Rob had been relaxing on a pile of leaves when he opened his eyes and blinked at his surroundings. He appeared to be lying down in the middle of a battle.
The air was thick with the acrid smell of burning wood and the metallic scent of blood. The deafening clash of swords and the screams of the wounded echoed through the battleground.
Elves and humans were on one side and the Scavengers were on the other. The leader Ace was charging at King Kojo with a scythe, his son was at his side wielding a staff and a black mass was hovering over his other palm. Black magic.
The dragons were blasting their enemies with flames and some were scooping some up and tossing them high into the air.
Rob was no stranger to visions from the future, but this was startling. He pushed himself to his feet only to get impaled with a spear. Sighing, he stepped aside and glanced behind him to see an elf with shoulder-length blonde hair behind him.
His eyes were wide with both shock and pain, and Rob watched as the Scavenger yanked the weapon out and ran off toward another victim. The elf collapsed to the ground and a human with blue hair raced toward him.
Rob averted his gaze toward Ari, who was choking a couple of humans with a piece of black chain. With his other hand, he was twirling the staff around keeping the elves at bay with the magic blasting toward them. Some collapsed with gaping holes in their chest and others had hair singed off.
Strange. Where were his daughters?
Wasn't Ari dead?
Rob sidestepped a flying axe and saw Ari's form flickering. The face of a boy with tan skin and blue eyes appeared for a split second then vanished again.
Eli.
Moving on, he saw Kojo and Ace hacking at each other, both had injuries and were bleeding but neither seemed to let up. Farther away King Davis and his son, Xavier were taking on some Scavengers with their dragons.
Rob could even see humans in the struggle, wielding everything from pitchforks to swords, bows, and arrows, to axes. Nico was in the middle of the din burning anything that got in his way, his friends were fighting alongside him.
...
The scene changed and Rob found himself standing in a hut where Kaya had given birth to a newborn boy. She was in a bed softly singing to him and trying her best to quiet his cries.
The battle raged on outside.
Rob stepped closer to see the child and noted his golden hair and startling bright eyes, but didn't get a chance to see more before the door to the hut was kicked down and two Scavengers came barreling through.
The boy started screaming and Kaya held the baby closer to her chest, her eyes bouncing back and forth between the Scavengers who had taken a position on either side of her bed.
"What do you want?" Kaya growled.
"You're the wife of the Guardian, are you not?" his eyes fell on the screaming child.
Kaya gritted her teeth. "You're not harming my child."
The Scavenger just sneered while the other one came up on the other side and with a quick motion sliced her neck open and scooped up the now squealing baby.
They both made for the door but an elf charged in and threw two daggers catching both Scavengers in the throat. The girl caught the baby in her arms and raced toward Kaya's side.
"E-Emmani?"
Emmani blinked. "Save your strength. I'm going to help you."
But as Emmani's eyes scanned the room there was no way for her to stench the bleeding and it was clear she had no training in treating wounds.
"Tell Nico that...I love him." Kaya closed her eyes. "Our child's name is...."
...
Rob was yanked out of the vision and he opened his eyes and sat up with a gasp.
War.
A war was coming.