Songs of War shorts

Lost Innocents

This is a short story for Songs of War I had the idea of. Nothing related to Mystic War, and OC's aren't canon.

Emeria watched the rising of the sun as it emerged from the distant ocean. A bright hue illuminated the province, Kaltaria. The village came alive, birds began singing their songs and the ardoni began to exit their caves. She waited for a few more moments, then turned and ran into the forest.

The young female bounded through the woods, carefully avoiding the trees and branches around her and the rocks lining the dirt and grass below her.

Two wooden swords were slung over her back, a pack of food in her inventory.
She followed the path until it passed by a small ravine, it could barely be seen with the trees in the way. Emeria turned off the path and towards the ravine, coming up to a fallen tree with some missing limbs.
The trunk was hanging over the ditch, supported by longer branches and high boulders on the other side.

Emeria climbed up onto the bottom half of the trunk, gripping onto the rips in the bark that dug as deep as a sword wound. She slowly got to her feet, balancing herself on the wood. Only when she had stabilized herself, she began to slowly cross over the ravine.

There was a sudden voice behind her, a voice of another ardoni, the voice of her father. "Emeria? Where are you going?" She landed on the other side of the ravine and whirled around to see a Kaltaris, with identical markings to her own, standing on the other side. A fishing pole was in his hand.

"Oh uhh... I'm just heading off to the beach, with a friend," it wasn't the truth, but it wasn't fully a lie either.

Her father narrowed his eyes. "Who's the friend?"

She answered with the first name that came to her mind. "Ametha. Mendoris, she visits sometimes."

Her father nodded slowly, then began to walk away. "Well, be back soon, alright?"
"Alright," she was quick to end the conversation, and immediately vanished into the forest.

She could never tell her father the truth. Never could, and never would. If She had, another innocent life would be lost. Another ardoni, marked with false crimes imprinted by the Walls of Time. Another ardoni from the forbidden clan among the ardoni.

. . .

A young voltaris sat by the shore of the beach, gentle waves thrusting forward and pulling back into the ocean. He stood at the sound of approaching footsteps. He turned, smiling at his friend's arrival. "Hello Emeria. It's good to see you again."
"Hey," she walked up next to the voltaris, an action very few had the confidence to perform. "You shouldn't just stand out here in the open. Someone will see you."

He frowned. "Sorry, I'm not used to these parts just yet.."

It had been only a month since the voltaris had come from Northwind. He had been lucky enough to not be seen, and he was too young to understand why he had to stay hidden. Emeria knew she couldn't tell him what had happened to his clan.
"You ready?"

"Yeah." Emeria tossed the younger ardoni a wooden sword. He tried to catch it in mid-air, but he bobbed it into the sand. He flushed with embarrassment and picked it up off the floor. Emeria pulled out her own sword and walked closer to him.
"You never lose sight of your enemy, blindness of the attack is the other's advantage. You must attack the unguarded, and avoid the attack, let's try it."