Chapter two: Water and Fire

Maxine felt the water soak all of her hair and face as Jake pushed her under. Immediately after she closed her eyes, she felt a strong jerk and her body was now twisting and turning in turbulent waters.

Air, I need air. Maxine moved her arms trying to find her way up, to find a way to fill her lungs with air, but the current was so abrupt she had no idea of which way was up. Air. The water was freezing, she was about to pass out when she felt a firm grip around her wrist pull her up swiftly.

Jake grabbed her tightly by the waist now as they were being dragged by the ice cold river’s current. She took a deep desperate breath, the chilled air filling her lungs.

“Maxine, you better hold on to me” he had to yell so she could hear his voice over the sound of aggressive waters.

“Jake, what is go…” and she felt it–

All of her internal organs went upwards inside of her as they free fell what it seemed an eternal distance, down a waterfall. They were together as one since Maxine managed to wrap around Jake with arms and legs, but as they hit bottom Jake slipped away from her grip.

Her eyes wide open could now see which way was up since a bright light was shinning through the calmer waters, she started swimming towards it. Almost there Maxi, almost there.

She looked around to see if Jake was anywhere to be seen but all she saw was rocks, and in a distance, the place where the water hit water forming a white cloud of bobbles, probably where they got separated.

Maxine was almost reaching air when something grabbed her foot pulling her into the deep. You gotta be kidding me. When she glanced back wrenching her foot away, she screamed letting out all the air she was saving.

A pair of big yellowish green eyes were staring at her. She could not quite make out what kind of beast it was, it looked like a jurassic fish. This is where I die…at least it wasn’t boring. She tried to shrug her foot away unsuccessfully, the pressure on her ears and lungs were becoming painful. She gave up struggling and looked up at the light rays penetrating the clear water, it was a beautiful last view.

She saw a shadow move somewhere above, squinting her eyes together to see who or what it was when she saw a reddish flowing hair coming towards her. What the hell? Farak was swimming so fast towards them he looked like he was built for water. Is that a sword gleaming in his hand? She glanced at the beast again, wondering how deep would it take her, Maxine could no longer feel her foot, or anything for that matter, since the water was so cold.

Water was going into her lungs–

“Wake up!” Farak yelled shaking her by the shoulders “Maxine, don’t you dare give up on us” he inhaled and with his lips on hers filled up her lungs, which made her feel the water pushing its way out. She started coughing up liquid while she laughed.

“All this trouble just” she coughed out some more water, “to give me a kiss Francis?”

“Are you ok?” Jake crouched besides them.

“I have my doubts if I’m still alive…All this madness that is going on seems I’m in a nightmare” she joked.

“I’m glad you still have your sense of humor, you’re going to need it” said Farak standing up straight stretching out his hand, offering her help to get up. She looked at his big, veiny hand and followed with her glaze to his other hand, where he was holding a sword extremely shiny in the moonlight.

“Did you kill the beast?”

“No, I would never. That creature was here long before our ancestors walked this land…I just scared it off” Farak answered still holding his hand out to help her.

Maxine propped herself up ignoring his help and stood tall, in silence, taking in where she was and trying to make sense of what was going on. Ouch. Her foot had a bite of gods know what, and she was just now beginning to feel the pain.

“My foot hurts I need to make some kind of tourniquet, I think it’s bleeding” she whimpered, whilst taking her boot off. Farak looked at Jake jerking his head towards her foot. He silently approached her “Excuse me” he said looking in her eyes and touching her wound. She could see a fine line of light between her skin and his and a tingling sensation, almost itchy , where the creature had bitten her. She was stupefied, gapping, staring at the situation like an outsider, as if her soul had left her and she could see the trio from above. Am I dead?

“How is it now?” Jake asked making her snap out of her third person perspective of them. “It’s…” she touched it, mesmerised “perfect”.

“What are you?” She whispered, touching Jake on the cheek.

“I’m a healer” he answered bowing to her. Farak rolled his eyes. “We need to move, get out of these cold clothes before we freeze, unless Maxi here can conjure some fire to help us get warm and dry”.

§

I stared at them. I looked around the beautiful scenery, the edge of the woods, the waterfall, the big rocks that surrounded the water, everything so visible in the night due to the big blue moon. I was so lost with everything that had just happened within the last few hours that my head was hurting, I was wet and freezing, my teeth were shuddering and my lips and nose almost completely numb.

Jake and Farak were now standing with squared shoulders looking back at me, as if waiting for me to do or say something that would explain all this. They looked different somehow, they looked, despite the wetness and uncomfortable temperature, completely comfortable.

I felt a rage growing inside me, anger, I wanted assault them both for being liars but I pulled some strength I had left in me to take a deep breath and calm down, I could not walk away from them now because I had no idea of where I was. Looking at Farak with his shining orange hair, all black clothes and a sword in hand I started to laugh, like an evil witch.

This was somehow my dream, to be taken out of that world and called upon to serve a purpose, and now that it was happening I could not react, I had no idea of who I was. But what I did know was that I never quite fit in back home, or back where I spent all my life so far. It is very confusing, very arousing, and all I could do was let it out in a nervous laugh.

They had their eyes fixated on me with serious faces, so I stoped, swallowed and came back to my senses. This was really happening. I was taken out of my known world through a bathtub and fell into a waterfall in another universe. Ok Maxine, you got this.

§

“How exactly do you expect me to conjure anything? How does it work exactly? Why don’t you or Jake do it?” asked Maxine with a firm voice, she was actually really curious “And by the way, where are we?” she smiled ironically.

“I’m only a healer, I tend to wounds of the flesh, and Farak is, as far as we know” Jake peeked at Farak looking for approval to go on, “a warrior, no particular powers that we know of” then he went on, “you, on the other hand, have magical blood in your veins, as do I, but it’s different.”

Maxine had so many questions to ask, so much that she’d hope to find out about herself but the cold was stopping her, she could not feel her toes, nose or ears anymore.

“So where do we go now? I’m fre” she could barely talk with her trembling jaw, “freezing…”

“Follow me…” said Farak going into the woods. And she did, at least moving her body would get her blood flowing.

“Jake, we did fall on the right waterfall right?” Farak said looking back at them, holding on the hilt of his sword as if ready to fight another creature. Maxine knew there would be a time and place for her answers, and kept her head focused on her survival for once, now that she felt life getting interesting.

“I’m pretty sure it was, the Goliah was there and everything…We’re on the right path it seems” responded Jake.

“What is Goliah? That giant ancient eel looking creature?” Maxine jumped to conclusions. “Yes, exactly. There are many waterfalls in the continent of Morthir, but only one of them has this lonely beast, and we had to be sure of where we would be when we returned…”

“Oh… so Morthir is big? How big? Like Australia?” she felt that she was pushing it with her many, many questions. “There” Farak pointed to a wooden cottage in the middle of the woods, “We’re here” and he started to speed up his steps to get there, Maxine did the same.

They entered the tiny place, there was only a fireplace, a thick rug big enough to cover almost the whole floor, and an old looking oak chest in the corner. There was wood in the fireplace, like it had been piled up ready to be lit, spiderwebs gave away how long it was there.

Farak walked in taking his shirt off, only to reveal that underneath what seemed to be a skinny body was a very fit body, along with some scars that got her curious. She wondered if she would have a scar where the Goliah bit her.

He opened the chest and got a weird looking apparatus and a metal can. Must be oil, to light the fire. With his other hand he tossed three fur blankets onto the rug. He lit the fire with ease, everything seemed to be happening like it was supposed to, he had wood, oil, that odd looking lighter, and exactly three blankets. Maxine’s arrival had been carefully planned.

“Take those clothes off Maxine, toss them in the fire…” Farak said, running his free hand through his hair. Was he always this handsome?

“But I have no other clothes, why would I burn them?”

“We can’t bring anything from that other…place” he said, carefully choosing his words.

“Are you going to burn your clothes?”

“Yes, as a matter of a fact, you, me and Jake are going to burn everything. We’ll be wearing only what we wear when we are born… our own skin” he was now smiling, knowing it would irritate her.

“I will not be naked in this cold, fuck no”

“Use the blanket, tomorrow we’ll wear these” he pulled out pieces of clothes out of the chest in random order, a green velvet cloak, couple of leather pants, and so on. All of the clothes looked ancient.

“Even my boots?” she said, sad because those were one of her favorite pairs.

“Even the boots…” Jake said, he was already burning his clothes standing butt naked in front of the fire, his skin glowing. He grabbed a blanket from the floor wrapping it around his toned muscles.

“It’s ok Maxine, we wont look. Give her a break Farak…” Jake curled up on the floor finding a good sleeping position, the blanket folding him in like a sleeping bag. “Good night…” he sighed.

Maxine walked towards the fireplace, took off her boots almost in slow motion, holding them up above the fire, staring blankly into the flames. This was a ritual of passage, she had to leave her old self behind, that was what this meant.

Without blinking, still staring into the flames, Maxine took off her socks, jeans, panties, every single piece of clothing she had on and watched them burn, standing there naked, reborn. She finally blinked, back to the moment.

She turned around covering her parts with her hands walking towards Farak, he was holding up a blanket with arms opened, a welcome posture. They were looking at each other’s eyes, into each other’s soul, he didn’t break eye contact to look at her body, making her let go of covering up.

Maxine knew this was a symbolic moment, so did he. She turned her back to him, he placed the blanket on her like a coronation cloak. The moment the fur touched her skin she felt a shiver of power irradiate from her head down to every part of her body.

She felt it, the magic in her veins.