Mountain [18+] ✔️ Complete

Nine • Bound by Fire

Lyla and I took turns catching Archer up on our patchy knowledge of the situation while we rebuilt the fire. He inhaled the other half of the dried apples, having not eaten since dinner the night before.

"How did I not get the plant power?" He lamented as he laid back in the grass, patting his bare belly. He'd stripped down and hung his clothes on a nearby branch to dry. "Would be so handy for farming."

"Of course that's the first place your mind would go." Lyla rolled her eyes, stoking the flames to try to rebuild the coal bed, and turned to me. "I wonder if we should build a second fire, a big one." Her dark eyes surveyed the sky, just starting to turn brilliant shades of pink and orange to prepare for sunset.

My heart sank at the looming threat of night. Though we weren't sure that the cloud demon was nocturnal, I couldn't help but expect it to come down on us as soon as the light was gone. But Damien was out there, alone, and searching for him would be next to impossible. We had to show him where we were.

Marius, too, though I had been wondering if he could actually communicate with my dreams at will. That might be a better way to locate him than building a fire.

I nodded my agreement at Lyla and started to build a cabin of sticks a few feet away.

"Do you think we can create these elements, or just use what's around us?" Archer mused, stretching his neck back and forth. "When I caused that wave it felt like I was pulling it from somewhere upstream... like I was connected to the river's head."

"Isn't the first law of thermodynamics that you can't create something from nothing?" I asked, finding my stick stacking almost therapeutic.

"Is this science, though, or magic?" He asked, and I knew he wasn't really asking me, just wondering out loud. It was an interesting question, to be sure. "Wow, I never thought I'd ask something like that."

"If it is magic, then we can't assume that any of this would work within the laws of physics," Lyla commented as she sliced another slab of meat for a kebab.

"I was thinking more along the lines of alchemy," Archer said, and rolled over into his side, leaning his head on his hand. Despite the serious conversation going on, I couldn't help but blush a little at the way his cock fell over his thigh at the movement. "Like transmutation, you can modify existing matter but you can't make it just appear. If you want gold, you still need a chunk of something to turn into gold."

"But we're not transmuting, or at least I don't think we are," Lyla shook her head. "When I blew the cloud demon away, it felt like it came from inside me. And Saph said she felt the blast from behind me hit her too."

"You could have been pulling from above or below you though, and then directing the energy outward." He pursed his lips in thought, pushing his glasses back up on his nose. They'd thankfully survived his near drowning.

"Why the sudden deep discussion into the science of all this, anyway?" I piped up as I shuffled over to borrow some flaming sticks from the small fire. "Wanting to study us like lab rats when we get back home?"

"No," he replied, "well yes, but no. I was thinking since we've all had these accidental outbursts, if Damien does too, his would be a lot more destructive than helpful trees."

My heart skipped a beat. I hadn't thought of that. If he just exploded into flame, it could take down half the forest.

"Shit," Lyla whispered, apparently not having thought of it either.

"But if he can only pull fire from a source, not create his own..." Archer shrugged. "I mean I guess we'll find out, but that's my theory anyway. If we can figure out how to properly use our abilities then we'll know more."