Life in the Flames

Life in the Flames-1

It was a quick and dreamless sleep, and I awoke before the sun rose, stiff and hungry. I took one last look at a mist shrouded Lake Korin, and set off down the stream towards camp.

The morning fog was with me until I made it through the trees.

The sun had just begun to flood the ground with golden light, and the birds were starting to sing their morning songs.

The morning breeze gently played at the flap of the tent as I approached and ducked inside. I looked around and found my parents' cots abandoned.

Strange, I thought.

Changing out of my dirty training clothes, I pulled on a dark navy sleeveless top and tucked it into my loose baggy brown breeches. Then I slipped on my sandals, grabbed my waterskin, wrapped it around my shoulders, and then I slipped out into the morning sun.

Something was wrong, something was very wrong.

It was way too quiet.

No one was out moving amongst the tents of our settlement along the shores of Reodran Sea. No cooking fires were lit, no one was in the cove playing in the morning sea foam, no one was tending to the gardens, no one was with the animals, and no one was in the trees that skirted the edge of camp.

Uneasiness began to settle over me as I tried recalling my years of training to avoid panic.

I went from tent to tent, tearing open the flaps but found no one. The silence was unnerving; all I could hear was my heartbeat, my feet hitting the grass, and the sounds of the waves lapping the shore.

"Hello!" I yelled but gained no response.

Where did everyone go?  I thought as I walked down towards the shore where the waves crashed gently on the white sandy beach. My entire body was screaming to just touch it, to feel the water against my skin. Within me, the power to control water surged to come into contact with my element.

The instant I stepped in the cool salty water I felt it all.

From out in the deep sea, I could feel large ships cutting through the waves toward land. I felt heat, the utterly unbearable heat, like my blood was about to come to a boil. Then with a surge I felt the power of my people through the ocean, the other water wielders, but it was becoming weaker and weaker with each passing second.

I closed my eyes and sensed with all my power which direction the battle was coming from. Seconds later my eyes snapped open and I started dashing down the beach. My people were in the next cove.

What could the tribe have done to warrant an attack? Our tribe of water wielders lived far from any other human settlements as our peaceful nomadic community traveled through our ancestral lands throughout the year. Always the same places, same path, same lakes, rivers, and ocean. There was nothing we could have done to deserve violence.

When I rounded the corner of the beach a wall of smells hit me: fire, water, salt, blood, burning hair, skin, and smoke. The smoke caused my eyes to water, which made the entire scene blurry. I saw people, my people fighting a line of fierce warriors in green.

Never before had I seen these invaders, and with no cause they were attacking my people, my family, and to my horror, they were winning.

My people were no warriors. No armor for protection, no weapons to put up a fight, and not nearly enough bending knowledge or power to put up a fight. 

The earth wielders had come to destroy.

They rumbled the ground and sent lava from deep underneath my people's feet to consume them. Many of my people fell to the earth benders' powers and were devoured by the molten lava, while the few others left alive tried to run to the sanctuary of the sea.

During this time, sailing toward the battle were five large wooden battle ships with red flames on the billowing sails; the sigil of the fire kingdom.

The waves split before the mighty warships of the fire wielders. From aboard the ships the fire wielders were setting ablaze and launching fireballs flying, trying to hit the powerful green adorned earth warriors.

The fireballs didn't seem to even faze the earth wielders. The remaining legion of fifty earth wielders blocked the fireballs by stomping on the ground, causing giant rifts of earth to shoot out from the bedrock beneath the sand, and with it, blocking the oncoming fireballs in their tracks.

My people fought their hardest to put out the lava by sending waterspouts and water whips, but nothing could stop the warriors and their ground moving powers. They sent showers of rocks and boulders but worst of all they opened the ground at my people's feet, and they were swallowed by the earth. It was absolute hell.

Then I saw my mother and father, back to back, fighting off a pair of warriors with their bare hands. From a distance I could see the bloody gashes and injuries they both had covering their entire bodies.

"No!" I yelled as I ran closer to the carnage through the water. My anger was swelling inside of me and I used it to my advantage. Any ounce of self-control that I still contained was burned away by pure fury and adrenaline. Losing myself was a risk I was more than willing to make.

I put my hands down into the water causing the tide to stop in its tracks and build up into a large tidal wave. It grew and grew until I could hold it no longer. Before I completely lost control of the powerful tidal wave I lifted my hands and sent the powerful wave forward onto the battle scene.

All the fires were doused, the lava sizzled and hardened. The warriors screamed in terror as they saw the oncoming wall of water, and they dropped their swords and spears to run. Every single one of them was caught in the powerful wave and was washed out to sea. The undertow was merciless as it pulled each one of those men below to the dark depths.

I quickly looked around to try to find my parents, my only family. Numbly I walked over to the spot where they had been fighting, but found nothing but shallow outlines of footprints being washed away in the sand. They were gone, and so were my people. The tears came as I realized I was truly alone.

I took a step back and tried to take comfort in the waves. I screamed in anger and pain, shooting a wall of water all around me. The waterspout went 30 feet into the air and then it came back down in raindrops around me, the salt water mingling with the tears streaming from my eyes.

Suddenly spots soon began to blur my vision along with the tears, and my head began to spin. Maybe dying would not have been the worst thing. I could go with my family . . . I almost welcomed the threatening oncoming darkness. I stumbled to try and regain myself on the shore, but all my limbs went completely numb and I collapsed onto the damp sand.

......

It felt like I was being carried, cradled in someone's strong, muscled arms as they shuffled through water. I could feel a strange amount of heat radiating off the body into mine. I felt so weak and worn out I couldn't open my eyes.

"She's the last one left sir. We were . . . too late for everyone else," a gruff voice said somewhere beside.

"We should have left sooner," the voice of the man carrying me said. It sounded angry and pained but it had a melodic deep tone behind it. Then the speaker turned his attention to me, "Poor thing. To see one's family gone in an instant. Surely she's drained from what she did."

"Truly magnificent, water wielders, and powerful" the first voice said almost warily.

"Yes and beautiful," the one who was carrying me said quietly so his companion couldn't hear him.

I finally found the strength to get my eyes to flutter open to look directly into the reddest eyes I had ever seen. With a frightened gasp I fell right back under into the blackness.

......

I know it's kinda short but it gets better, I promise ;) please keep on reading! Hope you liked it ~Morgan =)

9/12/18 - Revisiting an old friend and changing it up. Chapter 1 edited and updated. Thank you for taking the time to check out my work. ~Morgan =)