“Hold it right there!” shouted James from the end of the hall. He was running alongside Raelinn, with Dai, Akoni, Eddie and Kierra behind them. “You’re under arrest!”
Orfeo looked around with amusement.
At the other end of the hall, Yas, Sam, Yas’s parents and other Sentinels also ran forwards.
“Oh, bravo,” applauded Penn. “I hadn’t expected that!”
James continued to sprint through the chambers. It was much farther than he had anticipated, but fortunately Orfeo waited for him to arrive.
James stopped and doubled over to catch his breath. Raelinn came to a stop effortlessly beside him.
“Urrgh,” James commented, breathing heavily. He looked sideways at Raelinn. “I mean, how do you do that? You’re not even out of breath? You must train regularly, right?”
Raelinn just smiled at him and then gestured to Orfeo, who was watching and trying to decide what to make of the situation.
James though, ignored the gesture. “Do you have a membership for a special ‘undead only’ gym or something?” he asked breathlessly. “Train ‘three times a week to feel human again’ deal?”
Raelinn smiled awkwardly.
“What are you wittering about?” interrupted Orfeo.
James straightened up, his hand still on his side, helping him catch his breath.
“What are you wittering about… Detective?” he shot back, with as much certainty as he could, despite his heavy breathing. “I’m here to take you into custody!”
“Into custody! Hah! You couldn’t arrest a fly! I can just turn you into a creature,” Orfeo commented. “I did once before!” He turned his back a little.
“But then you’ll miss all the fun,” replied James.
“What fun?” Orfeo turned back to face him.
“The storylines,” James explained. “All around us!” He made a play of ducking to the side. “Oops, there’s one!”
“What are you talking about?” commanded Orfeo, his eyes searching the hall.
“The twisting storylines you’ve heard all about,” James replied. “From Mr. Penn! If they catch you, who knows what you’ll end up doing. You could be all ‘Breaking Dawn’ or something,” he quoted the words with his fingers, “and face off with the werewolves. Like a bad trip at a hypnotist show.”
“There are no werewolves here!” retorted Orfeo. “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“He’s speaking the truth, Orfeo,” said Raelinn calmly. “If, a little dramatic.” She glanced at James, sighing. “He has shown me evidence of the twisting tales.”
“Twisting tales!” Orfeo shot back. “You’ve allowed him to fill your head with nonsense.”
He paused, taking in the number of Word Guardians gathering around him. “Get over here and summon my army!”
“Our army,” Raelinn corrected, calmly.
“What?” he replied, shocked.
“We work together, or not at all,” she added.
“Never mind,” said Orfeo. “I’ll deal with you later!” He swept his hand through the air in front of him. It created a wave, visible in the air like heat rising. It moved down the hall, spreading through the chambers and touching each mirror. In response, the surface of each rippled. Then each one started to bulge, characters emerging.
“Get ready!” called Kierra. The Word Guardians spread themselves throughout the chambers and started to move towards the mirrors, to confront whatever was emerging. Orfeo’s soldiers started to step through to meet them.
“Cut them down as they emerge!” shouted Dai, conjuring a word shield and sword and rushing forwards to the soldier that had just pulled its head free. He sliced through the soldier before it had fully emerged into the hall.
“Well, that was predictable,” said Penn, sarcastically. He created a shield of his own and watched with interest.
The slain soldier dropped to the floor, melting into a pool of reflective water, the surface very much like that of the mirror. For a moment it just reflected the ceiling high above, but then it bulged and started to grow into another soldier.
“What the hell?” remarked Dai, realising what was happening. He sliced at the growing soldier, who had seemingly learned from the first encounter and allowed the sword to just pass through. While it stayed in liquid form, Dai was unable to inflict any damage. Also, a new soldier was starting to emerge from the mirror.
Dai moved back from both and waited until each had fully formed, then cut them down again, only to find that the same pattern repeated.
“Yes, as I expected,” said Penn, mostly to himself from his position near the windows. “The story has adapted. Mutated. It’s like a virus, seeking survival. This should be interesting.”
Orfeo shielded the arched doorways of the chamber he was in. James and Raelinn were inside the chamber and there were five mirrors, three on the back wall and two on either side, from which a procession of soldiers was emerging.
“What do you plan to do now?” Orfeo challenged. “You wanted to bathe me in light, apparently?” He nodded over to where Penn was standing.
“He told you,” said James, looking back at Orfeo, disappointed that their plan had been betrayed. He glanced at Raelinn, making a show of the fact that he wasn’t sure what to do next.
Penn smiled. “What did you expect… Detective?” he asked, sarcastically. “It wouldn’t have worked anyway,” he continued. “It’s too predictable.”
“You hear that?” gloated Orfeo. “You won’t win.”
A guard of soldiers now formed a circle around them. Other sentinels were casting magic against the outside of the shield to try and break their way in.
“Oh, I don’t think that’s what he said,” replied Raelinn. “He just said it wouldn’t work.”
“So, you’re with them now, are you?” Orfeo asked, moving on.
Raelinn started walking towards Orfeo.
“No but I wish to re-evaluate our relationship,” she said.
“What does that mean?” Orfeo replied. He paused for a moment, then an evil smile crept across his face. He looked at James.
“Let’s see,” he continued.
With his free hand he shot a string of words at James. It formed a rope that pierced his arm and then wrapped around his body.
James called out in pain and tried to wriggle free unsuccessfully.
Orfeo lifted the rope, and like a kite, James hovered in the air, the rope pulling at the wound on his arm. James struggled in pain.
Raelinn continued as if nothing had happened. She stopped in front of Orfeo, running a long talon across his chest.
“Leave this one to me,” she said. “You said yourself. He couldn’t hurt a fly.”
Orfeo smiled down at her, as if buying into the storyline. She smiled back up at him, perhaps a little seductively.
“It’s just me and you,” she continued. “And pets,” she lifted her head to gesture towards James behind her. “Like old times.” She moved her hand back across his chest gently.
Orfeo’s gaze changed quickly. Raelinn noticed it, but not before he grabbed her wrist. He yanked it away, pulling her off balance slightly. She looked up at him in shock and then smiled. It seemed she had found a fear. A vulnerability perhaps. It had jolted him from the storyline that she had helped take hold.
“What are you doing?” Orfeo demanded. “You didn’t think I’d fall for that, would you?”
“Fall for what?” Raelinn asked, twisting her wrist out of Orfeo’s grip and turning slightly away.
“You seek to betray me,” he said cruelly. “You want him, now?” he gestured to James, wrinkling his mouth in distaste. “I can smell him on you!”
She turned and stepped back to him. She gently interlaced her fingers with the hand that had gripped her wrist and she looked into his eyes in as conspiratorially a way as she could muster.
“He’s just a plaything,” she said. “He means nothing to me. I brought him here from the Void, remember?”
&n
bsp; Orfeo’s eyes changed once again. She noticed and smiled even more. They seemed to glaze over, buying into the storyline. He dropped the word rope and James crashed to the floor.
James unravelled himself as quickly as he could, then stood up. The soldiers started to close on him, but then stopped as they noticed some new magic forming around him. He felt something form around his neck. It was a collar, which sprouted a leash that extended towards Raelinn.
“What the?” he said, grappling at it with his good arm. The leash ran back to Raelinn’s free hand. She flicked it, pulling him towards her a little and forcing him onto his knees.
“Stay down, boy!” she laughed, then turned her attention back to Orfeo.
James pulled at the collar with both hands to no avail, but then realised that the magic that had formed it was also healing his injury. He continued to try to loosen its hold but was less panicked. At best this was Raelinn’s way of keeping him out of harm’s way. At worst, she was falling victim to the same storyline she was trying to convince Orfeo of.
In the different chambers up and down the hall, the Word Guardians were fighting the soldiers. Creatures that had fought alongside them at the Battle for the Peacekeepers appeared in the chambers at either end of the hall. White stone lions, bears, wolves, panthers, bird headed men, moth winged creatures and many more joined the battle. The hall became a melee of swords, claws and teeth.
Yas’s parents had joined forces with Janine and Peter. They were trying to conjure shields that created barriers over the mirrors, to prevent more soldiers coming through. It slowed them down, but the shields strained as soldiers pushed their way through, eventually splitting them apart. Yas’s mom created a fresh word net, throwing that over an emerged soldier to pull him to the ground. That too only held for a short time until the soldier was able to conjure a knife and cut his way free.
Yas and Sam were in the next chamber from her parents, also battling the soldiers as they emerged from the mirrors. Very quickly, they too realised that as soon as one soldier was cut down, it melted into the floor only to reform.
In the midst of the fighting, Yas thought she heard someone call her name.
“Sam?” she asked, looking to him briefly.
“What?” he answered, taking his eyes off the soldier he had just sliced through.
“Did you say something?” she continued, puzzled.
“No,” he replied. He gestured to the bulging pool that lay near his feet. “This is getting us nowhere,” he said, exasperated.
“Yeah,” agreed Yas. “It’s like that tale of the enchanted brooms, although not quite.” She wracked her brains for a moment, trying to remember the story. Then she remembered what they had talked about at the Boston Library.
“Be unpredictable, remember?” suggested Yas to Sam.
“Yeah,” said Sam, thrusting his sword at another soldier, emerging from the mirror. “And do what, exactly?”
Yas heard another whisper. Someone was calling her name.
“Did you hear that?” she asked again.
“No?” replied Sam, slicing across the soldier stepping down from the mirror and stomping down on the puddle that was bulging again.
“And stay down,” he said. It had little effect but made him feel better.
Yas looked around. She couldn’t see any obvious source of the whispers. She wondered if she was making it up. Perhaps it was being created by a combination of other sounds in the hall.
She looked back at the mirror nearest to her, readying herself to cut down another soldier. Then, out of her peripheral vision, she caught sight of a Fate, hovering for a split second in the surface of the next mirror. It called her name again.
“Sam!” she called. “It’s the Fates!”
“Where?” he asked, looking around.
“There,” Yas pointed, to the mirror at which Akoni and Eddie were fending off soldiers.
“Akoni!” she called. “You two switch with us!”
“What?” replied Eddie, seeing Yas gesturing behind Akoni’s shoulder. He nudged Akoni on the arm and pointed at Yas.
“Switch with us,” she repeated. “I need to get to that mirror.”
“Okay,” they agreed.
“What are you doing?” asked Sam, looking up again and trying to keep up with the changing events.
“Cover me,” she said. She traded places with Akoni, and Eddie moved across to take Sam’s place.
“Okay,” he said, following her, slicing at another soldier who had just reformed from the floor.
“I need to find out what’s behind this,” explained Yas, as she moved closer to the mirror.
“What are you going to do?” he asked, worried that the surface would bulge again.
“I’m going to scry,” replied Yas, touching the mirror.
“It’s not that bad,” he said, mishearing her, possibly on purpose.
Yas sighed. “Just try to keep back whatever might be coming through?”
Sam nodded.
Yas reached out and touched the mirror.
As soon as she did, a rush of images flew through her mind and she struggled to keep up. She saw water on the floor of the hall and an intense orange light bathing everything. She also saw other custodians standing around in the water, including Y’an who was looking at her and smiling. She had no idea what it meant. An intense wave of emotion caught her also. Sadness, so extreme she found herself tearing up. She mused for a second at what Sam had said about crying. She figured the emotion was coming from the trapped Fates. She could feel it coming through the mirror.
“Time to go,” Sam interrupted, pulling her away from the mirror as another soldier started to emerge.
Yas gasped for air, shocked at being pulled away from the emotion suddenly. She felt disorientated and for a split second could also see wisps of twisting words moving around in the hall, along with the sense of the battle that was occurring.
Sam held his sword ready, waiting for the soldier to appear. The soldier seemed to struggle. The mirror started to show a face, but then it was pulled back. The Fates appeared instead and called again to Yas.
“I have to try again,” she said to Sam.
“What? No!” he exclaimed. “There’s another one coming through. It’s not a good idea.”
“I’m winging this,” she explained. “I have no idea what I’m doing but I feel it has something to do with how I can help free the Custodians.”
“Oh!” replied Sam, his eyes lighting up. He nodded. “Okay. What do you need me to do?”
“Cover me again,” she said, moving back to the mirror. The soldier was clearly struggling to pull itself free. There was a conflict occurring inside the mirror.
Yas reached forwards and touched the bulging mirror again. She closed her eyes, preparing herself for the onslaught of emotion. It still hit her like a wave, though. She bent over forwards and cried out with the shock.
“Yas?” Sam called behind her, defending her from another soldier that was making its way to them.
“I’m okay,” Yas struggled to say. She had no idea if she was or not, but she knew she just had to stay in touch with the mirror. It was trying to tell her something.
She focussed back in. The mirror showed her flashes of images from her lifetime. Her Mom, Dad, happy times, arguments and sad times. Being outside for a memorial for Akoni and not understanding where he was. Grieving for grandpa without having said goodbye. Then seeing him again just before the Battle for the Peacekeepers. Emotion welled up inside her so much that tears streamed down her face and she started to sob.
“Yas?” Sam called again. “You okay.”
She couldn’t speak. She knew that, but just held her free hand up to him to say to hold back. She focussed back in on the raw emotion, the underlying feeling.
“Err, whatever you’re doing, you’ve got their attention,” she heard him say behind her. That seemed so much farther away the more time she spent here. She acknowledged what he had said. That was good. She t
ried to go deeper still, into where she felt the emotion coming from.
“We need to do this quickly,” she heard him add. “Akoni! Eddie! Dad!” he called.
Behind her, soldiers were coming towards them, through the archways on each side of the chamber. Whatever Yas was doing was attracting more of them and Sam was concerned about being overwhelmed.
Back inside the shielded chamber, Raelinn continued to speak with Orfeo, to try to keep him focussed on the storyline she wanted him to hear.
“It’s working,” she heard James say behind her, as he got slowly back to his feet.
She knew he could see the storylines, so there must be something, invisible to her, spiralling its way through Orfeo and allowing her to keep up the tale. It was her time to show him what an asset she had been and could be. Orfeo knew that Index was powerful, and she wanted in too. She and Orfeo could rule together, side by side.
“Be careful,” came James’s voice gently behind her. “It’s close.”
She shook her head and looked back up at Orfeo, fighting to stay in the present moment.
“We need Index here,” she said gently, running her finger across his chin. “He can finish off these guardians in an instant.”
Orfeo looked down at her and smiled. It shook Raelinn for a moment. It was not a nice smile even if he intended it to be. It seemed that he was naturally blessed to be an antagonist. Who could love that face? She felt the betrayal that he did. He had always been alone. He had learned at a young age to always only count on himself and never trust others.
“You need to trust me,” she forced herself to say, as gently as she could. “We can do this together.”
“Together,” Orfeo echoed gently. He looked down at her and nodded. For a moment she felt as though she had cracked his hard façade. She thought she saw relief on his face.
With his free hand, he conjured a point of light about three feet above the ground. It expanded slightly, but not enough to be a doorway. Then through it came a rush of air. A swirling vortex of light appeared and landed on the floor, settling and changing into Index. It was like viewing a man through a small cyclone. Wind and light rushed about him, but inside was a tall Asian man, with punk spiky black hair, a long trench coat, leather pants and combat boots. He shone, but his light was tainted somehow.
The Word Guardians: and the Twisting Tales Page 29