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Prologue:
Lizzy was seventeen years old, she was also an orphan. Her only companion was a magical horse named Ivy, in this magical-mideival world. She woke up from a nightmare: on her fourteenth birthday; three years ago. Her parents were yelling and their house was in flames, her father ran to Lizzy and told her to take Ivy and run. Lizzy obeyed, fear in her face, and as she turned, heard her father unsheath his sword, she could not hear her mother among the screams from the other villagers, her dream faded. Later that dreadful night she had gone back to find her parents dead, and she took all the money and food she could find. Six months after the dream...
Chapter One: New Beginnings
Lizzy woke up to find that Ivy has gone, she tracked the magihorse to a nearby waterfall, where it had taken a drink, but had not lingered. Lizzy filled her canteen with the icy water, her reflection showed long brown hair, and clear green eyes, a girl of seventeen years, perhaps. As she capped the canteen, she looked around, a field was layed in front of her, and she saw Ivy grazing, the magihorse looked up at her, and came galloping. Lizzy watched her companion come toward her, it's beige body was shining in the early morning's light, markings like green vines across it. Her main was made of blues, of the morning sky and of the ocean's tides. The hooves beating the ground were a pale green.
For three years Lizzy had lived alone, Ivy with her, the parents she once knew and loved so well had been killed in raids of their village, and her older brother, Christian, had not been home. In fear, Lizzy had abandoned her home, not wanting to face memories, or the dangers currently inhabiting civilization. She had seperated herself from any human life, hating the raiders that wandered through villages, stealing and lighting homes aflame.
Lizzy walked with her steed back to the camp, a half hour's journey, they lived where the edge of Candane Forest met the Fierce Cliffs. Lizzy was growing restless in her new home, a tent outside of a small cave, and was now planning to travel, to where she did not know, but she hoped to find relatives or old friends, despite enemies abroad.
Lizzy was a hunter, though in her time not many female archers or trackers existed, since her parents' death, she had to fend for herself, so she had taken on new talents and traits, to add to the ones that other girls her age normally knew.
Lizzy fed Ivy an Apple, and also pulled one out of her backpack, for herself to eat. Then emptied her canteen into a pot on the campfire, which was now burning low. Frusterated with the fire, which an hour ago had been hot enough, she kneeled down and busied herself with feeding the fire dead leaves and branches. A while later the water was roaring, and she carefully took the pot from the flame to cool. To have clean water, often meant an hour of work for her, and it was no different today. She went to the small cave, yards away, and began taking her storage out, travel took preparation, so she was packing. Soon she was able to transfer the water back into her canteen, and this time took the pot itself with her to get water, an hour later she returned, she would have ridden Ivy, but was afraid it would mean spilling. As the water began bubbling again, Lizzy began searching for vegetation around the campsite, to nourish them on the road.
By now Lizzy had almost a weeks supply of water, heavy, but needed. A shy rabbit made it's way along the trees, moments after she noticed it, it was caught, with a little effort. 'Good, we have meat now, not that you'll eat it...' she thought, smiling over at Ivy, who had been watching with mild interest. The magihorse simply snorted, a bit of dust in the air now.
When the work was done, and her few belongings were packed, except the nightly essentials, Lizzy went to sleep. Waking up hours later to morning doves cooing, she extinguished the fire, rolled and tied her blanket, packed up the tent, placed flint and a knife in her pack, and began loading what she could not carry onto Ivy's back. Magihorses were very strong, and could hold the wait a packmule normally did, along with a person. This helped greatly, and it was now decided where the duo would be off to. Now she would be leaving landlocked Candace, her lifelong home, to head for Coastacea, a coastland country, which was not quite so dangerous. They departed eastward, toward the sun, though the noon hour would soon come, and after that, their shadows would lead them.
The sky above had white clouds scattered about, and the sunlight shown down through the gaps in the tree limbs. The Forest of Candane was a three-day journey, and a when their shadow was small underneath Ivy's feet, they stopped to eat and rest. Lizzy took stale bread out of her pack, and ate it, still good enough to nourish her for the time being. A sip of water came after it, a refreshing gulp of cold water replenished her strength greatly, but she sat in the shade for the time, letting Ivy graze a little on the grass, still touched with dew from that morning. Not long later they were moving again, and for the remaining hours of clear sunlight Ivy trotted. As the sun began to set under the tree line, smoke rose from the trees, Northeast of them, the cliffs had receded now, and a camp with an already-burning fire was inviting. Lizzy whispered in Ivy's ear, and they changed direction, toward the smoke, as the sky changed to a vivid pink. Just as the gray dusk was fading to black, Lizzy jumped off, and walked next to Ivy as they neared the fire, a bow and arrow out, incase it was inhabited by thieves. Lizzy was surprised, and relieved to find no one there, except another magihorse. She sat down as Ivy walked over to the other creature, whinnying joyfully.
Chapter Two: Magihorses
Lizzy did not wait long before footsteps were heard not far away, and into the firelight walked a girl not much younger than her, the girl held a large bucket of water, and trailing behind her was another magihorse, which was carrying a load of firewood. The girl was startled the moment she saw Lizzy, and nearly dropped her burden, the expression on her face was clearly shock, but it soon dissapeared, to be replaced by happiness mingled with confusion. At once, Lizzy recognized the girl who's camp she had intruded. "Melanie!" She exclaimed, overpowered by surprise, she quickly put down her bow and arrow. "...Lizzy?" was the girl's response, soon they were deeply in a conversation, covering their lives, slowly backtracking to that day they had last seen eachother. "I- I thought you were dead, Lizzy, your parents were, and you were gone, along with Ivy, I didn't think for a moment you were safe, our magihorses had been stolen, set loose, or killed. Everyone thought you must have been kidnapped.." Melanie finally said, a nervous tone accented her voice. "My father told me to take Ivy and run until it was safe, when I came back early the next morning, our home was burned, I knew my parents were dead, I just didn't... want to deal with it, I guess.." She looked at Melanie with eyes that betrayed the calmness in her voice. Silence was in their camp, except the melodious chirping of crickets, and a soft wind blowing through the leaves, causing the fire to flicker a little. Lizzy broke the silence "Mel? Have you seen Johnathan?", Melanie replied by explaining that she had seen him weeks before, in Cartearai he had been vending different goods, and that he had planned to move. "Can you take me to him?" Lizzy asked, "Ofcourse, but don't get your hopes up, he did not say which province he was going to trade in, he might be gone when we arrive." a silent agreement was made that the next morning they would leave to find Johnathan. Lizzy took the oppurtunity to have a better look at Melanie's magihorses, the one which had been left by the fire was a brown stallion with fiery markings along his body, and a rust-colored mane and tail blended the hues of the flame and mud well, Blaze was his name. The other was Moonlight, she was of a blue so dark it was almost black, across her body was scattered silver and white specks, giving the illusion of a starry night sky. Her mane and tail were of a gray which accented the rest in an eerily beautiful way, on her forehead, though normally covered by the mane, was a pale-white crescent. Moonlight was the first magihorse which Melanie had raised and trained on her own, a mare now a little more than two years of age, almost reaching it's prime. Since then Melanie had bred, raised, tamed and trained ten different magihorses, and sold them for great profits, Blaze would be the eleventh. Melanie also took this time to examine Ivy, which did not take long at all, being from a line of magihorse ranchers, and having seen Ivy before hand. She took note of the mare's strength, which she thought unusually high for a crossbreed.
Melanie's family had owned Ivy's parents before they were sold to Lizzy's parents, and had a foal. She remembered well that the father of Ivy was a raised magihorse purebred, and her mother was a captured and tamed magihorse halfbreed. Magihorses had different elements, which defined their different breeds, these include: aqua, pyro, geo, weather, astro, and flora, all that did not fall under these categories were considered to be of the wonder breed. The mare which had been Ivy's mother was named Raindrop, a weather-aqua halfbreed. The stallion who had fathered her was Elm, a flora purebred magihorse. After noting how Ivy had matured, Melanie began cooking a meal for them both. When the meal was nearly finished she handed Lizzy some oats to feed the magihorses, and a thought occured to her about Ivy. 'plants feed from the weather and water, what if these elements in magihorses replenished their strength continuously..?' Pleased with her discovery, Melanie handed Lizzy a bowl of rabbit stew, which did not take long in preparing, and inturn served herself. They ate quietly, cleaned their dishes and the empty pot, and then boiled the remaining water. When the water had been purified and poured into two canteens, they went to sleep, not giving a second thought to tending the fire. This was because, Blaze controlled the fire, all magihorses had a special ability involving their element, though crossbreeds and wonderbreeds could have as little as no powers, to as many as three multiple powers. However, some purebred magihorses could have more than one ability, or an ability having to do with wonder, even if that was not their element, though this was very rare.
Chapter Three: Cartearai
The next morning they rose with the sun, and were very soon on the winding rode leading through the trees. The green tinted light that rained down on the through the leaves made Melanie's hair shine brilliantly, the natural copper highlights in her brown wavy hair ended in ringlets below her shoulders, and her olive skin seemed to have a soft glow beneath the treelimbs, green eyes matched the foliage, but contrasted against her tanned skin and dark hair. Underneath her, Moonlight still had droplets of dew on her mane and body, shimmering. Behind them, Blaze carried their supplies and things which Lizzy and Melanie did not wish to carry. Lizzy did not speak until they breaked their fast for lunch, but listened to Melanie hum a tune.
When they had stopped to eat Lizzy started a fire with her flint and some dried leaves, adding twigs and wood, and Melanie took out the leftover rabbit stew which Lizzy had provided for, and Melanie had cooked. They heated it in the pot it had been stored(the lid tied on top to keep it from spilling while riding). Wanting to break the day's silence, Lizzy asked "Mel, where are your parents?", she had always thought Melanie the type to live with her family until she was married, or a few years longer than this, as was normal for girls in these times. Melanie answered, "Well, they are somewhere near the bordors of Faeriva and Ecacia, the pastures are really good for raising magihorses, and I hear that unicorns and mirahorses live there." mirahorses was a common name for magihorses with multiple abilities, or powers outside their element. "I expect they will stay there, beautiful place, and not to many inhabitants." Lizzy thought of lush green pastures and forests, clear blue skies, and a dazzling lake. "I've heard stories about the terrain, I would like to visit that area sometime.", soon they were rested and packed up again, on the move, they would most likely arrive in Cartearai by sunset the next day.
That evening Lizzy went hunting, she heard chickens in the shadows nearby, and hoped to catch one. She followed the clucking, until she heard a rustle in the bush on her left. She paused, it was to big to be a chicken. Aiming at the bush, she said quietly "Speak or I will shoot.", incase it was a human hiding, no answer came, a wild boar charged out, before it could skewer her with it's horns, she had released an arrow, once the boar collapsed, and she was sure it was safe, she dragged the pig by the horns toward the campfire's faint light, Lizzy was a hunter, but this beast was very heavy, indeed it took a while for her to get it to the camp.
Chapter Four:
Chapter Five:
Chapter Six:
Chapter Seven:
Chapter Eight:
Chapter Nine:
Chapter Ten:
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