Heather's Adventures: The Search for Maxamus

Chapter 29. Dawnlight

What a rude awakening.

"Hey, wake up we need to move soon." I was nudged by Rheannah. Sheria had the luxury of waking up Heather and Max. She somehow managed to wake them up without they wanting to take off someone's head so I assumed everything was alright.

"We need to move in thirty minutes or less to beat the storms so let's get ready to move." Rheannah commanded.

Heather stretched and sighed, "just five more minutes..."

"Storms, Heather, storms." Sheria repeated.

Max turned to look at her, "Heath, we're not ready and prepared for storms."

"Heath, is that what you're calling me now?" Heather grumbled and griped a bit before she stretched some more.

"Sorry," Max apologized in a small voice to her as he got up and looked up at the sky, "looks like a nasty one. We better hurry too to avoid all the rain."

Heather stood up quickly, "anything to avoid water. Anything, anything at all."

Josh sat up next to me, "you ready to move?"

I nodded back to him, "yeah, just need to pack up this blanket and then I think we're set."

"Good. I want to be out of these mountains by sundown. We've got a long day ahead of us and starting a few hours early won't do us much harm."

"It does harm to me," Heather groaned as she folded her blanket, "why does rain have to ruin everything?"

"Rain doesn't ruin everything. It just presents a different mood. Sadness."

"You depressed fish face?" Heather taunted as she got up into Max's face.

"You angry fire witch?" He talked right back to her. That was a first. No one really argued with Heather. Ever.

"Maybe I am, maybe I'm not. I guess you'll never know now will you?" Heather gave him a look I've never seen her give anyone before. It was as if she was leading him on about her rather mysterious intentions. What was she thinking?

Heather walked away while she was ahead. I don't know whether this was a smart move or not. Max was almost royalty. An heir to the Merrywell household was just as much royalty as the solo daughter heir to the throne in Prontena. The princess was royalty but not held as high because she was sixth-or seventh, the controversy still stands between her and her youngest brother-in line for the throne. In her lifetime she would never been queen. She was doomed to be the forgotten princess of Prontena. Her parents even agreed to that. That's why she was sent away to go live elsewhere, or so the public had been told. No one outside her family has seen her in years.

Enough about her.

Heather was messing with heirs. Heirs. She was nothing much more than a common child, or that she knew of at this point in time. If they Merrywell family knew if how tempestuous she was being with the heir to the head of the family, needless to say Heather might be hunted down and banished from Issola even. Not to mention they would never take Max seriously ever again. Rheannah was just as much heir as the princess of Prontenia as well. She didn't accomplish much. Couldn't accomplish much. Couldn't be anything really. She was just the younger sister to the throne. They would never accept her as the heir. They couldn't because she was a girl just like the princess.

Boy, I'm glad I'm just a commoner now. No competition within families to worry about at all. Nothing to worry about at all. This was the way to go I guess. Not be part of a family that was "great" was well, normal. My family was known for its service to Nellie's family, so that's what I was doing. It didn't matter who we were, we just always strived for justice. There was no separation no matter who you are. That's the way it should be.

Soon following that, we were on the road once more...or well the road being scaling mountainous terrain since we still were in the mountains of what probably was Montana.

"The rain is coming closer than I anticipated. We must find shelter for the rest of the night." Rheannah stated, "We will not make it down the mountains in time."

Heather rolled her eyes and turned to Sheria, "think you can scope out the area for a cave or something?"

Sheria nodded back to her, "got it. But you're carrying my backpack until we get there." Just as Sheria rehearsed with me months ago, she quickly transformed herself into the same eagles that were circling around overhead and few up overhead to scout out the mountains. Heather collected her backpack and threw it on her back.

"How can she..."

"She's an earth type, Rheannah. She can do a lot of amazing things. She was gifted with the ability of animal transformation."

"Lucky here," Rheannah stated in a bit of jealous tone as she watched the eagle fly in the sky, looking for a way. Sheria soon came back down low to the ground to lead us to this cave. Just in time, thankfully too, as by the time we entered it started to rain.

"Flying is hard work, ah my arms are sour," Sheria commented after she changed back, "How long do you think we'll be held up here for?"

"All night probably. I don't feel it letting up anytime soon. We might as well make camp for the night."

"Might as well, huh." Heather commented.

"Well, while we're here we could start training them. Nothing better to do." My brother stated.

"Or we can find out where the end of this cave is," Heather raised her opinion. She raised her hand full of flames above her head only to realize the cave wasn't very deep, it was as deep as a four car garage. "well that was anticlimactic."

"Very. I thought we were going to do something exciting." Rheannah sighed.

My brother continued as he pulled gathered all the wood and scraps from trees on the mountains from around the cave and brought them into the center of the cave, "Heather, light us a fire and we will begin."

She groaned, "what if I don't wanna..." As she lit the fire anyway without another word. Even after all that she has done, it's hard to remember that Heather's just a child, just like the rest of them.

"Alright," he continued as we all sat around the small fire, "this is very highly complex power that you're dealing with so all the upmost care must be taken at this point. One small slip up or mistake and you could cause significant damage. It could kill both of you or everyone and everything around you. Given your powers are opposites there's no telling what damage you two could cause."

"Lovely, now what can we actually do?" Heather was pushing the limits once again.

"As for each of you individually, you each should have access to your heart's power. It is a very strong technique that is used for damage typically in a large area."

Heather was still pushy, "what's it called?"

"Only you know what it is called. I can't tell you."

"Well that's just so helpful now, isn't it?" Heather rolled her eyes.

My brother shook his head, "you just need to listen to your heart for the power, it isn't that hard. Once you're focused on it that is."

"Alright then let me focus," Heather stood up and focused on creating a fireball betwixt her hands.

"Stop!" My brother and I stood up rapidly, "not in here you're going to create a huge power level change in the power levels around here as well as possibly blow up the cave. If you change the power levels we might be tracked." My brother finished.

"Then why did you want to teach us about it if we can't even use it?" Heather dispersed her fireball and sat back down, "what use is it to me?"

"A time may come," I stated, glaring into the fire, "that you won't have the opportunity to hesitate. You'll just have to use it to defend everyone. If you're aware it exists it'll become an option if your heart yearns for it."

"You can't use it directly but you can listen to what your heart is telling you right now if you focus on listening to your heart."

Heather looked to Max before shrugging, "alright,let's do it."