Earth Force Rising

"Fire!," screamed Hatie as she ran toward the village's only water source, the paltry well that lied on its outskirts. Elderwoman had whispered in her dreams that this day would come, but she couldn't think about that know. She had to put out the fire before it was too late.

Running out of breath, her steps faltering, she instictively knew she would never make it back to her village on time. "Oh, to the Gods, No! This can't be happening!" Acshel's armies were setting the fires. She heard the awful war drums beating in the distance near her village. Screaming in agony, she rolled into the fetal position wishing to die, just as the rest of her tribe had done. She was sure there would be no survivors for Acshel had no mercy on Elemental people. The dark queen had pursued them across the world and back just so she could eradicate anyone who opposed her.

Haiti noticed the flames while foraging for berries in the brammyback bushes in the neighboring forest, about four hours by foot, two with the aide of a Warthorse. Hatie was part of a nomadic tribe, the last tribe that she knew of, that still worshipped the Earth Element. Elderwoman told her once of a prophecy that she would lead an army to defeat Acshel, self-proclaimed Goddess of all Terramont. That she alone would journey to the other three tribes and seek out their Shamans to force a pact between them in order to raise an army to defeat Acshel.

Never in a million moon cycles did Haiti anticipate Elderwoman's ramblings to be true. "But if that's true, then...Oh to the Gods!," she looked reluctantly at her odd shaped birthmark on the top of her hand. She didn't want to believe it. On her eighth lunar cycle Elderwoman took her hand, packed it in dirt, sprayed water over it and pulled a seed from it. Elderwoman told her that the Gods showed this mark to her in a dream and the child with that mark would lead her people to salvation but not without death and despair. She thought a second about the seed, but she didn't have the time to ponder where it came from.

Suddenly, she awoke to children laughing and playing. "Wake up, Wake up, it's time to get up, it's Lunar Day." Haiti woke up sweating, "Oh, to the Gods! It was a dream," she thought to herself and she snuggled back to sleep on her cozy hayberry bed.