by Lucian Bane
“No,” Poe gasped. “No!” He raced along the tree line, looking for some way to stop it. “Help me!” he yelled to Sabre and Valentine.
“Tell us what to do!” Sabre yelled back.
Poe stopped running when the growling of the demolition grew so great, he knew it was useless. The entire forest was crumbling before his eyes, turning into ash.
“What happened?” Valentine asked, stopping next to him. “They’re ashes. And yet there’s no fire,” he said, perplexed.
“The Bog Guards,” Sabre said. “They’d know.”
They ran through the Bog, now flattened to nothing. The Bog pool was on a hill and Poe raced up as fast as he could, a sick feeling in his stomach. At finally making it to the top, he peered down in confused shock.
“Where is it?” Sabre asked, breathless next to him.
Poe was speechless as he gazed into the empty crater. Everything was gone. Nothing was there. Almost like it never had been.
“You like it?”
Poe spun around.
Zinfandel. “You did this?” Poe asked, fury clawing through his fictional blood and power, begging to punish him.
“Meow,” he said, winking at him.
Sabre stood next to Poe. “Who are you? What happened here?”
“I’m no friend of the Paranormal Guardian, if that’s what you’re wondering,” he said, eyeing Sabre.
A scream broke out and four Were-Vamps dragged Rukie forward. “Let me go you four legged balless bitches! Let me fight you! You cowards! Poe was so right to turn you into cats, you’re all pussys!”
“Damn,” Valentine whispered.
Poe’s fury forced him to breath shallow. He licked his lips, tasting it on his skin. Poe regarded the devastation in the forest, not wanting a fresh dose of anger. “Did you do this?” he asked, needing to be certain before he acted.
“The one and only.” Zinfandel spread his arms out at his sides.
One more question. “Where is the energy pool?”
“A lot of that is in our bellies,” he said with a laugh, and the entire pack laughed with him. “And the rest… went to the Guardian in exchange for what I so kindly asked you for.”
So he got his power. “And now what do you want, Zinfandel,” Poe grit.
“Your head. While our little traitor watches.” He looked at Sabre and Valentine. “Looks like we’ll be getting three for the price of one today. Our favor is already growing.”
With Valentine in normal clothes again, the element of surprise was on their side. Poe eyed Rukie, who constantly tried to bite at her captors.
“But before we have fun with you and your friends,” Zinfandel muttered. “You will get to watch what happens to those who betray me.”
Rukie thrashed and screamed as they dragged her to the front. Valentine stepped forward and three seconds later, his clothes turned to a tight suit of thick shiny blood, his hair laying in ruby ropes around his shoulders.
That got their attention.
“Fellas,” Sabre called out, coming to stand next to Valentine. “Say hello to my good friend. The Blood Guardian.” He patted Valentine then muttered, “Have fun.”
Poe saw the quarks and hadrons look flash across many faces and enjoyed the feeling of what was coming. Whatever it was.
****
Valentine put on his blood vision, eyeing every creature’s stream beneath their skins. When he looked upon the girl, he saw she wasn’t quite the same as the rest.
At sensing their intention to attack, he muttered, “Be still.” He wanted to get a better look at them. He’d not seen any Were-Vamps up close before. Valentine took note that their blood was indeed obedient to him, which meant it was real blood. All characters derived from human Scribblers had it. The clots he’d formed in their thoracic and lumbar vertebra prevented leg, vocal-cord, and arm movement.
He began his investigation with the ones holding the girl. Feeling the power churning in the beings around him, he spoke to the codes in that same blood and ensured they stay put.
Coming to stand before the girl, he angled his head, peering beneath the skin on her neck then following it up her face. She didn’t just have blood, there was something else. Blood and…
“Fire,” she said, then grinned at his surprise.
A mind reader. No doubt they all probably were. But it did them no good. They’d just read his mind and know just how screwed they all were. “Is that why your blood is so hot?” he asked.
She smiled. “No, it’s because I am.”
Valentine contemplated her answer finding it made no sense to his scientific inquiry. Maybe she was another female with parts missing. He leaned in to her slowly.
“Aren’t you worried I bite you?”
He paused, not having considered that.
“I am a Vampire and you are a walking supply of food for a year.”
He looked into her eyes and flames leapt in the intense blue irises. “Don’t bite me,” he said.
He leaned in and sniffed her, closing his eyes.
“You’re smelling me?” she asked, her pheromones spiking with her accelerated blood flow and temperature.
“I’m reading,” he explained, moving his nose to her neck where things seemed to be most condensed.
“This is getting a little awkward Blood Boy,” she whispered. “Why don’t you just ask me for a date and I’ll let you read me all you like?”
Valentine pulled up. “I don’t need a date to do that,” he said, studying that fire in her eyes again. “Your blood is getting hotter.” And now he wanted to know how it acted under those kinds of temperatures.
“You should see me when it’s boiling,” she whispered, leaning in quickly.
Before Valentine could pull away, her tongue slid over his cheek. He pulled slowly back, finding the gesture obscenely… interesting.
“Wow,” she whispered. “You taste amazing. What is that stuff in your blood?”
He leaned in once more to her ear, not wanting to say it for the whole world to hear. “Eternity.” At having his lips close to her again, his mind said he really needed to see what else there was to discover about her. She was certainly a work of art. In need of studying.
“Hey Valentine,” Sabre called. “How about you offer to help her in exchange for being your friend. You can use more than one of those.”
“Valentine?” she said, laughter in her voice. “Isn’t that the perfect name for you. Go ahead. Do what he said.”
Valentine looked at her for a few moments. “Would you?”
“Would I what?”
“You’re being difficult.”
“Yes.”
“You have no idea who you’re being difficult with.”
“Show me.”
The breathless challenge affected him more than he’d expected. He forced all her blood to pulse in certain places and she gasped. Valentine was about to give her a quaint little nod of now you know when heat filled his midsection, making him take a step back.
She laughed and quirked her brow. “Seems you may have a form of fire in that body of yours, Blood Boy.”
“Is that a yes?” he asked, quickly removing that heat she’d doused him with.
“Can I think about it?”
“No.”
“Fine. Yes.”
“Valentine?” The caution in Poe’s voice made him pause. Interesting. The Were-Vamps were breaking through the clots he’d placed.
He looked at the girl. “You may want to close your eyes while I finish up here.”
“No thank you,” she said in a cold tone. “I’d rather watch.”
“Suit yourself,” Valentine muttered. He considered what exactly he wanted to do. He wanted to continue to study them but they were short on time. He’d settle for taking a sample.
Opening his arms wide, he clapped his hands and forced their blood to exit their bodies via the cleaner orifices—eyes, ears, and mouth. Every creature fell to the ground and the girl stepped away from her now dea
d captors while Valentine opened his pores and allowed enough to enter his body. He gave an internal hum that guided it to the soles of his feet where he stored samples.
“Uh… V?” Sabre called.
Valentine regarded him at hearing the worry and Sabre nodded at the slain. Valentine looked. Their blood flowed in reverse along the ground, returning to its owner. He angled his head, puzzled, and took the girl’s hand, not wanting his prized catch touched, tainted, or spoiled in anyway.
“It is farfetched,” Poe said, “but not impossible, that their Scribbler has engaged them in some way at this moment.”
“One way to find out,” Sabre said, pointing a finger at Zinfandel. A bolt of thin light arched and encased the body. The Were-Pire trembled and shook on the ground, its blood with it.
Valentine watched the light return to Sabre’s finger, a slow meandering flicker. He’d used such little power. Ever the conservative. He was glad in this case, no sense in wasting more than required on this brood of fictional pathogens in dire need of the recycling bin.
“Divinities,” Poe muttered as again, the blood began to return to Zinfandel. Valentine eyed the remaining herd that was nearly ready to stand again.
Valentine called his staff and waited as it formed in his palm. The second it reached its full power and length, he slammed the point on the ground, sending the blood far beneath it. “We should go,” Valentine suggested. “Something in their power is enabling them.”
“Enabling them how?” Poe wondered, confounded.
“Not sure exactly,” Valentine mused, wishing he could linger for a longer study. He felt the blood he’d just trapped in his heel, trying to escape. “It has to be the Scribbler’s power. It’s the only one that has any rights over mine if it’s in accordance with Seventh Realm codes.
“He wanted more muse power,” Rukie said, pulling her hand out of Valentine’s. “I think that’s how he’s doing this. Through his Scribbler.”
“It’s the only thing that makes sense,” Valentine said, feeling the girl’s eyes on him, calling him to observe her. His villainous traits refused the almost demanding invitation, wanting to establish the hierarchy between subject and master. But the strong challenge of her stare made him want to play differently, and so he gave in. The lock of their gazes caused his blood to vibrate oddly. He sensed the heat building and cut the contact before she brought him into another predicament not fit for public, without incurring awkward attention and conversation with Sabre over it. Sabre liked to think that because he was a Villain, he didn’t dabble in romantic related activities. He’d be right, but for all the wrong reasons. Valentine was designed by his Scribbler to exploit, and that’s exactly what he did with that topic. Particularly the powers inherent in one activity between a man and woman. He hadn’t found a more potent source of energy anywhere outside the Seventh Realm, and that fact alone required his due and undivided attention.
And he was sure the Fire-Vampire would make the perfect subject to study at a semi-close distance for as long as he could. He wasn’t certain what it would demand of him. But he’d be ready to terminate the experiment at a moment’s notice.
For now, he needed to put her someplace for safekeeping so they could bring the news to the Queen about this treachery at the Bog.
“Like what you’re looking at?” the girl asked.
Valentine realized he was staring at her again. “I do,” he said honestly, knowing it wasn’t in the way she imagined, but not caring that she thought otherwise. For now. She liked to play. So did he. It was a good fit for his intentions.
The ground began to tremble beneath their feet and Valentine sensed it was the blood he’d just sent beneath it. “That’s not good,” he muttered. Were they growing even stronger? The blood in his foot begged to answer that question for him and so he quickly examined it. “It’s… mutating,” he whispered.
“What is,” Sabre said.
“The blood. Its properties are changing.”
“Into what?” Poe demanded.
“Into… something not controllable by me.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
“Divinities,” Poe growled, pacing the Bog floor. “As much as I’d like to end this for good, we need to speak to the Queen.”
“You’re right,” Sabre said. “Call it in.” Poe looked at him, confused. “On the phone,” he clarified.
Poe felt like an idiot as he pulled the communication device from his pocket and handed it to Sabre.
“You need a crash course in modern technology, my friend,” Sabre mumbled, taking it from him and dialing. Poe didn’t argue as Sabre paced a couple of feet away and reported their findings, and those involved. Then he hung up. “She wants us to return immediately. New developments. Not good ones.”
“What did she say about the energy pool and the entire bog being destroyed?” Poe wondered. He also wondered what happened to the Classicals guarding the Bog. They were nowhere to be found. Were they being held somewhere? Had they been destroyed too? Was that even possible?
“She… sighed,” Sabre said sternly. “But… it was a really intense one,” he added, as though Poe needed the coddling.
Judging by the angst in his being, perhaps he did. He’d failed his new friends. He eyed Rukie then Valentine, not liking what he was seeing in the Blood Guardian’s eyes when he looked at her. He’d deal with that later.
They headed out of the Bog and Poe wasn’t sure when he noticed it. He turned and found Valentine, Sabre, and Rukie, frozen still, several feet behind him.
Power slammed his midsection and threw him several feet to the ground. The snarling face of Zinfandel appeared over him, evil grin as his fingers wrapped Poe’s neck and the weight of his body felt like a mountain, crushing him. Poe’s power collided with the pack, all condensed into Zinfandel’s and stronger than ever.
Terror gripped him when he felt it. Zinfandel had mused on his Scribbler. He saw his dark claws stabbed into his Scribbler’s mind, saw her near convulsions as she fought with her pen on the paper, resisting. Divinities, he was ordering her to kill them!
Poe raced along the line connecting Zinfandel to his Scribbler and found it densely blocked.
No!
The pain in Poe’s body was real, just like in the hospital during Kane’s rescue. That meant the Were-Vamp had gotten through the highly secured connection Poe had with his Scribbler and was killing both of them.
Divinities, Poe needed to think but it was difficult while dying. He reached out around him, for something, anything. His energy reached Sabre finally but he was quickly fading. He reached for Valentine, Rukie, his power crawling along blindly.
Images flashed through Poe’s mind. His Scribbler when she was just a little girl. Different events, different ages. Birthdays, vacations. His heart ached at the memories of her childhood, then her dark teenage life.
Panic gripped him. He was seeing her life pass before her eyes, not his. This was her mind he was in. She was dying. And he would die with her. As would Sabre and Valentine and every other creation.
A scream echoed above him and Poe vaguely saw arms wrapped around the neck of Zinfandel. It all moved in muffled slow motion, words and colors dragging like a water color story in motion.
“Mr. Poe!” a woman with golden hair cried, terror in her blue gaze. “Don’t die! Don’t die!”
He knew her. The girl. Bill. Todd. Begging him to live while clobbering the monster on top of Poe with small fists. Brave fists, Poe thought. She’d come into her new traits.
“Fight!” she screamed at him, the sound a muffled echo.
Fight. His mind fumbled with the meaning of the word. It was something important but he didn’t know why.
“Muskrat!” Another echo filled his right ear, closer. “You’re sitting on my branches!”
I’m sorry, Poe wanted to say to them. Sorry he’d failed them.
“Nonsense,” the tree said loudly in his ears now just as a giant hammer slammed into Zinfandel’s head, throwing hi
m off of Poe.
Poe felt himself standing somehow and looked at his hands. The Ancient Ones… they’d somehow entered him. He gripped a massive club in his right hand, and a wooden shield in his left. “Old school, my dear boy,” the club said.
“Watch out!” the shield yelled.
Poe spun with the club and hit the midsection of Zinfandel, the power sending him sailing through the air. Poe gasped, looking down at the club.
“Me bark is worse than me bite,” the club boomed with a laugh. “Let me at ‘em, I want to hammer him into the ground.”
Poe wasn’t sure if he was alive or dead, he was only sure that he would oblige the hammer and shield. On the third and precise blow, the hammer sank deep into Zinfandel’s skull, crushing it.
“Use me,” a voice cried below. Poe looked down and pulled the wooden short sword from a holster on his waist. He walked over to the Were-Pire and lifted the sword. Poe felt the power of the Ancient Ones surge as he swung—centuries of fictional life roaring through his blood. The dull looking wood sword sliced clean through the neck and even into the ground. Poe growled and grunted, yanking it back up, his lungs burning and his muscles thriving with life.
“Zinfandel’s Scribbler, dear boy,” the blade urged. “Quickly!”
Poe dropped to his knees next to the body and placed his hand on it. He charged through the mess of codes and found the connection to the foul creature’s Scribbler. Shock caused his hand to tremble at finding strange symbols along the walls of the man’s mind. At closer studying, he saw it. The Tabard. The man belonged to the group of humans on Earth that worked their treachery on Octava. A deep sadness filled Poe followed shortly with a blast of anger.
Poe gathered all his power inside himself into one explosive breath… and aimed it… at the Scribbler.