Thanks Reasonable!
-Chapter 3:Isabel-
When we reach Arkarian's chambers, Mum is surprised. When the rock wall disappeared, her eyes grow to the size of watermelons. Arkarian is here to greet us. He stares outside for a moment, but then invites us in. I jump into his arms and hold him for a moment. His eyes are soft and filled with love. I bet mine are too. We go into another room for a moment, and kiss. He runs his fingers through my hair once, gives me another kiss, and we head back out into the main part of the chamber again. Mum is sitting on the ground, looking at everything like it's the first time in her life being in a cave. I grab her arm and pull her into our meeting chambers. Everyone else is already there. Arkarian produces a couple of hand-carved stools and motions for us to sit down. With greetings out of the way, he looks to Matt. Oh great, he's leading another meeting. Arkarian coughs into his hand and I shield my thoughts.
"As you all might have guessed, the Order is back. Lathenia's son, Laeolos, has taken the throne. Like his mother, he is afraid of fire. My cousin will not be stopped easily, as he knows as much as she did about us. But don't worry, for we have a new member of the Guard soon to be an apprentice. Many of you have already met her. Her first power to reveal itself is the ability to make fire at will, which will be a valuable asset to our fight."
I stand up. "Who will be her trainer?" Probably Ethan or Arkarian. Perhaps even Shaun or Jimmy. Matt nods.
"I can see where you are coming from with that thought, but no. It won't be Ethan, Arkarian, Shaun, or Jimmy." He takes a deep breath. "It has been decided that you, Isabel, will be her trainer." Wow! That's great! I can't wait to start training her! "One more thing though, Isabel. You only have a month to train her." A month? This is going to be way too short! How am I going to do it? "Remember, Ethan didn't even have three weeks to train you, and you saved your first mission from being a complete failure. We know you can do it, that's why we picked you. Plus, you deserve it. Without you, we'd be lost." I nod at this. "Your new apprentice is Rae, I believe you've met her already." I nod, remembering how she thought Dillon was crazy. "Start training her as soon as possible." I nod.
"I'll start tomorrow after school." I answer. Mum is confused by all of this. I tell her. "There are three levels in the guard: apprentice, trainer, and master. Everyone starts out as an apprentice, and the master is the highest rank. Arkarian is a master, I am a trainer, and Rae is an apprentice, well, she will be soon." Mum nods. "So, we're going to 1302, right?" Matt nods. After this, the meeting is over. Dillon decides to walk home with me and my mum. When we leave Arkarian's chambers, I notice someone lying on the ground next to the door. Dillon's eyes get wide.
"It's Rae! We have to get her home, she must be freezing! At least she's wearing a coat now." He lifts her up into his strong arms and starts running down the mountain, and Mum and I follow.
"Do you know where to go?" I ask him. He nods and keeps running until we get to Rochelle's old house. He knocks on the door, and a young boy answers.
"We need to get Rae inside, she's suffering from hypothermia!" He yells. The boy moves out of the way and we run inside. Dillon places her on the couch, and I can't help noticing how blue her lips are. "Heal her, Isabel!" He yells. I nod and get right to work. Her heart is beating slowly, but it's still there. I get it beating faster, and Dillon gets blankets on her. I nod in appreciation. The boy is still watching Rae.
"Who are you?" I ask him. He has medium length, mousy brown hair in a mushroom cut. His eyes are large and brown.
"I'm Rae's brother Tim." He answers. He's staring at her again, his eyes full of tears. He probably thinks he's going to lose her.
"She's going to be all right, don't worry." I say to him. "Look, she's stirring. See?" He nods and smiles, relieved to see his sister returning to consciousness. Dillon looks even more relieved. I haven't seen him like this since he had that crush on Neriah.
As Rae wakes up, she looks around. She sees Dillon and blushes. Wow, those two are crushing on each other and haven't even noticed. She sees me. "Isabel, what happened? I saw the rock disappear, I saw a person, and is that your Mum?" She's still a little bit groggy, and I keep working to get her heart back to proper rate and getting her cells working again. She moves a little. "What are you doing? It tickles a little, but it feels good." She says.
"I'm making you well again. What were you doing up there on the mountain at this time of night?" I ask her. She obviously doesn't feel comfortable answering, but I can't help her.
"I was curious about where you and...it's your mum, right?" I nod. "I was curious about where you were going." She's much more awake now, and keeping her mouth shut about her previous mention of the wall. I can tell she's disturbed.
"What you saw with the wall did happen. You weren't hallucinating. I'll come here tomorrow morning, and we can walk to school together and talk about this. But don't tell anyone else, it's a secret." She nods, but now I have to worry about her brother. But he was too busy trying to catch a bat that had gotten into the house. I notice that there's energy coming out of it that could only be from Matt. I smile, and thank him. He flies around my head a couple of times, and flies out the door, Tim following him. Mum looks as surprised as Rae.
"What was that?" They ask at the same time. Mum would be a bit surprised at first about Matt's magical abilities, so I shake my head.
"Oh, I thought that was a flying fox, did it look different to you?" Mum seems a little skeptical, but Rae is ok with that. Living up north, she obviously doesn't know that around here bats hibernate. I'll apologize tomorrow. I look at Rae, checking to see if I can tell her strengths. She's too tired right now to tell. "Are you ok now?" She nods. I'm going to have to teach her how to use her hands' heat powers before a similar accident takes place. "It's not wise to go hiking without a torch." She nods and seems a bit embarrassed. Dillon is obviously more worried than I am. She's fully healed, but Dillon obviously has it bad for her. "Well guys, we'd better let Rae get some rest, she had an interesting day. Oh Rae, one more thing." She looks at me. "If you don't mind my asking, how good are you at history?"
She seems surprised, and seems to be deciding whether or not to answer. "I'm a B- student in history, why?"
"Because, you'll be an A student by the time we're done with you." I smile, and we leave her to think about the events of today. I wonder how easy it will be to teach her all of the necessary skills. I bet it will be hard enough to even convince her that all of this is real. Oh well, I'm pretty sure I convinced Mum a little while ago.
I hear a sound in the bushes. I listen carefully, and look out through the woods, shining my torch in all directions. If anyone's going to spot the maker of the sound, it'll be me. After all, I have the ability to see in any light. Of course Mum doesn't know that. Then I see it. A large Great Dane, watching us with its silver eyes. I get between it and Mum and pull a dagger out of my boot. Dillon gets on the other side of me and does the same. I then remember I have my light sword in my pocket. I pull that out and put the dagger back. Mum seems surprised to see me with a dagger and a bar thing. I close my eyes and concentrate long enough for a beam of light to come out of the handle. Mum shields her eyes for a moment. Dillon doesn't appear to have his weapon, originally meant for Rochelle, with him. With more light, I see the other dogs, seven in all. They look hungry. If only Matt were here!
Suddenly, he appears in front of me. "Matt! You're here! Do you see..." He nods and closes his eyes for a moment. The next thing we know, the air is alive with fire. Mum, Dillon, Matt, and I are inside of a barrier. The dogs howl and run off into the woods. The fire disappears. "Thanks Matt! You saved us!" Mum didn't see more than just the first dog. Hopefully, she thinks that there was only one. We hurry home, and Matt stays with us this time, constantly looking and listening for the hounds to return. We all are. I invite Dillon to stay the night at our house. He gratefully accepts. It's not safe for anyone to be outside alone with those hounds around. I keep my sword drawn and light lightly, just in case. After all, I only need a drop of light to see everything. We get home and Dillon falls asleep on the couch. Mum goes into her room, and Matt and I head to our rooms. The hounds are definitly back. I ask Matt to watch over Mum tomorrow. After all, they did see her with us. That puts her in danger. Rae is also in danger. We were attacked almost right outside her door. I need to go to make sure she's ok. I tell Matt where I'm going, and I use my wings to get into her living room. I see her sitting there with the TV on. But she's not watching anything. She instantly notices me as I materialize in front of her.
"Isabel! How'd you do that? What are you doing here? What are you, a ghost?" She's panicking. I have got to remember not to do that to my apprentices any more.
"Sorry, but I had to make sure you were all right. No, I'm not a ghost. I materialized here. I saw some large Great Danes outside your house on my way home." Suddenly Dillon appears next to me. Now Rae is even more scared. "Neither is Dillon. Those dogs are evil; the servants of an evil immortal. They would have attacked us, except Matt saved us. Well, I probably could have saved us too. Oh yeah, where's Tim?"
"In his room, why?" Rae is obviously more scared than ever. She won't have to worry though, because we'll protect her.
"He can't hear what I'm about to say. Rae, you have all the qualifications to join the Guard. We guard time. It's a hard job, but somebody's gotta do it. Some people are born with powers, amazing beyond belief. You are coming into your powers, Rae. Remember this morning, when your hair caught fire?" She nods. "You were wishing you could warm your face, weren't you?" She nods again. "Just as I thought. That's the way it was with my healing powers too. Dillon said your eyes glowed pink and the fire came out of your fingertips, and your hands weren't burned. Glowing eyes is odd, and would creep Ethan out even more. He's a part of the Guard too. Earlier, when you followed me up the mountain, I was heading to Arkarian's chambers. But anyways, our organization has to get started again. A crazy immortal wants the world at his fingertips, and uses chaos to do so." I explain the Order to her. "We were summoned to find out about a new mission I'll be going on. I get to go to the year 1302, to America. I was also given an apprentice, someone I can teach the ways of the Guard to. That person is you, Rae. Are you ready to fulfill your destiny?" She looks at me. She doesn't believe me. I've got to prove it. I bite my lip. I have an idea. "Turn off the lights so that you can't see, write a letter on a piece of paper, and show me while the lights are still off. One of my gifts is being able to see in any light." She does as I suggest, and I get it correct. She turns the light back on, but I can tell she still doesn't believe me. "How else would you explain what happened today?"
She nods and says, "Ok, I'll give it a shot. But if you are only doing this as a cruel prank..." Dillon looks around for a heavy object. He notices a heavy chair. He lifts it easily, like it was just a pillow. Her eyes grow large and she says "OK, I believe you! Put the chair down!" Dillon puts the chair down.
"Good, then I'll bring you to Arkarian's chambers tomorrow. Can I stay at your house tonight, to make sure you stay safe, because those dogs were less than an eighth of a kilometere from your house." She nods, and I send my thoughts to Matt and Arkarian. I call my house to tell Mum, but she apparently went right to sleep. She's had a stressful day, I can't blame her. Jimmy says if she asks he'll tell her.
I thank him and fall asleep, but it's not a peaceful one. I have a dream, or a vision. Not sure which. I see Rae running through the woods, being chased by the hounds. Dillon runs over and single-handedly beats them all, but he's injured. I see myself going over to heal him. Eventually he's healed, but now I have to heal Rae. She's not as badly injured, but it still takes me a while to heal her. Some of the trees she ran past are on fire, and the dogs run from the fire. I wake up to see Rae in front of me, obviously worried.
"Are you OK? You were screaming about dogs, and Dillon, and fire." I think about it for a moment, and nod. It was definitly a vision. I have to warn everyone! I grab the phone and start dialing my home phone. Rae is confused. "Why are you calling someone this late? It's almost midnight, and we have school in the morning.
"One of my skills is having visions of the past and future. I think I just had one. I have to get hold of Dillon." The phone rings a few times, but nobody answers. On the fifth ring, Matt answers.
"You had a vision, didn't you Isabel? I saw it too. Are you ok?" I tell him I did have a vision, and I'm ok, and we say goodbye. I tell Rae we'll start our training after school, and to meet Dillon and I by the gates to the school grounds, and she nods. I tell her to get some sleep, and I do the same.
The next morning, I'm very tired. I quickly use my wings to go home and grab my stuff. I grab my uniform, hairbrush, and an apple. I then go back to Rae's
"How long will it take before that doesn't surprise me?" She asks. I start running my brush through my hair.
"Who knows? It took me a while to get used to seeing Ethan use his wings." I explain what wings are, and she nods. I put my hair in a high ponytail and start eating my apple. After that, I put on my uniform. Matt, Ethan, and Dillon appear at the door shortly after.
"Wow Isabel, you're already ready." Matt says. I usually sleep in, but I've got an apprentice now and can't afford to. I glare at him. He gets the point.
"Oh common Isabel, Matt was just trying to have some fun." Ethan says. "At least I thought it was funny." I glare at him too. I'm not exactly in a good mood this morning. He obviously doesn't know that this house used to be Rochelle's. I hear the bus pull up in front of the school, and we all get on. I remind Rae not to mention any of what happened yesterday to anyone. She nods, and we go to our classes.