To Cheat Death

Chapter Twenty-Four

My bed was hard. And lumpy. I had been given a whole room to myself but the furnishings were scarce. This cot and a mirror were the only things to distract from the cold stone walls. I rolled over. I was tired but I couldn't sleep.

Harsh words echoed behind my door, and I woke with a start. Glancing around for the window to find how early it was, I stopped myself when I remembered there were no windows. Not in this place.

Rubbing my eyes, I threw off my blankets and then touched the single bead I had saved from my talisman in my pocket. At least I had that.

I glanced at the floor. The lose stone hid the heart stone well but I still worried.
As I stood to open the door and see what all the commotion was about when I stopped stunned. Color  swarmed over the stones in front of me and now it arranged itself into a pattern no a picture.

Words fell from the sky and  formed themselves into creatures. People stood and breathed. They muliplyed and spread touching other creatures and becoming them in a fashion. Dragons flew through the clouds followed by birds and other magical creatures.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw three brilliant birds sweep down. The phoenixes. Forests sprang up and wood nymphs peered from the branches. Lions yawned on the savannas and deer danced here and there. I heard myself gasp. It was beautiful. A girl touched a dragon and her body morphed into a copycat version. Men rose from the ground and shot fire from there fingers destroying everything in its path. I realized I knew this story.
My eyes blurred with memory of a garden a lifetime ago it seemed.

"Tell me a tale mother." I said while pulling up a prickly thistle. She turned towards me, her face bright, her hands dirty as she tended our yellow squash.

"Youve heard all my tales." She smiled ruefully at me.

"The one about creation then."

"Well I suppose, we have little else to do...Long before the terrible wars of the magicians, before the elves fell from the stars, there was a story."

I sighed at the familiar words and pictures that filled my vision.

"The creator spoke a word and commanded everything into being. He created all that you see. The birds, the three phoenixes, the living trees, the skys and many other creatures that have disappeared into myth. Then he created the human peoples and even among all the other wonderus creatures the humans were perhaps the most marvelous. For they had something nothing else had. They could chose what they were to be. One human chose to become a nymph. He and his partner traveled to the sea and touched one. They became the ancestors of all the mer peoples. You see while he chose to be a nymph he did not become exactly what he expected. This was how it was with all the humans whatever they chose they became it and yet, different. Unique.  They, by there choices, they became the sky people, the water dwellers, the mountain people, and so many more that I have no knowledge of but the tales insist there were too many to count. One human and his mate became greedy and sought to gain the upper hand, to become more powerful then all the of there kind. Instead of choosing one magical creature to mimic they choose to have the ability to become all the magical creatures. They were dismayed to learn of the limitations to this gift. While the other humans had magical properties because of their choices the two greedy humans realized they could change into a magic creature only if the creature consented and gave them a part of their magic. Where in the initial choosing it took no effort nor permission to chose something now it was impossible to change into anything intelligent without its permission. They were left to live as nothing more than a common shiftier. Able to change into only the animals they became the least of the human peoples. It was not till centurys later that a young girl convinced a dragon of her trustworthy nature and gained a scale. Dragons magic is strange. it seems to disregard the normal rules for magic. When the girl gained the permission and scale the rest of her kind with the same power as her could change into the dragon too without touching the scale or gaining permission. As long as one of them was touching a scale they could change as if all of them were touching it. They became know as the drakgon, out ancestors."

"Mom you forgot the magicians."

"Well I suppose I have. Long before the girl became a dragon for the first time all the way back to when the human people were choosing what they would be one human and his mate chose to chose nothing. They decided to remain human. They said the creator made them that way and if the creator was good so must his creations be. They would not change their minds. They became known as the ungifted and were thought foolish to chose to work with their hands to survive. The ungifted descendences became farmers and nomads taking large swaths of flatlands to support their income.

The mountain people lived high on the peaks, in the ice and the cold. The cold could not effect them and they could control the snow and wind but it was hard to make a living from the barren ground. The animals in the mountains were quickly hunted to extinction.The mountain people began to starve. They looked out and saw the fertile planes of the ungifted humans. Then they marched on the ungifted and took all they could. With great storms of winter  and swords of ice, the mountain people attacked the ungifted and enslaved them.   They were easily overwhelmed and no match for the mountain people. The ungifted looked to the heavens and begged the creator to save them. They cried out saying, "Did our ancestors not choose to trust you when they refused to change what you made? Now don't let us parish in winter but save us because our ancestors gave you honor." The creator heard and because he remembered the honor their ancestors gave him he granted fourteen ungifted with marvelous power. They killed the king of the mountain people  and drove them from the flatlands. Thereafter the people called them kingkillers. They divided the land and the people into fourteen parts and each became a leader promising peace with one another. They had not forgotten what the creator had told them when they were granted their powers. He told them to watch over and protect the ungifted. That as long as they ruled in peace and did not use there powers for there own gain their decendences would always be great. It is said they could do things even a fullblooded elf could not.They could look at a mountain and command it to move. They could order the stones to build themselfs into a house. The forest obeyed them and the skys did their bidding. Fire sprang to devouter their enemy. The people under their rule had no need to fear famine or drought. The crops always grew tall and strong because the rains always came in their season. In those times no one went hungry and all had a place to call home. Sickness soon became extinct because the kingkillers could heal. Their power was pasted to there children and this new race was called the magicians. "