Elementals

My heart’s hammering in my chest. I take short, gasping breaths. Taking a cautious step forward, I look into the darkness beyond my watch post. The intruder alarm cuts through the air like a butcher’s knife, making my teeth chatter around my jaw. The flashing amber warning lights spin in frantic circles, their illumination dancing on the nearby trees.

The intruder sirens had gone off numerous times during the past eighteen years, but never on my watch, never when it was me who was supposed to know what to do next.

“TO YOUR POSITIONS!” bellows the loudspeakers above my head. Position? What position? Scrambling to my feet and seizing the watchman’s spear with my sweaty palm, I crane my neck to see over the balustrade. What am I supposed to be looking for?

No one had actually ever seen one. Well, little Alexa May swore that one with bright blue hair and teeth as long as her arms, came to visit her once in the bathroom, but she had a tendency to let her imagination run away with her.

A sharp crack of branches, like a gunshot in my ears, causes my stomach to shoot up and dive into my throat. Something is here...and judging by the tingling hairs on the back of my neck, it is watching me.

Deciding that I need to at least put up a bit of a fight before this infiltrator rips my head from my quivering shoulders, I gather myself together, stand as tall as possible and point my spear menacingly into the night. I will not back down easily. Even though I might be an eighteen year old teenage girl, I can inject the feeling of dread into others if I so wish!

“H-h-hello?” I whisper pathetically into the trees. Oh yes, you sound the picture of terrifying, I seethe. Furious with myself, I begin again.

“Who’s there?” I croak in a surprisingly much lower voice than usual. I fight the temptation to roll my eyes. Unexpected...but better. “You shouldn’t be here.”

Nothing.

“I have back-up on the way.”

Nothing.

“I have a spear.”

Nothing.

“A really, really sharp one.”

A short, sharp rustle from directly in front of me almost makes me drop my really, really blunt spear into the undergrowth below. The amber warning lights and the wailing intruder alarm stop abruptly, leaving a mighty void of silence hanging in the air. It is only now that I realise I have been holding my breath.

“FALSE ALARM! STAND DOWN WATCHERS,” booms the loudspeaker, simultaneously being very nearly responsible for my literal demise on the spot.

Wait – what? It’s not a false alarm! There is something out there!

“ Ok, ok. Stop toying with me and show yourself. I know you’re there.”

Another abrupt rustle comes almost instantly, too loud to be natural, making me bite down on my bottom lip. The metallic taste of blood touches the tip of my tongue. The trees loom over me, whispering to each other with the breeze fluttering through their leaves. It’s almost as if they are waiting eagerly for the show to start.

I am just about to let the invader off the hook, and assure them they don’t need to let themselves known to me when I see it. Just a slight glimpse. Not for more than a few seconds, but a bright blue pair of eyes were definitely there, glowering right back into my rich amber ones. My mouth falls open wide and I lose the power to speak, to breathe. I have never felt such a mixture of emotions as this moment. One part of me is utterly hypnotized whilst the other half wants to run screaming for the hills.

As quick as it had come, the black shadow with it’s scrutinising ocean blue eyes, dissolves back into the night. The whispering forest seems to droop in disappointment. My knees hit the splintered wooden boards of my watch post and I finally let my breath free in a half sob, half hysterical giggle.

Have I just survived a meeting with an Elemental?

Elementals have lived beyond our protective fence for as long as anyone can remember therefore presenting the reason for the said protective fence. No one knows what they do on their side of the shield, how they live, what they eat or even how many of them there actually are.

Legend would have us believe that the Elementals have continually and persistently forced us ‘normal’ folk down to the southern coast of Sunder, hoping we would eventually fall off the face of the earth into the rolling ocean.

To give them some credit, if this is their life mission, they can’t really complain at their progress. My village of Silverpin had somewhat changed in size over the centuries. Changing from the industrious city, to the bustling town, to finally becoming a cramped triangle, squashed under the Southern mountains. In the last ten years or so, the Elementals had clearly decided that their ocean plan was taking far too long so we were now surrounded by them from all sides, pressing us tighter and tighter together. Our population has dwindled to a sparse three hundred and twelve which is the kind of number where everybody knows everything about everyone, even the things that you couldn’t even bare your own mother knowing.

Of course, there’s also the real reason us ‘normal’ folk want nothing to do with the Elementals and their world. Their different capabilities. Their spooky powers as it were. The legend claims that they have complete control over fire, water, air and earth. They pass their knowledge down their ever growing lines of generations and train them up to be as competent, if not more powerful, at bending the elements to their will.

The deep suspicion and fear of these magical gifts is exactly the reason I’m where I am right now; doubled over on my wooden, rickety watch post, not daring to believe that I actually just might have stared into the eyes of my sworn enemy.

Silverpin’s protective fence had six tall watch posts around its circumference, with square platforms placed high up towards the forest canopy. A different watchman, chosen from the village, is assigned to a post each day and night to undergo their duty.

I am currently on watch post number five, feeling dizzy from the nights unexpected turn of events. The streams of adrenaline are slowly leaving my system, dragging my exhausted and heavy body down with it. Not caring that I am still supposed to be on vigilant guard duty, I fall into a deep and troubled sleep, filled with visions of floating eyes.