I Am Lightning

“Nova,” I said, turning to look at him, “you were given a shard from the Cosmic stone, weren’t you?” How else could he still be the same age? I was now around the physical age of nine or ten, but Nova was the same as ever. These few hundreds of years hadn’t changed him at all, and it was only the Masters who held the stones that did not age. That, and the fact that they had awakened.

“I was,” he replied, his voice deep as ever.
“And you... awoke?”
His response was to nod at me.

How could it be? There were four steps to becoming a Master and gain immortality. The first was to be born as that one person who had the potential and had the true eyes of their element. You had to be chosen, the Masters say, by the element itself. This in itself gives near immortality. The second is to take a new name that is befitting of the element. The true reason behind this is that names hold power, and even though it may be a small, insignificant amount of power, nonetheless it is not acceptable. The third step is to receive the stone that holds a vast amount of the power of the element. This I had received only a few years ago, along with a new name, and it hung around my neck on an elegant silver chain. But there was a fourth and final step I hadn’t undergone yet. The awakening.

And so I still aged. The awakening was, as the Masters had told me, something rather like an epiphany. It was when the person came to understand completely something that until then had been hidden from them, and at this point, they truly became their element. And that, apparently, made them immortal. I had not been able to reach this point, yet here stood Nova, my constant companion and bodyguard, already immortal. Although it is true that he is a few years older than me. His physical age is around 19.

It was true that I no longer needed a bodyguard, but Nova and I didn’t speak of it, and Sirius hadn’t said anything, either. Nova and I had grown so accustomed to being in each other’s presence, it would be strange for it to be otherwise. It was his power to teleport the two of us to any destination that made him such a valuable companion, and a perfect bodyguard. He had, in fact, saved my life a few times when I had been out training in the wilderness. But now I was too strong, too fast, to adept at my elemental prowess.

...But how had he already awoken!?

I gasped in a breath and looked about, having bolted upright in complete darkness. No longer did my body pain me, and more interestingly, nobody slammed their way through a door to yell at me. I was lying upon a stone slab, and as my eyes slowly adjusted to the dark, I could tell by the strange inscriptions on the walls that I had never been in this place before. Except for the few times I had woken up here, screaming, surrounded by mages.

Yes, they were mages! Thank you, brain, for working that one out for me. That’s what the magenta eyes meant. Did that mean... I’d been taken to the College of Mages? Is that where I am now? I slowly slipped from the slab, following the inscriptions on the wall with my eyes, spinning around the strange, circular room. I finally noticed an end to the carvings, and there, right where it should be, was light, seeping out from beneath what I now knew was a door. I walked over and pushed it forward.

Sunlight blinded me for longer than it should have. I slapped a hand to my eyes as my vision flashed white and red. Slowly I opened them again, but still the light was too much. How long had I been in darkness? How long had I been unconscious?

Slowly it all came back to me. Alter City, Lord Martin, the man with the black eyes and the fight with his shadow. My things! I looked down to find my belt and blade and bow were gone. The stones were gone, too. My hand went next to my breast, but my Lightning stone was still there. I huffed a sigh of relief. I doubt anyone could ever prise it from me unless they were to kill me. The stone and I are one, pretty much. If someone touched it and I didn’t consent to it, they’d be instantly zapped and killed. I am, after all, the Lightning Master.

I thought instantly of the previous Masters and their terrible demise, and I shuddered. I have to work out how long I’ve been out, what happened to the stones, and how to get them back. I didn’t want to admit it, but it was likely that the shadows had taken the stones.

Was I a fool to have kept them on me? I didn’t realise I had made myself such a juicy target. Not only did they want me dead for my stone, but I had all the other stones, too. And here I was thinking I was protecting them. Pah!

The sound of voices pulled me back to reality. I could see now in the sunlight, which filtered through a nearby window, and found myself standing in a brightly lit corridor. I turned to look at the room I had come from, and met something rather chilling.

The handle of the door was rusted. Dust had settled on a sign tacked securely to said door. And the sign... it said:

Beware: Entry Is Forbidden

How long had I been asleep?