TSWNN - Chapter 4 - Highway Robbery

When Bud, Jack, Nat, Phoenix, and Phoenix’s siblings were almost half way to Jade’s house they came across a middle-aged beggar, wearing tattered clothes, and a dirty cloak wrapped around him.

The little group rode up to him. Bartholomew asked Jack if he had any money that they could give him.

“Yeah, here,” Jack replied, handing Bud a small square coin.

As soon as the coin was in the beggar’s cup, he jumped up, flinging off his cloak—for dramatic effect—and drew a knife from his belt.

“Have at ’em boys!” he yelled, and laughed maniacally. Over the rocks leapt thirteen men dressed in dark clothes and hooded cloaks. They surrounded the travelers and pushed them tighter together. “Take all their money,” the fake beggar said.

Bud could see the fire light up in Phoenix’s eyes. Smoke started curling from Jack’s hands. Bud decided to follow his lead and smoke the place up. When there was smoke all around them and the crooks were looking around for the fire, Bud and Jack vanished into the shadows, and started talking to them.

“Hello, thieves. I think you should know that there is a book, that I really think you should read. It highly recommends not stealing,” said Bud. His voice made it very clear that he was smirking.

Phoenix dismounted and blasted fire into the sky, making bright orange fireworks. Fire balls rained down on the thieves. They all scurried for covers, but the smoke was too dark, and they couldn’t see. They all crashed into each other and fell down, covering their heads.

Bartholomew and Jack appeared out of the shadows on both sides of the crowd, and started flying. Nathaniel used his elemental power of Gravity to lift Bud up, while Jack was using the Gravity that he had absorbed from Nat to lift himself up.

“You should know better than to attack random people on the street when they could be ‘evil sorcerers’, like us,” Jack said, as he flew around the circle of people. Bud cleared the smoke away so that Becky, Seth, and Nat could see—and breathe— properly.

The fourteen crooks crowded even closer together, getting as far away from the ‘sorcerers’ as they could at the same time. Bud teleported through the shadow to Phoenix, and the robbers scrambled out of the way, running down the path away from the travelers.

“Don’t let me see you robbing anyone again!” Bud yelled after them.

“Don’t worry, you won’t!” the leader shouted back.

“Is everyone OK?” Bud asked helping Becky up. She had fallen from her horse during the fight. She had never really ridden before, because of her limp.

“Yeah, we’re fine,” she said in return, “That was a really cool stunt you pulled just now!” She accepted Jack’s help to climb awkwardly back onto her horse.

“Heh, I really love not needing to hide my powers,” Bud said.

“Speaking of powers and the such…do you have any?” Jack asked Becky.

Phoenix froze. She looked at Becky with her mouth open. “Uh…yeah…she does…” Phoenix said, nervously. “Water. She doesn’t know how to use it yet, but it’s there. And now you have it, too, Jack. And you shouldn’t spray me with it, no matter how much you may want to.”

“Aw, man! Why not?” Jack complained.

“Because. I hate water. It’s the only thing I'm allergic to. It burns me. It doesn’t leave marks, it just burns. You had better hope it doesn’t burn you.”

“Oh. Ok,” Jack said. He dropped some water onto his hand to see if it burned him, “It doesn’t burn. That’s good. Makes sense, since I have water now, too.“ Phoenix, riding next to him, shrank back a little at the sight of the water.

Becky saw her sister recoil. “Phoenix is afraid of water!” she teased.

“I am not! I just don’t like it!” Phoenix said.

“What are you afraid of, Phoenix?” Bud asked.

“Just the element of Mind. I hate the idea of someone digging around in my brain,” Phoenix replied.

“Now that is a very legitimate fear—“ Bud started to say, but Nathaniel cut him off.

“Guys, where’s Seth?” Nat asked.

The whole company turned to look back at the horse on which Seth should have been sitting. It was ambling along behind them, with no one on its back.