A Godly Disease

Many believe the speculation that gods cannot grow sick. However, Mira once was poisoned, and nearly faded away. This is the accounting of the quest resulting in the phantom assassin's deeds.

  A Godly Disease

 By Amy Jiao

 Chapter One

 Every assassin needs a proper toolkit, right? Well, Elvanto, a famed phantom assassin, had everything. You must be thinking,"But it isn't possible!" However, with magic on your side, especially dark magic, that IS possible.
"Hmm,"he muttered as he surveyed Mira's statue. He had a lance, spear, sword, bow and quiver, a dung bomb, and vials of potions popping in and out of his tool belt, but none would work on a cast. He needed a poisonous claw extension. 
Elvanto's arms grew fearsome claws, deadly poison dripping from them. Since the only Jammers out were scammers and hackers planning their new moves, nobody would stop Elvanto. The moonbeams glinted off his essence, and he moved in for the kill. First dashing, then leaping, he injected a drop. The metal started to steam, and the cast melted away,revealing a white egg of light. Mira hatched from that egg, and grew to full size, but keeled.
"Elvanto, curse you."she snarled. He melted into shadow without any reply. Then, a mechanical owl perched in a nearby tree noticed Mira, and recorded everything. It sent signals back to the hut, where Graham frowned at his computers. He turned in his swivel chair.
"Mira is sick."he told his fellow alphas."We must act, or Mother Sky will die."

 Chapter Two

 Cosmo was mixing sleep potions out of plants for himself when Lisa burst in, panting. Apparently, she had run the length of the hallway just to see him.
"What?"he asked her sleepily."It's midnight. Go to sleep."
 Lisa pulled down a grass drape, to show the sun rising."It's dawn, Cosmo."she said in a stern voice.
"Mira is sick, and Elvanto has poisoned her. She has been revived, but her presence may fade and leave Jamaa to utter chaos if we don't act soon." Cosmo stroked his chin where his beard should be, but it had been taken away centuries ago."Only the skin of Firetail can heal her."he said after some thinking.
"The Firetail or a Firetail?"Lisa asked him."The Firetail."he confirmed.
Lisa looked shocked."Then only Harper can save her."she said. Cosmo looked tired.
"Harper is very powerful, and is a good alpha, but she is in the spotlight too often."he groaned. Lisa shook her head.
"She has beat him before, it is her destiny. We must not tamper with fate." They sent a text to Harper, as she could go over the details on her phone with a wooden case later.

 Chapter Three

 Harper received the text, and nodded.
"I will go to the Coraxese ice palaces, where Firetail will be fighting the spirit of Melissa and Shade to melt them."she said.
"It is also territory where my powers will be strongest." Harper set down her phone, and told her mother what she would be doing. Her mom didn't look scared, and nodded. "Your father had this determination, as he was part of the Cithara Order. They are a similar force, keeping order in the lands of ice."(More will be posted on the Cithara Order later, when Cithara, Apophis, Moon, and Moko, the other deities besides Mira and Zios in Jamaa, come together.)Harper felt relieved feeling a connection to her faraway father, and trained for a bit. She sharpened her claws, swam against the deep sea currents(deep POOL currents,actually), then teleported far north into the Corax region of Jamaa.

 Ice palaces surrounded her, phantom runes etched on them. The sun was present, yet had no effect on the snow. Snow cannons and spirits of long dead archers stood on the turrets, ice between their wrinkles of age. If you are wondering, Melissa is an antlered moose who distracted the Phantoms when they were attacking Jamaa through snowfalls, and fought the phantoms here. Greely had preserved her as a rune in Coral Pathways, but her spirit kept fighting here, defending it from Firetails and the Firetail. Harper slid into the palace, and glimpsed a gruesome glance she had to say "OMG"over.

 Chapter Four

 Shade, the experienced Coraxese priest and Melissa, the Coraxese antlered hero(her antlers were a birth defect) fought Firetail, a flaming red serpent with flames forking from it's mouth and scales. Ichor poured from many places on it's pelt, yet only Shade and Melissa tired, despite Shade being alive and Melissa drawing on the powers of her looksake(if one existed). Harper snuck past them, in case Firetail had shed some skin during naps. 
"Cithara, please help me."she prayed silently as she wound through the maze of halls, ballrooms, bedrooms and other rooms. The runes of various deities etched on the walls glowed, and the Cithara pictures formed into a seal as large as Mira, with clothes woven of auroras. 
"I shall help you, my diviner and alpha."she said in a voice that was loving, and yet chilly at the same time, like Cithara's embrace on the lands of ice that kept them that way.
"Go into the heart of this castle,"she instructed."I have placed  a magical compass inside you to guide you there. You shall call on me whenever you like."Cithara faded, and Harper was left in the swirling winds of the castle.

 Chapter Five

 Of course, Harper could find her way with the sensation of the compass tugging at her gut, but the slide was still tedious. Harper slid down ice slides, wallowed through snow, and swam across polar bear-infested springs. She was shaken after that, but she remembered that the Coraxese built their homes above powerful ancestral graves, and protected the tombs with all their might. A palace without a mummy guardian would be doomed to fade.
"Are you looking for this?"a rather handsome voice said. Harper nearly jumped out of her blubber, and turned. A grey wolf that looked like Greely held a red blanket of red scales, yet he had a cloak of words on him and unforgiving eyes, as if his life was more miserable than Amelia's, and her life was driven by a false oath. It was Seth, Greely's son. Harper took it, and he faded. That was easier than she had expected.
"Wohoo!"she shouted, whispering Gangnam Style under her breath, even including the "sexay ladeey"part she loathed. But she regretted her cheers when a roar came from the direction she had came from, and her mind burst into an inferno.

 Chapter Six

 "You will Not, Not heal Mira!"Firetail bellowed. The fire serpent slithered over ice and polar bears, accompanied by Cosmo's worst enemy, Elvanto.
"We had a deal, Firetail, to stop her from getting your cloak. I shall take care of this."Elvanto said in a raspy voice. Firetail growled, but just slithered away to fight Melissa, Shade and Seth forevermore, as Edgar Allan Poe might say. Elvanto got flaming claws out of their unnatural sheaths, and approached her slowly.
"Give me the cloak,"he snarled."Or, get your head chopped off and your guts presented to Apophis."

 The next few minutes was a blur, as Harper feinted, used powers of all the alphas, and blocked/ counterattacked Elvanto's moves.
"You're worse than an apprentice!"Elvanto would taunt, but Harper kept her powers on the defensive. Soon, Elvanto got tired and stabbed at her. However, the wards of Marco's mind blocked it. It cursed, and tried a sludge punch,but Cosmo's force fields kept it away. Harper put on Firetail's shedded skin in the cloak form, and felt fiery energy course through her veins. She lunged, and combined all the Alpha's powers to destroy Elvanto. He floated there in shock as he was torn apart, to depart into the lands of the dead forever. Harper managed to teleport into Lisa's bedroom before fainting from exhaustion.

 Chapter Seven

 Cosmo approached Mira carefully, and put his paw on her glowing feathers. She looked down at him, face tired and eyes full of pain.
"C-cosmo, the hero will come in time. Give me the cloak so that I can sleep in peace until then."she sighed shakily. Cosmo didn't look satisfied.
"But, Mother Sky, I can keep you awake until then."he told her. Mira shook her head.
"T-the poison is the only thing that keeps me out of statue form right now, and you would not keep retrieving Firetail's cloak just to keep me alive, would you?"Mira smiled, and the look in her eyes told Cosmo that it was hard for her. Cosmo sighed, plucked a few of her feathers for magical use, and draped the cloak on her shoulders. Mira glowed with such radiance as she became her true form that Cosmo had to look away, and when he glanced at her, she was nothing but a turquoise stone. The stone sat at the statue of Mira's feet, and he took the round stone. Mira possibly was strong enough to be separated from her stone, as she had spliced this stone from her statue, so Cosmo slid it in his skirt.
"Mother Sky, I will find a way to revive you and Zios."he muttered.

 The End Beginning of The Beginning...