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Phoenixes die just once

Red tailed hawk

I can fly! Can you?
Welcome to my first story here!
I'm writing a lot, so why not share the stories with you? I want to become an author, really^^
Well, let me just tell you that I'm a better writer on Norwegian than English. If you understand Norwegian, you can read the story here
And then: I might have some problems with have/has/had, to/too, and so on, and misspelled words that give the sentences a different meaning. I've used a dictionary to translate, and I hope I've got it right. But if you see an error, can you please tell me in a nice way? Also, give me comments to make me a better author!

Read and enjoy:

Prologue

First summer night.
The night when the magic was under the greatest influence, the night when restless spirits wandered free.
A cool breeze blowed in the trees, heavy, exotic scents hung in the air, and it was dark and stifling.
A wild and beautiful music filled the forest with its deep booms and warm, filling tones. Tones that made every single muscle in the body to vibrate, the blood to rush in the veins, everything to look perfect, and gave a feeling of being alive. The elves’ festival music.
Several hundred of them were gathered on a gigantic clearing surrounded by golden and crimson fireballs. In the middle of the circle, a tall, smooth granite pedestal rising over everyone, carved with a special pattern and possessed with gems.
Ten ice blue, gleaming spheres created a five armed star around the foundation; water shaped by the elves' magic.
The grass under the star was lusher than outside it, influenced by the water spheres formation.
Gathered around one of the fires, a group of thirty-thirty-five elves sat, playing flutes and other instruments; mostly of the music came from them.
A little north for the pedestal, eighty-ninety of young and older elf couples danced with the rhythm of the music. A few didn't dare to join the dancers, and instead sat and watched them, perhaps to learn some new moves or brace themselves.
Beyond them again, stood a small group and song with so beautiful voices that they gave the phoenixes hard competition.
Spread in smaller groups, circles of friends in the teen ages and chatted and laughed, watched the different things that happened, or just relaxed and studied the night sky.
They waited everybody.
Waited...
Waited...
And then, just before midnight, an eagle cry that drowned the music was to be heard, even as it was far away.
The water spheres gleamed intensive in the light of the fires, which suddenly had grown larger.
It was close now.
Thud!
The deep booms turned more powerful, and the music became wilder and warmer.
Thud!
Eyes glimpsed out in the dark, between all the old oaks, ashes and fir-trees, for just to disappear behind a bush or under a root.
Thud!
Thud!
The rhythm went faster and faster, until it became a so fleeting melody that it was impossible to separate the different tones from each others.
Then it fell silent.
A warmer, more beautiful, wilder, more filling and more alive song than the earlier tones filled the stifling night air. No one could point out from which direction it came, but one thing was sure: It was close now.
A stripe of golden light was suddenly visible on the night sky, and shined on a lonely, silvercoloured outline sailing up there.
It went a whisper through the mass of elves, and in one movement, everybody’s gaze was concentrated on the figure.
The song became louder, and the water spheres lifted until they were on height with the top of the pedestal and began circling around it with a ghostlike gleam.
On a moment, the figure was right over the pedestal; it had dived down with such speed that no one had seen it.
With flapping wings, it landed slowly on the pedestal with one sliver white lion paw, hold the pose a moment, and put the other paw down. The pedestal lowered until it was on eye height with the tallest elves.
Pupil less, deep-violet eyes studied the elves that gathered around the pedestal, and a lion tail waved slowly from side to side while the creature waited for the elves to fell silent.
The wings were still spread out, necessary for the beast if it should keep its balance. The creature had the head, wings and forelegs of an eagle, the hindquarters of a lion, and feather-covered horse ears.
The silvercoloured feathers were lighter under the beak and belly, where they turned into short, smooth fur. The gryphon had darker patterns over the forelegs and the long fur on the end of the tail.
The beak was strong and pale golden and ended in a dark edge. The scaled eagle legs was even paler and ended in three front-turned and a rear-turned claw, whom each hold four long, ebony talons.
Táirh Nehrvá, the Silver Gryphon.
One of the most powerful mages time ever had created. Three millennia he was, and still he showed no sign of age.
He showed himself on rare occasions, and that was just when dangerous times were close. He came to warn, to prepare, to learn the different species what was going to happen. He was a mystical creature that often disappeared as fast as he arrived, and no one knew more of him but what he told them.
Now he stood still on the pedestal, even without blinking, while the excitement grew among the crowd.
Then, fast and suddenly, he stretched out one foreleg, as if gripping falling prey. A lightning bolt shot through his fisted claw.

"Magic," he said calmly and withdrew the claw, still holding the lightning bolt.

Slowly, the claw was opened and the lightning became free, for then to begin pulsing around his talons on both forelegs.
He stared at it, and as if on command, the lightning bolt created a white-glowing, pulsing sphere soaring a feather-length over his talons.

"Magic," he repeated, and with a wave of his right claw, the sphere disappeared.

He stood silent for a long while.
Suddenly, the whole gryphon was in the middle of a fiery inferno. Orange flames creaked while they licked his feathers and fur.
It came a frightened gasp from the crowd, and they slowly backed away.
As sudden as it had come, the fire disappeared, and Táirh Nehrvá still stood at the same place, in the same pose, as if he had not noted what happened.
The deep-violet, pupil less eyes gleamed weakly, and he ruffled his feathers.

"Magic," he said for third time that night.

"Powers that easy exceeds the ones to a randomly selected creature. You can send a mage out on a battlefield. He can summon fireballs, lightning, earthquakes, floods, hurricanes of deadly wind, and still he is just one and can be eliminated. Magic is so much, and some phenomena even my knowledge cannot find answers to. It lives its own life, and comes when we summon it. It can come in everything from massive destructions to small glimpses of healing.
It's not everyone who have these powers, but they who have are to fear. You'll never know what a magician will do when you meet one.
They who expect a mage to do that and that makes a great mistake. You're never guaranteed that it goes as you want. A magician is unpredictable.
The magic also contains the possibility to create living beings. Beasts that are created in such ways are also in possession of these powers, as the magic fleets with their blood.
It is restrictions for what can be done with magic, because it saps you for power. New magicians do sometimes die by overuse of magic, because they haven't enough powers to pay the price the spell needs.
But with time, the powers grow stronger, and for me, it's as exhausting to destroy this forest as it is to lift my claw."

He took a break, and became enveloped in a smooth, sky-blue sphere.
When it disappeared, the gryphon sat himself on all four and stared out on the crowd. Since he had no pupils, it was impossible to tell who he was staring at.

"Dark powers have begun to invade this land. You'll be laid under the shadow of tyranny if you aren't careful."

"But," a young elf burst out with a loud voice, and everyone turned to face him. He turned a little red before he continued.

"Aren't you one of the most powerful mages in this land? Aren't these dark powers easy for you to handle?"

It came shouts of disgust from many of the elves as he finished speaking. Who behaved in such manner against Táirh Nehrvá
But to everybody’s surprise, the Silver Gryphon grinned, his beak gaping wide.

"I'm glad that question was asked," he said with a warm voice, and it glimpsed in his deep-violet eyes, "To answer the first question first: Yes, I'm one of the most powerful, but remember that I'm not alone. And the second: It had, if it hadn't been for that it's many more behind this than I first thought. Every single mage with a mad thought in his head has gathered to destroy you and other species and lay the path clear for their maser, whose name I'll not mention now."

He gave the crowd some time to discuss the topic, before he clicked his beak and everything felt silent.

"You," he said, nodding toward the elf that had asked the questions, "What's your name?"

The elf muttered something unhearable to his knee.

"Sorry, I didn't catch that. Could you please repeat it, in a louder voice would be very nice."

"Arin," the elf said louder, and the Silver Gryphon nodded.

"Well, Arin, can you come up here?"

The crowd parted as Arin drawed closer to the pedestal with nervous steps. Who did know what was going to happen to him?
He stopped in front of the pedestal, measured it with a quick glance, and leaped, landing on the hard edge.
Táirh Nehrvá laughed.

"You elves are as resilient as you're told to be," he said and moved a little backwards, so that the elf did not need to stand balancing on the edge.
Carefully, he laid a claw on Arin's shoulder and, without hesitation, asked in a loud voice:

"Are you willing to bear the mark of the Silver Gryphon?"

A whisper went through the crowd, and Arin's thoughts whirled around in his head.
It was a great honour to be marked by the Silver Gryphon, and only a handful had been so through the history. Often, the Silver Gryphon had chosen them long time before they was born, and waited for the right moment to pick them out. They were changed, but no one knew of what kind.
Being incapable of speaking, the elf only nodded.
Táirh Nehrvá studied the elf boy for a long while.

"Be aware of that if you choose to be marked, it includes numerous dangers threat your own or others' life and some must die because you cannot save them in time. But are you willing?"

"I am," Arin replied hoarsely, and the grip around his shoulder was tightened.

"Then," the Silver Gryphon replied calmly. Suddenly, he cried:

"Entéra vöhere de gréfyne älter seìlfer!"

Frost spread from the gryphon's talons and over Arin's body as a cold blanket.
Everything became hazy and icy, he felt cold and empty, dizzy and faint, and -
- and he was tore out of a trance the same moment as the claws left his shoulder.
Táirh Nehrvá studied him with a calm expression.

"You're marked," he said.

Arin frowned.

"Where? I can't see any mark," he said, confused.

Without replying, the Silver Gryphon summoned a mirror of water out of thin air.
Arin studied his reflection for a long while, trying to find the mark.
One change done to him was easy to see. His features had become very hawklike, and his eyes had turned yellow.
Else he was as he used to be, tall and slender, with straight back and strong arms and a starved look that came of he had grown too fast on too short while. As usual, he wore his moss-green elven tunic and the earth-brown pants, with the quiver over his shoulder and the sword in his belt. The bow he had left behind on the place was he and his friends had been sitting while they waited for the Silver Gryphon.
But ever how much he studied himself, no mark was to be seen.
Táirh Nehrvá seemed to understand what he looked after, for the gryphon nodded towards his forehead.
Arin wiped away the dark blonde forelocks and gaped dumbly.
At the middle of his brow, it was a symbol of a silver gryphon with its head in profile and wings and tail pointing downwards so that its body created a triangle.

"That - that - that..."

"Is my mark," the Silver Gryphon replied, finishing the sentence for him, "You'll discover the powers it hides when the time has come."
He spread out his wings and was ready for take-off.

"The next one waits," he explained, "And the night is soon at an end."

Then he disappeared as a silvercoloured line and left Arin at the top of the pedestal with only one thought in his head:
I am one of the chosen ones!
 
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Yami Ryu

Well-Known Member
.. your sig is too big >.> just incase you didn't see it in the other post I did.

First: Read the rules. All of them. For the forums and for the fanfic forum, and for the sigs. Secondly: Read advice for aspiring authors. Thirdly: read both it and the fanfic forum rules repeatedly.

For all its length, it still feels rushed, and it's a giant block of text, with further adds to this feeling. So just cause it's in one language that you translated to english, doesn't excuse that formatting.

And you abuse commas more than I do.

Eyes glimpsed out in the dark from between all the old oaks, ashes and fir-trees only to just disappear behind a bush or a gnarled upturned tree root.

:/ you should have left it in norwegion(sp) and only translated when you had a better grasp of the english language, or atleast put more effort into translating/finding a beta, to help the flow be better.
 

Red tailed hawk

I can fly! Can you?
Thank you for the comments.
I'll reduce my sig, I forgot the rule.
But I'll just say that the translating made it worse than it is on Norwegian. Not as an excuse, I just say it. Some of the words I didn't even find in the dictionary>>;; As drønn(booms) femtakket(five armed) and so on.
And with the commas; Word edited the sentences I made by deleting commas and other things like that, and it appeared a green line under the text when I edited back.
I'm also aware of that it needs a rewrite, and I'll do that when I have time.
But thanks for the comments, I think it'll help me alot^^
EDIT: I've made paragraphs where they speaks. Think it's better now.

~Red tailed hawk
 
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