Chapter 8
Road to the Earth Nation Capital
After about 2 weeks of walking we were both very tired and low on food. "Owwww my arms are killing me. Zack can't we rest now? We've been walking all day and I can't go on." I gave in I was feeling quite tired as well so we set up camp. I made a fire and Joshua got some water from a nearby stream for drinking and cooking with. "What food do we have left?" "Just some stale bread, a bottle of sage, a few small tangerines, and a bit of cinnamon."
Joshua sat and thought for a moment until he came up with an idea. "We can make some stew." "With tangerines? Come on that's pushing it." I heard my stomach rumble and then said "Alright fine just make it quick I'm hungry." Joshua did make it quick he started by putting in the bread which got soggy, then he added in some sage, the tangerines came in next after they were skinned, finally Joshua sprinkled some cinnamon into the stew and stirred it for a few seconds and it was done.
"Yumm this is good Zack try some." I did the next best thing I got some of the wooden bowls we had left and served up the stew which smelled delectible. After a spoonful of the stew I nerely threw up and dropped the bowl. "You said it was good!" "It is good." I looked at him in disbelief "It tastes like an oxen dumped in it!" He laughed at this. "It tastes good to me." "Fine then you eat it! I'm gonna go look for a rabbit or something."
I left the campsite and rummaged through the forest for anything that could make a good meal. I found and killed 2 rabbits then found some good tasting berries. After a while of searching I grew tired and hurried back to camp with my soon to be meal. When I got back to camp I found Joshua on the ground with the mark on his left cheek glowing brightly and him shivering as if he was in freezing water. "Joshua! What happened?" I touched him and felt my whole body become extremely hot and I collapsed to the ground.
I layed their in intense pain and when I looked into some water that spilled to the ground I saw the mark on my cheek glowing a bright red. I continued to lay there in pain until I blacked out and saw some sort of vision of a man in all dark clothing and a hood discovering a small necklace in a cave and when he put the necklace on I felt me cheek burn more than it did before and saw a mark¹ appear on his cheek. After I saw the mark glow under his shadowy hood the vision faded and I awoke hearing Joshua's voice.
"Zack! Zack! Wake up!" I opened my eyes and saw a ravine below me and it occurred to me that both of us were on wooden poles on the edge of a ravine. "Joshua! What the hell happenend?" "After we blacked out some thieves took us captive and left us here to rot! They even took our necklaces!" My eyes widened in horror. "We've got to try to break free from these poles." "I already tried the ropes are too tight and if we struggle too much then we'll fall in the ravine below."
I sighed. "Well I guess we're on our own now. No more magical bending powers to bail us out this time." "Things look pretty bad right now, and all we can do is pray and hope that someone comes along and helps us." After a few more minutes of thought and reflection I asked Joshua about the vision I had. "Did you have a vision when you blacked out?" "No did you?" "Yes I did it was of a man in all black clothing and a hood. He found a necklace like ours except the mark was different and the stone was opposite."
"And did he put it on?" "Yes he did and a mark glowed from under his hood that made my mark burn more than before." "So you think he's like us? With magical bending powers?" "I don't know. He probaly is, but I got a bad vibe from him. Like he was gonna use his powers for evil ya know." That was the last thing we spoke of that day. We were both very tired from trying to break free and failing, plus the heat was pretty bad with the sun beating down on us.
We must have been on those poles for atleast 3 days before we tried to break free again. Joshua got the idea of using what energy he had left to edge himself up the top of the pole and pull his ropes over the top so he could jump off, but they were too tight to edge up the pole. "Joshua I would rather fall to my death than die like this so lets try to get these poles to fall into the ravine." Joshua tried as hard as he could to shake his pole and I tried too, but niether of them budged.
mark¹ the mark Zack spoke of was the ancient's symbol of Earth shown above.