The Siblings

In a secluded village called Libertad, nestled within the heart of the land known as Filipinas, I was born to my mother, Nanay Ana, and my father, Tatay Nonoy. I am their firstborn child. Following me came a girl named Chique, and the third was a boy whom most people simply call Lee. But what my parents didn’t expect was that they would have a fourth child. They thought Nanay could no longer bear children. And so, the youngest among us came as a surprise — a girl we now call Cleopatra. We were born one year apart, each of us arriving in close succession. Yet as we grew older, something unusual began to awaken within us. By the time we began our studies in a distant temple dedicated to our sacred faith — the Benevolent Brotherhood Buddhism, or BBB — we discovered, slowly and astonishingly, that we were unlike the other children of our village. We had powers. Powers that no ordinary child could possess. I am John Lucas, twelve years of age — a boy gifted with the ability to wield magic and bend reality with the force of my will. I can move and command objects through incantations and gestures, my hands glowing with ethereal light when I summon the arcane. My sister Chique, a year younger, commands the element of water. She can call down rain from a cloudless sky or summon waves to rise at her feet. In her presence, streams dance and droplets hang in the air like tiny jewels suspended by her will. Lee, the third-born, manipulates the wind itself. He can soar through the skies like a bird, the air obeying his every breath. His power is so refined he can even control the respiration of others — a whisper of wind from his fingertips can silence an enemy’s breath. And Cleopatra, the youngest, holds dominion over the sun and fire. Flames bloom in her palms like living creatures. The light bends to her, the heat wraps around her like a cloak. She speaks to fire as though it were a friend. Our mother is a humble woman, selling rice at a small local market. Our father,