Astalena Powers

Astalena Powers - Addy Ley (6th Grade, Creative Learning Academy) 

   Leina’s day had been going great…until she got woken up by her mother. The argument went a little something like this…

   “Please Ma! I don’t want to go to school!”, Leina groaned after her mom had woken her up. “Leina you are going to school and that’s final.”, Ms. Gainava yelled from the kitchen. “Ugh! Please Ma I don’t want to go! I want to stay here and train.”

“No! Leina I will not be putting you anywhere near that war!” 

“But I want to fight!”

   “Never! You’ll never go near that war! Ever!”, Ms. Gainava’s eyes burned Leina’s a tear streaking her cheek, “I can’t risk losing you too…”, her mom said.

   Leina’s dad had gone to war and had gone MIA; they hadn’t seen him in 2 months. Leina hated not having him here, he was the only person who ever understood her. Ma said she got sad looking at Leina. She was the spitting image of her dad. Same red, firey hair,(she had one side shaved and the other side really long) , same dark hazel eyes, and same crazy obsession with martial arts. She tried not to think about him but she always would, when she was mad, sad, but mostly when she was happy. All her happy memories were with him, and now he was gone. 

Leina looked down at her feet, “Ok,” then she heard her sister’s voice.

“Leina! Come on, get down here!”, her younger sister yelled.

   Leina groaned, put on a change of clothes-a red long sleeve shirt and baggy pants-and stomped down the stairs her mother trailing behind her, “What?”, she said clearly annoyed. Her sister didn’t get the message.

   “You’re so lucky you’re going to school! I’ve always wanted to go there. When you get back will you tell me what it’s like?”, Leina’s sister, Caranma said excitedly.

“Yeah, yeah. Sure.”, she said with no enthusiasm, “Only if you’ll leave me alone for once.“

“Ok!”, she said with way too much enthusiasm.

   Leina looked back at her Mom. “Please Ma I don’t-“, she started but got cut off.  “Leina Pasalona Gainava! Drop it! You are going to school whether you like it or not. End of story!”, her mom snapped as she placed a dish of tacos or “breakfast tacos” as her mom called them. Leina looked at the food, she hated tacos. Her mom knew that, even her dog knew that! But, nonetheless, her mom put down the plate without even a glance at her. “I can’t believe this, my own Ma knows me less than my dog does,” she thought to herself. 

   She picked up the plate and placed it on the ground next to her seat. “Laurie!” she called. Her dog came bounding down the marble stairs and-just like usual-landed flat on her face. Leina smiled, “Stupid dog.” Laurie ran up and ate the food of her plate. Leina sighed, “I’m going to head out Ma.” Her mom turned and smiled, “Have fun miel.” Leina smiled back, she loved when her mother used French around her, it made her feel more connected to her ancestors, she loved that feeling. She grabbed her bag and walked out of the house.

   She looked up at the sky and around the city; Astenlana. Astenlana was a smaller town, it had tiny, townhouses-all colored in different shades of brown-surrounding every block. Then, Leina looked over to the East, she took in a sharp, surprised, breath. There was her school, Astenlana Academy-such an unique name right? She took one last look around, the city looked so peaceful in the morning. You would never guess that a goddess had declared war…and was slowly winning. She tried to shake the thought of her dad and the war of which she had lost him to. Finally, she straightened up, took a deep breath and started walking towards school.

   “Ok. It’s time for school.” The bell rang and she walked in, completely unaware of what was coming.