1 Where It All Began 1

People running everywhere, trying to hide, struggling to survive. The chaos!

What seems to be a Knight, no dark mage or a combination of both... Killing...

Babies, children, mothers, fathers.. Innocents all fall by the sword. The delight in the eyes of their killers as they take each life one after another,with no remorse.

There are those who try to fight back, but they can't last long under the powers of the catastrophic magic. People screaming, anguish everywhere...

"It's like hell has let loose on us, brother I can't hold on much longer," said a girl in her early twenties, a mage to a boy of the same age group standing by her side.

"You have got to hold on. Do not die on me" the boy commanded. "We would make through it, help would come soon, Sylvia."

"I can't anymore, I am sorry for being this weak brother"

They kept on fighting the dark Knights, the girl conjures vines from the ground to attack the knights and the boy creates a barrier to protect the other villagers. Two knights kept on hitting on the barrier the boy had put up.

The girl used her vines to pierce the chest of the two dark Knights.

"Brother are you okay?"

"I can hold it for a little while longer."

"We've lost many, we would fall soon. There is no other way."

"Sylvia no, we can still fight. Don't do this."

"Brother, you know its the only way. If not all these sacrifices would be for nought."

The boy made gestures with his left hand and snaps the neck of three knights coming close to his sister.

"Please, Sylvia don't, it would kill you."

"I'm sorry brother. Goodbye"

She moves forward, using the vines to kill some knights close to her and starts muttering some words.

"Vetkeni triveankin centu va nie letusumi netweniaakarr..."

Soon the fire comes out from her fingertips and burns a wide range of dark knights and she falls down. Her brother stops his magic and the barrier disappears, he runs to meet his sister on the ground.

"Sylvia, please open your eyes, don't die on me, don't leave me sister."

She coughs and opens her eyes worryingly.

"Live on James, take them and run. Survive! No matter what, I have slowed them down, but more would soon come. Go, I love you."

Her hand holding his shoulder drops and the pretty face calms down as the emotions are no longer on them, there was nothing. She was dead. He screams.

She opens her eyes while screaming. Looks around and the door to her room opens, with a lady in her forties running in and enters her bed, she hugs her close.

"It's okay dear, you are safe now. It was just a dream," said Elizabeth as she holds the girl close to her chest.

"Mum... It was scary!" she sobs and holds her mum tighter.

"Its all okay... I am here now Isabel. I won't let anything happen to you."

The next morning Isabel talks to her parents over the breakfast in the dining room.

"Isabel dear, you are saying your dreams are progressing?" Asked the man in his forties.

He was wearing a top and a trouser and eating his breakfast of toasted bread and egg with milk.

"Yes, daddy. Before I couldn't hear what the people were saying, but now, I can hear their conversations. There were two mages, a boy and a girl, all the other mages in that village had fallen."

She took a bite of her breakfast, then continued telling the horrible experience she had, dreaming last night and the nights before that.

"The girl could control the vines, the boy set up a magical barrier to protect some villagers and they fought for a while, later it was obvious they were losing the battle."

Her parents looked at her with interest as they ate on.

"The girl bled from her nose as she continued manipulating the vines to do her bidding. Her name was Sylvia and her brother's name was James..."

Both of her parents had a look of shock written all over their faces and Isabel saw it before they changed their expressions.

"Dad, mum, why were you surprised when I mentioned their names? You don't think I made it up, do you?"

"No darling, I... Umm, we... were... Ummm," he stammered, not sure how to react to the petrified child.

"No dear, what your father is trying to say is, that Ummm....Well, now the characters in your dreams have names. They never did!"

"That's because I could hear them this time around"

"Baby, you are stressing yourself too much, perhaps it was the movie you watched yesterday that made you feel... "

Isabel hits the table with her fists. She looks back up at her mum and one could see the tears form in her dazzling eyes.

"Mum don't tell me you don't believe me. I'm saying the truth, it's not because of any film. Please," the tears freely flowed down her cheeks as she spoke.

"Don't cry love, your dad is only concerned about you. Nothing much, you are safe here."

She reaches out her hands to touch Isabel, but Isabel avoided it and placed both her hands on her lap. She didn't want any comfort that would prove her dreams a mere delusion, right now.

"You never believed me. It is okay. You think I'm crazy. But I'm not."

There was pleading audible in her convincing voice. Her mother sighed, not knowing what else to say to comfort her, she never knew!

"Baby, you'll be late for school. Hurry up and go" her dad commanded taking the situation in his hands and trying to divert the attention from the topic.

"I'm already leaving dad. Bye mum".

She got up as she knew there was nothing more she could say to convince them. She sighs as she takes her bag from the couch in the parlour and left.

"You should not be like that towards her, she is a child, don't hurt her feelings".

"I am doing my duty to protect her."

"You will only lose her."

"Don't encourage her, I'd rather kill her hopes, than let her hope or think its real, its affecting her studies, she is too scared".

"You cannot erase her past. Can't you see it's getting weaker? I'm afraid it won't hold much longer".

'''Its going to be okay". He pats his wife on the head, assuring his words but their was a flicker of doubt in his mind too.

"Get ready, you would be late for work".

"Thank you honey" she smiles and packs the dishes...

"Stop love, I would do it, after all, I am on leave. Now then off you go. "

He pecks her on the forehead and she leaves...