The darkening sky hung ominously over everyone’s head as they continued their depressing activities. The food supply was low now that we no longer had any fishermen doing their job, so the entire island relied on the gardens. It was enough to keep us strong, but we were never fully satisfied. The villagers had boarded up their windows and had begun making weapons to prepare for our war against the shadow creatures, knowing full well that most of their friends and family members would die in this seemingly hopeless war. Not only this, but Maktu’s daily lessons had reached the awful parts on the war itself. Even with the rest of the heroes there to live through it all, the sky seemed to be a perfect representation of how the island felt. I tried to keep positive, but after everything that had happened in the past few days, I too only had but a flicker of hope to keep me strong. Even Mare, who seemed so wonderfully happy that nothing could ever bring her down, was also downright afraid of what was going to happen to us, but she did her best not to let it show through. “Excuse me?” she asked Maktu from where she sat a seat to the left of Akuma and two seats from where I sat. “I was wondering where you may think us ‘protectors,’ are from?” she asked, putting quotes around the word “protectors.” She seemed to be attempting to change the subject from the war scene Maktu had been describing, in an extremely vivid way.
Maktu seemed slightly annoyed by this question, but managed not to say anything and shifted his attention to giving her an answer. “No one knows for sure where the protectors came from,” he began. “But what we do know is that none of the gods have powers like yours. What we can infer, from what we are reading is that your ancestors had started out on Earth, but had been giving a certain power,” he said. “Now I have a question for you, miss Mara, is if you have a different power from those who have come before you, or if it the same as say, your father,” he asked, looking over to Akuma as she thought about this. I knew that for Akuma, he had a different power from his father, who could fly featherless. I was surprised at the question Maktu had asked, as I now wondered the same thing and waited anxiously for Mare’s answer. I looked around at the rest of the heroes, who seemed either to be thinking about this for themselves, or waiting carefully for her answer. Akuma seemed to be waiting the most patiently, as if worried there was something wrong with him, and that he should be more like his father. He sat tensely watching, not seeming to notice Maktu’s gaze into his eyes. I touched his arm lightly, signalling to Akuma that even if her answer was different, there was nothing wrong with him. He smiled, but continued to wait for Mare’s answer.
Eventually, she responded, and when she did, the room was dead silent. “My father’s powers are different from my own,” she said. “He fades from different states of matter, whereas I stay the same state, just become different animals,” she said quietly.
“Except for a dragon,” Onde reminded her with a smirk. “Never a dragon.”
She rolled her eyes. “That’s right, Ondie, good boy, I can’t turn into a dragon,” she teased, speaking to him as if he were a dog named “Ondie,” which appeared to be her nickname for him.
Maktu interrupted this exchange of conversation with his idea to ask every royal guard in the room whether or not their parents had the same powers as their children. After this, he challenged the elemental heroes to guess the answer to a question he would call out, before their guards could answer. I enjoyed this small moment of competition, as it took my mind off of what was going to happen at some point in the near future. It seemed Maktu had seen that I had figured out his plan, as he winked at me. I smiled back and then participated in the game with Akuma. That was how the rest of the lesson went, Maktu giving us a topic and the rest of us competing against one another to learn the answer. That was the day I saw another side of Zanshi I had never thought to see, her hyper-competitive nature showing through as she yelled her answer as quickly as possible, without giving Ditio a chance even to respond. This had been the first time in days where the sound of laughter could be heard throughout the entire island, and it was all because of Maktu, and for this, the world owed him, for inspiring hope in the heroes and reminding them what they were fighting for.
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