Burn Like a Beacon, page 1
Lillian Bricker
Burn Like A Beacon
Elemental Chronicles Book One
First published by Warrioress Publishing 2023
Copyright © 2023 by Lillian Bricker
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
Lillian Bricker asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
Lillian Bricker has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party Internet Websites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such Websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.
Designations used by companies to distinguish their products are often claimed as trademarks. All brand names and product names used in this book and on its cover are trade names, service marks, trademarks and registered trademarks of their respective owners. The publishers and the book are not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book. None of the companies referenced within the book have endorsed the book.
First edition
Illustration by Jonah Paul @bootstheartist
Illustration by Hikoharu
This book was professionally typeset on Reedsy
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As a little girl, I dreamed of becoming an author. As I got older, I lost sight of that dream. I got pulled in to the mundane familiarizes of life. Focusing on college, my failed marriage, and my career. I dedicate this book to what helped me get to this moment in time. In November of 2022, I was diagnosed with schwannoma tumor growing on my spine. Surviving gave me the courage to go back and achieve the goal I had as a child.
Contents
Map
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Characters
Sneak Peak of Fly Like A Butterfly
About the Author
Map
Chapter One
The surface of the blue pond rippled, as she hurled pebbles into it from a few feet away from the edge. She had put them into her old satchel bag along her way there. It was an old habit of hers. The pond was her safe place, where she came to find some calm, usually when the day was nearing its end or at least that’s what she told her siblings. Abigail and George still hadn’t even agreed to call her pond a pond; they said it was an oversize puddle she needed to get away from, whatever she went there for.
Luckily, whether this was a puddle or a pond it was now hers. She had to leverage Alexander’s interest in her, the son of a chief, as a political favor for the property. A decision she hoped she didn’t get to regret in the future. The land was abandoned and had about four acres to its name. Being on the far side of the island, no one wanted to claim it. In her free time, she was working on removing debris and the overgrown weeds.
When she reached the mouth of the pond, she saw some nymphs had taken the cue and began to dance at the far end of the pond, creating ripples of their own. She smiled. The unnatural way of the world, of this world, never ceased to amuse her. A lot of the magical creatures she encountered only revealed themselves to other magical beings when they did not sense harm.
On her way there she always spoke to everything, believing they were all alive in some way. It was by the pond too she had seen a unicorn for the first time, its head bobbing in the bushes. From her readings, unicorns only appeared to those who have pure hearts. It is rumored that the unicorn’s horn also possesses healing abilities. A unicorn possessed a lot of magical abilities that were unfamiliar to her knowledge because no one could really study a unicorn. Another magical creature she saw at her pond was a phoenix, which was more common than a unicorn. They liked to jump between the spruce and pine trees shouldering the pond.
Of course, her family could never enjoy the unnatural way of this world. To them, these creatures were only the stuff of folklore. How she knew this was because magical books only reveal themselves to other magical beings – a mage or a sorcerer. By word of mouth, mortals translate stories down on paper for others to enjoy. Spotting a deer, squirrel, or rabbit brings her siblings the same amount of joy she feels when she sees her unicorn or phoenix.
It would be, but an hour or so before sundown. The evening was still warm though, a far cry from the burst of wind of yesterday that sent shudders around the village. She came and made to sit by the foot of the pond, arranging her brown scarf to the side and dipping her legs in the water. A relieving sensation crept up her spine as she did that. Later, she reached to loosen her brown scarf whilst starting to hum a song, which she had learned from festivals where people sung and danced at. She folded the scarf and placed it by her side, revealing a purple imitation of a ponytail. She plucked it out and a real pixie hair white as snow blossomed on her shoulders.
Her name was Claire Matthews; her nose was delicately slim, her body as lithe as a feather and her beauty was one to be envied. She had no specific agenda here today. Her mind journeyed to an old memory of when she was six. She could not recall where she was traveling to with her father but that wave, she’d never forget.
The events of the memory lingered since then, sometimes as a nightmare. She could remember the moment as if it was yesterday even though it happened twenty years ago. Their Scudder, someone who tracks the clouds informed them that it would be a safe expedition if the wind did not shift. Her father took his chances. Sometimes she wondered what would have happened to her life if he had not gone on that life-altering expedition.
The ocean was silent for one moment then violent the next because the wind had shifted. She had never seen such a huge wave before. It was so powerful that it overturned their little boat. Father says that the wave was at least thirteen feet high. They were so far from shore; however, most of our supplies fed the ocean that night. They had lost everything. Luckily, it was not a shipwreck because there were enough men to flip the boat upright again. She barely had enough strength to keep treading the waters, so helping them was out of the question. She remembers the ocean surrounding her. She was just doing her best to remember the swimming lessons her father instructed as a kid. “Do not swallow the saltwater,” echoed in her thoughts because it was drilled into her head. The further she swam down the overwhelming feeling of tiredness struck her. She remembered glowing white lights around her before complete darkness hit. She wondered if this was the way she was going to die. She never felt so tired before, her body even became numb. Soon, she felt arms around her. She learned that one of the crew-mates remembered which direction of the ocean she had fallen into. It took her about two weeks to wake up from being thrown overboard. During that time, her hair started changing colors to match the glow she saw within the water.
She recalled waking up to her mom sobbing. She remembers her mom thinking that she was not going to make it because of how much water had filled her lungs. Without the knowledge she knew now, she would have thought the same thing. Years have passed and her hair is fully white now. She usually wears a colorful knotted scarf and her hair in a ponytail to cover her hair. Somehow in the midst of drowning, she received a powerful gift. It was the day she was made into what was called an Elemental, as she would later come to understand, courtesy of her own research and findings.
It was her secret all these years.
She had guarded it with her life, her imitation ponytails, and her scarfs of which she had varieties. Her parents ignored the fact her hair grayed and whitened over the years for safety. While Claire was drowning below the whitish billowing waves of the sea that day, her world was frozen for an extended second. In the early days, weeks, and months after that incident, the appearance of water freaked her out all the time. It brought all these terrible memories of the most terrible death she could have had at sea, but she would outgrow all of that in time. She knew in some inexact way that she would have to accept the fact that her life would never remain the same. She would have to adapt, just like water.
That’s precisely what she has been doing since then. She sought to learn the properties of water at the local book keeper’s stall, gleaning any, and everything she could grasp about that most abundant of elements. At the very end of one of the books she had found on the subject in those days, the author had warned that the gift of an Elemental was not to be flaunted in public. Claire
Sadly, she had come to learn that she was alone in her gift whose specific designation was as a Water Elemental. Elementals, one in each of the major elements of the Earth, were chosen in every generation. Claire was this generation’s water Elemental. This generation’s Fire, Air, and Earth Elemental have yet to be found. She didn’t know what this fully entailed, and, in the meantime, it helped to cast off whatever burden should’ve at once sat on her shoulders, in responsibility to her generation.
Though she hoped to learn some more about her kind and what being an Elemental really meant. She foraged for books to that end all over the village of Havenswood. As for her manipulations of water, she taught herself most of what she employed. That was why her visit to the pond was no ordinary one, but an opportunity to practice her water manipulation skills in considerable secrecy.
The nymphs of this world were as common as a deer or rabbit. They lingered at most lakes and pounds. They listened to her furtive actions whenever she shushed them and motioned her fingers to magically stir the waters. So far, she could make the water move from one state to another. Solid to liquid and reverse and so forth. These tricks were beginning to grow stale, and she needed to learn more.
Dark was starting to draw a hood over the trees. She remembered that when the stars came out, they tended to create a glitter over the blueish pond that was a marvel to watch. She wasn’t going to stay out that long tonight. The bottom of her skirt was wet from water and water was dripping from her ponytail onto her shirt. She staggered to her feet, dusted her clothes, donned her ponytail and scarf, and was on her way out of there, skipping through the darkening pathway, hoping that she would be dry before she made it to her home.
“Bye, bye, bye guys,” she said dreamily to the row of trees by the side of the dirt road and to anything else she thought could pay any attention.
Leaving there, she was sure to put on the facade of being Claire, the ordinary girl who knew just as much about being an Elemental as did the next person. With the new property she was working on, she had plans for her kind if the journey did not kill her. The only thing that is really known about the Elementals is that the previous generation’s Fire went mad with power and started murdering people who disobeyed them.
If word got out that she was an Elemental, one of the clans running the council would come after her. They made a ruling that being an Elemental is a death sentence. Claire’s dream is to relocate them to this new property, whenever she found them. There was a dilapidated barn in the back of the property that used to be a stable at one time. The horses that used to live here were relocated closer to town. She secretly hoped that neither of them was a billionaire with a mansion already, though in a way she did so she wouldn’t have to worry about money. If one had a mansion, it would be silly for them to relocate. In the meantime, however, she lied to everyone that asked that she was only trying to start a stable and piggery and to see where things led. She needed to purchase some horses and pigs next time she was on the mainland to make her lie more believable.
Besides, there wasn’t much known about her kind. She hoped to learn from the others should she finally find them. She knew somehow that they’d find strength in banding together in a world of beings that were something other than them. Oftentimes though, she had wondered if her gift was nothing but a fanciful curse. The questions that went through her mind on the subject were endless, and so it was better she kept things to herself. That way, there will certainly be less unforeseen complications.
It also hurt her that she had to keep this even from him. Many times, so many times, she had come this close to telling Alexander (Alec) Moonstone, her childhood friend, what she was—an Elemental. She imagined how he’d freak out because neither one of them had ever seen one before, or so she believed. He’d probably begin to think she was crazy, as if she didn’t have enough embarrassing encounters with him already. Surely, Alec would then see her foolish explanation as her reason for stalling him all this while. He would then move to connect some dots that weren’t there and come up with a very false story. She didn’t see a way it’d end so well for her.
Alec was perfect and totally in the public eye; while she was, well, not so perfect and had to stay away from the public eye. Alec taking an interest in her would inevitably spell public interest in her once private life. Seeing how the girls in the village gushed about him, Claire was pretty sure he was playing them. She never really understood why the other women of the village gushed over him just for being the chief’s son. She thought it was because of how rare his blonde hair was. Perhaps she couldn’t join them in gushing because she’d seen him grow just as he had her. Granted that he didn’t take up the amount of responsibility he now did when he was younger, being the chief’s son now made him quite the cache for almost any lady, but not Claire.
Alec always claimed to have eyes for none other than her. That she was the apple of his eye and all that. She wanted to believe him, she really did, but whenever the image of his smirking face floated into her head, she couldn’t help but think he was playing her. She knew Alec mostly translated her rejection of him as playing tough just because she knew she was pretty.
The gate creaked as she slid it to let herself in. She hated the old thing but had always heard it was necessary to help keep them safe, not to mention it was an important landmark to help tell when one was at Havenswood. The words, “Havenswood, home of the free and magically abiding races” was neatly inscribed on a brassy plate placed on the gate by the founders.
As she made her way in, she saw that the village was soon going to retire for the day. She thought she saw lamps either getting blown out or taken elsewhere, families summarily gathered in their homes, and the pathways generally getting swept off people. She was heading to her family house this time, and not to the new place on the outskirts of town. Havenswood was not the biggest of villages by far, but still had a good-sized market that would be busy on the weekends, and a nice bathhouse that was only built last year. The harbor was of course right at the back or side, depending on which way it was approached from.
Then there were the farming fields where many villagers shared buildings such as barns and for other purposes. Also, there’s a giant courtyard in the middle of the buildings with a two-tier water fountain made of stone. A water mill and wind turbine stand somewhere near the back of the village.
Scampering past these places, she was careful not to get caught by Alec even though at the same time she secretly wished she could get a sneak peek of him. They’d known each other for all their lives, and sometimes their friendship waxed stronger than other times. Passing by his family’s manor, she saw that the place was still lit up, but by that different kind of lighting that was only used by them and the mess hall. The mess hall was mostly just a place for the men to gather and talk about news and for hosting festivals. During the day, it became a one-roomed schoolhouse for the children. The loft area held the chief’s office. By the doorway on the left side was where the three counting machines were for the village. She’d never really seen them or had reason to since it was an exclusive object meant for administrative affairs, it was said. Bookcases filled the loft as well for the lessons that the teacher had to give out.
Havenswood was a village stuck between two times. The old stone buildings-built generations ago still stood resolute, but modern steam technology had been added in between — steam powered lifts instead of stairs and then hot baths and the giant clock is attached to the meeting hall. While the protruding metal pipes could sometimes be a bit ugly, Claire considered Havenswood the best of both worlds. She wouldn’t give up her hot steam bath for all the gold in the capital.
As per the last census, the human population alone of Havenswood stood somewhere around eighteen hundred people. The rest were other beings and livestock whom they lived together with in peace, harmony, and perpetuity. All of them found a thriving solace and quiet in this little world whose tranquility could not easily be found elsewhere.
