Coldsnap: Harbinger of Ice

Chapter 10: The Secret Gets Out

The next day, Cassie was hard at work on her computer getting her assignments done for school, when all of a sudden, a wormhole opened up out of thin air and Firebird leapt out of it, appearing to be in a panicked state. 

"Oh, umm....hey, Firebird!" Cassie greeted. "Wasn't expecting to hear back from you again so soon!" 

"Coldsnap, listen! Things got bad really fast!" 

"What? What do you mean?!" 

"After our trip yesterday, I headed back to the Firelands, right?" 

Cassie nodded, then Firebird continued. 

"I returned to the Inferno Fortress and was about to retire to my chambers for the evening, when I thought I could hear Frost King Alpin and Morton Flamestar having a conversation in the throne room. Although I didn't hear any of it, I did see something interesting afterward. Flamestar pulled a hidden lever behind his chair and the entire central platform dropped down.....kind of like an elevator. He got onto it, and I stealthily followed behind him. And....Coldsnap.....there's a hidden area beneath the fortress," she revealed. 

"What? What's down there?" 

"A bunch of creepy-looking mages that looked like they were some kind of offshoot from the Fire Sect....they had black robes with orange lining rather than the usual colors. There were also a lot of monstrous creatures born from the environment of the Firelands itself, all of which I've never seen before." 

"Isn't Ignicion a magma creature, though? We've already seen him." 

"Coldsnap, he was there, too." 

"Huh?!" 

"There was, like, a bunch of pews with the weirdly-dressed mages sitting in them, and the other monstrosities were all standing along the edges of the chamber. And then...." Firebird paused briefly to catch her breath. "I saw Morton Flamestar sitting at the front of the room, with Ignicion standing right beside him." 

"What are they all doing down there?! Are the other Aspects aware of this?!" the ice mage exclaimed with worry. 

Firebird shook her head. "I highly doubt it. The whole thing looked very unsettling....." 

"Okay, so they were holding some kind of meeting in secret.....but that doesn't really tell us anything. Maybe they were planning a surprise." 

"No.....no, Coldsnap, it's much darker than that," the Fire Sect mage admitted as she took a scrying orb out of her armor and showed it to her friend, revealing exactly what was discussed during the conference. 

Cassie almost fainted right then and there in her seat at this revelation, but Firebird quickly brought her back to her senses before she became completely unresponsive. 

"They're planning on destroying the world?!" 

"Yes. Apparently they're calling themselves the 'Seared Hand'.....and they don't really see humanity as being worth the Aspects' efforts," Firebird continued. 

Cassie sighed and lowered her head in disbelief, desperately wanting this to be all some kind of bad dream or a figment of her imagination. "Please tell me this is some kind of prank....." 

However, Firebird remained firm. "Nope....it all seemed pretty real to me." 

"But....but Morton Flamestar seemed like such a nice guy a couple of years ago! Wasn't he one of the people who supported our friendship the most?" 

"I thought he was cool, too! But....I guess he was just really good at hiding. For all I know....he's probably been like this the whole time. Still....he's not entirely wrong in how he thinks. All of the things that the Seared Hand claimed to happen did indeed happen."