I smiled at him, our eyes meeting across grass that was stained crimson with blood. Pausing for a moment, he briefly shouted out to me.

“Stand down Ilea. You can still come home.”

“Elmira is not my home.” I replied, lighting a small flame on my hand and making it dance around my fingertips. I watched my hand and felt the anger radiating from Orion, as I ignored him. He started to speak again, but I shook my head.

“You’re wasting your breath.” I informed him.

He shot a bolt of energy in my direction, but I flipped high into the air, arcing my back over the electricity and springing from my hands back onto my feet. Another shot at me and I dipped under it. We played for a while; he shot lightning and I danced around it. The lack of complication to his fighting bothered me; He was holding back.

Always the calculating chess player, his current moves were ungainly, seemingly fuelled by anger. He had played his Pawns and I believe he wanted me to think he was playing his Queen, although the only things on the board were Castles.

The acrobatic display I was showing had been fun, at the start, but I was bored. I glanced at him and flicked my arm up in front of me. The earth responded. Before Orion knew what had happened he was on his back, braces of stone chaining his wrists and ankles to the ground. I walked towards him and received a thrill of power as the soldiers that had once surrounded Orion, ran from my approach.

I glared down at him, the fires still burning beneath my lashes and along my skin.

“Why will you not leave me alone?” I snarled. He made no answer, adamantly turning his face away from me, stubbornly refusing to speak. So, I made him scream. The fire licked along his fingers first, blistering them like the innocents he had murdered. Then it ran up his arms, slowly searing hair and skin before burning his muscles and blood. He screamed again.

“Because of who you are!” I stopped the flames.

“Explain.”

“Your lineage, your power.”

“You know who I am? Tell…” Footfalls as quick as a hummingbird’s wings cut me off. I whipped my sword up into the air and stepped backwards as another crashed down onto it. Leaping backwards, I glared at Senkrad, Orion’s Queen Piece.

Whipping my sword around it screeched as it hit metal. Senkrad’s block was quick, but I was slightly quicker. I feinted left and my sword touched his, as my right fist slammed into his side. I heard him sharply suck in his breath as he tried to thrust his sword through my stomach. I parried, forcing my palm into his chest and compelling air between us so that he flew backwards. Running towards me, he glanced over my shoulder and smiled.

I followed his glance and blue light caught my eye. I whipped my hand out and sent a gust of air towards Orion’s incoming missile as I blocked Senkrad’s blade from slicing through my neck. I felt a rumble through my feet and launched myself into the air as the ground where I had just been standing erupted in stone skewers. Abruptly twisting the air around me, I launched backwards and barely missed the swoop of Senkrad’s blade as he tried to slice off everything below my knees.

I landed a couple of meters away from them. It was only then that I realised that the soldiers had been a distraction, that Orion’s playing before, had been exactly that. They wanted to wear me down and then fight me together. I tried to ignore the nausea growing in my stomach.

 Orion sent strike after strike of lightning as Senkrad took a running arc towards me. I counter attacked Orion’s magic for as long as possible, then sprung to the side and slashed my sword as Senkrad’s blade rained down on me once more. I raised an earth wall at my back to try and hold off Orion’s attacks and focussed on slicing off Senkrad’s head.

Sliding from one stance to another, we became a deadly dance of two halves. I tried to focus on his eyes and blade simultaneously, knowing that his eyes would give away the move he was about to make split seconds before he made it, calves, stomach, arms, stomach, neck. I tried to concentrate on blocking each attack and counter attacked with determination. They could not take Beau away from me.

I could feel myself growing tired, the wall of earth I was holding behind me was needing constant supervision as Orion tried to blow it apart. But the fight with Senkrad was unbelievably fast, metallic peals rang like a melody as we twisted and span into and away from each other. The sweat was dripping down my forehead and into my eyes but I could not afford to wipe it away.

An explosion at my back threw me forward and I desperately twisted my body to avoid being impaled onto Senkrad’s upturned blade. There was nothing I could do as it sliced through the flesh above my hip and began to bleed a crimson waterfall. I crashed on my back, my head smashing into the ground and my left shoulder landing with a crack that made me scream out in pain.

Orion strode through the decimated wall and threw strike after strike at me as I lay on the ground uncoordinated and desperate. I countered as quickly as I could, but I was growing weak. The tears fell from my eyes as I thought of Beau and then lightning caught me in the chest and everything became a blur. I felt an ice cold hand place itself over my fore-head and then familiar eyes bore into my own.

“Go to sleep Ilea.” The world went black.

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Wow can't believe it's finally finished!...thanks to everyone who stuck with me and has read this all the way through. Sorry if its not the happy perfect ending you wanted, but if it had been then there wouldn't need to be a 2nd book, and you don't know what happened to Jacob or Johanna yet, or who Ilea's mother and father are, or where she comes from, or why she is such a powerful elf, or why Orion and Senkrad need her so much, or who are they trying to use her as protection against??....all will be revealed in the next few books of this series!!

Please check out the 2nd book if you liked this one, either go on my profile or follow this link (if it works) =P

http://www.wattpad.com/3855837-ilea-dawning-book-ii

Well, Enjoy!!!

-x-