Post by cinnamin on Jan 30, 2010 21:49:18 GMT -6
(This is a book that I wrote in middle school. I never finished the series - there's a second one of these - because I started writing something else around freshman or sophomore year. I don't know if it will ever get published, so I'm taking a screne shot just in case. Plaigarism and book stealers beware!! I have evidence against you!)
Chapter 1
Flames licked the dark sky and obscured the stars, acrid smoke choked the air, and the crackling of burning timbers blotted out almost every sound. All the other sounds that came through the noises of the fire were barely audible because of the raucous the men trying to put it out were making.
Watching their efforts but ‘too small to help,’ a small boy stood across the street, tears running down his face in streams and his orange hair whipping about in the wind almost as wildly as the fire. None of the men pouring water from the nearby ocean had even thought of asking him where the rest of his family was.
As much as he did not want to, he had the best idea of where his parents and ten siblings were. If he was right, they were still inside the burning building. The only reason he was not in there with them was that he had not been able to sleep and had decided to take a walk out along the beach. When he had come back, the fire was already consuming the second floor, and many men were running about trying to put it out.
Leaning up against the wall behind him, the boy sank down to the ground. He pulled his knees up to his chest and let his chin rest on them. There was nothing he could do anymore, and he knew it. The helplessness overwhelmed him, and letting his forehead fall and his knees hide his eyes, he wept.
When he lifted his head from his knees, the sun was just rising above the sparklingly blue ocean, casting beautiful highlights across it surface just like the ones in the boy’s blue eyes. Where the roaring fire had once been, there was only blackened boards, fallen beams, and broken glass that stood out against the sky. As the boy walked into the remains, his eyes searched the piles of debris for any sign of his family. There seemed to be nothing, but when he kicked aside a black board, an odd red pool revealed itself to him. In panic the little boy pushed away all the burnt materials until he could see al the edges of the red pool.
Nothing of his family was there except for a small piece of torn, darkened paper. The little boy picked it up gingerly and dusted off the ashes with careful fingers. Smooth curling handwriting was revealed with each pass of his hand.
“Your father and I knew this day would come. I’m not sure what will happen to us, but you, my son, must keep yourself alive and free. Your best chances are somewhere far away from here,” Aaron read aloud once the letter was clear “I know it is hard for a boy your age to find work, but the only way for you to get away is with one of the trader lines. It should cost you around ninety coppers. I know this will be hard for you, Aaron, but you must be strong and never give up hope. No matter where we all are, we will always be with you. You will always have us in your heart.”
Slowly, Aaron folded the paper and pushed it into his pocket. He felt that he had somehow known his mother would leave something behind for him. She had almost always known when something bad was going to happen. When Aaron’s two oldest brothers had been building a fort high in a tree, Elori had gotten her husband to that tree just in time to catch the second oldest boy, who had fallen of the fort’s platform. She had also predicted an attack on the city which had been repelled thanks to her insight. Aaron did not understand why she could not have pinpointed when this was going to happen like she had the other events.
But then, a hopeful thought came to Aaron: maybe she had predicted it precisely. If there was ever any harm that would come to their family, she would have sent her children to a safe place and stayed behind with their father to meet whatever meant them harm. The closest place she would have sent them was the tree fort Aaron’s two oldest brothers had built.
Stopping before the tree, Aaron found the rope ladder dangling from the open hatch in the floor of the tree fort. He climbed the ladder and pulled himself up into the one place where all of his siblings had spent numerous nights.
Their things were strewn about as if a small twister had spawned in the small room. Everything was on the floor, including the shelves that they had nailed to the walls. Mother had sent his brothers here, but someone had expected that.
Sitting down in the midst of the mess, Aaron began to sort through the things his brothers had kept in the tree fort. Piles began to form on the floor; the wooden swords and their holder, the books and bookends, the rattles and building blocks, the blankets, the sleeping bags, and the sea shells were all eventually put back into their respective places.
Once the tree fort was back in order again, Aaron climbed back down the rope ladder. He found the thin rope up against the tree trunk and, pulling it, watched as the rope ladder rose back up through the hatch. Aaron tied the rope to a small root that stuck out of the ground and then retrieved the collapsible pole from the hollow in the tree. Putting all the pieces together, Aaron used it to push the hatch closed and lock it into place. He then untied the thin rope, collapsed the pole, and put the four pieces back in the hollow.
Aaron turned and walked away to check the only two places that would even consider a boy his age.
~*~
Aaron worked the billows at a furious pace even though the other apprentices just stood there and offered no help, Aaron did not complain. Iclac the old fisherman would be coming to get him in a few minutes.
“Good work on the billows, Aaron,” Nalbo said.
Aaron smiled back at the blacksmith and kept working.
“Boy, stop with yer metalworkin’ an’ get o’er here!” the cracked voice of a familiar, old seaman called “I’s time t’ haul in the nets!”
“Coming, Iclac!” Aaron called back to the old man “How many did you set afloat today?”
“The six big uns,” Iclac said once Aaron was walking beside him towards the docks “and if m’ bones are talkin’ sense today, then we’ll ‘ve a full tank o’ fish comin’ back.”
Aaron smiled but inwardly cringed. The big nets were horribly heavy and took a lot of time to haul in when they were empty. It would be nearly impossible to get them on board if they were full of fish.
Running out onto the decks ahead of Iclac, Aaron began to untie the ropes holding the boat in the bay. Aaron had learned from his past three years of working for Iclac that you never waited until the old seaman was on board to start untying the ropes if you wanted to be on his good side.
When Iclac came to the boat, Aaron was holding tight to two of the ropes, using all his weight to keep the boat from floating off. Iclac walked up onto the boat and pulled the gangplank up.
“Hurry up an’ get aboard!” Iclac shouted.
Aaron shook his head, even though he was used to this and was quite good at what Iclac expected him to do. Taking a running start across the dock, Aaron jumped. Like he usually did, he landed on the boat’s railing as it slowly floated away from the dock.
As he coiled up the two ropes he held, he remembered the first time Iclac had expected him to jump onto the moving boat. It had started the same, but having been younger and smaller than he was now, Aaron had caught the railing by his fingertips while the rest of his body had slammed into the side of the boat. He had been sore for a week, but had learned to judge how far the boat would be away from the dock by the time he jumped.
Sailing was boring, as usual, for the only thing Aaron could do was prepare the hooks and ‘swab the decks’ as Iclac liked to put it.
“The first one’s comin’ up off the port bow!” Iclac shouted from his place at the helm “Catch it as weh pass by!”
“Aren’t you gonna stop beside it?!” Aaron called as he picked up the hook that he had so carefully attached to a long metal pole “I don’t think I’ll be able to hold it!”
“Ya’d bettah hold it! I’ll lose a whole week’s pay if ya drop it an’ I’ll take that outta yer pay!”
Aaron sighed and wrapped the rope attached to the end of the pole around his hand a couple of times. Better in the water than without the hook.
Dipping the hook in the water, Aaron caught three netting wires before he even made an attempt to pull in the net. At a snail’s pace, the net inched its way over the railing. Once he had enough slack, Aaron looped the net around the small hooks on the inside of the railing.
Every time Aaron could, he pulled more of the net in, but after about three feet of netting lay on the deck, no more would be pulled in. Although he could usually pull in around ten feet of net before he would have to stop, the full big net was simply too heavy for him to pull anymore in.
“Get the cranks movin’!” Iclac shouted “The drag’s kickin’ up ‘lready.”
Running back to the middle of the boat, Aaron grabbed two hooks attached to a couple of hand winches that had one shared crank. After he came back to the railing, Aaron threw the hooks out into the water where they would hopefully hook onto the other side of the net. Aaron turned the crank on the winches and instantly found the weight of the thousands of fish pulling at the lines.
Aaron was only able to inch the cranks forward, but he made steady progress. “Faster!” Iclac ordered from his place up at the helm “The next net’ll be comin’ up off the starboard bow soon!”
Aaron ran the cranks as fast as he could, but the bottom of the net had just left the water’s surface when Iclac shouted at him to get the hook-pole and catch the next net. Aaron let go of the crank, which locked and held the net in place, and ran to get the hook-pole. Skidding to a halt up against the starboard railing, Aaron leaned out and just barely caught one line of the net. When that one line touched the hook, Aaron knew Iclac was driving the boat too fast.
The hook-pole was wrenched from Aaron’s hand, but the rope at its end was wrapped so tightly around Aaron’s wrist that he was dragged down into the water with his tool.
The water was freezing. All the air was knocked out of Aaron as he crashed into the freezing waves. Aaron struggled back up to the surface, the net’s weight pulling at the rope around his wrist. Trying to remain calm, Aaron changed his attempts to breathe from a desperate struggling to an orderly swim stroke that he had learned long ago. It was not enough.
Somehow managing to take a deep breath before going under, Aaron was pulled below the waves. Hearing a strange sound echo through the ocean, Aaron slowly opened his eyes to look into the depths of the salty water.
A strange being of shimmering blue looked back at Aaron, curiosity sparkling in its small black eyes. Its long white hair billowed around it in the ocean currents. It opened its mouth, and a sweet singing drifted forth like a gentle breeze.
It was the softness of the sea’s lullaby, and the being before Aaron was a siren. As the siren gently pushed Aaron back up towards the surface, it occurred to the young boy this siren was not like those in the tales he had been told.
That’s right, a soft voice said in his head We are truly not the evil beings that your stories make us out to be, although we can be. Sailors who have no respect for us see the monsters that we are in stories. But you who care about us and the sea will see only the beautiful, sweet side that you see before you. Spread what you have learned as much or as little as you want to. The siren smiled at Aaron. Thank you for reminding me that someone still cares for us. You are always welcome in the oceans, she said.
Then Aaron was propelled out of the water and soon found himself back on the deck of Iclac’s boat. “Well boy, I thought I’d have to save you,” Iclac said “Did you drop the net?”
Aaron looked down at his arm and found the rope of the hook-pole still strangling the blood out of his hand. Without a word, Aaron began to haul up the second net as he had the first, but it came to the time to use the cranks, Aaron had to finish bringing in the first net.
When they came back to the dock, the boat’s hold was overflowing, and Aaron was draped over the railing, half-asleep. Iclac was in a wonderful mood, only having to stand up at the helm and watch as Aaron hauled in full, huge nets of fish.
“Aaron, we’re almost in,” Iclac called down to the lightly snoring youth.
Snapping out of his dream of waves and kindly sirens, Aaron dropped off the railing onto the deck and picked up two coils of ropes. Once the dock was close enough, Aaron leapt off the boat and landed on the old dock. Quickly he tied the two ropes down and then hurried to the edge of the dock to catch one end of the gangplank.
Old Iclac stepped onto the dock and turned to go down to the end of the dock where the men who bought everyone’s catches were waiting. “Why don’t ya come with this time?” Iclac asked Aaron as the young boy started to head home “Ya did such a good job today, ya deserve it.”
Iclac’s meeting seemed to take forever, but once it was done Aaron got to help the old seaman figure out how to divide up the money they had gotten for the fish. Aaron walked away from that deal with a pack of coppers that could hardly fit in both his hands.
As Aaron came into the market section of town, he decided he would buy a bit of provisions. Aaron walked around from stall to stall and searched for some decent food. Finding what he was looking for, Aaron told the man at the stall what he wanted and took out his now large bag of coppers. Pulling out four coppers which he knew would cover the price of the food, Aaron set his bag down on the stall table and held out the four coppers in his hand to the man.
“I don’t think that’ll be enough,” the man said.
Aaron took out two more coppers.
“I don’t think that’ll be enough either.”
Aaron took out a few more coppers.
“Here, let me. I’ll find the right amount of money,” the man said reaching out for the bag.
After a minute of hurried debating, Aaron reluctantly let the man dig through the bag. Before the man took any out though, the bag fell to the ground with a muffled clinking noise.
“Oops, clumsy me. I’ll just pick that up for you.”
The man handed Aaron the bag and then bent down to the ground again. “There’s enough on the ground to cover the cost,” the man said with a smile.
Aaron opened up the bag to put the coppers that were still in his hand back and found only crumpled pieces of cloth in the pouch. Turning the bag upside-down, Aaron watched as the cloth fell to the ground.
“What did you do with my money?!” Aaron shouted at the man behind the stall.
With a terrified look on his face, the man fell backwards out of his chair and backed up against a wall. “I-it’s on the…”
“Give it back to me!”
People behind Aaron screamed, the man behind the stall shouted at Aaron to stop, and the racquet of the elders coming down nearby streets rang loudly through the air.
“Don’t hurt me!” the man behind the stall suddenly whimpered “I don’t want to die!”
“Hurt you?” Aaron mumbled, a confused look creeping across his face “How could I hurt you? I’m just a…”
Aaron felt strong hands grab his arms and lift him up off the ground. Their grip was unwaveringly tight, and even though Aaron struggled, they did not even slip.
“Stop this dark magic!” the voice of an elder cried “There is no good that will come of it!”
Aaron looked around himself and found a huge spray of fire dancing around him. The fire looked like it was surrounding him, and it moved as he did. Aaron stared at the flames in a mixture of shock, fear, and curiosity. The fire wavered a bit. ‘I guess it’s talking to me,’ Aaron thought as the fire moved around and flickered in front of him ‘so maybe it’ll listen to me.’
Aaron told the fire to disappear, and with a small wave, the fire obeyed.
“What is this?” a second elder asked as she came to the side of the first “What has this boy done? Why are you treating him like a criminal?”
“Because he is!” the first elder said “He was about to harm that merchant!”
“How can you say that?” a third elder asked as he came into sight.
“There were flames flying all around the boy,” the first answered “And he had the merchant, who was screaming for help, backed into a corner.”
“And you saw all this?” the second elder asked.
“Yes I did,” the first answered confidently “I was a few feet away when this scene started.”
“Turn the boy around to face us,” a fourth elder said as he came to stand beside the other three.
“What should we do with him if he’s as dangerous as you say?” a fifth elder asked, putting her hands on her hips.
“Well, we should…”
“First we should see if he really is as dangerous as you think, and then we should pass judgment on him,” the high elder said as he came into the market area with the last three elders following “Put the boy down.”
All the elders nodded their approval, and the high elder knelt in front of Aaron. “Is what Sairn said true?” the high elder asked.
“I don’t know,” Aaron answered “I didn’t want to kill the man, but the fire part was true…I don’t understand how though.”
“So you can control fire,” the high elder said “It seems we have a young wizard in our midst. Any suggestions of what we should do?”
Chapter 1
Flames licked the dark sky and obscured the stars, acrid smoke choked the air, and the crackling of burning timbers blotted out almost every sound. All the other sounds that came through the noises of the fire were barely audible because of the raucous the men trying to put it out were making.
Watching their efforts but ‘too small to help,’ a small boy stood across the street, tears running down his face in streams and his orange hair whipping about in the wind almost as wildly as the fire. None of the men pouring water from the nearby ocean had even thought of asking him where the rest of his family was.
As much as he did not want to, he had the best idea of where his parents and ten siblings were. If he was right, they were still inside the burning building. The only reason he was not in there with them was that he had not been able to sleep and had decided to take a walk out along the beach. When he had come back, the fire was already consuming the second floor, and many men were running about trying to put it out.
Leaning up against the wall behind him, the boy sank down to the ground. He pulled his knees up to his chest and let his chin rest on them. There was nothing he could do anymore, and he knew it. The helplessness overwhelmed him, and letting his forehead fall and his knees hide his eyes, he wept.
When he lifted his head from his knees, the sun was just rising above the sparklingly blue ocean, casting beautiful highlights across it surface just like the ones in the boy’s blue eyes. Where the roaring fire had once been, there was only blackened boards, fallen beams, and broken glass that stood out against the sky. As the boy walked into the remains, his eyes searched the piles of debris for any sign of his family. There seemed to be nothing, but when he kicked aside a black board, an odd red pool revealed itself to him. In panic the little boy pushed away all the burnt materials until he could see al the edges of the red pool.
Nothing of his family was there except for a small piece of torn, darkened paper. The little boy picked it up gingerly and dusted off the ashes with careful fingers. Smooth curling handwriting was revealed with each pass of his hand.
“Your father and I knew this day would come. I’m not sure what will happen to us, but you, my son, must keep yourself alive and free. Your best chances are somewhere far away from here,” Aaron read aloud once the letter was clear “I know it is hard for a boy your age to find work, but the only way for you to get away is with one of the trader lines. It should cost you around ninety coppers. I know this will be hard for you, Aaron, but you must be strong and never give up hope. No matter where we all are, we will always be with you. You will always have us in your heart.”
Slowly, Aaron folded the paper and pushed it into his pocket. He felt that he had somehow known his mother would leave something behind for him. She had almost always known when something bad was going to happen. When Aaron’s two oldest brothers had been building a fort high in a tree, Elori had gotten her husband to that tree just in time to catch the second oldest boy, who had fallen of the fort’s platform. She had also predicted an attack on the city which had been repelled thanks to her insight. Aaron did not understand why she could not have pinpointed when this was going to happen like she had the other events.
But then, a hopeful thought came to Aaron: maybe she had predicted it precisely. If there was ever any harm that would come to their family, she would have sent her children to a safe place and stayed behind with their father to meet whatever meant them harm. The closest place she would have sent them was the tree fort Aaron’s two oldest brothers had built.
Stopping before the tree, Aaron found the rope ladder dangling from the open hatch in the floor of the tree fort. He climbed the ladder and pulled himself up into the one place where all of his siblings had spent numerous nights.
Their things were strewn about as if a small twister had spawned in the small room. Everything was on the floor, including the shelves that they had nailed to the walls. Mother had sent his brothers here, but someone had expected that.
Sitting down in the midst of the mess, Aaron began to sort through the things his brothers had kept in the tree fort. Piles began to form on the floor; the wooden swords and their holder, the books and bookends, the rattles and building blocks, the blankets, the sleeping bags, and the sea shells were all eventually put back into their respective places.
Once the tree fort was back in order again, Aaron climbed back down the rope ladder. He found the thin rope up against the tree trunk and, pulling it, watched as the rope ladder rose back up through the hatch. Aaron tied the rope to a small root that stuck out of the ground and then retrieved the collapsible pole from the hollow in the tree. Putting all the pieces together, Aaron used it to push the hatch closed and lock it into place. He then untied the thin rope, collapsed the pole, and put the four pieces back in the hollow.
Aaron turned and walked away to check the only two places that would even consider a boy his age.
~*~
Aaron worked the billows at a furious pace even though the other apprentices just stood there and offered no help, Aaron did not complain. Iclac the old fisherman would be coming to get him in a few minutes.
“Good work on the billows, Aaron,” Nalbo said.
Aaron smiled back at the blacksmith and kept working.
“Boy, stop with yer metalworkin’ an’ get o’er here!” the cracked voice of a familiar, old seaman called “I’s time t’ haul in the nets!”
“Coming, Iclac!” Aaron called back to the old man “How many did you set afloat today?”
“The six big uns,” Iclac said once Aaron was walking beside him towards the docks “and if m’ bones are talkin’ sense today, then we’ll ‘ve a full tank o’ fish comin’ back.”
Aaron smiled but inwardly cringed. The big nets were horribly heavy and took a lot of time to haul in when they were empty. It would be nearly impossible to get them on board if they were full of fish.
Running out onto the decks ahead of Iclac, Aaron began to untie the ropes holding the boat in the bay. Aaron had learned from his past three years of working for Iclac that you never waited until the old seaman was on board to start untying the ropes if you wanted to be on his good side.
When Iclac came to the boat, Aaron was holding tight to two of the ropes, using all his weight to keep the boat from floating off. Iclac walked up onto the boat and pulled the gangplank up.
“Hurry up an’ get aboard!” Iclac shouted.
Aaron shook his head, even though he was used to this and was quite good at what Iclac expected him to do. Taking a running start across the dock, Aaron jumped. Like he usually did, he landed on the boat’s railing as it slowly floated away from the dock.
As he coiled up the two ropes he held, he remembered the first time Iclac had expected him to jump onto the moving boat. It had started the same, but having been younger and smaller than he was now, Aaron had caught the railing by his fingertips while the rest of his body had slammed into the side of the boat. He had been sore for a week, but had learned to judge how far the boat would be away from the dock by the time he jumped.
Sailing was boring, as usual, for the only thing Aaron could do was prepare the hooks and ‘swab the decks’ as Iclac liked to put it.
“The first one’s comin’ up off the port bow!” Iclac shouted from his place at the helm “Catch it as weh pass by!”
“Aren’t you gonna stop beside it?!” Aaron called as he picked up the hook that he had so carefully attached to a long metal pole “I don’t think I’ll be able to hold it!”
“Ya’d bettah hold it! I’ll lose a whole week’s pay if ya drop it an’ I’ll take that outta yer pay!”
Aaron sighed and wrapped the rope attached to the end of the pole around his hand a couple of times. Better in the water than without the hook.
Dipping the hook in the water, Aaron caught three netting wires before he even made an attempt to pull in the net. At a snail’s pace, the net inched its way over the railing. Once he had enough slack, Aaron looped the net around the small hooks on the inside of the railing.
Every time Aaron could, he pulled more of the net in, but after about three feet of netting lay on the deck, no more would be pulled in. Although he could usually pull in around ten feet of net before he would have to stop, the full big net was simply too heavy for him to pull anymore in.
“Get the cranks movin’!” Iclac shouted “The drag’s kickin’ up ‘lready.”
Running back to the middle of the boat, Aaron grabbed two hooks attached to a couple of hand winches that had one shared crank. After he came back to the railing, Aaron threw the hooks out into the water where they would hopefully hook onto the other side of the net. Aaron turned the crank on the winches and instantly found the weight of the thousands of fish pulling at the lines.
Aaron was only able to inch the cranks forward, but he made steady progress. “Faster!” Iclac ordered from his place up at the helm “The next net’ll be comin’ up off the starboard bow soon!”
Aaron ran the cranks as fast as he could, but the bottom of the net had just left the water’s surface when Iclac shouted at him to get the hook-pole and catch the next net. Aaron let go of the crank, which locked and held the net in place, and ran to get the hook-pole. Skidding to a halt up against the starboard railing, Aaron leaned out and just barely caught one line of the net. When that one line touched the hook, Aaron knew Iclac was driving the boat too fast.
The hook-pole was wrenched from Aaron’s hand, but the rope at its end was wrapped so tightly around Aaron’s wrist that he was dragged down into the water with his tool.
The water was freezing. All the air was knocked out of Aaron as he crashed into the freezing waves. Aaron struggled back up to the surface, the net’s weight pulling at the rope around his wrist. Trying to remain calm, Aaron changed his attempts to breathe from a desperate struggling to an orderly swim stroke that he had learned long ago. It was not enough.
Somehow managing to take a deep breath before going under, Aaron was pulled below the waves. Hearing a strange sound echo through the ocean, Aaron slowly opened his eyes to look into the depths of the salty water.
A strange being of shimmering blue looked back at Aaron, curiosity sparkling in its small black eyes. Its long white hair billowed around it in the ocean currents. It opened its mouth, and a sweet singing drifted forth like a gentle breeze.
It was the softness of the sea’s lullaby, and the being before Aaron was a siren. As the siren gently pushed Aaron back up towards the surface, it occurred to the young boy this siren was not like those in the tales he had been told.
That’s right, a soft voice said in his head We are truly not the evil beings that your stories make us out to be, although we can be. Sailors who have no respect for us see the monsters that we are in stories. But you who care about us and the sea will see only the beautiful, sweet side that you see before you. Spread what you have learned as much or as little as you want to. The siren smiled at Aaron. Thank you for reminding me that someone still cares for us. You are always welcome in the oceans, she said.
Then Aaron was propelled out of the water and soon found himself back on the deck of Iclac’s boat. “Well boy, I thought I’d have to save you,” Iclac said “Did you drop the net?”
Aaron looked down at his arm and found the rope of the hook-pole still strangling the blood out of his hand. Without a word, Aaron began to haul up the second net as he had the first, but it came to the time to use the cranks, Aaron had to finish bringing in the first net.
When they came back to the dock, the boat’s hold was overflowing, and Aaron was draped over the railing, half-asleep. Iclac was in a wonderful mood, only having to stand up at the helm and watch as Aaron hauled in full, huge nets of fish.
“Aaron, we’re almost in,” Iclac called down to the lightly snoring youth.
Snapping out of his dream of waves and kindly sirens, Aaron dropped off the railing onto the deck and picked up two coils of ropes. Once the dock was close enough, Aaron leapt off the boat and landed on the old dock. Quickly he tied the two ropes down and then hurried to the edge of the dock to catch one end of the gangplank.
Old Iclac stepped onto the dock and turned to go down to the end of the dock where the men who bought everyone’s catches were waiting. “Why don’t ya come with this time?” Iclac asked Aaron as the young boy started to head home “Ya did such a good job today, ya deserve it.”
Iclac’s meeting seemed to take forever, but once it was done Aaron got to help the old seaman figure out how to divide up the money they had gotten for the fish. Aaron walked away from that deal with a pack of coppers that could hardly fit in both his hands.
As Aaron came into the market section of town, he decided he would buy a bit of provisions. Aaron walked around from stall to stall and searched for some decent food. Finding what he was looking for, Aaron told the man at the stall what he wanted and took out his now large bag of coppers. Pulling out four coppers which he knew would cover the price of the food, Aaron set his bag down on the stall table and held out the four coppers in his hand to the man.
“I don’t think that’ll be enough,” the man said.
Aaron took out two more coppers.
“I don’t think that’ll be enough either.”
Aaron took out a few more coppers.
“Here, let me. I’ll find the right amount of money,” the man said reaching out for the bag.
After a minute of hurried debating, Aaron reluctantly let the man dig through the bag. Before the man took any out though, the bag fell to the ground with a muffled clinking noise.
“Oops, clumsy me. I’ll just pick that up for you.”
The man handed Aaron the bag and then bent down to the ground again. “There’s enough on the ground to cover the cost,” the man said with a smile.
Aaron opened up the bag to put the coppers that were still in his hand back and found only crumpled pieces of cloth in the pouch. Turning the bag upside-down, Aaron watched as the cloth fell to the ground.
“What did you do with my money?!” Aaron shouted at the man behind the stall.
With a terrified look on his face, the man fell backwards out of his chair and backed up against a wall. “I-it’s on the…”
“Give it back to me!”
People behind Aaron screamed, the man behind the stall shouted at Aaron to stop, and the racquet of the elders coming down nearby streets rang loudly through the air.
“Don’t hurt me!” the man behind the stall suddenly whimpered “I don’t want to die!”
“Hurt you?” Aaron mumbled, a confused look creeping across his face “How could I hurt you? I’m just a…”
Aaron felt strong hands grab his arms and lift him up off the ground. Their grip was unwaveringly tight, and even though Aaron struggled, they did not even slip.
“Stop this dark magic!” the voice of an elder cried “There is no good that will come of it!”
Aaron looked around himself and found a huge spray of fire dancing around him. The fire looked like it was surrounding him, and it moved as he did. Aaron stared at the flames in a mixture of shock, fear, and curiosity. The fire wavered a bit. ‘I guess it’s talking to me,’ Aaron thought as the fire moved around and flickered in front of him ‘so maybe it’ll listen to me.’
Aaron told the fire to disappear, and with a small wave, the fire obeyed.
“What is this?” a second elder asked as she came to the side of the first “What has this boy done? Why are you treating him like a criminal?”
“Because he is!” the first elder said “He was about to harm that merchant!”
“How can you say that?” a third elder asked as he came into sight.
“There were flames flying all around the boy,” the first answered “And he had the merchant, who was screaming for help, backed into a corner.”
“And you saw all this?” the second elder asked.
“Yes I did,” the first answered confidently “I was a few feet away when this scene started.”
“Turn the boy around to face us,” a fourth elder said as he came to stand beside the other three.
“What should we do with him if he’s as dangerous as you say?” a fifth elder asked, putting her hands on her hips.
“Well, we should…”
“First we should see if he really is as dangerous as you think, and then we should pass judgment on him,” the high elder said as he came into the market area with the last three elders following “Put the boy down.”
All the elders nodded their approval, and the high elder knelt in front of Aaron. “Is what Sairn said true?” the high elder asked.
“I don’t know,” Aaron answered “I didn’t want to kill the man, but the fire part was true…I don’t understand how though.”
“So you can control fire,” the high elder said “It seems we have a young wizard in our midst. Any suggestions of what we should do?”