The Fire and The Storm - The Nexus of Kellaran #2
Chapter 41

Part 8

"We know you'll be ready for bed soon, so we'll present your gifts now." Nemia said as she cleared the low table. "Your gifts are each of a set, and we all contributed equally to making them. Each of us spent six hours working on them, each to our own skills, whether that was crafting, spell casting, or polishing.

"Go ahead Dear."

Yazadril cast a Summoning that brought the gifts from the home of Sana and Markhan the senior, where the last of the work had been done.

Two baby-sized armor stands appeared with full suits of gleaming steel plate-over-chain-mail armor, each complete from boots to helmet, and each equipped with a sword and scabbard, a round shield, a light lance, a bow and a quiver of arrows, and a pouch of the heavy little darts that were designed to be propelled by Movement. Each item had a few small but tasteful gold accents.

"Oh wow!" Helemia squealed and clapped her hands, just as Reggie said; "Oh excellent, thank you!"

"The swords are a compromise design, since we don't know yet what style you'll eventually prefer." Markhan the senior explained. "They're light enough to be used with one hand, but have enough handle for two. Same with the shields, they don't have the coverage of a full line-infantry shield, but they'll cover well and they're still handy enough to use for striking.

"They're beautiful, all of it!" Helemia marveled as she and Reggie bounced from their parent's laps and drew their tiny swords.

"And as you might expect, they're all rather heavily spelled." Yazadril added with a grin. “Perhaps most importantly, they'll grow with your size and strength. The armor will always fit you, the weapons will grow to match your body and hand size, and the bows will increase in pull to match your growing strength."

"Of course the armor has added magical protection, and the weapons have added offensive capabilities, but it'll take you a few days to become familiar with all the spells involved." Alilia smiled. "There's rather a lot of them. When my turn came, they already had so many enhancements that I couldn't think of many to add, so I spent most of the time adding charge and power to the spells."

"You've been hinting for a while that you'll want to start combat training soon," Mark added, "So we were pretty sure you'd like these."

"Do we ever!" Reggie marveled as he tried the pull of his bow.

"Thank you all so much!" Helemia added as she tried the weight of her lance in her hand.

"Okay, hugs for everybody, then I'm gonna put on the whole thing!" Reggie declared as he replaced the bow in it's carry-case.

The twins each gave everyone a hug and their thanks, then Mark and Alilia helped them into their armor.

As they posed in front of a full-length mirror, Talia had to laugh. "It's amazing that you look so very dangerous and so adorably cute at the same time!"

"Well as you showed in The Turning of Zarkog's Commanders," Helemia giggled, "Being very cute can be an effective offensive quality!"

"It sure can!" Povon laughed, remembering. "I wish I'd thought of this get-up then, it would have been even easier!"

"You sure do look cute like that, all fuzzy and everything." Mark chuckled.

"Especially Equemev, you look absolutely adorable like that!" Helemia grinned as she took off her helmet.

"Thank you Helemia, but I think Silaran looks cutest of all!" Equemev teased as she nuzzled Silaran's pink mane.

"So you think Equemev is cuter than me?" Karzog teased as he landed beside Helemia and gave her a playful shoulder-bump, almost knocking her off balance.

"Girls are cuter than boys, and unicorns are cuter than dragons!" Helemia declared as she tackled him to the floor, surprising him, and held him pinned for a moment as she smiled down at him. "But you're always cute, Karzog, even when you're killing something."

"Well that's sweet!" Karzog responded as he flipped her over, and they rolled across the floor wrestling, accompanied by the soft clacks of her armor against the hardwood and the sounds of his claws sliding as he scrambled for purchase.

"But I'll have you know I am not cute when I am not wearing this silly form, I am a mighty and conquering hunter! There!" he declared as he tied her up with all of his limbs; legs, arms, wings, neck and tail. "Got you!"

"You think?" Helemia responded as she started tickling him on his ribcage.

"Ah! Ahhh hahahaha! No fair, tickling is no fair!" Karzog protested as he escaped her grasp and took to the air.

"I didn't hear you listing any rules before you almost knocked me over, you beast!" she yelled as she took off in pursuit.

"That's enough of that!" Mark laughed as he dexterously reached out a long arm and plucked her out of the air on her way by. "No chasing each other around the house, you know that!"

"He started it!" Helemia accused.

"That's irrelevant and you know it!" Talia chuckled.

"I know, but he did!"

"It'll be fun playing tomorrow." Karzog declared with anticipation as he landed on Mark's lap beside Helemia and gave her a hug. "I'll be able to play with you with my real body, and with your armor on, I won't have to worry about squashing you accidentally!"

"No, I'll just have to be careful not to squash you accidentally!" Helemia returned with a grin. "There really are a lot of nice spells in this stuff! I could take on a full squad of Sylvan by myself with this on, I'm sure of it!"

"Some of the spells are safeties." Alilia pointed out. "Until your combat training is at least up to a professional level, they should prevent you from doing any accidental damage. Not to say that's it's impossible for you to get in trouble with it, but you'd really have to try something quite foolish to do so."

"We'll go through everything tomorrow when you start your training." Mark said as he set her on the floor. "For now, take off your armor and put it back on the stands. Then there's something I want to ask you about before bedtime."

"Yes Father." Reggie said as he took his helmet off.

When all of the pieces were back on the stand in their proper places, the twins sat on the edge of the low table facing their parents.

"First, let me say again how immensely proud of you two we all are." Mark began. "Your displays of skill today were wondrous, but your display of character was even better. Your showing of Somonik's fight makes me wish I had the time to watch the whole thing in real time, and maybe after the nexus I will.

"But what I want to ask about is the prophecy. That was a very important prophecy, if it turns out to be true."

"Yup. It means we're gonna win." Reggie agreed. "The demons are gonna fear us, and we're gonna kill lots of them, and we're gonna find their homeworld and destroy it!”

"Let's hope so." Mark nodded. "Now, you obviously chose some very momentous-sounding wording for your delivery, and it was very entertaining and dramatic. But what was the exact wording of the prophecy?"

"Um, I don't really get them in a sequence of words, really." Reggie explained. "I just suddenly know certain things, and it feels way different from when you just think of something normally, or when you get something from someone else with psionics.

"With that one, I knew the demons would call Helemia The Fire, and they'd call me The Storm, and we'll kill a lot of 'em, and we'll destroy their homeworld. That's it, really. I don't even know if they'll call us that because we're gonna kill a lot of 'em, which seems the obvious reason, or for some other reason. I don't know if they'll call us that and we'll kill a lot of 'em here on Kellaran, or in the void near here, or not until we're fighting on their homeworld. And I don't know when any of it's gonna happen."

"Ah." Mark nodded. "Well the word I wanted to ask about most is 'vengeance'. You said; 'I shall destroy their hordes with the hurricane of my vengeance.' That implies that you'll be killing them not as a defensive effort, but in revenge for something they did to us. I'm still hoping we can all come through this unscathed; all of us on Kellaran and The Triax as well. So can you clarify that? Was the word or concep of revenge or vengeance part of the prophecy?"

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