.” The bandit said tauntingly. “Look over there at your father. Quite the sight, isn’t he?” Now directing his voice over to my father the bandit spoke in a rough tone. “Now if you don’t want your precious little daughter to suffer a painful death like that pig over there,” glancing at my mother, “I recommend you do exactly as we say.”
My father, looking up with tears still streaming down his face, screamed, “Why are you doing this to us?!”
“Oh you know, just a little cash for the coughers.” the bandit replied while laughing. “Now the first thing you’re going to do is inform the royal family of your capture and, not so kindly, ask them for quite a large amount of ransom money.”
My father, looking like he had nothing to lose, agreed and asked me to get that scout spell I prepared earlier. Grabbing it out of my bag as the bandit held it up I circulated my mana through the paper. As it caught flames a majestic almost divine bird morphed from the flames in my hand. The bandit relayed the message to the phoenix.
“Now have it go to the northernmost settlement.” the bandit demanded.
After watching the large bird fly towards the north, the bandit yanked my collar and threw me down. While rolling I came to the cliff edge peering down. I contemplated everything I’ve done until now. As the bandit walked over, he pulled back his foot again and kicked my side, and sent me flying off the cliff. As I spun in the air I didn’t bother to scream instead I just fell, thinking if I could do this again from the start, what would I change. As I fell my abdomen was caught by a stiff branch and tore open letting blood spill over the tree below, I rolled off the branch and fell to the ground. As I stared up at the sky for what seemed like the last time it quickly became covered in fog.
‘Huh so I don’t even get to see the sky before I die, that’s kinda depressing’
As thoughts like these raced through my head a figure appeared in front of me.
[Do you want my blessing or are you going to die here, helpless]
‘Huh? Blessing what do you mean’
[Oh common, don't tell me I have to start there.] The divine voice rang out sounding almost dejected.
‘Well, whatever, will it help me live through this?’
[Well, I suppose you could call it surviving.]
‘Good enough, honestly I don’t know about all this blessing stuff but if I’m going to die I may as well pray to have another life.’
[good, now I just need you to say ‘I agree’ after the terms and conditions I read out.] after that the voice started reading out words that went in one ear and out the other.
‘I have no idea what you were just saying but I guess I’ll agree’
The divine sighed. [Listen, I need you to say OUT LOUD ‘I agree’ if you don’t this won’t work out, for both of us.]
“I agree!” I said out loud reluctantly.
[Now when you wake up, you’re going to want to ask the people around you what happened. Just don’t and when you get back to this scenario, come see me again, I’ll be down here as always.]
‘Alright, let’s get this over with.’
[Ah, right almost forgot. You’re going to feel extremely nauseous when you get up so take it easy. I don’t need you puking out your guts and dying again. Alright, I'll see you again.]
As she said the last word the sound of a clock winding back its second hand rang out in my head so loud it almost split my head open. The sound got faster and faster until it was almost a screeching sound. Then my vision went white then faded to a deep shade of red. The color of the light passing through your eyelids.