Soul of Magic

Prologue

Her heart beat like it was going to burst as she ran but she kept pushing on, her pursuers weren't giving up and neither should she. The forest urged her on as she ran and the leaves whispered words of encouragement to her soul.

Try as she could, she couldn't come up with a reason as to why she was being hunted like a beast, but the bleeding wound in her side clearly showed that her assailants won't stop until she was as dead as a doornail. Quickly, she whispered to the forest in the sacred tongue, telling it to prevent her pursuers from getting through as it made way for her. Fortunately, the forest was already on her side so cajoling it was no problem.

She was about to give a sigh of relief as she came out of the forest into a clearing when an arrow suddenly struck her in the shoulder, embedding itself very close to her chest. She screamed in a mixture of pain and surprise as she hit the ground, clutching her latest wound even as the older one still bled profusely.

"There's the little witch", said a man as he came strutting out of the forest with about four knights behind him. He's tall, sporting a black hair that stopped at his neck and a little moustache conversant with men of his age. He wore only a chainmail instead of the full armour like his men, a sword hung by his hip, a bow in hand and the signet of the house of Winchmore- two Snakes coiling round a sword with an Eagle wing on each side- adorned his hands. The Winchmores are the ruling house of the great Kingdom of Cyrian.

"Nicolas", she said, seething with rage as she looked up into the blue eyes of the man who had smiled so many times at her but only a scowl graced his face now.

"Hello, Fara", he replied, giving her a quick condescending smile, "I never knew that you could run this fast, guess you were humoring me by letting me win all those races since we were children, right?"

"You shouldn't have attacked my people", she said, standing up as a spell began to take shape in her mind but as she wanted to direct the energy, two arrows lodged themselves in her back, making her scream again as she went to the ground in another wave of pain.

Fara realised that the arrows were laced, she could feel the poison running through her veins. Quickly, she casted a spell that kept the killing fluid at bay in her body but it wasn't going to hold forever, she's going to die and she knows it.

"Why are you doing this, Nicolas?", she asked, looking into his eyes and wondering what could have caused the fine young man she knew to become this, whatever this is, "We were on the same side, we were a family".

"Fara, this is the work of God and I must do it", he replied, "Surely, you understand this".

"This isn't the work of God!", she returned, her anger springing anew, "This is a reflection of your fear, Nicolas. You, the mighty son of Eldor, are afraid of what we are, of what we can become".

"Afraid?", he repeated as if she had just said the most ludicrous thing in the world, "I was not the one who ran away and left her kin to die back there, you did. You are the one that's afraid, and you should be".

Without warning, he brought out his sword and swiped Fara across the throat, severing her windpipe as it went. Fara looked up in surprise as she clutched her throat tight in her fingers even though the rich red fluid gushed out in defiance. Nicolas only stared at her with a blank expression, his face unreadable even as he watched one of his dearest friends drown in a pool of her own blood.

Fara hit the ground, the fight clearly gone out of her but suddenly, she felt the energies of every life in the area binding together and moving up her body as they tried to heal her. Unfortunately, no one is capable of cheating death and she knows that it's only a matter of time before the energies break down and she would eventually shed her mortal coil.

"Nicolas, no matter how hard you try, you will never succeed", she said, her eyes turning green as the energies fuelled her for one last go and she screamed so loud the ears of the men around began to bleed, "The soul of magic can never be destroyed!".

"Well, I am Nicolas, Vanquisher of evil", he replied, standing up after the onslaught to his ears to see Fara gasping her last, "And you can tell your soul it is next".

The both of them had made promises, and they were prepared to keep them, no matter what it took.