A/N: Okay, so it took me a day longer then I said it would to get this chapter out.  But hey!  Its out and that’s all that counts, right?  So anyways, here you go…On to Chapter 5!!

 

Also, I’m going to try something a little different with this chapter…as an experiment, since ff.net seems to put too many blank lines between paragraphs, SO…I’m just trying something new…if it STILL looks weird to me, then I’ll go back to my original way of typing…

 

~*~Children of a Dying Sun: Chapter 5:  Dragon and Phoenix~*~

 

Someone’s pounding on the door, and my headache is growing by the second.  From the top bunk, Phoenix moans and throws her pillow at the door.

A lot of good that does.  I push myself to my bare feet, “I’m coming, I’m coming…”

At the moment, I’m too tired to think about who is on the other side.  Luckily for me, it’s Drago.

“Orlan’s just been spotted,” he says, then yanks me out the door.

The sun is too bright and my headache gets worse.  But Drago is right.  Land is on the very horizon.  I smile and nod to Drago, then head back down the stairs.

“Hey!”  He calls after me, “Don’t you want to see Orlan?”

“I’ll see it when we get there.”  I mumble over my shoulder and open my door.

Phoenix peers over the edge of her bunk, her eyes still fogged with sleep and her short hair pointing in every direction.  She looks at me questioningly as I bolt the door shut again.

“Orlan.”  I say, then yawn.  She nods and is barely able to catch the pillow I throw at her. She sighs and buries her head into the pillow as I collapse back onto my bunk.

 

~~@~~

 

            I figure an hour has passed before Drago calls my name from outside the door.  This time, I’m able to focus and am much more careful when I open the door.

“Jeez, you two are lazy ass’s.”  Drago mutters as I let him step inside.  He looks around the room, “Time to get up.”

“Mm…” Phoenix groans now, “5 more minutes…” Then her voice drowns in her pillow.  I close the door and gesture to the chair.  Drago folds his long legs as I lower myself to the floor.

            “We’ve got a problem,” I say in a hushed voice.

            Drago nods, “I know.  Probably bigger than you know.”

            “What do you mean?”

            “You hopped aboard at the worst possible time.  The crew’s planning a mutiny.”

            THIS is news to me.

            “It’ll probably fall into action today.  And…since you’re here, they’ll probably kill you.”

            We sit in silence for a while, “They have our weapons.  We’re practically defenseless.”

            “Well, then, I guess we’ll just have to get them back.”  He gives a grim smile to the floor, which has suddenly seemed to have captured his interest.

            “I guess.  Where do you think they are?”

            “Well, Phoenix’s beam sword will be easy to get…it’s probably on a shelf in the armory.  I can get to it…easy.  Your sword though…” Drago inhales deeply.

            I nod, “I kind of figured it’d be hard to get a hold of.  Any ideas where it is?”

            “Probably with the First Mate.  That’ll take some magic to get a hold of.”

            I look up at Phoenix and say, “If we don’t want blood spilled, I agree with you.  But magic isn’t exactly something we have.”

            Drago rests his chin on his hand, deep in thought.  Finally, he shakes his head, “I don’t know.  But I can get…probably two beam swords that won’t be missed.”

            Without another word, he rises and leaves the room, closing the door behind him.

            I move to the chair and watch Phoenix for a while more.

~~@~~

 

            Noises from the hallway snap me from my deep thoughts.  I rise and go to the door.  It’s unlocked.  As I reach to lock it, the door burst open and a crew man levels a gun at me.

            I wonder what Phoenix had done with the gun I had been toting when I met her.  The guy grabs me and drags me into the hall.  Two men enter the cabin.  There is the sounds of a fight before Phoenix emerges, captured, but sporting only a bloodied lip.

            The two that had gone in for her…one has a black eye forming and is favoring one of his legs.  The other is being careful with what he does with his left wrist and hand and is keeping his body as far from Phoenix as he cam, without losing his grip on her.  Both of them eye here warily.  She just stares defiantly ahead-at me.

            “G’ on, ye two.  Get up them stair.”  One of the men shoves me with a pointed object.

            As I head up the stairs, Phoenix is pushed into me from behind.

            “What are we going to do?”  She whispers, as she walks beside me.

            “I’m not sure yet.”  I whisper back, before looking straight ahead at the group of men--and a few women--who have formed on deck.  The all smile maliciously at us.  Of course, our glares can do nothing to them.

            Someone snaps their fingers and we are pushed to the deck, where someone ties our hands behind us in messy knots.  If I tried, I would be able to get it off.  We are hauled to our knees.

            “Ye two have much strength.”  Someone says.  I look up.  I know the voice.  The man talking had been one of the conspirators we had heard.  The man is wearing a pair of ripped up brown pants, a white shirt and a red bandana…like a pirate from on of those classic stories parents told their children.

            But this man is no ordinary ‘Pirate’.  He is the First Mate.  And in his hands…he has Blade.  He holds it carelessly by the handle, tapping the palm of his other palm with the sheath-covered blade.  He smiles when he sees where my gaze has fallen.

            “Ye recognize this, boy?  Yea, it’d be yours, alright.”  He unsheathes it.  The metal hisses.  It’s sound seems so foreign, it has been so long since I last heard it, “But now, boy.  It’d be mine.”  He points the blade at me, “Now, who shall be the first to die…?”  He moves the blade across the crowd, starting with me and making a 180 degree sweep, coming back again.  It stops, pointing at me.

            But it isn’t at me.  It’s up too high.  I turn my head to see who’s behind me.  Mme Consigea.

            “Ah, lady Captain.  It seems this fair blade hath chosen you!”  The First Mate sounds delighted, “Why don’t ye step up and claim your prize?”

She is shoved and almost trips over me.  The First Mate circles her once.  Twice.  Thrice.  A fourth time before he says, “No.  You are not worthy of having this blade take your blood.”

            Consigea’s face pales even more.  She knows that she will not escape alive.  I know it too.  Her eyes meet mine before her fate is told to her.

            “Aw hell, let’s do it de old fashioned way…prepare the plank!”  A call goes up in the crowd and a plank of wood is brought forwards and hooked onto the side of the boat.  The only help she receives on stepping onto the plank is not from very friendly hands.  I’m sure she’s very badly bruised by now…but what does it matter?  She’s going to die anyways.  I turn my head to Phoenix.  Phoenix’s eyes are glued to the Captain.

            I turn back and force myself to watch.

            One moment, the woman is on the end of the plank.  The next she is gone.

            Her fate has been sealed.

 

~~@~~

 

            It’s been ten minutes.  The plank hasn’t been removed.  We haven’t been moved.  The First Mate…now Captain…talks with some of the others.  After several moments, they all nod.  He turns back to us, smiling.

            “You’re lucky, boy.  You’ll die by your own blade.  Your girl here, however…” His eyes travel over Phoenix’s body.

            She is hauled to her feet.

            As she is moved towards the plank, a war cry is given from what seems like somewhere very far away.

 

~~@~~

 

Drago swoops down from somewhere above, with several others.  An all-out fight breaks out.  But dies quickly.  Drago meets my eyes.

“Thanks for trying.” I mouth.

“It was worth a shot.”  He mouths back, shrugging, as he is overcome by conspirators and tied up…in much better knots then Phoenix and me, I take note.

“They’ll both die!  Together!”  The First Mate cries from somewhere ahead.

The crowd grows silent as a path is cleared…so I can plainly see the plank.  Phoenix and Drago look at each other, silent, as if making an agreement.  But there is no time to think about them.

The First Mate makes his first mistake.  He pulls me to my feet.  Phoenix steps onto the plank, without the help of others.  Drago follows.  They will jump together.  That must be what they had decided on.

            Drago looks over his shoulder at me.  I lose focus and see only the gray of his eyes.  Then I realize, I am not seeing his eyes.  I am in the gray space again.  I see the pentagram.  It’s spinning, faster and faster it goes.

            My human body—outside of the gray space—does something odd…

            …it smiles.

 

~~@~~

 

            A part of myself tries to reason with the fact that my charges…no, FRIENDS…are in danger of dying.  The other part just continues to smile.  The First Mate eyes me now.  He’s probably thinking I’ve gone insane.  And maybe I have.

            But I still see the gray space.  It stretches out ahead of me, with the silver pentagram, spinning.  Faster and faster.

            Phoenix and Drago each take a deep breath and look at each other.  They’re on the end of the plank now.  Phoenix looks back at me.

            The instant they have both disappeared from my sight, the pentagram shatters.  I am consumed in the silver fire.

 

~~@~~

 

            If this is death, so be it.  But it doesn’t hurt as much as I would have thought.  Just the opposite.  An anger that had been building inside of me explodes to the surface.  I am VERY aware of my surroundings, though my eyes have a glazed look to them.

            Blade calls for me.  I can hear it.  It screams its own name…mine.  Without thinking, I shred the knots from my wrists.  The crew around me begins to panic and spread away from me.  The First Mate looks startled, then smiles.  He draws Blade.

            The joke is on him.  He’s just made his second mistake.  He charges at me, Blade pointed directly at me.  But the sword does not pierce me.  It cannot.  I am its true owner.  In one fluid movement, Blade is in my hand…and under the First Mate’s throat.  The man tries to scramble back from the deadly metal, but I am there.  He cannot move.

            I move my arm and slice his throat.  He makes a gurgling sound as I drop him.  He is not a threat any more.  One thought has crossed my mind this entire time:  They who dare to harm my people, they shall be the first to die.

            A war cry echoes across the suddenly silent ship…this time, it’s mine.  But it is joined in seconds, by two more.  Drago bursts forth onto the deck again, shooting upwards from the water in a wave of blue mist.  He lands beside me, smiling evilly.  I grin right back.

            “See?  I’d say we have some magic in us.”  Drago says, then shoots forward, pulling out his beam sword, which burns red and draws blood from those who meets its electronic blade.

            “I’d say we’ve got PLENTY.”  A new voice from behind me.  Phoenix’s.

            I nod and take off with Blade, raised over my head.

            The man who meets the blade dies a quick, painful death.

 

~~@~~

 

            There is no more battle to be fought here, on this ship.  And we’re only a small ways away from Orlan.  We lower a lifeboat into the waters.  Phoenix is the first to go down.

            Then Drago.

            Finally, I begin my descent.  The boat is rather large, and should hold steady until we reach the shores of Orlan.  We begin to float away.  I pull out a lighter from my pocket and look at Drago.

            “You do the honors, Blade.”  He says.

            I light the alcohol bottle on fire, then throw it at the ship.

            The flames take it over quickly.  I turn away.

            “How is it that we were able to win?  To survive?”  Phoenix asks.  She watches the flames still, “There were only the three of us.”

            I shrug, “I’m not sure.  Maybe this is the magic my grandmother told me about.”

            “What?”

            “I’ll tell you about it later.”  I look up at the ship, over my shoulder, again.

            The last thing I see is the Black Dragon’s sail, sinking into the flames and the waves.

            Now, there is only Orlan left for us.

 

~~~~*~~~~

 

Hehe…okay, maybe it was a bad chapter…I DON’T KNOW.  It’s all about what you guys think.  Let me know!  Write me a review!