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"Look, you're the tallest."
"What about Corey? He's like a foot taller than me."
"He's a wimp who's terrified of heights."
"Remind me how you guys even got it up there to begin with."
"That's not important." Miranda crossed her arms in front of her chest and shot a look up at Callie. "Now please hurry up and grab that thing before Clare gets back and kills all of us."
Callie sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose, before walking over to the tree, jumping up and grabbing one of the lower branches to pull herself up.
It was the dead of winter, and the tall oak was barren. Its spindly branches reached out, the dark wood like cracks in the sky.
But holy fucking shit was that tree tall.
The hat hung from one of the upper branches. How Miranda had managed to toss the thing twenty feet into the air and onto the tree in the two minutes that Callie had her back turned, she did not know, nor, at this point, did she bother to question.
The branches creaked beneath her weight as Callie reached up to grab another branch, pulling herself up another couple feet. The further up she climbed, the stronger the bitterly cold wind blew.
"I swear to—" Callie clicked her tongue as she hoisted herself up the final branch and grabbed the baseball hat. "How the hell? This is a good twenty feet up in the air. Did she tie rockets to this thing?"
With the hat in hand, Callie began her descent, carefully making her way down, branch by branch to the forest floor below.
It was there that everything went wrong.
Maybe she'd put a foot down on the wrong branch, or that branch had already been weak, dead from the bitter cold. Callie didn't know for sure, but she did remember the loud crack of a snapping branch as she suddenly plummeted down.
Pain.
She remembered dropping the hat to grab hold of a passing branch as she fell. She remembered seeing Miranda's horrified face and Corey's petrified figure as she skinned her hands against the bark.
She remembered closing her eyes and waiting for the impact of the fall.
---
If Callie was being perfectly honest, she wouldn't be surprised if it suddenly turned out that she lived in some cheesy fantasy cartoon.
She sat in the middle of a grassy field, perfectly fine as if she hadn't just fallen ten feet out of a tree. The winter that had once covered the forest had been stripped away, replaced with a calm, lush spring. The blue sky that had once hung above her head had been replaced with dark night.
There were two explanations here. One: She'd whacked her head on a branch or rock or something and was now completely delusional and in the hospital.
Or two: All that change was real.
Callie decided to go with the first explanation. None of that was real. It was all just a figment of her imagination and she was actually lying unconscious in the hospital.
But if it was all just a dream, then her dream must have been wanting to kill her.
Because the next thing she knew, she was back on her feet, wandering through the forest, glancing around at every rock, every trunk, every creature and every branch. Dots of light flickered here and there, lighting up the woods.
Callie broke into a jog, following what seemed to be an old overgrown path.
The terrain shifted suddenly, forest breaking away into jutting rocks and steep hills.
Callie didn't turn back. Instead she continued forward, persistent as ever. The one time she did look back, the forest had disappeared, grey mist in its place. And despite the fact that she had only just started climbing, below her was a sheer drop into the unknown.
That's it. She was definitely dreaming.
Callie huffed to herself, then reached up to slowly pull herself up the stone cliff. She wasn't cold, wasn't warm either. She couldn't feel any pain, despite the fact that she was certain that stones were cutting into her palms. She didn't feel tired, despite clinging to the side of sheer rock.
'To hell with it.' Was the only thought on her mind as she continued her ascent.
(She knew that she should question why, how, and where she was, but she didn't bother to. It didn't affect her. After all, it was all just a dream.)
When she finally reached a ledge, that unnatural tirelessness had worn off, and she lay on the cold stone, panting for breath. The scenery around her had changed so abruptly that it was scary.
She let out a sigh, then sat up as the mountain around her disappeared once again, this time changing into a lush pine forest at the entrance of a cave.
The moment she stepped into the cavern, the forest outside disappeared once again, a solid stone wall that was peppered with glowing crystals stood in its place. She blew hair out of her face, then turned back around and continued forward.
The first thing that hit her was the searing heat. It was sudden, much like the changing surroundings, and Callie was forced to shed her coat and sweater, rolling up the sleeves of the shirt she had on beneath.
---
Watching, lurking. Golden eyes following the path of a tall girl. Scampering along stone, leaving red hot footprints behind. Tail flicking as it disappears further into the caverns.
Only a flicker of shadows on stone. A flick of a tail and the shadows vanish.
In its place, a figure cloaked in white. It stands amongst the stones, watching the girl, humming slightly to themselves before also disappearing into the dark.
---
Well fuck.
What the hell was even with that dream world?
That was the only thought recurring in Callie's mind. The ground behind her had started falling into oblivion the further she walked, and now she stood in front of red-hot stone. Cracks could be seen, and the surface was practically glowing.
The ceilings and walls were covered in red dust, and rune-like figures had been traced out. Some looked like they were an actual language, while others looked like people, animals, and creatures of all sorts.
The one that stuck out the most was the picture in the center of the cavern ceiling. It was of a dragon-like lion hybrid. Its body had the physique of a lion, but its tail was elongated and partially covered in scales, the same way its back and neck were. Its head was that of a lion, but two catfish-like whiskers protruded in wisps from the sides of its mouth.
That's when she noticed the crack. The crack that split through the center of the ceiling, and was slowly growing. Not long after seeing the fracture, she heard the rumble, then the crack and crash of stone falling to the ground.
She whipped her head forward to see a figure cloaked in white, standing at the other side of the lake of fire.
They dashed forward, straight at Callie as the ceiling fell to pieces.
The world turned to black.
---
She woke up to a pair of golden eyes set upon a cat-like face, and her first instinct was to grab the thing, sit upright, and chuck it across the room.
It only squeaked in response, before flipping around and landing flat on its feet. The creature was small, about the size of a housecat, but majestic, and it was practically the spitting image of the mural that had been in that cavern, save for the fact that it didn't have whiskers.
While she was sitting up, Callie got a good look at the room she was in. The room was less of a room and more of a stone cavern. Stone shelves had been carved into the walls, and metal furniture lay scattered throughout the area. She sat upon a more or less modern cot, something that looked like it belonged in an old house rather than a cave. The entire area was unnaturally lit; Callie could see everything, but not a single window or light source.
"I know that you're freaked out, but it's really not a good idea to be throwing a fire spirit around."
Callie flinched, whipping back around. A girl dressed entirely in white stood in the corner of the room, a red stone box in her hands.
"Had he reacted badly, this entire portion of the cavern could've been blown apart." She walked over to the bed where Callie lay, setting the box on the ground beside her.
The girl dressed in white stood back up, strands of white hair falling over her silver eyes. The dragon-like creature darted across the floor, towards the girl, jumping up and scaling her arm, coming to a rest on her shoulders. This one had whiskers, but was missing the antler-like protrusions that the other had on its limbs and tail.
Callie stared in awe, scrambling back and pushing herself against the stone wall.
"Call me Lilac. This little guy here, he's Spark. Ash is probably clinging to the ceiling somewhere." She glanced up to the ceiling, her mouth making a small 'o' shape when she spotted the other fire spirit, which clung to the ceiling above Callie's head.
Ash unlatched herself from the ceiling, dropping down to the cot, landing beside Callie before darting to Lilac and taking a perch on her other shoulder.
"So... um..." Callie pushed herself forward, placing her feet on the stone floor. "Where are we?"
Lilac shrugged. "Everywhere and nowhere. It's kind of hard to explain."
"Okay, then, what kind of a dream is this, 'cause I'm fairly certain that it's classified as a lucid dream but—" She cut off when her eyes flickered to Lilac's expression.
Lilac stood there, one of the spirits having crawled into her arms. Her eyes were narrowed as she stood, unmoving, seeming to analyze Callie for all she was worth. That frozen expression broke when she finally sighed. "I'll let you believe what you want to believe. Some pieces of information were forgotten and remained forgotten for a reason."
"Alright then," Callie stood up, crossing her arms. "So how do I get out of here then?"
Lilac merely shrugged in response. "Don't know. I've been here for as long as I can remember since I wandered in. I picked up the spirits in the caverns that you had been in but..." She trailed off. "Everything's balanced. If there's fire, there's earth. With earth is water, and with water there's air. Everything loops in a continuous circle. I can only assume that you'd be able to return if you find your own spirits."
"You found your spirits. Why can't you leave?"
"I technically only found one spirit." Lilac set Spark on the ground and picked Ash off her shoulder, placing the spirit on a nearby shelf. "They're two parts of the same thing. You've got the beginning of the fire, the spark, and the end, the ashes."
"Is this going to end up like one of those super dramatic, super cliche movies then?" Callie deadpanned.
Lilac smiled slightly. "Don't know. One never knows, though I can see how you might think that." She laughed lightly. "Honestly, that's what I feel like the majority of the time. There's a lot of things in this space that are confusing. Space, time, memory, all of it is distorted." Her gaze darkened. "The only reason I've lasted so long is because of those two."
Callie paused, no words leaving her. Her eyes flickered away from Lilac the moment a crash sounded off to the side. Ash stood on the ground on all fours, hissing, a broken ceramic beside her. Spark dashed over beside his counterpart, taking on the same defensive stance.
Lilac sighed, then stepped over to the two spirits, waving her hand over the ceramics. The broken pieces rose up in the air, swirling around as if being carried by a breeze. The pieces replaced themselves, fusing back together into the shape of a bowl.
Spark and Ash, however, stood next to each other, hissing at a solid stone wall.
"Do they always do that?"
"Occasionally." Lilac shrugged. "That piece of stone, if it's enchanted, isn't anything that I can pass through."
The two spirits suddenly darted at the stone at the exact same time, colliding with the rock with a dull thud. That didn't deter them though. Again and again, the two spirits ran at the stone, unrelenting, no matter how many times their attempts had been smothered out.
Callie walked to the stone wall, careful not to step on the spirits. She placed her palm on the stone. Despite the searing temperature of the rest of the room, the stone was cold, ice-cold.
And then the stone melted. It wasn't like the way ice melted, where the material just slowly trickled down a solid surface. It was more like the way ice cream melted, how you could just sort of press your finger through the stuff if you pressed hard enough.
And that was what happened to the stone. Immediately, the two flame spirits darted forward again, passing through the stone. Callie pushed her arm forward, walking forward as her arm seemed to melt into the stone wall.
She turned her head back to shoot a questioning look at Lilac, who simply shrugged then stepped forward, following her spirits in disappearing through the wall. Callie huffed, then followed the girl, pushing through the weirdly textured stone.
On the other side of the wall was a chamber. The ceiling rose up yards above Callie's head, and majestic creatures had been painted into the stone. Both the ceiling and the chamber had been split into five sections. Four quadrants of a circle, then a smaller center circle.
Each section of the ceiling had a mural of a different creature. One was that of a cat-like creature with bat wings, its fur, feathers, and scales a mix of pastel blues and yellows. Another was that of a horned animal that kind of reminded Callie of an adorable sea cucumber with paws. There was the mural of the two fire spirits in their conjoined form, the same painting that Callie had seen earlier. The final was of a group of squirrel-like creatures. They were small compared to the rest, but there were many of them, each varying in size and color.
And in the center circle was a snowy white fox, flames licking up from beneath its feet. It was majestic, padding over snowy ground, head and tail held high.
The chamber itself was also split. Four ridiculously long bridges led from respective gates, one of flame, another of earth, and two more of air and water, into a center platform.
A hissing sounded from by her feet, and Callie whipped her attention to the fire spirits—well, fire spirit now.
Ash and Spark had fused into one, their scales and the ground below them glowing red hot during the process. They'd nearly tripled in size, now about the size of a Great Dane, and were the spitting image of the mural.
"Central. At least that's what the ancients called it." Lilac stepped beside Callie as the two girls followed the flame spirit down the bridge. "Every couple millennia, the central spirit would summon each of the four other spirits and their wielders and there'd be a meeting as to what should happen in the living world." She glanced up to the ceiling. "I guess the wielders changed with every meeting though, seeing as how I've never been here."
Callie simply nodded, then broke into a jog in an attempt to keep up with the flame spirit. As she neared the center, she could see other figures running from the three other gates. A cat-like creature with wings flew above a young boy. A large, horned spirit darted forward ahead of a girl. A group of small squirrel-like animals perched on another boy's shoulders, a few running at his feet as they made their way to the center.
She was the first to set foot on the center circle. Immediately, after her foot made contact with the stone, the entire surface lit up in silver, each of the bridges starting to glow in reds, blues, greens, and yellows.
Four thrones, though slightly crumbling with age, also began to glow. From right to left, red, blue, green, yellow.
That was when Callie saw the fox. It was a small creature, nearly transparent, and it sat by her feet. Spark/Ash darted at the creature, only to pass through the apparition before stumbling over their paws and rolling to Lilac's feet.
The fox dipped its snout in Callie's direction, then padded over and touched its nose to her legs.
Thank you.
Callie whipped around to see the other spirits and their wielders, having finally made it to the center platform, and Lilac, walk towards the thrones.
The world around her seemed to crack, then the sound of broken ice sounded through the air, and the image around her shattered.
---
Stuck for so long.
Didn't know what to do.
Needed a savior.
No more mages, then a human.
Yes, a human. A mortal that will one day forget.
Choose wisely, o' dear spirit.
---
"Oh my fucking god she's alive."
Callie groaned, sitting up, wincing as she leaned onto her right hand. "You guys are all assholes."
Clare sighed. "Yeah. We know that already. I walk off for five minutes and return to a crying Corey, a passed out Callie, and the story of how Miranda threw my hat twenty feet into the air."
"You mean a passed out Callie with a broken wrist." Callie deadpanned, shifting her weight to her other hand. "Let's just get out of this forest and into a hospital, damnit. At least it's cold out."
Clare nodded in agreement, then reached down to help pull her friend up.
---
Unseen by the humans,
a small white fox
running through bushes, jumping over dead bracken,
a silver flame in the center of its forehead.
It watches as they leave,
then dips its snout,
before disappearing into the white woods.