Chapter warning: All events in this chapter are fictional. Do not attempt anything from this chapter in real life. Seriously. DO NOT try this at home.
Nettal screamed. Addie screamed. The creature screamed.
Addie’s heart started racing in her chest. She glanced over her shoulder. Some kind of short furry man stood just a few steps behind Addie. His brown furry silhouette was accented by Addie’s purple flames.
Strangely, the furry man started cowering away from the two girls. He put his hands up in front of his face, then he started whooping. He quickly turned tail and ran back in the direction he had appeared from.
Now out of sight, Nettal also stopped screaming. Addie felt like she could breathe again.
“What the heck was that!?” Nettal pointed down the cave.
“I don’t know!” Addie shouted back, scrambling to her feet. “Stop shouting or it might come back!” She whispered harshly. Addie ignored the fact that Nettal had said a bad word.
Squishy must have picked up on Addie’s distress through their soul bond since she felt him talking to her, “What happened? I shall hurry back.”
“It’s okay, we’re fine. Keep looking for food, but stay close.” Addie responded through their bond.
“Call for me without delay should you be in danger.”
“Whatever it was, it can’t have been too dangerous. It ran away from us!” Addie said to Nettal and laughed a bit. Then, she repeated the message to Squishy through their bond.
Nettal let out a big breath. “I thought he was going to attack us!”
“Me too!” Addie smiled.
Both girls started chuckling, partly at the ridiculous situation they were in.
“Did you see his face?” Nettal got out between chuckles, “I thought he was gonna poo himself!”
Addie started laughing so hard that her chest hurt. She replayed the image in her mind over and over again, of the tiny furry man running away in terror. “He did look like that!” Addie agreed.
After a bit, the laughter petered out, and Nettal’s expression turned serious again. “I’m sorry for the thing I said earlier. Let’s work together and get home, ok?”
Smiling, Addie replied, “Yeah. I’m sorry too. We can definitely find a way home.”
Nettal held her hand out, and Addie grabbed onto it. Together, they could accomplish anything.
“Maybe we can wait for Squishy to get back first. I’m starving.”
“Yeah, ok.”
Both girls sat back down.
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“I found some kind of furry rabbit,” Squishy proclaimed as he dropped something that looked nothing like a rabbit.
It hit the floor of the cave with a limp plop.
“That’s a raccoon!” Nettal said. “Ew, couldn’t you have found literally anything else? These things eat garbage!”
“We had an honorable fight. It is only just that we consume the corpse in his honor.” Squishy flicked one of his ears.
“Yeah, we’re not eating that,” Addie agreed with Nettal.
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Luckily, Nettal had a pocket knife, and Squishy even managed to find some trees to take some sticks from.
Now, everyone was staring at meat cubes on a stick, mounted over a pile of firewood. It still looked half frozen, so Addie didn’t know if it would burn. Well, everything always burned when she used her soul flames, it just might not be hot.
With a flicker, she created a ball of flames in her right hand, and she reached down to spread the fire to the wood pile. The flames spread immediately, but just as she had feared, the ghostly purple-white flames didn’t produce a lick of heat.
Her training with Christena came to mind and all of their magic lessons together, too. Christena had talked about this, about using magic sideways. If her magic was suited toward it, she could alter her magic to do something outside of its main power.
Addie furrowed her brow and concentrated. She remembered her fight with Black Cloak. At that time, his flames at the end of their battle had felt hot.
If there was one thing Addie remembered from that fight, it was rage. She hated Black Cloak. All the children he hurt, and especially how he hurt Nettal.
But there was more to it than that, wasn’t there? She didn’t want her soul flames to just be destructive. Flames could give warmth and life. Not just destruction.
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Addie turned her head and looked at Nettal’s ring, which started to glow all of a sudden.
“What are you doing?” Nettal asked as she held her finger up in the air.
The ring was talking to Addie. Then, the book flew out of Addie’s soul and glowed the same color as Nettal’s aurocondite ring. The golden hue lit up the cave in the majestic color of dragons.
*Take the rage, remember your magic lessons with Christena. Feel the energy of dragons.*
*Now! Combine those feelings! Create warmth, hatred, and glory! Fire!*
Ember and Addie joined their intent. The sickly black scars on Addie’s chest burned. Then, she released the fire from her hands.
They burned white hot— not a trace of ghostly purple in the mix. The flames roared out from her palms and scorched the stone underneath so hot everyone but Addie had to take a few steps back. She felt the stone warm up under her bare feet. The cave was bathed in blinding light, the stalactites and stalagmites casting shadows across the walls. Addie blinked as the heat pressed up against her face, but it didn’t hurt. Her flames would never hurt her again.
Finally, she stopped the magic and looked at the firewood, the cave suddenly becoming black once again. She had to use her spatial sense to look at the pile. Nothing remained but ash. A moment later, the mounted sticks with raw meat fell over, spreading ashes into the air when they landed in it.
“Well, that was a bit too much,” Addie observed.
Nettal coughed a few times, “Yeah. Don’t do that again near me, ok?” she said.
“Okay.”
Addie rubbed at the back of her head as she turned to face Squishy. “Can you get us more firewood?”
Squishy chortled at her, but then he happily ran off to gather more wood.
“Will you be able to do that again, but with less fire?” Nettal asked.
“Yeah. I get it now.” Addie said.
One of the cracks in her soul slotted into place, like two jagged edges finally fitting perfectly back together in a puzzle. That section of her soul glowed for a moment, and then healed, smooth as it had ever been before. One of the black marks over her heart faded, gone forevermore.
“I can definitely do that again,” Addie said with confidence.
With a decisive snap, the soul book slammed shut. Then it got sucked back into Addie’s soul.
“Addie, what was that book?”
Flicking her fingers, Addie ignited another soul flame on her pointer finger, just enough for a bit of light.
“Oh, that’s right. I haven’t told you yet. I found this book in the library, and it’s supposed to help me learn how to use Ember’s magic.”
“Huh. How come you didn’t tell me about that sooner?” Nettal put her fists on her hips.
“I forgot, I guess.”
“You forgot to tell me about the magical glowing book sitting inside of your soul?” Nettal cocked her head.
“Yeah,” Addie replied.
“Alright.”
Both girls just stared at each other for a bit. Addie thought Nettal was staring at her, but she realized after a moment that she was more likely just staring off into space.
“Oh, Squishy’s back.” Addie could feel Squishy getting closer through their bond.
Nettal turned around and watched as Squishy trotted back into the cave. After everyone noticed Squishy, he stopped making so much noise with his paws. He walked the last few steps silent as a hunter. Then, he unceremoniously dropped the giant branch he had dragged in behind him.
Addie and Nettal worked together to stomp the giant branch into more manageable pieces of firewood, which was difficult due to how frozen the wood was.
Finally, Addie pulled from her magic again, this time sending a steady stream of those hot white flames into the pile. It took longer than she expected, but soon the wood caught aflame, and Addie was able to stop using her magic. She admired the white flames coming from the logs, still the same color as she created them. For a moment, she expected it would look like a regular fire, orange or red. But actually, this made sense. Even if she wasn’t using her magic at this exact moment, the flames were still hers.
Taking a deep breath in, Addie smelled the nostalgic aroma of a campfire, and a brief flash of memory appeared in her mind. A moment, sitting on her father’s lap, staring into the embers of a campfire. The memory faded away as fast as it came, though.
Behind her, Nettal started coughing again.
“Ack. This—” *cough* “This smoke is worse in the cave!” Nettal started fanning around her face and backing up.
Addie wanted to suggest that Nettal walk further away, but for some reason, her mouth wouldn’t quite work right. Actually, her whole body seemed to be weird and tingly. The edges of her eyes were going black too.
Like someone yanking a chain attached to her chest, something pulled strongly on her soul bonds and the next moment Addie was in Realmspace. Nettal and Lotty popped in a moment after, and finally Squishy at the very last.
The edges of her vision were still dark, so Addie sat down on the floor for a moment and just caught her breath. Beside her, Nettal and Lotty were both coughing like crazy, also sitting down on the floor.
“What” *cough* “Happened?” Nettal got out between hacks.
“I don’t know,” Addie said slowly, groggily.
“I pulled all of us into Realmspace. Something put poison in the air.” Squishy turned his angular cat-like face toward Addie.
Addie just took a moment to get her breath. Once she felt well enough to stand, she spoke up to Nettal, “Squishy said there was poison in the air.”
Her coughing started to ease up, and Nettal just stared up at Addie’s face. Then, she turned her head to Lotty with a concentrated look on her face.
“Oh, Lotty, you’re right.” Nettal smacked her palm into her forehead. “That was stupid! You can’t light a fire in a cave! At least, not without some kind of chimney. We were choking on the smoke and other poisons from the fire.” she explained.
“I didn’t know that.”
“Yeah, that’s why Mom always said we can only have fire in the fireplace. Since, that makes a path for the smoke and poison.”
“Huh. That makes sense I guess.” Addie said.
Still sitting, Nettal spread her legs out on the Realmstone. “Well, we might as well sit here and wait until the food might be cooked anyway."
“It’s so warm in here.” Nettal put her hands behind herself and used them to lean back a bit.
“Do you think it’s ready yet?” Addie asked.
“It’s only been like ten seconds!” Nettal rolled her eyes.
“Alright.” Since it would be a while, Addie also decided to sit back down.
They waited for what felt like forever to Addie, but it probably wasn’t more than ten minutes.
“I will check the meat.”
Squishy pulled on their magic again and disappeared from Realmspace. A moment later, he returned, with three big cubes of meat already sitting in his jaws. He turned his head up in the air and gobbled the meat down like a bird, only barely chomping on it to help get it down. “It is cooked.”
Addie sucked in a breath and held it, then jumped back into reality. Upon reappearing in the cave, she held her hand out to the fire. The magic flames quickly smothered out under Addie’s will. Then, still holding her breath, Addie walked over to the meat skewers, grabbed the five remaining ones, and teleported back into Realmspace. She handed two to Nettal, one to Squishy, and kept two for herself.
Bland-cooked meat had never tasted so good.