Latest chapter is up guys, hope you enjoy, and if you have anything to suggest I add then please PM me or review.

Chapter 12: The Hood

It had been almost two weeks since Charlie had jumped into the red kings portrait without a moment's thought, he was trapped and alone, and the balance within the school was as bad as it had ever been, everybody was suffering especially Billy; Charlie was his only real friend so as the youngest all he could do was speak to the damn dog blessed.

All that aside Tancred was also feeling like shit, ever since he had the accident involving Charlie he hadn't been able to manifest the weather quite the way he could before. He was striving to achieve the red lightening he had created a few times before in anger but failed so on every try. Tancred had been in his secret training place for four hours and actually had improved on lots of things such as the speed in which he could force clouds to strike lightening.

"God damn it!" He sends a slightly purple bolt at a rock and it bounced off without a scratch, it seemed that anything in the middle of blue and red was useless.

Tancred sat down cross legged and attempted something his father had taught him, he closed his eyes and tried to picture the clouds around him, so far he had barely made fog but this time when he opened his eyes he was in an utter black cloud with lightening crackling around it in small doses.

The next step was too mix his weather monger abilities with his body movements; he moved his arms round in a kind of dance that as he did made the clouds around stir and swell, he was now ready to again attempt red lightening. He released all the built up pressure in the direction of a nearby tree and it connected, but not with the tree.

The lightening was red, but there was no explosion or fire or anything for that matter, the lightening had been absorbed into a metal rod sticking from the ground, a metal implement that was not previously there.

"Congratulations Tancred... but beaten by a simple piece of metal" Tancred spun round to see his visitor; he saw a Hooded figure around his height approaching him.

"Who are you?" Tancred took a step back and the wind picked up considerably.

"A fellow bringer of nature Tancred, one on a much higher level than you are now stop that wind before mi do" The figures voice was familiar but Tancred had no idea of who this was, he didn't stop the wind, instead he raised the velocity, but the figure didn't flinch.

"I'm warning you, stop the wind" Tancred felt compelled to obey and stopped the wind; this man could very well be an ally.

"You could level the city if you trained that wind enough" The figure walked over and pulled the metal from the ground, when he did it glowed red and formed into a sword which he sheathed.

"What do you want stranger?" after seeing the blade Tancred grew weary, the man was obviously endowed with some metallic power, but he claimed to be a nature user like himself.

"To help you out, I know of Charlie's predicament and also of the fact he will emerge from Badlock" He saw Tancred's confusion "I have the painting"

"Are you going to hand it over then?" Tancred felt very lucky right now but there must be a catch.

"In due course, I forgot to mention I'm also here to give you a wakeup call" Tancred didn't have time to react before he was struck in the side by a boulder, he hit the floor with a lot of force but due to his great pain barrier shot up with minimal struggle and began to charge his clouds. "Great, you have some fight in you"

Tancred blasted several small strikes of blue lightening at the attacker but all missed, they stuck the floor and left burns all over, he then picked up his wind and the hooded man flew into the air... of his own accord.

"I forgot to mention that we share an ancestor" The Hood used wind currents of his own and Tancred's to climb a few feet up, if he was hit by a strike now he would fry because he wasn't grounded. He retaliated by sending a flurry of sharp stones at Tancred, he dived to the side and received cuts on his arm from a few but dodged most of them.

"Who the hell are you?" Tancred screamed as he started his rain, he had a plan.

"Your plan is to wet me and strike the ground, I'm not a fool boy" The Hood drew his blade and pointed it towards Tancred "I have a surprise for you"

Tancred saw the sword glow red and knew exactly what was going on, he charged his own electrical energy up and to his luck released the strike at the exact same time as the Hood, the strikes were both a blood red and hit each other directly, Tancred was thrown many feet backwards by the prevailing explosion, bits of the nearby tree flew into him and a rock struck him in the face.

When the smoke cleared Tancred looked up and saw that the Hoods clothes were ripped, he still had his identity hidden by the Hood and the rain ran down his abs.

"Ha-ha, good move scumbag!" Tancred was concussed from the rock and he watched the Hood come closer. The Hood was actually making sand, he was using his endowment to grind up the rocks and make sand. Tancred watched in horror as the sand formed around his right arm and melted into molten glass, the glass was cooled by the rain into a two-foot blade running from his knuckle. Similarly on his left arm, the metals from the ground had snaked up his leg and formed armour on his leg, all the way up his left side, and his arm.

"As you can see, as a complete nature user I can use the elements to make anything I want, if you were not so ignorant then you could do the same Tancred, I am a year you junior and am more powerful than you can ever be at your rate" The Hood charged blue lightening up his left armour, this shortly became red.

"I wish I was as powerful as you, I don't understand how you can do all this" Tancred was on his feet for a final stand, he had been pooling water for the last two minutes in a crater left by earlier training efforts and thanks to Dagbert he would use it.

"I got a wakeup call" at the end of this sentence Tancred formed red lightening and sent it towards the Hood who stood waiting to block. Meanwhile Tancred used his new ability learned from Dagbert to draw the water into a sphere and send it as a torpedo towards the Hood also, the electricity and water met in the middle and Tancred saw the shock in the Hoods face.

"Easy" the lightening hit its mark but went dud when it hit a sand wall, the wall exploded and into the air and thanks to the heat of the lightening became glass, now it was raining glass. Tancred was sliced and burned and ended up with a shard of hot glass in his leg, The Hood meanwhile stood and his skin absorbed the glass.

"Time to wake up" The Hood made his way into Tancred's shoulder with his glass claw so quickly and stood away so quickly also that there was no pain until he turned his back.

"Arrrrgh!" Tancred's shoulder began to piss blood at an alarming rate and Tancred couldn't stop the bleeding.

"Try burning it maybe" The Hood's suggestion came painfully in handy as Tancred bolted himself to clot the blood.

""If you don't yet understand the situation boy then let me prove your worth, There's Blue... red, and there's" He pointed the metallic arm of his at Tancred and a small white beam of a diameter of no more than a pencil went straight through Tancred's other shoulder.

Tancred was unconscious before he hit the ground so the Hood left a note upon his person that told Tancred of the Badlock paintings location. He then walked away with a smug look on his face as his clothes stitched themselves up.

(Was going to end it here)

The next morning Emma was up early to spy on a certain somebody called Tancred, she had spotted him training a few days ago and watched him every morning as a bird just for a few m minutes to see his progress, deep down she obviously still had feelings for him but was scared of him as a person too much right now. Emma flew over the canyon that day to see the most horrible sight for the second time in her life; Tancred dead or seriously injured.

The Hood defiantly is trouble, please review guys, I'm lonely out here.