"Maybe we should just use the griffin that brought the message to fly out of the city," Ash suggested but Roger immediately shook his head. "We can't all fit on one griffin." "How about I just cut down all of the sand worms with The Breakfast and you guys watch my back?" A.C said. "A.C, there are too many sand worms. What if they all turn on you? I heard that there are hundreds of them out there at this point. How would you survive if they all attacked at once? We wouldn't be able to defend you against so many opponents," Ash said. I quietly got up and started walking towards the door. "Westlyn, where are you going?" Elise asked. I turned to look at her. "I, I'm not part of the team and like A.C said, I can't just walk into the Guild without permission. There is no point in me taking part in this discussion since I won't be going with you guys." There was silence in the room. "No, you can take part. You would be a useful member of our team, after all your fire magic would come in very handy in a tense situation," Ash said. I stared at him. "But you barely know me. I've spent time with you all for less than a week," I said. I was astounded at Ash's response. Me, join the team? I had never expected to be asked to join them. A.C nodded reluctantly. "I suppose Ash is right for once. Your spells are pretty impressive." "And you did help us out a lot while we were fighting the sand worms. Like when the two attacked from two different directions? A.C, Elise and I might have been dead if it wasn't for you," Ash said. My shock quickly turned to joy and I sat back down in my chair with a big smile on my face. I was now officially part of Team 13!
We silently trudged out into the desert. We didn't want to be seen or heard leaving the city in case other people tried to join us because our plan wouldn't work if a huge group of people rushed into the desert, yelling war cries. We needed to be quiet and stay out of the sand worms' sight. We walked for about five minutes before we finally reached the temporary barrier that the mages had set up. It was shiny, so shiny that it was almost invisible. I peered through it but I couldn't see any sand worms. "Oh no." I turned to the team. "They're all underground. How is our plan going to work now?" The plan that we had quickly thought up was to simply sneak passed the worms as quickly as we could and attract as little attention as possible. If one or two of them attacked us it would be pretty easy to deal with them. However the sand worms would feel the vibrations of our feet when we hiked across the land. There would be nothing to stop them from digging up to the surface and just swallowing us whole. Ash frowned. He turned to his, our team-mates. "Any ideas?" he asked them. "Ash, you can just use your Levitas spell to float us over the ground," Roger said but Ash shook his head. "My spells are pretty basic. I couldn't make all of you float that far or for that long. My magic isn't strong enough for that." "Then there's nothing for it," Elise said, "we'll just have to get over that bit of ground as fast as we can and hope for the best." None of us were happy about this but there was nothing else we could do.
A.C quickly stomped over to the barrier. "How do we get past this? If we break it, the sand worms will get through and destroy the city, besides it'll probably kill us since it is a barrier of defence," he said. I reached forward and touched the barrier. Nothing happened. "Could we just climb over it?" A.C shrugged and stepped up onto the barrier. "Don't see why not." He quickly and skillfully climbed the barrier and stopped at the top. "Come on, Ash. You're up next." Ash narrowed his eyes at the barrier before hesitantly beginning to scale it. A.C reached out an arm and dragged him up the last few metres. After a few minutes we were all poised on top of the barrier. As soon as the last person got to the top A.C started climbing down the other side. We all followed him.
At last our feet touched solid ground and we started running; setting our feet down as lightly as we could but we only made it a few yards before the ground started shaking. Roger staggered and A.C quickly grabbed his arm before he fell over. A sand worm shot up from the sand and seconds later two more appeared next to it. They all started snapping their jaws at us. A.C pulled out his sword and started brandishing the shiny blade. Elise and Ash teamed up and rushed in from the sand worm's left; distracting it. It turned and A.C shoved his sword into the sand worm. I used my fire magic to keep the other two creatures back while they fought. I didn't use all of my power since there was no need so far.
I turned back to my team. They were still battling the first sand worm. It lunged at A.C but was stopped by a dark barrier that Elise threw up. The worm turned on her but Ash quickly positioned himself between them. The worm kept charging and Ash didn't dodge fast enough. The worm sank its fangs into his leg. Ash cried out in pain and fell to the ground. A.C and Elise tried to run to him but another sand worm burst out of the sand in front of them and started attacking Roger. Roger shrieked in terror and A.C ran at the snarling animal. The first sand worm was still creeping steadily closer to Ash. It opened its mouth and started lowering its head towards him. "Help, please!" Ash yelled trying to wriggle away from the giant mouth. I started running full-speed at the creature. I threw up my hands and shouted with all my might, "Incendiatas Ultimus: Blue Blaze!" The worm was immediately covered in flames from top to bottom and it roared. Then it quickly vanished back into the sand; leaving a trail of smoke behind it. Ash was staring up at me in shock. "How, how do you know such advanced fire magic? How old are you?" "I'll explain everything later. For now we have to go. Come on," I said. I could see A.C waving at us. He had cleared a path through the sand worms and I cautiously helped Ash to his feet. He winced and leaned heavily on me as we followed A.C, Roger and Elise.
Soon we were off dangerous ground and everyone sighed in relief. Roger frowned at Ash's leg. "Are you ok?" Ash grimaced. "I'm fine. What about you?" he asked pointing to Roger's arm which had several deep tooth marks all over it. Roger moved his arm and shook his head. "Nah, these are only minor injuries. Trust me, I have experienced much worse." Elise poked Roger in the ribs. "Stop bragging about yourself and go help Westlyn with Ash." Roger muttered to himself and he had an injured look on his face as he took Ash's other arm. We both helped Ash as we made our way towards the howling pass.