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This time the renegade fire mages (living in Mt. St. Helens I should note) decided to make certain of their ex-brother who had left them when they had betrayed the mysteries of the fire and turned to evil.  They had struck several times at the resting place and tools he had used (the rope making machine).  They decided that now would be the time to finish whoever or whatever had balked them.

So they raised up an elemental from the earth's core, a creature of magma and fire, and sent it by the secret paths through the earth.

So right after school, there the little girl was, playing in the school yard with her new friend, who was a babysitter, when this thing came out of the ground.  It was three stories tall, and surrounded by what looked like shadows made out of earth (it had drawn the attention of the earth shadows).

From across the field she saw the babysitter's godmother.  She could have sworn that the setting sun behind her looked like a giant eagle made out of fire.  The babysitter looked as if she was turned to stone (her illusions slipped).  Then the creature shook and faded into the shadows around it, but a hideous sulfur stench floated out on the air.

Nobody seemed perturbed by what they had seen.  Most of the kids hadn't seen anything at all. The little girl didn't know what to make of it.

From the phoenix-ruk's perspective, she had seized control of a magma elemental from whoever had summoned it, and then they had cast a stink in her face (as bad mannered a challenge as breaking wind).  She caught the taint of corrupted fire magic and marked it down for a future reckoning.

From the earth shadows, they had responded to the City Spirit's demands and when the fire mages lost control of the elemental, they drained it of power (giving several of them the ability to burst into flames) and contained it.

From the fire mages' view, they concluded that they had run afoul of the City Spirit and that was where everything was meeting its end, so they sent an insult (a city spirit can't leave its boundaries) and ceased to be concerned.

From the babysitter's point of view, a terrible creature had surprised her just when she thought she was about to make a new friend, but instead of it destroying everything, her godmother (with a complete lack of humor) handled it with less effort than her picking up a kitten.  She decided to just ignore the whole thing in the hopes that her new friend hadn't noticed all the magic.

Most of the kids waiting to go home didn't notice anything at all or thought they had day dreamed for just a moment.

And that was the surprise.