A large cat-like creature sat in front of a gold-plated window. His huge humanoid body tensed then relaxed again as a group of small, feathered green creatures flew by the window. His great chainmail breastplate rose and fell with the motion of his breath. He had an enormous golden crown sitting upon his large head. It was studded with rubies and had a huge bright glistening emerald in the center.

This strongly built leonin was staring silently over his expansive castle home, over the homes of the many leonin that lived in the city of Kradle. Past the large walls that bordered the city, to prevent the wolfborne king, Eclipse, from sending his armies to attack Kradle and wipe out the leonin. He was gazing past the grand expanse of plains that surrounded the city. These plains worked both in favor and against the leonin, it was easy to see enemies from far away, however it was extremely difficult to defend. The great hills and stretches of flatlands barely provided any protection to Kradle and the leonin that lived within its walls. But no, this leonin was staring past that, past everything in sight. He was staring off into the stars, off into space, off into nowhere.

This leonin, this king, king Sky, suddenly blinked and buried his face into his big paw-like hands. He took a deep breath, and turned around, pushing the oak stool, cushioned with velvet, into a corner. He looked around the large room that he slept in. It was mostly taken up by a big oak bed pushed against a far wall. It had red sheets that were pulled up neatly on the bed. Along another wall, to the left of the bed were two huge dressers that reached halfway to the high ceiling. In the bottom right corner was a desk that had piles of papers and books spilling over the edges.

Sky looked down at himself, he looked at his white fur and his silk robes under the chainmail shell. He couldn’t see it but he knew there was a blue star pattern around his right, amber eye. As he went to sit down at his desk to clear it off, there came a knock at the door. Sky knew who it was.

“Come in,” he growled. A small brown leonin, wearing a black shirt and brown trousers came through the large brown doors. “Hello Juniper,” Sky said.

“Um, well I have the report on the wolfborne’s wearabouts,” Juniper stuttered. Sky quite liked Juniper, he was sweet and kind, he had a great sense of humor and was always nervous around any authority figure.

“They have a basecamp right on the border of the Katasha Plains and the Hidden Forest. Scouts have reported large numbers of them gathering in that general area.”

Sky growled deep in his throat. What are they doing so close to leonin territory? Sky thought to himself. “Thank you Juniper,” Sky said out loud, “You are excused.” As Juniper left the room Sky caught himself feeling worried. I am never scared or worried! Sky thought to himself. However, he knew he was kidding himself. The threat of the wolfborne’s growing numbers was worrying, no one could deny it. But what they were planning to do was still a mystery to Sky.

This mystery, this danger, haunted Sky for the rest of the day. Even as he left the hustle and bustle of the castle to visit the royal gardens, he could not stop himself from thinking about the growing threat of the wolfborne. What was Eclipse up to? He found himself thinking. How and why is this growing number important? It can’t be for anything good. He knew that for a fact. He knew that wherever Eclipse went, a path of destruction and death followed. And if that destruction was coming to Kradle, well, he needed a way to stop it, because if he didn’t, that could mean the end of the leonin civilization.

He slowly started his trek back up to the castle when something caught his eye. It was, well, an eye, peering out of the darkness between the ivy on the castle wall. The eye blinked, then disappeared. Sky stood staring at the place where the eye had just been. He shook his head, maybe I just imagined it, Sky thought to himself. But he knew that was not true, he knew he saw that eye, and that eye, that small eye, filled him with a deep, deep dread. The distant noise of Juniper searching for him snapped at him out of his trance, and he slowly started walking back towards the castle.

***

Almost ten hours later Sky woke up in his bed, unsure of what had woken him, until he heard it, the screaming. Sky jumped out of bed and ran to his large window, outside was a battle, leonin and wolfborne battling with weapons and claws. Sky cursed, then quickly ran to the wardrobe at the far end of his room. He threw it open, he tore out the silver armor and quickly assembled it onto his body. At the back of the wardrobe sat two items. A long silver sword with a golden handle, beaded with small rubies, this sword had been passed down in his family for generations. He grabbed the sword and put it in the sheath on the side of his hip. The second item was a long staff, that looked like multi-colored woods had twisted themselves together and formed a staff. At the top sat a small yellow gem. This staff was the mythical Oracle staff, from the legends of the mythical peacekeeper that wielded three artifacts to bring peace to the land. The Artificer’s Eye, The Moonlight Stone, and the Oracle Staff. This staff held more power than most artifacts ever created. Sky muttered another curse, Why didn’t Juniper warn me about this attack?! Sky threw open the large doors; the sounds of battle were more prominent now.

Sky ran down the long hallway, and round a corner that led to a large staircase. He flew down the stairs and landed with a loud thump on the carpeted floor. He stood for a split second listening to the screams, now much louder, and took off running again. As he was running down a long corridor, something caught his eye. Why is the door to the welcoming hall open? The welcoming hall was a huge hall lined with tables for great feasts and welcoming important guests. It connected to almost every part of the castle. Sky slowly started to slow down to a trot, the screams were definitely coming from inside the welcoming hall. As soon as Sky realized this he ran in, screaming a war cry. What was inside chilled him to the bone: Two huge wolfborne, their gray fur matted and deadly looks in their eyes. They were both holding weapons, one, a wickedly curved sword and the other, a long, wicked pike, both covered in blood. A small heap of brown fur was curled underneath them. It was Juniper! Sky realized this and stopped focusing on the wolfborne, which was a mistake.

The two wolfborne launched themselves into Sky, and he was caught off guard and flung into a table. His armor clanged loudly against it. As the wolfborne started to approach, Sky hurled himself, sword point, at the wolfborne. It was the wolfborne’s turn to be surprised as Sky’s sword cut through the long shaft of the second one’s pike. The first wolfborne swung at Sky with his own sword. Sky jumped and landed behind the wolfborne, and he slammed the hilt of his sword into the back of the wolfborne’s head. He crumpled to the floor. The second wolfborne, now filled with rage, came screaming a war cry with the broken pike still in his hand. Sky easily dodged the attack, as the wolfborne’s rage was making him clumsy. Sky easily rounded the wolfborne and slammed the hilt of his sword into the back of the second wolfborne’s head in one quick movement.

The battle now over, Sky turned his attention to Juniper, who was barely breathing. Sky leaned over him, his eyes filled with tears. The wolfborne had done some serious damage to Juniper. He had two long cuts down the length of his body, That must have come from the sword, Sky realized. And that Large Impalement near his abdomen must have come from the pike! Sky was tempted to go right over to the wolfborne and kill them right there and then. But no, that was not allowed in the code of leonin. Sky leaned over Juniper, who was barely alive now. Sky nudged Juniper gently until he was lying on his back, his closed eyes gazing up at the ceiling. Sky took the Oracle Staff from his back and held it over Juniper. Sky muttered a few words under his breath, and shook the staff lightly. A few small, green orbs that looked like they were made of pure light, floated down and landed on Juniper’s chest. Suddenly Juniper's chest rose and fell in a small, quick, motion. Sky sighed in relief, he was alive. Sky picked up Juniper and carried him out of the hall and down a few halls to a small healers’ room There were many healer rooms inside the castle, sky knew there would be someone there, even during a battle it was required to have at least one healer in every healer room. After leaving Juniper with a very kind looking, white, female leonin Sky started down the halls again desperate to get out to the grounds and down to the battle.

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Sky ran quickly through the long halls of the castle, the rooms passed in a flurry of motion. Some of the rooms he glanced into had battles between wolfborne and leonin going on inside of them. When he finally got to the large doors of the castle, he burst out, right into a horde of wolfborne. Ug, Sky thought, I can not deal with this right now. There were five wolfborne, all of them holding weapons. Two of them held long swords, glistening with blood. The other three held long pokers that were crackling with electricity. One of the wolfborne holding a sword, who looked to be a general, started to growl a long cold laugh,

“Looks like it’s our lucky day,” the wolfborne’s growl dripped with loathing as she ran her hand along the length of her sword. Sky spotted the eyepatch on the wolfborne’s left eye. Sky suddenly recognized Her, this was the wolfborne general, Moon. Sky had sliced out her eye in a battle for territory only a few months ago. Sky looked around and realized he was largely outnumbered. Great, He thought, well at least I can try out this new trick.

Sky whistled three quick sharp notes, then waited. “What was that!” sneered one of the wolfborne. The wolfborne was about to lunge when a small blast of fire hit him in the behind. The wolfborne yelped with pain and leapt back behind the others.

“Ay, Sky.” three leonin bounded down from atop the castle’s overhang. The one who had spoken was Wark, a leonin elemental. Elementals were very rare, born into a species only once every five generations or so. Elementals have power over the elements, Wark, being a fire elemental, could create and manipulate fire on command.

“Jeremy, take those three.” Wark spoke just as he was throwing another ball of fire at the wolfborne.

The two other leonin took a battle stance, they were both holding weapons. The Leonin carrying a bow, Jeremy, notched three arrows and shot them at the three wolfborne holding electrified spears. The wolfborne were pinned to the castle wall by their armor. The other leonin, who was holding dual broadswords, launched himself at Moon.

“We’ll hold them off, you get to Eclipse.” Wark shouted at Sky while launching more fire.

Sky started running down through the streets of Kradle at a tremendous speed. There were many battles going on throughout the city but Sky avoided them, desperate to get to Eclipse. He ran through the long streets, throwing off wolfborne as if they were merely nuisances getting in his way. As sky neared the large wall that surrounded Kradle, he saw that the large gates that led to the outside were shut! What am I going to do? Sky thought to himself, suddenly he had an idea. He pulled out the Oracle Staff, he had trained, for as long as he had the staff, but nothing had prepared him for this. The Oracle staff had the power to gift its user the power of any and all elementals in the land.

Sky focused his mind, Great Oracle Staff, member of the Mistifact Three, grant me the power of the air. Grant me the power of the wind. Grant me the power of an air elemental! The yellow gem resting upon the top of the Oracle Staff glowed. Sky suddenly felt a blast of energy. It started in his hands, where he was holding the staff, then the surge of energy flowed throughout his entire body. Sky took a deep breath, he was now at the bottom of the wall. He slammed the bottom of the staff into the ground and jumped up. A great burst of air exploded behind him, and he was up, up in the air and over the wall. But, suddenly he was falling, back towards the earth on the other side of the wall.

Sky made a sweeping motion with the staff and he found himself resting on a cushion of air on the other side of the wall, mere inches from the ground. He stood up and looked over the grounds, and what lay before him was a battlefield. There were leonin and wolfborne all over the grasslands that surrounded Kradle. Swords and spears clashed, voices screamed and shouted. some of them were on the ground, not moving. The earth seemed to be stained a shade of blood red. Sky slowly swiveled his head, surveying the battlefield, and there he was, Eclipse, wielding a huge hooked blade.

He was easily fighting off five leonin, barely breaking a sweat, many more leonin lay on the ground around him in pools of their own blood. Sky lunged at him just as he picked up another leonin. Eclipse laughed and snapped the leonin’s neck, just then, Sky kicked Eclipse in the back of the head. Eclipse snapped his head around and snapped his huge, drooling, jaws at Sky. Sky easily spun and landed on the ground next to Eclipse. The other leonin backed away from the two. Eclipse sneered down at Sky, at that moment Sky realized just how gigantic Eclipse was.

“Well, if it isn’t Sky, I haven’t seen you for many years my friend.”

“We stopped being friends a long time ago.” Sky slammed the bottom of the staff into the ground. Lines of gold launched from the staff along the ground, then they arched up around himself and Eclipse, pushing out the other Leonin and wolfborne.

“Ha!” Eclipse laughed at sky. “You require the power of a Mistifact artifact to protect yourself and your allies!” Eclipse reached one of his huge clawed hands down to his sword belt, pulling out a giant, cruel, curved blade. The blade was glimmering with the blood of many a leonin.

Sky growled a low growl deep in his throat. The Bone Blade, Sky realized with a start. “But that was lost to the ages!” He said out loud.

Eclipse barked a laugh. “Looks like I found it, doesn’t it!” Eclipse lunged at Sky, his one eye filled with fire. His one eye, the other was floating slowly behind him. It must have been Eclipse’s eye that was watching me! Sky realized.

He was so caught up in this fact, that Sky didn’t have enough time to dodge out of the way of Eclipse. Eclipse hit him with the weight of a freight train. Sky managed to move out of the way of Eclipse’s blade but his shoulder slammed into Sky. Sky was blown to the ground, the breath knocked out of him. Eclipse stood over Sky, his great maw open wide, blood staining his teeth. He lunged, Sky barely slid out of the way, Eclipse’s jaws snapped shut just where Sky’s head had just been seconds before.

Sky shot to his feet and drew his sword. My sword, Sky thought, this sword has been handed down for generations, and has slain threats greater than eclipse. Eclipse thrusted his blade forward, and Sky barely dodged again. Sky, with staff in one hand, sword in the other, shot at Eclipse with enough rage to fell the greatest enemy. Eclipse was not expecting this bust of rage, he was knocked off his feet as Sky slammed into him.

Sky knew that he could not win this fight, grabbing Eclipse around the neck Sky shouted to the heavens, “I swear by my life I will defeat you, even if it takes millenniums!” With his arm still wrapped around Eclipse, Sky took the Oracle Staff and shouted an inaudible phrase.

An orb of pure light burst out from the staff. The orb got bigger and bigger, until it engulfed both Sky and Eclipse. Eclipse’s screech was heard just before the light vanished.

***

The Oracle Staff clattered to the floor, both Sky and Eclipse had vanished. The din of the battle slowly drew to silence. Then, one screech erupted from the silence of the battlefield.

“Eclipse is dead!” the scream echoed around the battlefield, then it was brought up again and again “Eclipse is dead!” “Eclipse is dead!” Both the wolfborne, screaming in horror and the leonin, screaming in triumph. The wolfborne started to back away, then ran, screeching back towards their own kingdom.

All was joy for the leonin, until they noticed the place where Sky was battling Eclipse. A hush fell over the leonin, the area was not empty, but neither Sky, nor Eclipse were anywhere to be seen. All that was left in the clearing was a long staff made of twisted wood. The Oracle Staff.