Chapter Six

Heva watches over her people as they construct a wooden dock over a small lake, the sound of stone smacking against wood ringing throughout the village. When Heva took over as the chieftain she had decided to change her people’s fundamental way of life. No longer would they go looking for fights, taking in order to survive, they would provide for themselves.

“HEVA!!”, a goblin yells from behind. Heva turns to see one of the goblins she had assigned to gathering running towards her. Stomping in front of her the goblin bends over and grabs its knees, breathing heavily. Heva looks to the goblin and kneels down, “Is everything alright?”.

The goblin shakes its breathlessly, gulping the goblin looks up and wheezes out, “Monsters!”.

In the center of the village the wood elves gather to share meals and to enjoy one another’s company. A large fire is built to cook the days kills, surrounded by long tables lined with chairs, the elves chatter and laugh, savouring the fruits of their labor for the day. These sounds of merriment reached Igneous long before he made it to the festivities. Two children chase each other, stopping when they see Igneous and wave at him, Igneous smiles back and returns the wave, before the two resume their game, other children joining in, whilst their parents yell at them to be careful. Igneous drifts around the crowded tables to the head table where he usually sits with Yasevl, Nevil, Corma, and Nelly. Upon arriving at the table, he sees that his brother is absent and, in his place four pale beings sit that he has never seen before, one, that he believes to be male, in blue robes sits next to Corma, the two having a friendly but heated debate. A shorter male sits next to Nevil, laughing and passing a waterskin between himself and Nevil. He sees a one in a yellow robe, running after some of the children giggling. Then he sees Nelly talking to a figure in hunters’ garb, dark tan leather laced with fur at the boot and wrist, with hair as red as himself. Nelly sees him floating nearby and waves for him to come over. Floating over he sees that the figure is a woman with pale skin, round ears, and eyes as blue as the sky. Nelly grins and gestures to the woman, “Igneous, this is Nora.”, gesturing back to Igneous continues, “Nora this is Igneous.”.

Nora smiles and extends a hand towards Igneous, “It’s nice to meet you. Nelly here has been talking my ears off about you and all the excitement that has been happening since you got here.”.

Igneous looks the woman’s hand and bites his lip. Igneous imagens all the heat leaving his hand and extends it, his fiery skin turning darker. Nora grabs his hand and shakes it up and down, and his body with it. Laughing Nora lets go, “Nelly told me that you have been practicing on not burning people when you touch them, and I thought that I’d give you a little practice.”.

Igneous shakes off the dizziness from being shook and nods, “Yeah it’s been hard, but I’m getting the hang of it.”, knitting his brow together Igneous looks at the side of Noras head and asks, “You said Nelly had been talking your ears off, is that why they’re not pointed?”.

“IGNEOUS! THAT’S RUDE!”, Nelly yells in reprimand at Igneous, but Nora only smiles. Nora turns her head to the side and brushes hair from her ear, “It’s okay Nelly. Humans don’t have pointed ears like elves, our ears are naturally round, see?”.

Igneous examines Nora’s ears and nods, “I see.”.

Laughing Nora turns her head back and fixes her gaze on Igneous, “I take it you haven’t met anyone other than elves.”.

Igneous shakes his head back and forth, “I’ve only met wood elves, and Yasevl, who is a spirit.”, Igneous’ face then becomes very serious and he adds, “And goblins.”.

Nora’s smile shrinks back, and she takes on a somber tone, “Yes, Nelly told me of the attack.”, looking to Nelly with sympathy and obvious affection in her eyes then adds, “ Thank you for protecting Nelly and this village.”.

Nora looks at Igneous with deep gratitude, causing Igneous to blush, “Well, I did what I could.”.

Nora smiles and changes subjects, “Well, on a lighter note, why don’t I introduce you and Nelly to the others.”.

Igneous smiles and opens his mouth to reply, but is promptly interrupted by Nelly, “Oh, please. I’d love to.".

Nora grins and wraps her knuckles on the wooden table and calls out, “Hey guys, introduce yourself to my friends over here, Nelly and Igneous.”.

The others at the table stop their conversations and look over at the three. The short man in red with brown hair that had been talking to Nevil smiles, his face red and his green eyes hazy, and says with a wave, “ Hey there, I’m Mitch. Nice to meetcha’ little elf and Mr. Talking Fire.”.

The tall man in blue next to Corma rolls his brown eyes and leans forward to look at the shorter man, “He’s a sprite you dolt.”.

Mitch waves the comment away and turns back to his conversation with Nevil. Leaning forward his elbow on the table the man smiles at Nelly and Igneous with a hand extend, “Sorry for my comrades’ rudeness, I am Korren.”.

Nelly reaches over the table to shake the mans hand, followed by Igneous floating over and taking it, the man giving him a much smaller shake then Nora had. The man retracts his hand and smiles, “So I hear that you both have some talents in fire magic, I’d love to see you at work. I know a little fire magic myself, maybe tomorrow I can give you some pointers?”.

Nelly’s eyes go wide and looks to her father, “Dad?”.

Nevil looks to Corma who gives him a nod, Nevil shrugs and turns back to his daughter, “As long as your grandmother and Igneous are there in case of any mishaps.”.

Nelly grins, “Oh thank you, thank you, thank you.”.

Nevil smiles and turns back to Mitch, taking the waterskin out of the man’s hand and takes a long swig before grimacing and handing it back. Nelly nods her head at Korren who smiles and turns back to Corma. The woman in yellow runs by, now being chased by the children. Nora smirks and points after her, “That’s Marigold, she’s the priest and healer of our party.”.

Igneous turns his head at Nora’s last words, “Priest? Party?”.

Nora twists her mouth and places the tip of her fingers on her chin, drumming them against her chin. Nora thinks for a moment then nods, “A priest is someone who serves a god, and in Marigold’s case that is Dorean, god of healing and diplomacy. She is why everyone can understand each other.”.

Seeing the confusion on both Nelly’s and Igneous’ face Nora sighs and explains, “A god is a being that people worship and serve. In return they watch over them and give them strength.”.

“Oh, like Yasevl?”, Igneous says looking to Nora.

“Kinda, yeah sure, but on a much larger scale.”, Nora says before adding, “And on us understanding each other. Nelly, do you remember when I first came to the village and no one could understand me?”.

Nelly smiles and giggles, “You sounded funny.”.

Nora smiles and nods, “Yeah, well, that is the language the humans’ from my village speak, and“, gesturing to the other humans, “them too. Now, I leaned how to speak the wood elf language, but they don’t know it. So, instead of them having to learn it like I did, Marigold prayed to her god and cast a spell that allows people that speak different languages to understand each other.”.

“Oooh. Okay.”, Igneous says, parroted by Nelly.

“So, then what did you mean by party then?”, Igneous asks .

“Oh, well our adventuring party, of course.”, Nora says as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. Upon seeing the two’s blank stares, Nora sighs, “Adventurers are people that are hired by people through the Adventurers Guild to take care of monsters and other problems.”.

“Hire?”, Nelly asks this time. Igneous follows with, “Monsters?”.

“This is going to take awhile to explain everything.”, Nora says rubbing her hand over her face .

A rabbit with a spiraling golden horn runs through the underbrush of the forest, dodging thorn patches and other running creatures, its little heart pounding. The horned rabbit darts into a bush and stands quietly still. When nothing happens, the rabbit begins to lick matted blood from its brown coat. As the rabbit licks its fur, it hears a rustling and the bush it’s in begins to shake, the rabbits fur bristles as something pushes its way through the brush. A blue gelatinous substance oozes through the bushes branches untill a ball of slime with a small crystal core sits in front the rabbit and gurgles. The rabbit branches its horn at the slime and chitters its teeth at the slime who responds with a terrified and pathetic gurgle. The rabbit stabs at the slime, causing it to shrink back and begin oozing out of the bush when a shadow falls on the bush and a dark claw shoots in and grabs the slime. The rabbit shrinks back and tries to make itself as small as possible as it hears the slime let out a weak gurgle, followed by silence. The rabbit sits trembling in terror, when a dark claw shoots in to the bush and grabs the rabbit by the neck and pulls it out of the bush. The rabbit is pulled up and comes face to face with the horrific visage of a goblin with black wriggling skin. The goblins face twists into a snarl and it shows sharp red teeth and growls in a deep voice that sounds like agony personified, “Hello pretty rabbit.”.

The rabbit twists in the air, placing its feet on the arm of its attacker and pushes with all its strength, its hind-leg muscles tense. The goblin lets out a sinister cackle, “Fight all you want little thing, but you won’t escape me. Nothing will.”.

As the rabbit fights to get free the goblin unhinges its jaw and opens its mouth wide to show off rows of deep red, dagger-like teeth. The goblin pulls the rabbit close. This sight is the last the rabbit sees.

After Nora finishes explaining that people use coins to buy and sell things she went on to explain the concept of kingdoms and how that there was a number of them and that they each were controlled by a king or queen or ruling class of nobles, which she explained. She explains that the Adventuring Guild that helps people with problems in exchange for money, and that every town and village in the kingdom she was from has one. Finally, she explained that monsters were beings with increased mana, which usually manifested in the form of increased physical strength and abilities. Luckily for Nora the food arrived before Nelly and Igneous could ask any more questions. As the food was placed down on the tables, Igneous looked around and saw that Yasevl still had not joined them. Worrying for his brother the sprite floats up behind Nevil and whispers, “Where is Yasevl?”.

Pulled from his conversation with Mitch, Nevil turns and looks at Igneous and back at Mitch, excusing himself Nevil gestures Igneous to follow him. The two step away from the table just out of ear shot. Nevil looks back once more then to Igneous, “Lord Yasevl is in his temple, he didn’t wish to distract our guest.”.

“Distract them how?”, Igneous asks without thinking. Nevil looks at the sprite with a curious look and says, “Sometimes I forget how young you are. As you know we worship lord Yasevl. And I heard Nora telling you how the humans worship their god.”.

Igneous nodded and shrugged not understanding, Nevil sighs and continues, “And he doesn’t wish to create a problem with the humans by showing himself around the human priestess. Okay?”, not waiting for Igneous to answer Nevil adds, “Now let’s get back, but lord Yasevl wishes to see you after we are done eating.”.

Nevil turns back and heads back to his seat and resumes talking with the people at the table. Igneous follows behind and takes his seat on the table in a small stone carved chair. And digs into a slab of moss deer meat. The group of adventures, the elves, and the sprite spend hours talking and eating before the fire at the center of the village begins to flicker out, which signals for the evening to end. The adventures say their farewells to the elves and sprite and are guided to a recently unused hut, the wood elves walk back to their respective huts. Igneous, after saying good-night to Nelly and her family, makes his way up to Yasevl’s temple. Floating through the doorway Igneous sees Yasevl sitting on the floor, his legs crossed and his hands in his lap. Upon noticing the sprite, Yasevl smiles and gestures for Igneous to sit on a stone slab on the floor that had been put there just for Igneous. Doing so Igneous plops down on the stone. Yasevl shifts and turns to face Igneous and asks, “Did you enjoy meeting the humans?”.

Igneous smiles and nods vigorously, “Oh yes! Nora told me about a lot of things about their kingdom and about being an adventurer and all the things she’s seen. I would love to see them for myself one day.”.

Yasevl nods and gives the sprite a small smile, “Then you should.”.

Igneous cocks his head and asks, “What do you mean?”

“You should go with the humans when they leave, if you want to and if they’ll take you. See the world.”, Yasevl says looking at Igneous with soft eyes.

“You want me to leave?”, Igneous asks with fear and sorrow in his voice. Yasevl throws his head back as if struck, his eyes wide with surprise, then suddenly laughs deeply. This surprises and angers Igneous, “What is so funny about me being kicked out of my home?!”.

“Oh, Igneous. I don’t want you to leave, but I think you need to if you are ever going to grow stronger and see all there is to see.”, Yasevl says, smiling at his brother and placing hand down near the sprite. Igneous looks up at his brother with uncertainty and asks with a timid voice, “So I don’t have to leave?”.

“Oh no of course not, you are my brother and will always have a home here.”, Yasevl says reassuringly then adds, “But, think about it, okay brother? Just talk to them some more and think about it, for me, okay?”.

Igneous nods his head slowly then stops and looks at Yasevl, “Only if you meet them first and if there is no problem then I’ll go.”.

Yasevl ponders for a moment and then nods, “Alright Igneous tomorrow I will introduce myself to them.”, Yasevl smiles then adds, “Well I already know Nora, but to the others I will.”.

Igneous nods and places a dark and only slightly hot hand on Yasevl’s and says, “Alright brother.”.

The two sit like this for a while, then quickly move on to Igneous telling Yasevl all about the training he and Nelly did, and what Nora had told him about. The brothers talk like this all night, only stopping when the room begins to fill with the gleaming rays of dawn.

Heva orders her warriors to guard the other goblins as they escape the village. A pack of deformed and twisted monsters of various types clash with the goblin warriors, taking more than a few down. Heva yells for the non-fighters to hurry and leave everything they can’t carry behind. Her shaman casts spells of fortification on both the warriors and the fleeing civilians. She hopes this will be enough to get them to the elven village. They may have been foes for generations, but the foe they were facing was far worse than any blood feud. She watches as the twisted and dark form of her brother laughs maniacally as he bites into the neck of one of the fallen goblins taking a chuck from it when he pulls back, smacking his lips as black blood drips from between his bared red teeth. She watches as the dead goblin begins to convulse on the ground his and its mouth foams, before its skin grows black and its limbs twist, bones snapping and piercing the skin. The creature that had been a goblin jumps up from the ground and howls loudly, baring red teeth. Heva yells for her people to run faster and for her warriors to retreat. She hopes they make it before all of her people become one of those things. As she runs, she can hear what was once her brother yell, “RUN ALL YOU LIKE SISTER! I’LL STILL GET YOU AND YOUR TRAITORS!”.