Sid is swaying. Sid is pale. Sid is wearing an awful hat.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s an underground fighting tournament, though, so Max doesn\u2019t let that distract him.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s there to fight!<\/p>\n
Max swirls his longcoat. He steps back. He intones: SNOWSTORM.<\/p>\n
Clouds start gathering over Max\u2019s head.<\/p>\n
Sid clenches a hand. He finishes drawing his summoning circle. His arms are all-over scratches and his eyes are bright from lack of sleep.<\/p>\n
He rasps: FIREBALL.<\/p>\n
\u201cWay to go,\u201d says Max, impressed. He grins. He watches Sid\u2019s hand closely as Sid brings up the fireball. Sid winds it up. He throws it.<\/p>\n
Max dodges to the side.<\/p>\n
Max\u2019s snow fairy manifests. Snowflakes begin to fall all around Max. Max pushes at the air and the snowstorm flows over and begins dumping snow down on Sid.<\/p>\n
Sid growls: FIREBALL.<\/p>\n
Max flicks his eyes to the fairy. He cautions: \u201cDon\u2019t let it \u2014\u201d<\/p>\n
Sid hurls the fireball at the snow fairy. The snow fairy\u2019s hair singes. Her eyes turn into Xs. She falls back onto her cloud.<\/p>\n
\u201c\u2014 hit you,\u201d Max sighs.<\/p>\n
Then he shrugs. He snaps his fingers. WHOMPING STICK, he summons.<\/p>\n
A whomping stick appears in his hand. He whomps Sid. Sid staggers. Sid falls.<\/p>\n
Sid rasps: FIREBALL.<\/p>\n
It is too much for Sid. Sid is beginning to bleed from the nose.<\/p>\n
\u201cUm,\u201d says Max.<\/p>\n
Sid throws it. FIREBALL, he whispers. FIREBALL.<\/p>\n
\u201cUm,\u201d says Max again.<\/p>\n
Sid pulls himself to his feet. His hands are burning.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m going to beat you,\u201d he whispers. \u201cIt\u2019s OK. I\u2019m totally fine.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sid\u2019s hat drools slime along his forehead. He wobbles. He hurls, both fireballs and the contents of his stomach, at almost but not exactly the same time.<\/p>\n
FIREBALL, whispers Sid.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re going to hurt yourself,\u201d says Max. He is appalled, but Sid doesn\u2019t seem to care.<\/p>\n
FIREBALL. F<\/em>IRESTORM<\/em>.<\/em><\/p>\n Flames whip up. They rage through the circle. They howl around Max and he repels them with a swirl of his longcoat and a NEGATE.<\/p>\n Sid\u2019s eyes are bleeding. His nose is pouring blood. He sniffles and accidentally chokes on it. He leans over, gasps for breath. He is pale and gaunt.<\/p>\n F<\/em>IRESTORM<\/em>.<\/em><\/p>\n But Max has wrapped his arms around Sid now. He is holding him up.<\/p>\n FIRESTORM.<\/p>\n Max isn\u2019t fighting him but holding him. He is whispering, fiercely, in Sid\u2019s ear, \u201cGeez, kid, stop<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n FIRESTORM.<\/p>\n FIRESTORM.<\/p>\n INTIMATION.<\/p>\n FIRESTORM.<\/p>\n Max holds him until Sid is exhausted. Until he can no longer summon. Until he is crying on Max\u2019s shoulder and he has nothing left.<\/p>\n \u201cI have to win,\u201d whispers Sid, and sobbing wracks him.<\/p>\n Max holds him there, but he does not fight.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Sid is swaying. Sid is pale. Sid is wearing an awful hat. It\u2019s an underground fighting tournament, though, so Max doesn\u2019t let that distract him. He\u2019s there to fight! Max swirls his longcoat. He steps back. He intones: SNOWSTORM. Clouds start gathering over Max\u2019s head. Sid clenches a hand. He finishes drawing his summoning circle. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5319,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[],"series":[50],"class_list":["post-5684","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-vidars-boot-chapter-5-66-summoning-circle","series-vidars-boot"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/Hat_5_nobg.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5684","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5684"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5684\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6050,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5684\/revisions\/6050"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5319"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5684"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5684"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5684"},{"taxonomy":"series","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fseries&post=5684"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}