The Heroes I-The Black Fire Lighthouse

Chapter IX-The Hell Raider War Begins

Every warrior was gathered in front of the castle, all of them ready for battle. Garen, Max, Cody, and Becky were all in the front with the king and Langholm, looking down at the warriors in front of them. There were only a few that knew Fire of Color, but the rest were just natural humans who wouldn’t stand any chance against a Hell Raider one on one and the fear on all of their faces was obvious. Not one of them has ever even seen a Hell Raider before and now they must fight them. They could hear the Hell Raiders marching in from the forest as they were preparing for the raid and the sound of these beasts was unsettling.


“Archers, take your stations!” yelled King Lang over the roars of the Hell Raiders. “Swordsmen, follow me to the front; I want you four to be by my side.”


The archers ran to the top of the buildings that surrounded the outer line of the city and took to their posts as they looked down upon the beasts coming at them, the fear within them growing that much more. The swordsmen followed King Lang to the front of the city to face the head of the attack, Cody, Garen, and Max coming up beside him with their swords drawn. King Lang looked back at his ranks, drawing out his sword, everyone else following his lead, then he look at the three beside him.


“Where the hell is that woman?” he asked.


“She went up with the archers,” said Garen, “I told her to, it's her specialty.”


“You disobeyed my orders by sending her up there,” he said calmly, “but you know her better than I, so it is probably better that you did that.”


The Hell Raiders stopped within an arrowshot away from the men in front of them and began to pound on their chests, roaring at the frightened men in front of them. Some of the soldiers took a step back in fear and others griped onto their swords a little tighter. The air swirling around them was tense and full of fear and the Hell Raiders in front of them seemed to enjoy the smell of it. They truly were ugly creatures, Garen was thinking as he gazed upon the nine or more foot creatures in front of them. Their skin was either a nasty brown or puke green looking color and the teeth inside of their mouths were long and sharp enough to easily bite through a grown man's femur. The faces of these Hell Raiders were distorted looking and didn't have any symmetry to them at all and the body build had an unnatural tone of muscle, almost impossible for a sword to pierce through. How are these humans going to kill these creatures, Garen asked himself, more importantly, how am I going to kill these creatures?


King Lang turned to face his men behind him and shouted out, “Today is the day that we prove to the world that humans can fight back and win against unbeatable odds and that we can fight alongside our enemies to defend the human race!” he turned back to face the beasts in front of him. “Now hold your fire until they attack first!”


The larger Hell Raider that was in the front held up his arm and all the rest of the Hell Raiders behind him grew silent in queue. He looked back at the lead archer behind him and growled in a nasty voice, “Keep hold and don’t fire until they do, they are too weak to hold back their bows for too long.”


“Aye, sir,” said the lead archer and relayed the order to the rest of the Hell Raiders.


Near the top of all the buildings there was an older warrior trying to hold his arrow back as best he could, but it was obvious that he was struggling and shaking from the pressure with his fingers starting to slip.


“Hold your fire, old man,” whispered one of the Naron warriors, harshly, “you’re too old for this job now anyway.”


“I’m trying to, but it’s too much for me,” the old man replied. As he said this, the arrow slipped from his grasp and it shot off to hit a Hell Raider directly in the heart and as the beast hit the ground, every Hell Raider with a bow released their arrows, sending a shower of black toward the human warriors.


“You fo-” started the warrior, but he was struck down by an arrow in the forehead, causing him to fall over the edge and in the middle of the crowd.


The warriors on the ground collided in a shower of sparks from the swords clashing together. The sounds of men screaming echoed over the clashing swords, but as every beast was struck down, their screams would be heard for miles. Some of the human warriors covered their hears, not being able to handle the terrible scream coming from the dying Hell Raiders in front of them and the men who did this lost their lives. The fear on the men's eyes grew as the Hell Raiders broke through their ranks, thrusting their swords through the bodies of the men as if they were paper, some Hell Raiders just picked the soldiers up and threw them into each other.


Becky was on top of one of the walls, shooting her arrows at the Hell Raiders below, dropping one by one. She reached for her last arrow, lit it up with her Gold Fire, and fired it at the closest Hell Raider to her, dropping the beast to its knees; not being able to let out its horrible cry, for the arrow was shot into its throat. Becky, then jumped off the wall, drawing out two thin golden blades from there sheaths at her waist and ran into the crowd of warriors, swinging her swords in a deadly, yet graceful manner, trying to kill all Hell Raiders in her path.


Max wasn't in the fight when Garen ran up to him in a castle tower, blood splattered on his face and the front of his clothes. Max seemed to be zoned off into something in the distance, either too frighten to fight or too overwhelmed with shock, Garen couldn't tell.


"Max, you need to get out there and fight, there's no way we can win without another Fire Raider," Garen said to him. "Max! What are you doing?"


He didn't speak back to Garen at all, just pointed toward the Dark Forest in front of them, with his eyes growing wide and fear coming across his face. Garen looked over in the direction he was pointing and saw something that was almost as tall as the trees coming at them. Garen's face went blank at the sight of the monster; how is it that the Hell Raiders came across a creature like this, a creature thought to be of myth and legends? It had to be at least six meters in height and looked almost just like a Hell Raider, its teeth were almost visible from the distance it was at and the earth was already shaking from each step it took. It was an Orca Troll, one of the most viscous and deadliest monsters to thought to live on this planet, and one was coming toward them now. How can they kill something like this when they can barely kill off the Hell Raiders?


Cody was on the ground, lazily swing his sword at each beast that charged him. He almost seemed bored with the fight and didn't even pay attention to the Orca Troll coming at them. His focus was on something else in the distance, a glowing rainbow light that seemed to be calling out for him to come over. It was an ominous sign to him, but at the same time inviting. Cody started walking toward the light, still swinging his sword at the Hell Raiders, then, he was at the area where the light was, his sword still in mid-swing with blood coming off it. He started sliding his sword back into its sheath looking at the masked man in front of him, his Rainbow Fire coming back to him.


"What do you want with me, you freaky looking bastard?" Cody asked calmly.


The Masked One laughed at the comment, and then said, "I just want to spar with you Cody, it’s nothing to worry about. I know you weren't being serious in our last fight together, so I want a real one."


"I don't think you want that with me," Cody said smiling. "I mean, if you knew my past, I'm sure you would be quite terrified."


"Believe me, I know you're past better than you think, and I am nowhere close to being terrified." The Masked One drew out his sword and pointed it at Cody, telling him to do the same. So Cody drew out his sword and charged at the Masked One, the sparks coming from their blades as they met in a loud clash, shaking at each other's strength.











Jake looked out of his window at the battle going on outside the city, no one was allowed to leave their homes due to the danger that was around. He was worried that Cody might get hurt in this fight, those monsters were huge and it looked like there was an even larger one coming into the fight. He could sense something, though, something bad was out there and powerful and he thinks that's where Cody may be. Cody's away from the initial battle, but now in a more dangerous one with someone very dark and powerful, it scared Jake that much more for Cody. He felt his fingertips start to tingle, but didn't really think much of it, his heart felt warm and the feeling went throughout his body after a while and the tingling in his fingertips got a little worse, causing him to look down. What he saw excited him; there was a rainbow color glowing at his finger tips and it was amazing. The sensation it gave him was unbelievable, it felt like he could do anything right now, even go out in the battle and help fight. But he was way too young for that, all he can do now is watch and maybe fight in a later battle.


"Jake! What are you doing!" screamed his large mother from the doorway.


"I'm watching the fight, mum," Jake said to her, then turned back to the window, "I want to see if Cody will be alright."


"Jake, get away from that window, right now," she said to him in an angry whisper.


"No, I want to see this." The woman came over to him and grabbed him by his shoulder, trying to get him to get into the kitchen, but Jake resisted and Rainbow Fire sparked from his fingertips, causing his mother to jump back in fear.


"Y-you're one of them," she said, the words barely stumbling out of her mouth. "You're a monster."


Jake ignored her and turned back to the window and watched the fight, which seemed a lot clearer for him to see now. The beast was coming in closer, but for some reason that didn't interest Jake at all. His eyes shifted to where he felt the power before and he could now see two figures out there fighting with Rainbow Fire at an intensity that was almost too much for him to watch. One of the fighters was Cody, he was sure of that, but the other fighter was not known to Jake, all he could tell was that this other fighter was extremely powerful and extremely evil.











Dust was spiraling around them and sparks were showering everywhere from each strike of their swords. One would go to attack and the other would parry the blows, it was a constant back and forth struggle and their strength seemed to be neutral. The Masked One jumped back and started swinging his sword in a circle at his side, looking over at Cody, who was now breathing hard.


"You're much stronger than I thought, Cody," he said, walking toward him slowly.


Cody squared up his sword and swung at the Masked One, who swung back at him, their swords meeting in another shower of sparks. They swung again at full force and as soon as their swords met, both broke, pieces scattering everywhere and the two of them left standing there with only little stubs.


Cody threw the hilt of his sword to the ground and lit his hands up in Rainbow Fire, the Masked Hero doing the same. "I guess there's only one way to fight now," Cody said with a grin. "And this just so happens to be a very high skill of mine."


"As is mine, Cody," the Masked One said with a smile coming across his mask.


He took a step forward and was out of Cody's vision for a second, but was back again right in front of him with his hand held to Cody's chest. He could feel the warmth of the Fire, then felt a force push him back and just as he caught himself, the Masked One was at him again, swinging his fist down at Cody's face. Cody jumped out of the way and kicked the side of the Masked One, who caught his leg and through him onto the ground. He looked up at the Masked One walking toward him, his Rainbow Fire spilling from his arms. Cody lit his feet up in the Fire and got up onto his hands, kicking the Masked One along the body and face, causing him to fall back and for his mask to fall off. Cody stood there, stunned at the sight of the man in front of him until he blew a wave of rainbow colored light at him, causing him to collapse on the ground.


"Tell anyone who I am," the Masked One said, placing the mask on his face, "and I promise you, that you will experience a death so horrific and painful that the Dark Lord would shiver at the thought of it." And he vanished with an explosion of dust around him, leaving Cody to sit there and stare blankly at were his friend was just standing only a few seconds ago.








"What the hell is that, Langholm?" Garen yelled over the roar of the beast. "I mean I know what it is, but where does a creature like this hide for so long?"


"I couldn't tell you, Garen," said Langholm, fending off a Hell Raider, "but I don't think this is the time for a history lesson." He ran off to the next hoard of Hell Raiders that were killing his men, leaving the other one to lay and bleed its way to death.


"Right," Garen said to himself then looked over at the Orca Troll that was now within an arrow's distance from them. "This one may be a bit difficult."


"Don't just stand there, do something about this monster," came Cody's voice from behind Garen, which made him spin around with his sword at the ready. "And please, don't cut me. I don't really need that right now."


Cody started walking slowly forward in the direction of the Orca Troll when a loud howl rang out of the Dark Forest. The howl was louder than anything they've heard so far and it sent chills down the warriors' backs. Cody looked over at the sound, then ran to a fallen warrior to grab his sword to get ready for whatever else was coming their way. The trees started shaking and falling over and the sight of a large reptilian head came out of the forest top. The skyright flew up into the air and started coming down at the battle going on at the front of Langholm, causing warriors to run back to the city in panic, and for some to even run into the crowd of Hell Raiders, causing them to lose their lives. Cody started running to the top of the castle to catch up with the skyright, and Becky, who was on the ground, picked up a fallen warrior's arrows to shoot the Hell Raider off the back of the dragon. She shot and hit the Hell Raider square in the back, causing the beast to fall to the ground, the skyright still flying its way to the castle where Cody was. It started to fly up, but just as it reached Cody, he stuck his sword out and caught the skyright by its throat and dragged the sword down its stomach as it kept flying up. Eventually it started to slow down and pause in midair, then started to fall back to the earth at a speed faster than when it was flying. The humans and Hell Raiders all started running away as the skyright made its way to the ground, but some of them didn't make it as they were crushed by the impact of the monster.


"Well that's one problem taken care of," Cody said calmly, "Now where the hell is that Orca Troll." There was a loud crash in the castle next to him, causing part of it to collapse and for Cody to almost fall over from the impact of the attack, but he kept himself standing. "Oh, guess I found it."


He turned around to see where exactly it was, and when he was fully turned, he found himself standing directly in front of the Troll's face. Cody held back his gags from its foul breath of death and rot. Its face was horrible, with its bent pig snout nose and its lopsided mouth, which was still expelling its nasty breath at Cody.


"Well, damn, you are one nasty looking beast," Cody said a little shakily, "and your breath is absolutely dreadful."


The Orca Troll looked as though it understood what Cody had said to it, with its large pupils contracting into slits. It raised its club at him and swung it at the tower that Cody was on, causing it to collapse under his feet, the rubble falling over him as he fell to the ground.


"I think Cody fell," Max said softly, watching the Orca Troll walk toward them.


Garen looked over at him quick, then back at the Troll trying to figure out how to kill it. "I think it’s more like he was attacked, but that works too."


Garen started to get up, but stopped when he saw the Troll's club fall out of its hand, crumbling into pieces as if it were made of a thick, brown glass. He could see Cody climbing out of the rubble, a rainbow aura surrounding his body and looking up at the Troll. It gave a loud roar and ran over to where the dead skyright was laying and picked the back end of it up. After its tail was in the Troll's hand it tore it off the skyright and started swinging it around its head. It stopped and looked over at the mass of humans standing next to the city entrance and used the tail as a whip to attack them. Many of the bodies were gone in a cloud of red mist, while others that only caught a little bit of the tail lost part of their legs or arms. A lot of the humans now were dead, too injured to fight, or have already ran away back to the castle, but there were some left and were fighting off the Hell Raiders with their best efforts, leaving Cody alone with the Orca Troll. He looked up at it again and then looked past his feet. Right before the forest there was a large break in the earth and it was only a few steps behind the Troll. Cody looked around, wondering why he, or anybody else, hadn't noticed this break before and then saw that they have been moving around the city walls the whole fight, trying to keep the Hell Raiders out of the city.


Cody sheathed the sword he had picked up from the dead warrior earlier and pushed his hands straight down, his palms facing the ground. Then, he made a fist with them and lifted them above his head, causing the ground that he was standing on to shoot up toward the Trolls torso area. Cody's hands started to glow brightly in Rainbow Fire and he held his arms in front of him.


"This is for you, you ugly bastard," he said quietly, then shot a stream of Rainbow Fire at the Orca Troll's chest, causing it to step back and trip into the break of earth, the screams of it echoing as it fell to the depths of the planet. Cody knelt down, the earth around him starting to break apart and he fell with it but into somebody's arms. He looked up and saw Langholm's old gentle face looking down at him with a small smile.


"You pushed yourself with that one, Cody," he said softly.


"We're not done yet," Cody said pushing Langholm off of him and running back to the battle. He looked back at the warriors quickly and yelled, "Fall back to the castle now! All of you and don't let any of these monsters follow you."


"Cody what are you doing?" Garen said, running up to him.


"I'm ending this battle, now get back to the castle," Cody growled at him and Garen ran off back to the city.


Cody looked around to see that everyone was gone and lifted his hands into the air again, a wall of earth coming up around the city to block the Hell Raiders from getting through. "Well, here we go. Time to end this."


Garen stopped and looked back at the wall of earth that had just risen up around the city to see all the warriors down there, including Becky, Max, Langholm, and the king, so he ran back down to join them. He could feel the ground start to shake below him and he looked up to the top of the earth wall and could see Rainbow Fire spilling out of the top. The sounds of frightened Hell Raiders rang through the wall and Cody's screams of pain started to reach their ears as the shaking grew fiercer. There was a loud explosion on the other side of the wall, causing many of the warriors to fall over and for there to be silence around the battlefield.











Jake saw the explosion of Rainbow Fire from his house, his legs shaking from fear. "No, he'll be back, he said he would," Jake's eyes started to water up a little bit as he said this. "You promised you would come back, Cody!"











The wall started to crack and bits of it were falling apart, the warriors running back into the city in fear, but Becky, Garen, Max, the king and Langholm stood there, waiting for the walls to collapse; they didn't have to. Off to their right a couple of meters, there was a blast of Rainbow Fire through the wall and Cody's body came stumbling out and then falling to the ground. His body was limp and it looked as though there was no life in him. Garen, Becky and Max came running to his side, while Langholm and the king walked to his body slowly. When Garen reached him, he rolled him over to see burn wounds all over his body and blood spilling out of a wound that stretched from his shoulder to the bottom of his ribs. Garen picked him up and threw him over his shoulder, carrying him back up to the castle to get him healed.


"Hold on, Garen," Langholm said. "Put him back down, I can heal him a bit here."


Garen didn't say anything in return, just placed Cody back on the ground and stepped away, letting Langholm do his healing. Langholm knelt down and put his hands over Cody's chest as he started to glow a bright rainbow color and little droplets of rain came down from his hand and on to Cody's chest. He opened his eyes slightly and gasped a little bit and Garen went down to his side, looking at his injuries.


"Why would you do something like that, Cody? We could've won the battle without your foolish sacrifice," Garen said in a soft voice.


Cody's hand reached up and grasped around Garen's throat tightly, his fingers wrapping around his trachea as if he wanted to break it and his eyes turning a fierce grey color. He brought Garen down closer to him and whispered roughly into his ear, "I couldn't care in the slightest bit if all these humans would've died. I am not here for them. This is for me and my quest to get revenge on that masked bastard!" He gave one last squeeze on Garen's throat and threw him back towards Max's feet. Garen sat there glaring at Cody, as he coughed, trying to catch his breath, his hand rubbing his throat. Cody struggled to get himself back up and looked down at Garen, then up to the others. "I wouldn't save these humans if it was the last race on this planet, they'll kill themselves soon enough, the Hell Raiders are just there to speed up the evolution by a few years."


He turned around and started walking away, but stopped because he could hear footsteps running up behind him. As soon as he turned around he saw a fist coming at his face and he was back on the ground, his lip bleeding. He looked up at Max, who was standing over him and his knuckles cut open. "How could you say something like that?" he said. "Without humans here, there would be no Fire Raiders."


Cody stood up, towering over Max and looked down at him with a little smirk, whipping the blood from his lip. "I'm actually surprised you were brave enough to hit me, Max, knowing how easily I could kill you." Max's face twitched, but he kept his glare up at Cody. "What you say is true I suppose, but no matter, it's time for us to leave this place, there's no need for us here anymore. I'm sure they can take care of themselves and move on from this city soon enough." He looked over at Langholm. "He's got some skills to go with his old age, so he can manage."


Langholm looked over at him with a slight grin. "You, of course are very right, Cody. My skills at everything are quite amazing, I can even kick a demon out of the soul of an innocent boy, if need be." Cody's eyes flickered a bit and shifted down. "But for now, you four will leave the city, we don't need you here now, in fact I don't want you back, you must complete your quest. Your things will be waiting a few yards behind you." Max, Garen, and Becky all turned around and saw there things appear in front of them. "Now get out of here, you have a world to save." Langholm turned around and vanished in a cloud of rainbow dust.


"Well, that's new," Max said with a smile, “I’ve only seen people vanish in smoke, now it’s developed to dust. I wanna learn that one."


Cody put his arm around Max's shoulder, who jumped slightly at his touch. "In due time, my little friend, in due time." He then walked on, picked his stuff up from the ground and kept going.


Max looked over at Garen to look for an explanation of Cody's sudden change in attitude, Garen just shrugged and followed Cody. Max looked over to Becky for the same answer, but she was already walking next to Cody, leaving Max back at the battlefield alone, until he ran up to catch up with them.


Becky looked at him with a questioning smiling, "Max," she said, "did you, by chance, happen to leave your stuff back there?"


Max looked back, stopped and starred at the pack lying ahead of him. "You have got to be kidding me. Where'd it go?" His stuff vanished from his eyes, then he looked over at Becky, who had his pack over her shoulder and had a smile on her face. "Well, er, thanks."


"You're quite welcome, Maxie," She said quickly and trotted off, turning around to look back at him with a wink.


"You're looking a bit red there, Maxie," Garen said with a laugh and ran off after the others leaving Max walking alone again, feeling his cheeks get warmer from the blood flowing up to them.


"Hey guys, wait for me," he said out to them, "you bastards."


Cody looked back with a grin and waited for Max to catch up; letting the other two move on. "Looks as though someone may have a little bit of a crush," he chuckled.


Max looked up at him and said, "Why the sudden mood change? You're not so pissy anymore."


"I find no need to be pissy right now, it's pointless. What's wrong with you Max?" Max was starring past him with a feared look on his face and pointed past Cody, who turned around to see what he was looking at. There was a large black mist in front of them not two kilometers away and there was no way to get around it. "Oh great, looks like the lovely Dark Lord wants to give us a nice hard time again; fun. C'mon Max, there's no way getting around this, we gotta go straight into the bastard's Mist."


"Now, why is it whenever we have a nice, happy moment, something like this has to happen?" Max said.


"Happy moment as in Becky flirting with Lil Maxie here, I suppose," Garen said with a smirk, then looked over at Becky, his face getting serious after seeing her look.


"Now is not the time to be messing around, Garen," Becky said. "We have to be ready for him this time, and we just got done with a pretty tough battle. If we're not serious, someone may die."


"I have to go back," Cody suddenly said.


"What are you talking about?" Garen asked. "Langholm just pretty much kicked us out of the city."


"I have to see, Jake," Cody said quickly. "I promised him, I would be back. And I've never been the one to break promises."


Cody turned on his heel quickly and ran off back toward the city, to where he left Jake. Garen, Max, and Becky starring after him, not following. Garen laid out his things and started setting up the camp, letting Cody go off and do his own thing.














Cody came walking back into the city briskly, avoiding eye contact with any of the soldiers that may know that Langholm didn't want him there. He walked into the rich community, who seemed to act as if nothing was going on. He looked around, watching the fat bastards eat their dinners, getting fatter and letting the soldiers fight for them. They should really go out and fight their own wars, even their king and elder were fighting for them and yet they sit here eating away; disgusting. He started to walk toward the house that Jake lived in when he felt an arm grasp gently around his shoulder.


"I thought I told you and your friends to leave, Cody," Langholm's voice said behind him. "What are you doing back here?"


"It's only me, Langholm. I'm here to see a kid that I promised I would come back for."


"His mother doesn't like you very much, in fact I think she may be afraid of you," Langholm came around and looked at Cody in the face. "We don't need anything bad to happen again, Cody. He's out there and if you're weak..."


"I am not weak," growled Cody. "You may have helped me in the past, Langholm but he will never take me away again. The Dark Lord has no power over me."


Cody walked off and started towards Jake's house, hoping that the kid would be there. He came up to the door and placed his hand on the door knob ready to walk in. His heart was pounding hard in his chest and he didn’t really know why. Why does he feel nervous about walking into some kid's house? Was what Langholm said making him this nervous? It didn't matter; Cody turned the door knob and pushed the door open and stepped in, looking at the window straight in front of him where Jake stood. He walked in a little bit, slowly, trying not to make too much noise and looking around for the kid's mother.


"Jake," he said softly. "I made it back like I promised."


Jake stood silently in front of him, so Cody walked forward, hoping everything was alright. When he entered the room where the boy stood he heard something swinging toward his head, so he stepped to the side and behind the fat mother of the boy who attempted to hit him over the head with a steel pipe. He grabbed the pipe with his hands and pressed it up against the woman's throat and dragged her back so he could whisper into her ear.


"I'm much faster and skilled then you would think, woman," he said. "Now what is wrong with Jake?'


"I'm fine, Cody," the boy squeaked. "She's afraid of me because I can do the same thing as you and Mother thinks it's your fault."


"What do you mean by that?" He dropped the woman to the floor, letting her fall to her knees.


"He's a monster, throwing around that colored fire from his hands," she choked. "Now get out of here, you bastard of a child! I will not have a devil's son in my house!"


"Jake, go outside for me please," Cody said to him softly. "I'll take you up to the elder when I'm done."


Jake ran to the door and stopped to look back at him. "What are you going to do, Cody?"


"Just talk." He waved his hand and the door closed in Jake's face, then he turned to the woman with a cold look in his eye. He grabbed her by the hair and pulled her up to his height, lifting her off her feet so they can be face to face. He had a snarl on his face as if he was about to say something, then just threw her to the side and lit his hands in Rainbow Fire. Cody lifted his hands up, then stopped in mid swing, seeing an image in his head. He could see his father throwing his mother aside to get to him and his mother running back up to defend Cody from his drunken father. He blinked and shook his head slightly and looked back down at the woman he just tossed across the room, the anger leaving his eyes slightly, but still there. He walked up to her slowly and knelt down, keeping his head away from her this time.


"You will never see your son again," he said gently. "You caused this upon yourself for fearing his gift. He will be living with the elder and king from now on and they will be leaving this city soon to leave the dirt like you behind and try to fend for themselves. If you go searching for the boy, you will die." He got up and walked out of the doorway, not taking another look back at the large woman sitting on the floor or the house where Jake no longer lived.


He could see Langholm waiting for him at the edge of the city as he made his way back to the others, Jake standing there next to him.


"He told me what you did, Cody," Langholm said, looking at him closely in the eyes. "And I have to say that I am quite proud of you. Proud that you didn't, er," he looked down at Jake quick, "that you didn't choice the latter."


"I told you, old man," he said, a soft smile coming onto his face, "he no longer has control over me."


Cody walked past them and then he felt someone grab onto his arm. He looked down and saw Jake standing there, looking up at him, "You're not going to leave me, are you?"


"You can't come with me, Jake," he knelt down to one knee to get down to Jake's height. "You have to go with, Langholm, here. If you go with us, erm, you just can't go with us, Jake, it's too dangerous. The old man will keep you safe, and I promise we will see each other again." He stood back up and walked off, giving a little wave to Jake and Langholm and then disappearing from their view.














Garen saw the smoke appear in front of him and stood up. Cody walked over to him and looked down at Max and Beck quickly.


"So how did it go," Garen asked.


"He's a Fire Raider," Cody said. "His mother is afraid of him so I sent him to live with the old man. It's alright, everything is good," he added at the look on Garen's face. He put his stuff down and walked to the middle of the group and started a fire, then walked back to his stuff and laid out his blanket, "That fire should last all night, it's gonna get cold here, soon, so sleep by it."


"Cold?" asked Max. "What are you talking about, cold? The weather is always warm."


"Maybe where you're from, but in all reality, the days are going to get much colder than you've experienced before." Cody grabbed his stuff and moved a few meters from the group and laid down facing away from everyone.


"Well, isn't he the social one," Becky said "Hey Max, let's stay up for a bit, tell stories or something. You can too if you want, Garen."


"Nah, I think I'm good," he said with a smile. "I'm pretty worn out." He looked over at Max and motioned him to go sit with Becky. Max got his stuff and laid his blanket right next to hers and sat down. She looked up at him with a little smile and looked away quickly.


"So what should we talk about, then?" Max asked. "Our past lives or something?"


"You can tell me about your past life if you want. Or," she reached down and grasped onto his hand, "we can sit here and enjoy the night, keep each other warm when it gets colder." She hugged up against Max's arm.


"Er, yea, we could, erm, do that of course," Max's stomach felt like it was doing multiple back flips as Becky hugged onto his arm, his cheeks were getting warm and he was very thankful that it was dark out so she couldn't see how red they were. He looked down at her with a smile, "You know we may have to tell stories to keep awake so we can enjoy the night. We can start from when I was a kid-." Becky cut him off by putting two of her fingers on his lips.


"Just shut up, Maxie," she whispered with a smile and leaned up to kiss him, their lips locking together as she guided him to the ground. The back flips his stomach were doing started moving faster, then they were gone and he could feel his tongue slide its way slowly into her mouth, his fingers working their way through her long, silk-like hair. She climbed on top of him and started wrestling her tongue with his as one hand held him down at the hip and her other grabbing onto his hair. He slid his hands down her body to her hips and rolled her over, the nervousness leaving his stomach.