by D. Levesque
“And by touching the small globe of water, you reel it in,” I say to her with a laugh at her ingenuity. “But how do you keep the bird up in the air like that?”
“Oh, that’s the magic. I can change the density of the water. It comes back to me quickly to keep it up in the air, and then once it’s in front of me, I change the density of the water to keep it more solid so that it stays up. Also to slow it down, so it doesn’t hit me in the face,” she says with a blush.
“So you have been hit in the face by the birds?” I ask her with a laugh.
She laughs awkwardly and says, “Not just birds. I can also use this for land animals. I have been hit in the face by rabbits, foxes, and even a boar once. That last one, in fact, knocked me out for hours. The trick of slowing them down before they hit me by changing the density of the water as they get closer to me took me another year to figure out.”
“Hey, that’s still good. Maybe it was a hard lesson to learn, but good job!” I tell her, patting her leg, which makes her look down quickly. I remove my hand and ask her, feeling awkward myself now, “So, how do we clean that bird?”
“With magic again. I use Water for this. I don’t want to dirty our area, so I move it away from us,” she says, and then suddenly the bird is encased in a water bubble. She waves her hand and the bird and the water move about ten feet away. She waves her hand again and the bird’s head gets decapitated, but it stays in the water. I expected blood to spurt all over, but it doesn’t.
She must figure out what I’m thinking because she says, “So in my water, I don’t let the blood run. Blood is made of water, so I can control that as well. So I tell it to stay in the body. For now. The next step is the feathers.”
Suddenly the water starts spinning super quickly around the bird, and when it’s done, the bird is bald. Amazing, beside the bird is an additional pocket of water holding the head and the feathers.
“Now, I don’t want the insides of the bird, so I do this,” she says, and the bird suddenly splits in half down the middle. I can see inside it and as I watch all the parts move into the extra water globe as well.
Not even a red streak anywhere. Then, I see a thick red rope move from the bird to the second water globe. Once it’s done, both globes separate, and Leeha now has one with chicken, I mean Macoa, and one with what I guess is inedible stuff.
She waves her hand, and the second globe suddenly flies off into the forest. “So that globe I will send about a mile away and just drop in the forest somewhere. Now, as for the bird, we need to cook it,” she says, looking around for something.
“We need sticks,” she says.
“Here, I’ve got something even better,” I say, an idea coming to my mind. With that, I think Earth, and then Stone Stick, and I imagine it being about four feet long, and thin, about half an inch thick. I want it pointy at one end to slide the bird meat on, and then thick on the other end to push into the ground. When I’m done, I am holding a cooking spit stick made out of stone. Is that a thing?
“Will this work?” I ask Leeha. She grabs the stick slowly and looks it over and then looks up at me and grins. “This is amazing! With this, you don’t need to worry about the stick burning. Though, can you make the other end pointed as well to make it easier to stick in the ground?”
“Hmm,” I say and take the stick back. Again, I think Earth, and I imagine the end that I had left blunt changing into a thicker, sharp end. Just like that, it changes.
I hand it back to her and she takes it, one hand reaching into the water globe and pulling out half of the bird. She spits it on the rock stick and shoves it into the ground, making sure that the bird is angled over the fire. Without waiting, I create another rock stick, and hand it to her. She nods her thanks with a smile and does the same thing with the other half of the bird, shoving it next to the first one.
Leeha sits back against the rock behind her and says, “It’s going to get dark soon. We should get some more wood.”
“I can do that, at least,” I tell her with a smile directed at her. I get up and head into the forest, noticing that Leeha is right, it is getting dark. It takes me about ten minutes to get a good load of dead wood that I find on the ground, since I don’t have a machete or an ax. Once we have a good pile of wood, I settle down next to her again. Leeha turns over the bird without even getting up, by just twisting the stick.
We sit in silence for another ten minutes, as the forest gets quieter and darker and the sun finally goes down, and all the light we have is our fire.
“Are you truly not from this world, Alex?” Leeha finally says in the quietness of the forest, with only the sound of the fire crackling and the bird cooking over it.
I turn slightly towards her before answering, “Yeah. I died on mine.”
“You died?” she says, appalled.
“Yeah. My God, on my world, he said my death was a mistake, that it was not my time yet. So I was given an option. Take on the life of the person who was meant to die, or come here to this world where magic is real. We do not have magic on our world,” I tell her.
“So your God spoke to our Gods, and they let him give you that choice?” she asks me, intrigued.
“Yeah, he said he talked to the Gods here, and it was all right,” I say, not telling her that it’s actually Angels who run this world and pretend to be Gods.
“And you said that your world has no magic? Then how come you understand some uses of it? Like those sticks?” Leeha asks, pointing to the sticks with the cooking pieces of meat on them.
“No, no magic on my world. To us, magic is only in stories. Although I’ve found out since I’ve been here that I can use the language of my world to do magic,” I acknowledge.
“That is sad to live in a world with no magic. Though, I am sure if you live in a world with magic but cannot use magic, it would be the same,” she says sadly.
“So not everyone can use magic on, what was it? Boromour?” I ask her, fishing for more knowledge.
“No, only those who are gifted can. And only for one Elemental. I did not get my gift of magic until I was sixteen.”
“So speaking of that, you said that most could only use one Elemental. Yet, my God gave me access to all of them. He knew I would need weapons to survive in this world. Though, I expected to get something like a dagger or a sword, not magical abilities. But you said that once every thousand years someone who can use all of them comes along. And that person destroys everything?”
“Yes, and each time they are called the Elemental Summoner. As you can use all the magical Elementals, that is what you are, even if you named yourself that as a joke. I wish to be there with you, as your ally, or more, when you do so,” she says, moving closer to me so that our knees touch.
“And you mentioned that most humans hate the other races?” I ask her, trying to ignore the fact that I have a fucking hot Elf next to me who is throwing off some pretty strong vibes that I am not sure I am reading correctly.
“Not hate. The humans deal with us, but there is always revulsion. As if we are tainted. You are the first human who has not treated me that way,” she says, putting her hand on my leg, “and for that, I thank you. Even amongst my own kind, I am rejected,” she says unhappily.
“What?” I ask her in shock. “Why?”
“Because I am an Elf, yet I take lives. I am an assassin. I use my magic to kill. Not just animals, but whatever or whoever I’m paid to kill,” she says, looking away from me.
I think that one over. I mean, she just admitted she’s a killer. But honestly, who am I to judge? This is not my world. And who knows, now that I am here I might end up doing exactly that. Killing. To survive. I can’t just go to the police station down the road or call them on my smartphone. Because guess what, Alex? That’s gone. Although, if she wants to stay with me, I can’t have her going around doing that anymore, right?
“Leeha,” I ask her slowly. “If I say yes to you staying with me, to destroy this world as you say, will you promise onl
y to kill if you need to protect me or yourself, and only if I order it?”
“If you will take care of me, yes!” she says passionately, staring at me intensely.
“Then it’s a deal,” I tell her with a smile, and bending down towards her, I kiss her lips as a seal. But really, it’s because I just want to kiss her since she’s so fucking hot.
Chapter Eight
Breaking away from the kiss after about a minute or two, I catch my breath and look at her. Leeha’s cheeks are red, and she is breathing hard as well.
“Hmm. The bird,” I tell Leeha, putting my forehead against hers.
“What?” she says, looking at me, still dazed from the kiss.
“The bird is burning,” I say.
“Oh, shit!” she says, scrambling up and grabbing the sticks. She takes them off the fire and looks at them, then looks back at me, blushing. “They are done,” she says, and hands me one of the sticks with half a cooked bird on it.
“Sorry for the lack of plates,” she says with a smile and a shrug.
“Hmm, let me see. If I can make sticks, why not plates?” I ask her with a grin.
With the stick in my hand, I think Earth and then Stone Plate. The stick begins to change shape by melting towards my hand, bringing the cooked bird towards my hand at the same time. As the stone reaches my hand, it flattens into a round shape and actually starts to look like a plate, and then it deposits the bird piece gently on its flat surface. Once the transformation is done, I have a cooked piece of bird on a rock plate.
I hand the plate over to Leeha, who looks dumbfounded as she takes it. I grab the other Rock Stick and do the same thing, and within seconds I have my own plate with a piece of bird on it. Which, I now notice, smells amazing. Almost like cooked chicken, really. I can’t wait to eat it, though a fork and knife would have been good, but then I would also need a table and a chair. Don’t overdo it, Alex. Grabbing a piece of the hot Macoa, I blow on it and pop it into my mouth.
Damn, this is like chicken, but it has a better taste to it. Like it doesn’t need salt or pepper at all. It’s like it’s infused with spices already. I look over at Leeha in surprise, and see she is looking at me eagerly.
“Good?” she asks me, grinning from ear to ear.
“How is that possible? It tastes like it’s been spiced?” I laugh.
“The Macoa is a special bird in that it eats seeds that are spicy, which infuses its meat. We were lucky that one was out here today, as it’s been days since I last saw one,” she declares, biting into her own meat and giving a moan of pleasure.
Damn, what else will I find in this world? It makes sense that I would not find animals from my world because of natural selection. Or will I? I mean, she mentioned the Cat People and the Rabbit People. So maybe there are animals from my world here?
“Are there such things as bears, wolves, sheep, horses, deer, and such here on Boromour?” I question Leeha, taking another bite of Macoa.
Nodding, she answers, “Yes. I assume by your reaction that there is no such thing as Macoas on your world?”
“Nope, because damn, they taste amazing, and if we did have them at one time, I guess we hunted them to extinction. Which, on my world would not surprise me,” I finish with a sigh.
“On your world, are my people there?” she asks me with a mouth full, covering her mouth with her hand.
“No,” I tell her. “Honestly, on my world all we have are humans. Things like Elves, or these other races you mentioned? They are only in our stories and fantasies. The God who sent me here said that there are many worlds out there, each different from the other. Mine has no magic to speak of, or if it does, I have never seen it. We are a society of technology. Though, I always loved stories that involved magic.” I don’t go into gaming, as I am sure that would just confuse her.
Leeha thinks about that before answering. “I cannot imagine a world with just Elves. While you humans find us disgusting and revolting, we Elves do not feel the same about you. Though some of the humans I have met are pigs,” she says with a sneer. “Even those ones would still not touch us.”
“Is there a reason that humans think that way?” I question. There must be a reason behind all this.
Nodding, Leeha replies, “It comes from the last Elemental Summoner. They are not always human. Well, the last Summoner over a thousand years ago was. But before that, it was an Elf. And thanks to that Elven Summoner, the Elves were the more powerful race. Stronger than the humans,” she says.
“But we still lived in harmony with all other races, even the humans. The human Summoner, though, changed all that. He destroyed the Elven Nations and cast us out of society. Not only that, he also made it so that any relations with us was a death warrant. He changed the mindset of all the humans and made them believe that to have anything to do with us was the same as doing it with animals,” she finishes bitterly.
“And since they brought the Elves down, all other races were added to the mix?” I ask her softly, seeing where this was going.
Nodding, Leeha says softly, “Correct. Now humans are the most powerful race on Boromour.”
“Is it because there are more of them?” I ask her.
Leeha shakes her head and sneers, “No. We Elves are more plentiful than the humans.”
“Then what makes them more powerful than you Elves now?” I ask her.
Lying back on the rock, the Macoa eaten and only bones left on her plate, she says, “They are organized, and they work together. Once, we Elves were a people who prided ourselves on working together, even with other races. Now?” Leeha looks back at me. “We are a disbanded race who try to survive on crumbs.”
Fucking hell. We humans are shit, aren’t we? Even on my world we’re shitty to each other, and here we have humans that are shitty to other non-human races. I would not be surprised to find out we are shitty to our own race here too. I put my empty bird carcass down and lie back as well. Leeha hesitantly leans into me, but to show her that I do like her and am not revolted, in case she is still worried even after that kiss, I put my arm over her shoulder and bring her closer to me.
“Is it safe here at night?” I ask her, as it’s now gotten pretty dark, and the only light is from the fire.
“I am not sure. I have not camped here in ages,” Leeha says, sounding sleepy.
“Where are we anyhow?” I ask her, looking around, trying to penetrate the darkness.
“We are in the Mital Forest, which borders the human lands of Prithgar to the east. Just south is the City of Lomar, which is where I was going to seek work,” Leeha mumbles into the side of my chest.
Damn, she must be tired, even with the forced one-hour nap I made her take. I should be also, but I am wired. It must be because I am on a new world, with new surroundings, and I found out that I can use magic using English words as the trigger.
I hold up my left hand and think Earth, and a globe of dirt is floating in my hand. But as I look closer, I see it’s not a solid piece of dirt. Inside I can see dirt, small rocks, and even green grass seeds. I look around our campsite, and the only wall I see is really the large rock, more of a large boulder, that we are leaning against. We aren’t even protected from rain or wind, I think, as I feel a gust of wind blow in my face and see it fanning the flames of the fire.
Leeha’s breathing has changed and I don’t want to wake her, so I need to do this quietly. I place my hand on the ground and imagine a wall around our campsite, with spikes sticking out of it. Spike Wall, the words come to my mind. Suddenly I feel slight vibrations around us. The ground rises slowly, and within five minutes, exactly what I had envisioned surrounds me. A rock wall, about five feet tall, topped by spikes that are angled outwards.
I look up at the night sky, and it appears cloudy. So I place my hand on the boulder behind me and think Rock Protection, and slowly a rock shelf grows out of the boulder and over my head until it and our fire is protected. I also picture two stone pillars to hold the weight up at the corners near the
fire, and they slowly grow out of the ground.
Fucking hell, this magic shit is powerful! The magic users in this world must be formidable. I mean, I saw what Leeha could do with her water blades. I wonder how other mages? Magi? I will go with mages for now. I wonder how other mages create things?
Satisfied with our protection, I lean forward with Leeha in my arm, and grab a large log of wood and throw it into the fire, causing the fire to flare up and embers to go flying all over the place. Settling back down with Leeha still sleeping in my arm, I notice that I am finally tired, actually. I lean my head against Leeha’s as a cushion, close my eyes, and slowly drift off to sleep before I know it.
“Alex!” Leeha shouts in a panic.
I open my eyes, expecting some bear, wolf, or monster to be attacking us, but it’s just us at our campsite. The fire is mostly embers now, but it’s light out, so we shouldn’t need it.
I glance at Leeha and she is staring around in a panic. Not sure what is going on, I ask her, “What? What’s wrong?”
“What’s wrong?” she asks me, seeming overwhelmed with fear. “We are trapped! Earth mages-” Yes! I was right, mages-“must have surrounded us during the night. With a wall like this, I would say there were at least ten of them working quietly overnight for hours to build this trap.”
“What?” I ask her, confused by her numbers. “Leeha, it’s all right. I built this. To protect us from animals or monsters. I also built this overhang to protect us from rain just in case,” I say, pointing up. Her eyes widen as they follow my finger.
“You did this? How! You must have barely slept!” she cries out in amazement.
“What? No, it took me all of five minutes. It would have been faster, but I was trying to be quiet to let you sleep,” I tell her, confused. “Although I did fall asleep right away after that. I suddenly got really tired, even though I was wide awake before that,” I tell her with a laugh. But Leeha doesn’t laugh with me. She simply stares at me in disbelief.
“Let me see if I got this right, Alex. You built this large structure, and this overhang over us, in less than five minutes?” she says slowly, looking at me with a penetrating gaze.
