by Ivy Carter
“Okay.” I whisper. Still unable to deny him anything.
Jaxx jumps to his feet and pulls me into a tight embrace. I am stiff at first then my body rebels against my minds warnings and softens itself into his touch.
Jaxx’s nose rubs against the top of my head. I hear him inhale as if he is trying to commit my scent to memory.
“I will wait until the oceans dry up, until the sky turns black, and the moon falls from the sky if I have to. I will never again touch another but you. You are mine and I am yours.”
“Forever.” We both repeat the all too simple vow. A vow that he has broken. A vow that could be made whole again if only I let it happen. But then Tristan’s roughly handsome face, his obsidian burning eyes float before me. Asking me to make my choice. But not to mislead him or leave him waiting without hope.
I pull out of Jaxx’s embrace and start to look around on the ground amongst the fallen leaves for the map that must have fallen from my grip.
Chapter 27.
Jaxx bends down and picks up the fallen piece of paper that had landed not far from where we are standing. When he is standing upright, he starts to scrutinize the map then a light shines in his eyes as if he recognizes something.
“I know this place. I played there often as a boy.” He grins as he no doubt relives some fond memories.
“Where is it located?” I ask while turning and searching the area for Jessa. Before I can call out for her…Someone has suddenly launched themselves on my back. I quickly fade then become corporal once more landing on top of them with my right palm fire up ready to turn the assailant to ash.
I look down into Jessa’s laughing baby blues in astonishment.
“You bitch!” I laugh out and climb off her. Sucking my gift inward as I do.
“What I was just trying to go for a quick bite.” She chuckles. “I am feeling a bit hungry myself.” She says as she fazes to her feet quicker than even my eyes can follow. Then she begins to dig through her large satchel of a purse for Goddess only knows what. She pulls out a silver package then rips into it revealing a cold blood bag. Genius. She pops the top off and starts to suck on the thing like a juice box. Slurping and moaning the whole time. Thoroughly enjoying her meal. I just laugh and turn back to Jaxx and the map. I find that he has been watching the show with a bemused smile on his face.
“Where is this place exactly?” Jessa asks between thick slurping sounds.
“It is about a hundred miles to the west of here. It used to be an old ceremonial gathering place for our people to pray to the Goddess on special holidays.” He says rather absently still studying the map.
“Why did people stop worshiping there?” I ask him suddenly really wanting to know. I love to learn more about my heritage that I was recently sucked into.
“I remember when I was small before my parents passed, we used to go there for ceremonies during full moons and holiday celebrations. Eventually the shadow started to spread, and people stopped caring about worshipping the Goddess. The light is dimming. I felt it before I left.” He looks at me as if he is scared to bring up something sensitive.
“I felt it before I left and went back to my clan. My family ruled my clan once. My father was the chieftain. When I felt them start to turn, I was afraid to tell you. Ashamed that I had let that happen. That was why I went back. That was why I was so secretive.” He tells me in an earnest voice.
“I could have helped. I would have done anything to help you. But now is not the time Jaxx. We have said all I want to say at this point. I have things to think about. A decision to make. I need time.” I tell him.
“I concur, here here!” Jessa peeps in as if she is a vital part of this conversation. Then she starts to laugh. “Goddess, I am a twit. Blood high and all that jazz, just excuse me.” She giggles again. I just shake my head at her and turn back to Jaxx.
“Well I can’t moon mist us there since it is still daytime. Do you think you can read the location? Maybe see it in my memories… Maybe that will be enough for you to fade us there.” I just nod my head and reach up and put each of my palms at his temples then I close my eyes and force myself past his shields and into his psyche.
When my mind joins with his, it’s like chaos explodes into my mind. So many memories are floating to the surface. Some of him with his parents. He gets his gorgeous looks from both of them. But he gets his eyes from his mother. I can see that now. I focus on one memory in particular of his mom holding a small little boy with shock white hair in her arms. She is bouncing him up and down while a very young Jaxx giggles uncontrollably. There is so much love shining in her ice blue eyes as she looks at her little boy.
I force myself to move onto a memory that has more to do with what I am searching for. But I can still feel the sadness attached to the memory of his mother. Tears stream freely down my cheeks. There is no way that I am able to stop them from coming. Knowing this man that I once loved…might still love with my entire being was ripped away from his parents. Parents that loved him with the kind of love that I could only dream about when I was a child. It is such a waste of innocence. I wish there was something that I could do to take the echoes of pain from his heart. But I would never rob him of these memories. Even if it would free him of the pain. Some things are both wonderful and terrible at the same time. I have learned that lesson well.
Finally, after sifting through more and more of Jaxx’s happy childhood I see the old ruins where people used to gather to worship in the ways of the Light. I focus not on the people surrounding a huge bon fire praying to the heavens, but on the surrounding area. Landmarks. I commit the complete scene to memory then I hurry and remove myself from Jaxx’s mind before I see something from the all too brief time that we had spent together.
“I have it.” I tell Jaxx and Jess needlessly as I remove my hands from his temples. I take the time to smooth back his mused hair before I remove myself completely. Before I can move away, Jaxx grasps my hand and places an open-mouthed kiss upon my palm. I just smile a small smile at him. Trying not to let his gentle touch get to me.
The decision that I have to make involves more than just Jaxx and me. It involves Tristan as well. He is a good man. A man that I have come to care for deeply. I don’t know if I love him. I know that he was there for me when I needed someone. He comforted physically while I tried to work out everything that was imploding mentally.
“Please.” Jaxx whispers.
I know what he wants. He wants conformation that I am going to pick him. That I am going to give us another chance. But I can’t do that right now. I have to keep my mind on the task in front of me, so I do make a decision. One that he isn’t going to like very much at all.
I ignore him and his plea and turn my back to him in order to face Jessa fully. If I look at his pleading eyes. Or his cursed sweet smile I will falter. I can’t falter, especially at a time like this. I have facing the most difficult thing that I have ever faced in my life. I need a clear head and Jaxx is more than a distraction. He is an enormous roadblock that just won’t stop appearing in front of me, something that I can’t force myself around for the life of me.
I wiggle my palms at Jessa, the universal sign to come to me. She causally walks over to me and places her palm in mine. Then she covers well by starting to blather incessantly.
“So how much trouble do you think that I am going to be in with Sebastian?” She moves to the side to look around then wiggles her eyebrows at Jaxx who is still standing behind me. “Do you think he might like ummm spank me?” The she sends him a saucy wink as we fade. It’s the fastest fade that I have ever been able to pull off. There isn’t time for Jaxx to hitch himself a ride this time. We were there then gone in less than a millisecond.
We reappear in a very gloomy looking place. There are piles of haphazard leaning stones littering the leaf strewn ground. Some piles form pillars or parts of a wall that once stood so strong and proud. The sun is shining brightly through the trees, but a dark shroud seems to encompas
s the entire clearing where the ruins are situated.
There is some rustling in the trees that causes Jessa and I to turn and look in that direction.
“Are you going to tell me why you left Jaxx back there to hike back to the cabin on his own?” Jessa enquires while she moves her head to and fro. Trying to see what is making all the noise that is coming from the thickest patch of trees surrounding the area where we are standing.
I turn and start to try and see what has Jessa looking back and forth toward the forest like she is watching a tennis match.
“Because he was too distracting. I can’t have that kind of distraction if I am going to do what I have come here to do. You know this.” I tell her calmly but in truth I am freaked. Not only by what I have set into motion. What I have come here to do. But by all of that blasted shaking of the limbs and trees.
“Come out, come out whatever you are!” Jessa calls in a sweet voice. Then she mutters under breath. “So I can suck the marrow from your bones.” I stifle a laugh at how morbid she has become in this new life.
Then the trees seem to part like curtains where the noise was coming from before. What steps through those parted trees has me and Jess both taking two steps back. They are so alien looking that it takes a moment to even process their appearance. The first being that steps through the trees is tall and almost skeletal in appearance. The skin that covers his or her long limbs looks like it’s made from ashen tree bark. Branches and leaves seem to grow from the top of her head where its hair should be. When it has cleared the trees, it steps to the side to let a second being pass through the forestry. This one is build and looks similar to the first, except that it is taller and its skin is made of brown bark instead of ashen.
They start to move toward us, and I have to make myself stand still. It seems that they read the freaked out looks on our faces because they smile and reveal shark like long pointed teeth full of rot. I shudder inwardly at the thought of those chainsaw-like mouths coming anywhere near me.
“What in all that is holy are they?” Jessa whispers as she sidesteps toward me as the strange beings start to move toward us.
The beings move with a long slow gate. Almost as if they are walking and moving through water. Then their feet touch the ground the already dyeing grass turns black and curls in on itself.
I just shake my head because I have no idea. They look like what the ever present incoming knowledge inside my head is telling me are forest sprites. But they cannot be. Forest Sprites are benevolent creatures of the Light. They care and cater to the forest all their lives. They do not look like these half-rotted tree creatures. The very smell on the air that must be coming from them lets you know that they are rotting on the inside and out it seems.
“What are you?” I call out as they continue to move closer to us. Jessa has been steadily moving closer to me until we are now standing side by side.
The ashen being moving in front clicks its long talon like nails together and seems to give a cackle that sounds remarkably like dried leaves cracking in half. The second being strikes forward and snaps her teeth together at us. They are not but a few feet away from us now and I am able to see their facial features more clearly. They do indeed resemble the beings that I pictured inside my head when I was wondering what on earth these beings could be. But their eyes… They are hallowed black pools not the vibrant leafy green of the forest sprite species.
“You come into our domain and dare to question us, child?” The first breathes out in a rusty crackling voice.
“I have come into my domain and you will answer my question, creature.” I fill my voice with authority and demand.
They are suddenly upon us. No more moving as if they are walking through thickening sand. The smell of rotting foliage is so thick you could choke on it. I fire up my palms and pull my light until it encompasses my entire being. I have only done this once before. When I was wrapped in the barbed vines. But I can feel the cool heat of my jade colored light spreading over me like a living flame.
Suddenly it is as if they are put on rewind and they are shuffling backward well out of reach of my light. They are both hissing and cowering.
“What in all that is darkness are you?!?!” The ashen being demands of me in a hissing voice.
My gift has fully flared to life now. Even Jessa, with her palms flaming has backed away from me.
“I am the daughter of the Goddess of The Three. I am of her blood and light and I demand you to kneel.” My voice is harsh and echoing throughout the clearing. I send out a very strong mental command for them to kneel. And kneel they do…The crackling sounds of their limbs splintering as they kneel on the ground before me against their will gives me a perverse sense of giddiness. I walk slowly toward the kneeling beings trembling at the thought of my light touching them.
“Celios.” They both hiss simultaneously. Their long frail looking limbs up and shielding their dark pools from my gift.
“Yes.” I tell them simply as I walk even closer to their cowering forms. “The most powerful ever born.” My voice still fills the small clearing with echoes of power.
‘KILL THEM!’ A sinister sounding voice whisper shouts inside my head. I recognize that voice. It’s my mother. But she has never actually urged me to kill someone before.
I don’t answer I just shake my head. This place was tainted by the people that chose to turn away from her Light. These beings were tainted by those who used this place for evil. They are in their own way as innocent as the trees and rocks surrounding us on all sides. The fact that she is urging me to kill them is confusing me on levels I don’t even want to dwell upon. I just shake my head to clear it and decide what to do.
“Jess you might want to dunk behind something. I am about to bless this place. I am going to make it sacred once more. We will need it that way for what we have planned.” I hear Jess running for the cover of the ruins littering the ground behind me.
I pull my gift inward as hard as I can. I close my eyes and focus all my considerable energy into my palms then I start feeding it, building it. Soon I am looking down at a growing ball of sparkling green energy. There are sparks of lightening running through it as it grows. Within seconds it is the size of a beach ball and I feel like a major part of me has been depleted. I don’t know if this is a good thing or not, but it is too late to stop what I have set into motion. The light shining off the growing orb of energy entrapped within my palms is cutting through the gloom that is shrouding the area around where I stand.
Beings still kneeling at my feet are bowing and scraping their talon like nails into the dead and dry soil at their knees. I can barely hear them pleading for their lives through the buzzing noise that has taken up residence inside my ears.
I feel as if I let this process suck anymore energy from me that I will totally drain myself. I fling my palms outward, not throwing the larger than a beach ball sized orb at any certain object. It’s more like my gift explodes outward riding on an invisible wind carrying a part of me, a part of my light outward. Everywhere the sparks of my light land the gloom and evil dissipate and disappear altogether. The world around me starts to take on new life. As do the beings that are currently still laying at my feet.
They are now the beautifully forest colored females that I had pictured inside my head when thinking of what a forest sprite should look like. Their skin is a beautiful bark color, their eye literally sparkle, and they are no longer gaunt and evil looking. They are rolling around in the newly sprung to life foliage beneath their bodies. As if they haven’t felt anything more decadent in their entire lifetime. Just looking at them puts a smile on my face. But then I force myself to look around at the clearing. Everything around me is now different. Completely and totally different from when I first arrived at this once desolate place.
Chapter 28.
I feel almost completely wiped out, but I can’t find it in myself to regret it as I still hear the laughing of the forest sprites… Not to mention when I look around an
d see a natural paradise surrounding me where a once evil shrouded ruin stood. This oasis is truly flourishing once more. As it should be. It is the perfect place to call and spellbind a Demon Lord. I can feel the positive energy strumming within the earth under my feet.
I start to walk over to where Jessa is still huddled behind a wall of the ruin, when I feel energy start to spark and shoot up through the ground and start flowing directly into me. The energy lights me up as if I am a live wire.
“Yes mother, reward her!” The forest sprites start to chant and sing in a language that I don’t understand. There is still a childlike wonderment to their voices. But there is nothing childlike about the amount of energy flowing into me. I am stuck. I can’t move a muscle. This time it doesn’t hurt. It’s a feeling of warmth as if I am being rewarded, thanked for what I have done here.
Jess peaks over the wall while pulling pieces of honey suckle from her hair. She stares at me as if she can’t believe her eyes. I notice that she does that a lot lately. Stair at me as if she can’t believe I can do certain things when I do them. Or when something happens her eyes will bug out. I would laugh at her expression that she is wearing right now. But every muscle in my body is frozen on the spot while the warmth of this strange energy flows up through the ground and into my body.
“Ella the script markings on your arms are shimmering then disappearing. What is happening to you?” Jessa whispers out. Anxiety thickly lacing her voice.
I wish I knew. The forest sprites are up and now dancing around my still prone body. Chanting in their seemingly ancient language. It sounds more like a song than a spell. I know they are praising nature herself. Whatever they are asking for or begging for…It’s working. Because this never-ending flow of energy seems to be changing things about me that I thought were permanent. It worries me that the sign of the blood scribe has suddenly disappeared. So, I think inwardly and ask myself, as crazy as that seems, what could possibly be happening to me. When the answer comes, I am relieved that I can still process the information that flowed into me from the ancient tome. I am also scared shitless at the answer that it gives me.