Chapter Four

The days following the goblin attack went by fast, the wounded were tended to, the dead goblins burned, and the dead elves buried with seeds along the valley’s edge, so they may protect the village even in death. During this time Yasevl explained his and Nevil’s changes to the people, but no one could quite figure out Igneous change, but it was accepted as just part of life. After the mourning period was concluded life in the village resumed, but there were some changes. Yasevl had begun to interweave the border trees into a tight nit wall, it was slow work, but steady. Nevil began having everyone, children included, train with the guards and hunters every day to prepare for future attacks. Corma began to tutor not only Nelly in the ways of magic, but all of those in the village that had any affinity for it. This included almost all of the children and a high number of adults, Corma attributed this to the hereditary blessing given by Yasevl. Igneous did what he did best: he asked questions.

“But what’s the difference betweenthe blessing that you gave Nevil and the herbal blessing the others have?”, Igneous asked, floating behind Yasevl.

Taking his hands away from the trees that he had just finished weaving, he gives a quick chuckle, and turns to the small flame sprite, “First, its hereditary, not herbal,”, Yasevl says, wiping sweat from his brow, “and second, do you know what a blessing is?”.

Igneous thinks about this, he knows that somehow the blessing made both his brother and the elves stronger, but he’s not sure how, “It makes you stronger, but how?”.

Yasevl nods, adjusts his fur tunic, takes a seat on the ground and gestures for Igneous to do the same. Igneous lowers himself to the ground, the grass around him catching fire, but Igneous quickly absorbs the flames, and makes himself comfortable on the burnt ground. Smiling at Igneous’ increased control, Yasevl continues, “So yes, the blessing does make both me and the elves stronger. The hereditary blessing that all of the wood elves have is passed down from the previous generation, I gave my blessing to the elves when I first came to the village, and when they had children their children had it too. This blessing gives the elves their dark skin, green hair, and pale eyes, it also gives them extra strength, greater agility, and dexterity.”, Yasevl pauses for a moment before continuing, “It may also be the reason so many of them have a natural talent for magic, particularly nature magic.”.

Igneous takes in the information and nods his head. He understands most of what Yasevl says, “But, then how is the blessing you gave to Nevil different?”.

Yasevl nods, “Yes, well. The blessing I gave Nevil is an additional blessing. His blessing is much stronger than the others and there for gives him more gifts.”.

“But, why is it stronger, and why does it make you stronger too?”, Igneous asks, tilting his head to the side.

“Well, what the blessing does is give a piece of my center to the elves, and also gives a piece of their center to me. When I first gave the blessing to the entire village, I was much weaker and doing so made me stronger. I continued to give my blessing to each of the village leaders in order to make them stronger, and in the processes, I grow stronger too.”, Yasevl rubs his chin in thought before adding, “Each time I give the blessing I give more of my center, but I take more as well.”.

This got Igneous’ attention, “But, if you give too much, couldn’t you lose your center and the elves too?”, Igneous jumps up in surprises, “What happens when you have no more of your center left?”.

Yasevl smiles at the little sprite, “That will not happen. Every elf born with my blessing gives me a small piece of their center, and as they grow and get stronger so do I. So, there is nothing to worry about.”.

Igneous, feeling a little better, sits back down on the ground and rests is head in his hands. The two sit in peaceful silence, before Igneous shoots in to the air, startling Yasevl, “AH! What’s wrong Igneous?”, Yasevl says jumping to his feet.

Igneous shakes his head with vigor, then smiles widely, “Could I give blessings too?”.

This shocks Yasevl, he had never thought of it, “Well, I’m not sure. I never tried to do so as a sprite.”, Yasevl ponders the thought for a moment before adding, “I don’t see why not.”.

Elation spreads across his face, “Then can I try it?”.

Yasevl shrugs, “I don’t see why not, but on whom?”.

Igneous rolls his eyes and points at Yasevl, “Well you of course.”.

This causes Yasevl to scrunch up his face, “I don’t know if that is a good idea, seeing as I am wood and you’re fire.”, Yasevl gives a meaningful nod then adds, “It may be dangerous for the wood elves too, seeing as they have my blessing already.”.

Igneous’ excitement quickly drains from his face and leaves defeat in its place, “Oh. Well I guess there’s nothing that can be done then.”, Igneous floats back down to the ground, “Too bad there isn’t someone without your blessing.”.

This time it’s Yasevl’s turn to jump with excitement, “What if there is?”.

Igneous looks up at Yasevl with doubt, “Who?”.

Yasevl grins from ear to ear, “Not who. What.”.

Kexel quickly hides behind a large tree. Peering around the tree just in time to see the shadow that he had watched take the souls of his men, rush past. Jerking his head back Kexel flattens himself against the tree, hoping the shadow hadn’t seen him. A few silent moments pass , when nothing happens Kexel looks again, and nothing. When he turns back, he is face to face with a shadow, and begins to scream, before a cold hand covers his mouth. A voice, like an empty cave in the heart of winter, tells him, “Keep quiet! If you don’t shut up, she’ll find us.”, a sinister grin spreads across the shadows face, “And we don’t want that do we?”.

Kexel shakes his head back and forth has hard as he can. The shadow nods and takes away its head. Kexel studies the shadow, it is definitely not the same one that had been chasing him. The one that took the others was a shadow, but it was a warm black, with a humanoid shape and golden eyes. This shadow was a storm of swirly darkness, the hand that it used to stop his scream dissipates into a mist once removed, this shadow wasn’t as much black as it was just nothing else. Kexel looks at the shifting form of the shadow, not sure what it is, and whispers, “What are you?”.

Eyes, somehow darker than the rest of the shadow, open and looks deep into Kexel’s eyes, and as color seems to drain from the world, leans forward and whispers, “A friend.”.

Yasevl and Igneous sit in Corma’s hut, Yasevl squished into a chair far to small for his enlarged frame, and Igneous sits comfortably in his small stone cup and smiles smugly at Yasevl, happy for his small size. Yasevl squints his eyes at Igneous and sticks out his tongue at the sprite, before quickly retracting it as Corma comes back to the table.

“Here we go my lord.”, Corma says, placing her staff and the staff left behind by the goblin shaman on the table . Sitting down in the chair opposite of Yasevl, her knees popping as she does so, “Oh, getting old is the worst.”.

“Thank you, Corma.”, Yasevl smiles at the old druid, “I know you have been wanting to try this for some time.”.

The old elf nods her head, “Quiet, some time, but why the sudden interest? And why do you want the staff of that despicable goblin as well?”, Corma asks with a spit on the dirt floor of her hut.

Yasevl nods with understanding at the druids disdain for the goblins, but quickly moves the conversation along, “ Yes, you have been asking me for a while and I meant to get to it sooner, but today I was talking with Igneous here,”, at the mention of his name, Igneous gives Corma a little wave, bringing a smile to her wrinkled face, Yasevl continues smiling, “ and we were talking about blessings. Igneous wishes to try giving a blessing but seeing as everyone in the village already has mine, were not sure if it would be safe.”.

Corma nods, grasping what Yasevl’s thoughts, “And so you wish to try it on something that isn’t already blessed, but does have excess mana. Yes?”.

Yasevl smiles at the druid, “I knew you’d figure it out.”.

Corma looks to Igneous and upon seeing the confusing on his face, informs him that staffs that have been used by magic users absorb leftover mana from spells casted. And over the course of time the staff’s gathered mana can be used to fuel a spell or even strengthen spells casted through it.”.

“But, if the staff doesn’t have a center, or spiritual energy, how can it be blessed?”, Igneous asks studying the wooden staffs placed before him. Yasevl gestures towards Corma, indicating for her to answer, “Well, instead of trading spiritual energy with the staff as you would with a person, you place a piece of your center into the staff. This means that if you or lord Yasevl did this you would not get the same return as if you had blessed a living being.”, looking to Yasevl with suspicion, causing Yasevl to become very interested in the ground, Corma continues, “I believe this is why lord Yasevl is so hesitant to try it.”.

“No. Of course not Corma, I simply haven’t had the time. That’s all.”, Yasevl says, convincing no one. Corma rolls her eyes and turns her attention back to Igneous, “But, I have never heard of a sprite giving a blessing. It will be interesting to see.”.

Igneous jumps up and floats over to the staff that had been the shaman’s and begins examining its dark and twisted wood. The staff was made of a soft wood that had begun to darken unnaturally with age and twist at the end till it was in the shape of a claw. He extended his energy towards it and found the mana in the staff to have a dark tint to its blue. Surprised he floats over to Corma’s staff. Corma’s staff look like a healthy sapling that someone had just cut down, it had a golden hue to it with stripes of light green running along the shaft with both ends of it coming to large round ends. Repeating what he had done with the shaman’s staff, Igneous extends his energy towards the druid’s staff and finds the mana to be an intertwining stream of gold, green, and blue, with specks of clear energy. Curious Igneous looks up to Corma, “Why is the mana so different in your staff then the goblin’s?”.

“ That is because while I use mostly healing and nature magic, with the occasional wind spell, that shaman seemed to use only dark magic.”, Corma tells the sprite, “Mana changes depending on the different type of magic one uses.”.

Igneous looks between the two staffs then back to the druid, “Is that why the staffs look so different?”.

Corma smiles, “That’s very insightful and yes. The magic I use makes my staff healthier, making it appear more alive and fresher. While the shaman’s dark magic makes it’s staff become darker and more twisted.”.

Igneous grins with pride at Corma’s comment on him being smart and looks up at Yasevl, “I’m insightful.”.

“Yeah, yeah, you’re real wise.”, Yasevl says, waving the sprites comment off with a flick of his hand, “Will the different mana hurt the chances of the blessing working?”.

Corma scratches her chin and looks deeply at the staffs, “I don’t believe so, but we’ll just have to try it and find out.”.

Corma shrugs and looks between the spirit and the sprite, and begins to say, “So who wants to g-.”, before being cut off by a loud voice entering the hut.

“Grandma! You home?”, Nelly’s voice askes filling the small hut. When she walks in, she sees the three at the table and smiles. Rushing over she yells, “HEY! Igneous, lord Yasevl! Whatcha’ up to?”.

Before either of the two can answer the loud elf, Corma snatches her staff off the table and with a single smooth motion, bonks Nelly on the head with a hollow thud. “Ow! What was that for?”, Nelly asks with a poked-out lip, while rubbing her head.

“For being so loud, for not having manners, and for interrupting me!”, Corma fusses at her granddaughter.

“Geez, I’m sorry. Doesn’t mean you have to hit me.”, Nelly retorts.

“Yeah, but it’s fun.”, Corma says with a cackle, this causes Igneous and Yasevl to smirk, before ordering, “Now shut up and stand there quietly.”.

Nelly mumbles under her breathe but does as she is told. Corma turns back to the other two, “Now as I was saying before I was interrupted.”, she says with a pointed look at Nelly, “Who wants to go first?”.

The spirit and the sprite look at each other and shrug, before Nelly chimes in, “To go first for what?”, she asks stepping back and covering her head with both hands.

Corma sighs and begins to explain to Nelly what they were doing. While Corma informed Nelly, Igneous and Yasevl discuss what they should do.

“You’re the one that wants to try blessing something.”, Yasevl says looking to Igneous, “You should go first.”.

Igneous shakes his head, “Yeah, but I haven’t blessed anything before and if I mess up, we won’t know if it works. You should go first.”.

Yasevl nods, “Yeah , I guess that makes sense. Watch closely when I do it, okay?”.

“Okay.” Igneous replies as Corma finishes up telling Nelly everything.

“That’s so cool!!”, Nelly exclaims, “I want a blessed staff! Can I Grandma, PLEAASSEE?”.

Corma looks over to Yasevl and Igneous, who shrug in unison. Rolling her eyes Corma smiles at her granddaughter, “Fine, but it is not a toy.”, she says emphasizing the last three words. Nelly nods her head.

“Okay, so who’s going first?”, Corma ask.

Yasevl stands up, having to pull the chair off himself, shooting a glare at Igneous as the sprite snickers. Yasevl picks up Corma’s staff holding it in his hands, “I will.”.

Corma nods but remains silent. Yasevl begins to concentrate on the staff in his hands. Igneous watches closely, extending his energy to get a better look. Yasevl’s mana begins to flow like a river in his body, before running through his center. Igneous watches as a small piece of Yasevl’s spiritual energy is taken with the flow of the mana and taken down Yasevl’s arm and into the staff. Yasevl’s mana pulls back as the spiritual energy enters the staff, with the staff’s energy sweeping the spiritual energy into it. The mana and the spiritual energy mix together, the white of the spiritual energy growing in length, and taking on a green hue, before wrapping around the mana and connecting to the two ends of the staff, before settling. Igneous retracts his energy and looks at the staff, which now has patterns of intertwining vines up and down the shaft. Yasevl hands the staff to Corma, who happily takes the staff and feels along its length. Corma eyes go wide, “I knew that it would make the magic stronger, but I never thought that it’d do this.”.

Corma seeing the confusing on the others face smiles and says, “This will triple, if not quadruple, the strength of my nature spells and it may help me learn some new spells.”.

Yasevl looks to the staff with shock, “Really, I gave it barely more than a speck of energy?”.

“Yes, really.”, Corma says, placing the staff in her lap, then moving behind her at seeing the greedy look on Nelly’s face, “But, I’ll look into that later. Why don’t we continue for now?”.

Igneous smiles with excitement and rushes over to the shaman’s staff and places his hands over it, causing small hand shaped burns. Igneous closes his eyes and feels for his mana. Unlike Yasevls mana which flowed like a river, his twirls and flickers like fire. He focuses on his center and imagines his center extending, but only in one spot, burning towards his hands like a fire spreading across a dry field. As his center reaches the tip of his fingers, he lifts his hands off the staff leaving behind a small piece of his center. Pulling his center back into its previous form, Igneous watches as his spiritual energy turns red and begins to spread across the staff burning through the dark mana until its flickering red and black flames burn throughout the staff. Stepping back and pulling his energy inside himself Igneous looks at the staff. The dark wood of the staff now has red outlines of flame along it, with the tip of the claw turning completely red. Igneous eyes his handiwork, before flying into the air and hollering, “Wahoo! I did it!”.

Before Corma or Yasevl can say anything, Nelly snatches the staff and holds it over her head and runs out of the hut, yelling, “Awesome! I’m going to go try it out!”.

After Nelly has left the hut, the three-remaining look to one another and burst out laughing, Yasevl looks to Igneous, “Well, you did it! But it looks like we’ll have to wait to see just what you did till later.”.

Igneous smiles, “Yeah , but now we know I can.”.

The two look over to Corma, who has stopped laughing and has a worried expression painted over her face, Yasevl frowns, “What’s wrong Corma? You should be excited!”.

Corma looks up at Yasevl and says, “I am, I am. But, remember how I said the staff should help me learn new spells?”.

Yasevl looks to Igneous and the both of them nod at the druid, before realization makes their eyes go wide. Just then they here Nelly’s voice ring from somewhere outside, “WOW! I can do fire magic!”.

Corma jumps up and looks to Yasevl, and says, “We better head out there before she burns down the village!”.

Yasevl nods and rushes out with Igneous, with the much slower Corma following behind.

Kexel screams silently has he feels the shadow’s energy pierce his center and begin to spread. The shadow smiles as it feels the goblins center give way to its energy. Kexel feels his center being transformed and twisted, “You said you’d help me!”.

“Oh I am!”, the shadow yells as Kexel’s spiritual body begins to darken and grow, “Oh I am!”.