The Human Phoenix

[FewRevelations]

[glow=red,2,300]The Human Phoenix[/glow]

She parried and slashed with her sword like the expert she was, even in the fading light. The gleaming steel of the blade was muddled with the glint of fresh, crimson blood. But she paid the blood that also stained her hands no heed, just as she ignored the splitting pain in her side and the magic in her mind, just sitting and waiting to be used.
She was Elmindreda Calthazar Shai’taer Manetherendrelle, a female warrior of Ortajh, and nothing could stop her now! Many men fell before her blade, their dead eyes frozen in shock as they realized they had been slain by a girl. Every so often, however, her concentration was momentarily broken as her fiery red-brown eyes flitted to the side, gazing for only a split second at the man she would protect with every fiber of her being, no matter the cost.
And then, her raven tresses fluttering harshly in the strong wind, she was sucked back into the battle. Her eyes were filled with flashes of light off the swords, her nostrils screaming with the stench of unwashed bodies and sweat, her hearing almost deafened by the clanging of steel on steel and grunts from men as they barely stopped a blow that would could have been fatal. Every so often, she would hear a battle cry go up among her men. “Rally to the banner of the Red Eagle!” “For the blood of out brethren!” or even, “For the Soaring Crown!” Her own throat was hoarse from her own cries, her voice exhausted from the screaming.
Suddenly, she realized something was different. Where were her men? What had happened to the weary battle cries, proclaiming that they should protect their country and queen? Min lopped off another man’s head before looking around. What she saw shocked her to her core.
All her men. Dead. Lying on the ground, perhaps choking on their own blood. A glance to her left again made her breathe a sigh of relief. He was still alive. But… He was in grave danger. The rest of the men they had fought against, the dirty Furgai’s attempting to conquer her homeland, crept up behind him, and he was locked sword-to-sword with a rather burly man. There was only one thing she could do to save him now, though she had vowed never to try and take another being’s life this way.
Reaching into the deep recesses of her mind, she grasped her true power. The sweet liveliness of magic flooded through her, coursing through her veins. Though it had been countless years since she had used magic, she still felt practiced. She had to save him. Raising her hands and turning to face the attackers, a stream of white-hot, liquid fire jetted from her palms. But it was too much for her to control. The flames engulfed the scene before her, the very air reduced to ash by the sure heat of it all.
Her magic could only be used for destructive purposes, which was why she despised it. And manifesting her power as this fire was giving it access to its true purpose. When the fire from her hands finally died down, what she saw made her fall to her knees in grief.
Dead.
Cold.
Lifeless.
She dragged herself along the ground to him, not trusting her legs to carry her. He was nothing more than the charred remains of a corpse, now, but she knew it was him. Only he wore a pendant shaped like a golden, bewingéd tiger, frozen in flight. The gold should have melted, but when she had bought it for him, a sorceress had placed protective charms upon it.
Tears leaked from her eyes, crystalline droplets running down her cheeks and dripping off her chin into her lap. She clutched the pendant in her fist, not sure what else she could do. It was her fault he was dead.
She had killed him! The only man she had ever loved, and he was dead, by her hand.
Calling upon her magic for what she hoped was the final time, flames began to lick at her toes. She succumbed to the pain, welcoming it into her body like a long-lost friend into her home.
Slowly the flames engulfed her, but she remained silent in her weeping.
And then there was nothing.

A chuckle rose from the depths of the blinding light. Why did the laughter seem so familiar?
Slowly, a figure appeared before her, glowing with his own light. He was bare-chested, his skin a lovely golden color she had never seen on a man before, his hair seeming to have been made of spun sunlight. He wore strange white pants with a gold border, the breeches having no division between the legs. It almost seemed more a skirt! He wore no shoes, and as he shifted his position, she could see the muscles in his chest and arms tense.
Could it be?
No. It wasn’t possible. Surely not…
He chuckled again, and she was sure. Helilo, the Sun God!
“Foolish Elmindreda,” he told her boigerously. “You, of all people, should know what happens when one tries to destroy herself with an element called forth by her own magic! And yet you tried anyways, wanting to die! Well, unfortunately for you, I’m not through with you yet…”
Everything faded. The light. The peace. The god. It all became nothing.

The volcano was almost forgotten by everyone. Nobody lived near it, and it had lain dormant for hundreds of years. Even cartographers left the trifle off their maps of Myrari.
This was why everyone was so shocked when it spewed a jet of blue fire, visible on the horizon from hundreds of miles away.

She awoke with a start, sitting upright abruptly and coughing and spluttering harshly. When finally she could breathe through the ash, she took a few calming breaths before looking at herself. She still had the same hair as before, except for the fact that is seemed to have taken on a reddish tinge. And instead of her gleaming, special-made plate armor, she was wearing an elaborate red and black silk and velvet dress fit for a palace! What had happened to her?!
She reached out for magic in hopes of finding an answer, but something new was there instead.
Min reached for it, as she had for the magic the seemed to no longer be there. She struggled with the alien presence for a moment before finally overcoming it.
Attempting to cry out in triumph, she realized she couldn’t. And looking down at herself brought a stranger revelation.
She was on fire!
Not simply on fire, she was fire!
Her concentration broken, she lost her grasp on the strange new ability, and found she looked human again.
So it was true; trying to destroy herself with fire she had conjured had fused her with the element. Now…
It seemed she would be stuck alone, a fire nymph filled with nothing but regret, the rest of her days.
She laid upon the slopes of the volcano that had birthed her and wept.

{Get up, you sorry lout!} came a strange female voice in her head.
Min rolled over and sat up, looking around in confusion.
{You really aren’t from around here, are you?}
Where was the voice coming from?!
Suddenly, from behind a big boulder stepped a monstrous creature, its fur striped bright orange and deep, dark black. It resembled a hugely oversized cat.
“What -- What are you?!” Min asked in confusion. “And how are you in my head?!”
{Oh, honestly, if you had half the brains of the most dim-witted person on this planet, it would be an improvement,} came the rude reply. {I’m a tiger. My name, since you failed to ask, is Moksha. And I’m in your head because I’m your Familiar.}
“My what?”
{Familiar! You know. An animal bonded to you se we can speak to each other with our minds, and I’ll die when you die and not before or visa versa! Surely you’ve heard of that!}
“Well, I suppose I have… But I thought you have to be alive for thirteen days, or in Myrari for as long, before you are bonded! Surely I haven’t been here for that span of time!”
Moksha’s lips curled back in the semblance of a smile, showing rows of gleaming fang-like teeth. {You’ve been asleep for fourteen days.}
“What?!” Min’s eyes widened in shock. She opened her mouth to say more, but was cut off by more words from the tiger.
{It isn’t important. Tell me, girl, what is your name?}
“Elmindreda Calthazar Shai’taer Manetherendrelle.”
{Ortajhian nobility, hmm? Well, you’re not any longer. So you’ll need a new name…}
By the time the she-tiger was through with thinking, my new name and story was decided upon. My first name was Ishara, after the first queen of Myrari. My last name would be Sei’Moiseve, meaning raised or level eyes. It meant I had honor. My entire name only hinted at what I had once been, a faint remnant of the woman warrior I would never be again.