Sierra was sweating, holding a book in one hand and a sword in the other. She ran to a safe place, but something was holding her back. She turned around and saw blood rose thorns strapping around her legs and then her body. She fought the thorns but it was no use. She sighed and closed her eyes and concentrated on her body glowed as a whoosh of her long red hair wrapped around the thorns. Leaves, branches, and vines came out of her tearing the blood rose thorns away from Sierra's body. Her hair came off her body and was now in braids, the leaves, vines, and branches disappeared from her body when the earth element appeared.
She wiped the thorns from her dress and fixed her glasses. She looked around and saw a couple of Thivans there with their mouths open. Then a loud clap came. "Bravo, Princess Sierra." A man came up to her. "You finally passed your fighting skills and used your abilities. But you didn't unlock your true earth elements powers."
Sierra gave a weak smile and nodded her head. She knew she didn't unlock her true powers, it shows you what she truly is, yet Sierra couldn't find anything. "Thanks, but I have to get home I think my father is expecting me."
"Ah yes, you may go." He bowed again and looked at the rest of the class. "Like the rest of you, I expect you guys to unlock your power. You too, Sierra, you have to unlock your Earthen spirits."
"Yes, Mr. Albion." They mumbled.
They rumbled out of the forest as Sierra went to her friends. "Hey, guys."
Hermione and Dion didn't say anything. Sierra and her friends walked in silence passing trees and cottages. She passed a couple of trees and saw humans working until she saw her kingdom. She went up the stairs and saw her friends waving their arms, Sierra waved back and went into her house.
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"Do you think she has it?" Dion asked. As he and Hermione went to their cottage.
"She has to, the letter clearly says 'the three of you will unlock the path of Earthen spirits.' Who else do we know has that kind of ability instead of us?"
Dion took out his letter and so did his friend. "You mean so do you. I don't know why I got a letter I'm a freaking human."
"Maybe it has to do with your parents like who they were."
"Maybe, let's go." Ever since Heath and Dahlia adopted Dion he feels like everything in his life is missing something, but every time he ignores it. He never knew his biological parents or what happened to them, but he wanted to know. He wanted to know who he was. He wanted answers. Dion looked at the letter again while he heard Hermione open the door. Maybe this letter will have answers. Maybe it can lead away to the truth. Dion stuffed the letter in his pocket and went inside and closed the door.
Dion saw his adopted mother, Dahlia, cleaning the entire cottage. Her black curly hair was in a messy bun. Dark green skin matched the emerald of her eyes. She looked up and saw his son standing by the doorway. "Don't tell me you're going out again?"
"Sweetie, leave the boy alone. He probably wants privacy." Heath said. Heath has pale skin dirty blonde hair and dark brown eyes. He held a newspaper in his hand as he ruffled Dion's hair.
"No Heath, this is his 10 times going out alone at night. It needs to stop." Dahlia said.
"Dah-"
"Mom, it's fine beside Hermione was with me."
"Well thank you. She didn't give you trouble, right?" Dahlia said.
"No, she wasn't, mom." Dion chuckled.
"Ok. I just don't want you to get hurt and also your sister needs to take responsibility from now on." Dahlia went back to cleaning as Heath came up to her and kissed her on the cheek. Dion smiled as he ran upstairs and went to his room. After he was in his room he locked the door and sighed. He sat on his bed and closed his eyes thinking about his parents.
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Sierra walked upstairs of her house looking at the portraits of her family and ancestors. She was about to go to her room but heard a loud sound at the end of the hallway. The young Thivan ran to a room and opened the door, and saw her brothers Mason and Clay fighting each other. Sierra got in between them and broke the fight.
She looked up while struggling with her 8-year-old brothers and saw her big brother, Axton, staring at Mason and Clay with a cold stare. She sighed and let go of her brothers. "Go handle them."
"Gladly."
When she walked out of the room all she heard was screaming and yelling. She went to her room and change out of her clothes and put on a white dress that showed little of her bosom, black tights, and put her braided hair into a bun. She fixed her glasses again in the mirror. She smiled and when she turned she saw a letter on her bed.
She went to the bed, picked up the letter, tore it open, and read.
Dear Princess Sierra,
This letter you'll read will change your life, you and a few kids are invited on a journey and see things you've never seen before. Are you tired of being left out - tired of someone judging you - tired of not having an adventure and tired of hiding, come to the Gounge and wait?
Yours truly, unknown.
Sierra's eyes were wide as she ran out of the room and out of her kingdom. And ran to the oldest oak tree that was far away from her kingdom. She took a deep breath as her hands were shaking. She heard noises in the bushes but sighed in relief when it was just her friends.
Hermione and Dion were sweating and looked at their friend.
"Sierra, you okay?" Hermione said.
"No, I'm not okay. I got this letter saying all this. crazy stuff, so I ran to my favorite tree to process it." The princess exclaimed.
"Finally."
"Thank God."
Sierra looked at the two of them in confusion. "Wait you two knew I was getting a letter?" She said.
"Of course we did. We got one too." Dion took the letter from his pocket and Hermione took the letter out of her hair.
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Hermione sighed and walked away from her friends, but didn't look where she was going when she tripped over the edge and she screamed.
"HERMIONE!!!" She heard her friends scream as they slowly ran to the edge not falling. Hermione rolled and rolled feeling pain shooting out on every part of her body. When she stopped and notice she was far away from the ground, she turned and winced seeing that her arms were covered by blood and rose thorns. She tried to pull, but the thorns were deepening into her green skin.
"Hermione!" She saw her friends as they looked at her. "Are you okay?"
"Am I okay? Of course, I'm not okay, I'm trapped by thorns." Hermione screamed.
"Okay wait." Sierra's green skin grew bright as branches came out of the ground and went straight to Hermione. Dion climbed the branches and when he went to Hermione he told her to hold still. Dion didn't know what to do he had no weapons. So all he did was grabbed onto the blood rose thirds and tore them away from his friend and did the same on the other side. Hermione fell on top of Dion as the branches wrapped around them as they were pulled down and onto the ground. Sierra's skin turned to her normal color as she fell to the ground. She looked at her friend - Hermione was wiping the dirt from her green dress and Dion was looking at his hands. Hermione saw Dion's hands were bleeding and his veins were turning red and green. "Dion, you're bleeding." She went to him and held his hand as she examined it.
Sierra walked up to them. "What's wrong?"
"It seems when Dion held onto the blood rose thorns, the thorns went inside him. You could see the red petals marks on his arms." The red petal was spreading through his arms and thorns were coming out of his arms. The cut on his hands was bleeding as it was covered by leaves and thorns.
Hermione and Sierra turned to get something to heal the cut, but before they knew Dion's hands were fine. There were no cuts, but his arms were still covered by red petals as thorns came out further from both his arms.
"What happened to the cut?" Sierra asked.
"I don't know, but can you guys do something about the rose petals and thorns," Dion said.
"I'm sorry we can't we're not healers. But maybe we'll find some help, okay." Hermione said.
Dion nodded and looked at his arms.
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Sierra, Hermione, and Dion went through the bushes. As they went further into the forest they noticed something weird about the forest, it wasnt the Thivan's tree bug they just ignored it. They saw tables and chairs and Sierra saw 4 teens sitting on one of the chairs. Sierra and her friends went up to them and sat down. The first boy had pale skin with blue-white haur, grey ends, and baby blue eyes. The girl had ashen skin with blue-white hair and pale blue eyes. The second boy had ivory skin with golden blonde hair and blue-violet eyes that were made his eyes huge by his glasses. He shrank back when Hermione was looking at him. The last girl had ivory skin with blonde white hair and dark blue eyes.
"I'm Aspen." He introduced himself and pointed to a girl. "...... This is my sister Iclyn." Iclyn wasn't paying attention she was staring at Dion and him too and Aspen pointed at the blonde girl. "And this is my girlfriend Bianca and her twin brother Cypress.
Sierra pointed to her friends and introduced them. " This is Hermione and Dion......" She pointed to herself. "And I'm Sierra."

© Breanna Holton