The Phoenix Ring(33)

Aidan rolled his eyes and jumped to his feet.

"Come on, we have a long walk ahead of us.”





Aidan knew within the first hour that there was no way they would get to Camp Ward in four days. Aside from the problem that Timothy had never walked more than three miles at a time in his life, the road was riddled with fallen logs and became more and more overgrown the further they went into the woods. At least there was no problem with water, there were streams everywhere, though they always seemed to choose the worst places to cross the road.

Aidan also found, to his disappointment, that he was unable to keep up the pace he had wanted for very long either. Four months of doing nothing but magic had not made him any fitter.

When the sun was beginning to set and twilight was creeping over the forest, the boys had only made it about fifteen miles, for which Aidan knew the Rangers would have been ashamed.

"You know," Timothy said between pants, "We probably should have taken some horses."

"They never would have made it over some of those logs, and they would attract predators at night."

"Wait, predators? What predators? What was that?" Timothy said, flinching back as a long, eerie scream split the air.

"Just a screech owl," Aidan said, rolling his eyes as he strung up his hammock.

There was silence for another few moments before a low moan dominated the night.

"Well then what was that?" Timothy asked, his staff at the ready.

"Uh, another owl." Aidan said.

Actually he was fairly certain it was a large cat, but it was probably better if Timothy didn't know that.

They spent the first night tossing and turning in their hammocks, finally falling asleep to the mournful howling of a wolf pack in the distance.





"Tonight," Timothy said, the bags under his eyes sagging, "We light a campfire and keep it going all night."

The smaller boy jumped down from his hammock and fell to the ground.

"Oww," he moaned, "My legs hurt so bad."

Aidan laughed and rolled off his own hammock, only to fall to his knees in a similar fashion.

I swear, if I live through this thing, then I will run around the entire fort three times every day.

"Come on," Aidan said, struggling to his feet," if we walk it will get better faster."

Thankfully, the path began to slope downhill as the day wore on, and they were able to make twenty miles. They fell into a clearing, exhausted, and just laid there for about five minutes.

Eventually, Aidan stood up and stumbled into the trees to gather firewood.

He had just found a small pile of dry branches when he heard a twig snap behind him.

He spun around, staff at the ready, and saw a little humanoid creature lying on the ground.

He cautiously picked up his staff and began to walk towards it. As he got closer, he could hear soft moans escaping its mouth, though it appeared to be unconscious.

Aidan had to stare at it for a few seconds before his brain could understand what his eyes were telling it.

It was a small creature, maybe two feet tall, with long, loping legs and arms and green tinged dry, scaly skin. It was covered by nothing but a loincloth, and small white hairs sprouted from its face and head. A lizard-like tail protruded from its back end, and its four fingered, clawed hands were clutched over its tiny chest.

"What are you?" Aidan asked the creature.

In response it moaned loudly and rolled over, revealing a knife wound across its torso, slathered in green blood.

Aidan had once seen a cut like that on a human. It wasn't serious and didn't go deep, but it was extremely painful and would leave a nasty scar.

The boy gently picked the creature up and hurried back to where Timothy was setting up camp, leaving his firewood behind.

The younger mage was hanging both the hammocks from different trees when he saw Aidan.

"What the-"

"I don't know, but it's hurt." Aidan said.

Timothy dropped his hammock and ran to his pack, pulling out a sewing needle, thread, and a few herbs.

"I think you have a pot in your pack. Get some water, bring it to a boil, and make some tea out of these," he said, tossing the herbs to Aidan.

Aidan grabbed the pot and ran down the path to where he had noticed a small stream earlier.

As soon as the water was in the pot he put his left hand under it and muttered "ingo."

Firewood is stupid.

Flames began to dance on his hand, though he felt no heat. He couldn't keep this up all night, but it was far hotter than anything that had ever burned in a campfire.

He walked back to the camp as fast as he could without spilling any boiling water on himself.

Timothy was kneeling over the creature, and was just about to finish sewing the wound closed.

"I'm going to speed up the natural healing process with a spell, but I also need the tea to counter any infection. I can't speed up its body without also speeding up anything that might infect the wound. This is complicated, so give me time to think after you give me the tea."