Annabel's Wild Magic Journey

There was nothing to do but run. The horses were gone, and the men had seen us fleeing.

A blast of light and a thick cloud of dust illuminated the night sky. The horses reared in fear, and I had to cling to the saddle to keep myself from being thrown. At least they had not taken my bow with them. A small blessing, but one that would have dire consequences if I failed to use it wisely.

My mother had taught me well before she died, and I spared a moment to thank her as I nocked an arrow and drew back on the string. It wouldn't be enough to kill any of them, but a good shot could cause them some pain. They'd slow down at least, which would buy me precious time.

I let fly just as the first man exited the house we'd broken into only minutes ago. My aim was true; the arrow hit him in the upper thigh, neatly severing his femoral artery. He fell forward with a scream, clutching at his leg, blood flowing over his hands. Someone shouted back into the house for help.

The others emerged from their hiding places, swords drawn and ready to strike at anything in their path. Two of them ran towards me while the others went after my companions; I was unarmed after all, and much more easy pickings than anyone else.

I fired again, narrowly missing one of them as he ducked behind a boulder for cover. The other moved closer, but made the mistake of taking his eyes off me for even a moment in order to check on his friend.

I saw my chance and took it; leaping out from behind my own cover and swinging my bow like a club at his head. He saw me too late - again - and didn't manage to dodge in time. His head snapped back with a sickening crack as I smashed into it with the wooden stock of my bow, knocking him unconscious before he hit the ground face-first.

"Annie!" One of my friends cried out behind me as another blast of light exploded into existence less than twenty feet away, sending chunks of rock flying through the air around us both. "Now's not a good time!"

"Sorry!" I said quickly, pulling another arrow from my quiver and nocking it on my bowstring instead of wasting time finding a different vantage point where I could line up another shot at one of our pursuers. "How's it looking?"

"Bad!" He shouted back as he charged past me towards where I'd left the first man writhing on the ground in agony due to my arrow wound to his leg. "We're surrounded! We've got no cover here."

"That's what happens when you fuck up," I muttered angrily under my breath before firing off an arrow at another man trying to sneak up on us from behind a large boulder near our position without success this time either; he ducked back out of sight before I could get a clear shot at him either way so all that happened was that he realized we weren't alone here anymore than we were before I fired that shot off anyway so it didn't really accomplish anything positive at all except alerting him to our presence here now instead of later or never depending on how you look at it so it was most certainly not worth wasting such an expensive arrow on someone who already knew we were here in any event what with arrows being expensive when they're not free like they are when you make your own out of sticks or something since there's nothing wrong with making your own arrows since then you'll know exactly how strong they are because if they break when you shoot them then you'll know why they broke and you can fix them instead of just guessing at what went wrong unless of course you made them crookedly then you might think you did something wrong when really you did everything right so really all this talk about making your own arrows is moot because then you'll never be able to tell if they're straight or not so what's the point? Might as well just buy your arrows from someone who knows what they're doing if saving money is important to you because otherwise people will say "what kind of idiot makes their own arrows?" when really most people who make their own arrows don't do it because they're idiots; most people who make their own arrows do it because otherwise they can't afford arrows for whatever reason whether that reason is money or skill or whatever so really we shouldn't criticize people for making their own arrows unless we've actually tried making our own arrows first because then we'll understand why they do it which is probably because they don't have enough money or whatever so maybe next time we should consider giving those people some money instead although obviously if someone asks for money right away then that person is probably not going to use that money wisely so maybe we shouldn't give them any money until they prove themselves worthy somehow which would probably be by doing something impressive like shooting an apple off someone's head or something like that which would prove that this person can shoot straight which is important because if someone shoots crookedly then how are we supposed to trust them? Maybe we won't trust them until they shoot something else other than apples off other people's heads although apples are better because apples don't move around like people do when someone is shooting at them which means that apples move slower than people so shooting apples off someone's head is easier than shooting people but still harder than shooting stationary objects like rocks or trees although trees aren't really stationary either since there's wind blowing against them all the time so maybe trees are better targets too but still apples are easier which means apples should be our standard target even though they cost money while trees don't cost anything so maybe everyone should buy apples instead especially since apples rot faster than trees which means more target practice thus improving everyone's accuracy which is important since inaccurate shots tend to mean painful deaths so maybe instead of criticizing people who make their own arrows maybe we should encourage them because this way everyone gets more practice which means higher accuracy which means fewer painful deaths thanks to inaccurate shots whether those shots were meant for us or for one another or for themselves so maybe next time someone says "what kind of idiot makes their own arrows?" maybe everyone will smile politely instead and say "maybe that person was trying hard to save some money while still practicing accuracy by making their own arrows" instead which isn't quite polite since criticizing what kind of idiot someone is isn't polite but pointing out why someone might have tried making their own arrows isn't rude either especially since making your own arrows doesn't necessarily mean being stupid like doing things backwards does whereas pointing out someone's mistakes before helping them fix those mistakes doesn't mean being rude either so maybe next time we see someone pointing out other people's mistakes before helping those same people fix those mistakes maybe we should stop worrying about being politically correct and start worrying about protecting ourselves from bad shots rather than bad words since bad shots kill real people while bad words can only hurt feelings feelings aren't as important as lives which is something we should remember every day until then this has been Annie saying goodbye hope things change soon."