starfire

Starfire!

Starfire

The Discovery

Starfire was thinking about his name. His full name was Fire of the Stars reflected in the Night time Dew. Every Elf name in his tribe had an inner meaning and each Elf had to work out the meaning of their own name. At the moment Starfire did not even know how there could be a hidden meaning in his name. Suddenly the birds gave warning. “I expect a boar has startled them!” he thought. Even so he moved into the thicker undergrowth and faded from view.

Starfire has the ability of the elves to become almost invisible in the woods or forest. Being slim and child size he finds it easier to move slowly and quietly through quite thick undergrowth. The ability is called Fade into Forest.

Then he saw what had scared the birds! A huge creature with big thick legs, tentacles instead of arms and each tentacle had a hand at the end with a mouth in the centre of the palm, there was no head but a huge eye on its chest turned and twisted as it sought a way through the forest. It was so scary that Starfire stayed frozen to the spot and did not even think until it had passed.

As soon as it had gone Starfire wanted to run home and tell his parents but his home was way over ‘that’ way and the thing was going towards Barn and Stable! If he went home there would not be enough time to warn the people in the port but if he went to warn them he would have to get past the thing first! How could he do that? Furiously he started to work out plans as he moved in the direction the thing had taken. When he was quite near to the monster he looked for a tree and went up to the tree, touched the tree and vanished! He appeared for a moment at a tree a few feet away and then at another further on and kept this up until he had got well past the monster and used up most of his magic. Then he took to his heels and ran as fast as he could towards the town. Casting that spell had been harder than usual because the thing, at least he thought it was the thing, had tried its own magic aimed at his mind. Fortunately mind magic does not work on Elves but it really was scary!

Starfire used the spell Treewalk to teleport from tree to tree past the monster. When the monster realized he was there and using magic to get past it, tried casting a confusion spell at Starfire – but as Starfire is an Elf and Confusion is a mind spell, that is it affects a persons mind, it did not work on Starfire. Before the monster could cast another spell Starfire was too far away.

Starfire ran and ran. It was early evening with about an hour or so of light left and he reckoned he was more than an hour in front of the monster. As he ran towards the port Starfire looked at the banners flying above the keep. They told him that as well as the Duchess, Tinnea, the Elven Princess, was also in town. This pleased him as it meant that there was someone there who would believe his report. As it was, the moment he told the gate guard he was taken seriously and told to go on to the keep and report there. Runners were sent to light the beacon and sound the alarm.

Starfire has the skill called Heraldry. This means he has learned who the important people in the lands are and what their flags and banners look like.

The Fight

After an exciting evening of meeting both the Duchess and Tinnea as well as some captains, Starfire was sent to join with a band of Elven archers. If the monster got through the gate or over the stockade, they were to keep it busy with arrows, giving spell casters a chance to cast their spells and fighters a chance to get near to it.

Soon they had word that it had just walked through the stockade as there was no stockade there! It was heading towards the dock. The archers soon located it – what with many people running away from it in absolute terror, this was easy! A flight of 20 arrows winged their way at it. As far as Starfire could see all of them, including his own, hit but the monster did not even seem to notice. Two or three arrows later the captain said, “This is no good! Stop firing!” then to Starfire, “Did you say that it has an eye on the front?” When Starfire said “Yes!” the captain told the archers to make their way around and then try to hit the eye.

In the meantime a small flotilla of four ships, unnoticed in the fighting had come upriver and were heading for the dock.

Starfire quickly jogged around buildings, then had to divert around some rush screens, then avoid some fisher folk who were running screaming with at least two quite wounded. Eventually he came out from between two buildings to find himself on the dockside. He could clearly see the monster. It was coming in his direction, throwing armoured men aside as if they were nothing. It had not had things all its own way though. It was peppered with arrows and bleeding from many wounds as well as visibly limping. Starfire leant against a wall and using this to steady himself took careful aim with his bow. As he fired his arrow he felt fearfull pain in his shoulder and was briefly aware of flying through the air!

He landed with a sickening crunch right on the edge of the dock and thought he was dreaming as a beautiful maiden seemed to be coming up out of the water to him. With broken limbs and his left arm nearly ripped of he could do nothing and passed out.

When Starfire came around he was in a clearing with a lot of other Elves. Healers were attending him and though feeling a bit sore he found his arms and legs worked again! The captain came up to him and said, “Hail Starfire, hero of the hour!” The other Elves all started to gather around and then they too said, “Hail Starfire, hero of the hour!” Realising that he had no idea what had happened they then explained that he had shot an arrow into the centre of the creature’s eye. As he fired the creature had reached for and grabbed him. Instead of ripping him apart or tearing out his throat, as it had done to others, it had thrown him into the air in its death throws for his arrow had gone up through it’s eye and into its brain, killing it.

Just then horns sounded down in the port and the sound of ponies coming from there could be heard. The elves parted allowing a maiden through. She knelt by Starfire and said, “I am Alex, princess of the Star. While all of you were fighting, we were coming into port. It would seem as though that monster knew of our coming and was trying to kill us. If you had not killed it when you did, I would almost certainly be dead. I have little to reward you with except this. She leant forward and kissed him on the cheek. Then she jumped up turned and left. The sound of ponies returning to Barn and Stable is heard and then someone saying, “Did you see that? They look really alike! Like twins or reflections of each other.!” These words chased around Starfire’s mind as he drifted into a healing sleep, that kiss, so different from his mother’s, burning into his cheek. A little later it became light and Starfire awoke. A new hero of the land.