by Kimbra Swain
“Let me grab a coat,” Samara said. “I’ll get Thomas. Go.”
I opened the front door, and a dense unnatural fog settled in as far as the eye could see.
“Abigail!” I yelled into the bleak white smoke. I reached out to the planes and felt for the spirit world. I pulled the veil across me and in the distance, a light flickered faintly. I shifted back to reality and took off running across the farmland toward the sea.
As I approached, I could see a white figure in the water. She stood still, and the waves lightly brushed beside her.
“Abigail!” I screamed again.
In the depth of the sea, I sensed an ancient powerful darkness move toward her. Panic rushed over me, and I hit the beach full speed, only to be slowed by the water. When I reached her, she held a knife to her throat, and she trembled. She mumbled incoherently, and her eyes focused on nothing. I jerked away the knife and tossed it into the sea.
“What are you doing? Speak to me!” I screamed at her, but her daze persisted in the same way as my inability to wake her from the nightmares. Perhaps the night of the terrors finally pushed her over the edge.
“I’m all alone,” she said quietly.
“No, I’m right here. We must get out of the water. Something stirs in the deep,” I explained. I reached for her, but she stepped away from me. “Not now, Abby. Don’t do this now.”
“I’m alone. The darkness owns me now. Just let me go,” she said in desperation.
“You are not alone. Look at me. I didn’t leave,” I stepped forward to her, and grabbed her by the waist before she could step away again.
“Lincoln,” she muttered as if she saw me for the first time.
“Abby, we must go,” I stressed.
“Okay,” she said confused. “We are in the sea?”
“Yes, and we aren’t alone. Move! Hurry!” I said pulling her with me out of the water. We were only 15 feet from the dry beach when a tentacle brushed my leg and latched on to hers.
Quickly, it pulled us both under the water, because I held on to her tightly. I knew her body couldn’t take the cold. I reached out for the planes to shift to any one of them and felt nothing. This creature negated the ways. I only knew of two types of beings that could do that, necromancers and the fallen. This wasn’t a necromancer.
When I saw Abigail earlier in the spirit realm from a distance, she pulsed with a white light. The heavenly light of Gabriel. A beacon to a demon.
We surfaced a moment later. I grabbed her face. “You have to fight. Look at me. Fight Abby!” I felt her pull power, and I knew we would have a chance. She opened her eyes, and a swirl of golden light wrapped around the bright green. She stood on her own and wrapped us in a protective shield. The long dark tentacles of the Leviathan slapped against it, and it flared golden light. I grabbed by her waist and backed us out of the sea as she held the shield in place.
The beast rose out of the sea, and his inky black skin glistened with the water. The waters churned around his long tentacles. Forming behind him, the back tentacles joined into slimy black wings. His eerily human face looked down on us with coal eyes. He bared his teeth, the long silver razors.
And then he spoke, “Child of the Light, come to me. I have not fed on one of your kind in ages. It calls to me.” His deep voice rumbled across the sea like thunder. She did not answer and held her power for the shield steadily.
I turned to see Thomas and Samara rushing to us. A whirling sound also approached, and I lifted my left arm to catch my short bow. Rounding on the demon, I pulled the string back, and an arrow of pure lightning struck the beast in the face. It howled in pain and spat salty water at us. I felt a small spray of it as Abby’s shield began to fail, and her knees wobbled.
“Samara!” I yelled, and his stronger shield enveloped us. Abby sank to her knees in front of me from sheer exhaustion, but stared at the monster in disbelief. I pulled back my bow, and another lightning arrow sang into the air. A matching arrow from my brother’s bow arched in the air above the creature, and both arrows struck him in the head. He thrashed about in the sea and retreated. Thomas had us covered in case the beast returned, and I knelt down to Abigail. The golden ring around her eyes faded, and her body crumpled onto the sand.
I tossed my bow to my brother. She felt light and limp when I picked her up. We hurried back to the house together, keeping an eye on the sea behind us. The fog started to lift.
“To the cellar,” I said as we entered the doors of the house. I rushed down the stairs and laid her down in the circle I had prepared. Her eyes opened, and she watched me making the final preparations for the ritual. “We are going to do this now,” I said.
Earlier I had staged the room for the ritual. Picking up a small knife, I cut my finger and spoke the word for circle in my native tongue, “Názbąs.” A wind whipped through the room, and the wine bottles in the cellar rattled together. I picked up a woven twine circle divided into four sections. Attached to it were several feathers and beads. Thomas finished the final touches on the medicine wheel this morning and blessed it.
“Lay down in the circle, and try to be very still,” I told her. She nodded. We were both wet and cold. If she got sick and died, the blame would rest solely on my shoulders. I did not see the signs that the darkness inside her had consumed her to the point that she lost control. Abigail was normally too strong-willed to lose control, but perhaps the death and resurrection took a far greater toll than I had realized. I laid the medicine wheel over her heart. Kneeling down next to her, I closed my eyes and focused on her. Her heart labored to beat. She took soft, short breaths, and her body quivered with the cold. I began to chant a healing song in Diné. Slowly, she faded into unconsciousness. I reached over and placed my hand on her forehead. Her skin felt clammy with fever.
Suddenly, I felt myself being ripped out of my body, and I stood in a dark cavern. I could hear the echoes of my feet brushing on the stone floor.
Her voice broke the silence, “Fulmen.” The ball of lightning above her palm illuminated the cave. She stood before me in a long purple dress. Her green eyes narrowed on me.
I put my hands up to show I meant no harm. “Abigail, it is me, Lincoln. Please don’t throw that at me,” I pleaded. I should have warned her that I would be entering her psyche. I didn’t know if she could harm me here. In reality, I am immune to injury, because my father lined my skin with flint rock. However, in the subconscious of her mind, it was possible she could hurt or even kill me. “I am here to help. We need to see what is out of balance.”
“You are in my head.”
“Yes, I swear I am only allowed to see what you show me,” I said.
She continued to hold the ball of light and turned to look around the room. “Ignacio.” Four flames erupted inside the cavern. It revealed the room to be a circle much like the one we sat inside of in the cellar. She closed her palm, and the lightning disappeared. She turned to look at me. “What do you see?”
“Nothing. You look complete and whole to me. I expected to see a part of you that had darkened or was missing. I’m confused, unless there is another being here with us,” I said and turned slowly in the room. A possession did not occur to me before, but now that I had entered her mind, I wondered. Shadows flickered off the walls. I had no shadow. Abigail’s shadow flickered in four directions due to the four torches. Then I noticed behind her, the four shadows repeated. My eyes met hers, and she looked confused. I reached out my hand to her. “Please, come to me.” I flicked my fingers, but I wanted her to move quickly from whatever it was that stood behind her. She stepped toward me and took my hand. I pulled her closer to me, and a haunting laugh echoed in the room. She turned around to face the origin of the laughter.
“Bloody hell, what is that?” she said and backed away from it. She stepped right into me.
“Reveal yourself,” I demanded.
A woman appeared with dark russet locks and vibrant violet eyes. She wore a long black dress that matched Abigail’s except
for the color. She looked identical to Abigail in every other way.
“Why should I reveal myself to you, Slayer? You have intruded on my territory without asking permission,” she said. Her dark and sultry voice did not echo in the room as ours had.
Abigail became more agitated, “Who are you?”
“I am you, my dear,” she said simply.
The realization hit me of what she represented. “She is you, Abigail.”
“Slayer, you are wise and observant,” she complimented me. I nodded to her graciously. “But again, I remind you that you came here without my permission. And now you must go,” she held up her hands before her.
“I give him permission to stay,” Abigail interjected. The woman snarled.
“You do not know what is best for you. Make him leave. He has never believed in you. He has never trusted you. He treats you like a child. Make him go,” she ordered pointing her finger in Abigail’s face.
“No, he stays,” Abigail said defiantly. I never imagined that her stubbornness would have redeeming qualities.
“At least you still have some fight left in you after you cut me off,” she huffed.
“Who is she, Lincoln?” Abigail asked.
“What do you see?” I knew she had to come to terms with this herself. I could lead her in the right direction, but ultimately, she would have to realize the truth and accept it.
“She looks like me, only darker. And that hair color looks dreadful on my head,” she said. I laughed. Of all the things, she was concerned about the hair color.
“Notice that I do not cast a shadow in this room, because I am mostly shadow. I pass through the planes, and one of them is my home. My soul and body are one. Every part of me exists inside this one vessel. You are casting shadows, so is she. She is a part of you that you have not accepted. She’s the dark part of you,” I explained.
“Oh, so wise, dear Slayer. What would we do without you to teach us?” she mocked.
“She sounds like me,” Abigail admitted. I snorted.
“Yes. Since you woke up, I’ve felt a part of who you are was missing. I decided that you had changed. The whole experience changed you, as it should have, but you also have to accept the things you did. Accept that they are part of you. Accept that this dark woman is inside of you,” I said.
“No, I don’t want to be like that. I killed those men,” she shuddered.
“You did. Whether it was right or wrong doesn’t matter. You have to realize that you are capable of such things. You cannot control the darkness until you admit that it exists,” I said.
“She looks real to me,” Abigail said. The dark woman approached us. Abigail trembled and pressed back into me. She feared this part of her. However, if she rejected it, it would create a void in her soul that could never be repaired. I knew she would make the right choice. “What do I do?”
“I suggest you voice your fears and accept the part of you that you refuse to acknowledge. You will be stronger for it in the end. I’m not saying this will fix everything, but it will put things in balance,” I replied.
“I know I killed them, so it’s more than that,” Abigail said.
The dark woman stepped face to face with Abigail. I put my hand at the base of her back. I just wanted her to know that I stood behind her and believed in her, which surprised me more than Abigail realizing she had a dark aspect of herself.
“Do you accept me?” she purred.
“I know you are there. I know you are part of who I am, but you will never control me. You will never consume me. And as far as I am concerned, you will never dictate my actions ever again,” Abigail warned.
“You will need me. There are dark days coming, and you would be wise not to reject me,” she reasoned.
“I agree that you are me. I accept you, but I control you,” Abigail concluded. She held her hand up like she did when she conjured the lightning. The dark woman smiled and winked at me. She placed her hand over Abigail’s and faded away. A dark black crystal laid in Abigail’s hand. Abigail closed it in her fist. She reopened her hand, and it had disappeared.
I looked down at the floor, and Abigail no longer cast a shadow on the floor. She was whole again. She turned and looked at me.
“Feel better?” I asked.
“Why did she wink at you?” she asked.
I blushed. “You winked at me,” I retorted.
“Oh, I guess I did,” she responded. “Now what?”
“Time to live with your choices,” I said.
She nodded. “Thank you, Lincoln.”
I smiled. She had changed. “No need to thank me, but you are most welcome.” I took her hand, and we opened our eyes in the cellar of the house in Northumberland. My brother had continued the chant after I entered her head. He stopped when he saw us both exit the trance and smiled. Samara leaned against the wall and studied us and the magic swirling around us. Raif peeked around the corner of the door.
“Did it work?” Thomas asked.
“Yes,” I said, and looked at her. When she sat up, the medicine wheel against her chest turned to ash and swirled around the circle. I broke the circle, and the particles drifted to the ground like dust. I started to stand up, but she grabbed my shirt. It was still damp from our adventure in the sea. She buried her face in my chest and wrapped me up in a hug. I sat dumbfounded.
Outward displays of affection or gratitude always caused me to cringe. I sat there with my arms out not knowing what to do. I looked at my brother, and he smirked at me. He nodded to her suggesting I should hug her back. Samara laughed too. I would eventually get the chance to tell them both to go to hell. However, for this moment, I put my arms around her and hugged her back.
Leave it to Abigail to ruin a moment.
“Are you hugging me?” she asked.
“I am not,” I replied.
“Just making sure,” she said and squeezed tighter.
“I’m going for a walk,” she said walking toward the front door.
“No, you aren’t,” I replied and continued to drink my coffee and read The Yorkshire Post. The Great War escalated in Europe, and we sat here day to day waiting for permission from Gregory Theodoard to leave Northumberland. As she put on her coat, I watched her over the top edge of the paper. “Abigail, the rain will start at any moment. It always rains in this damn country,” I grumbled.
“Yes, it rains all the time. That’s why I want to go out for a quick walk before it starts back again. It’s rained for forty days and forty nights,” she exaggerated, but not by much.
“No,” I said firmly. Of course, she did not listen and put on a wool hat.
“I’ll be back soon. I promise I’m not going to play with the Leviathan,” she joked.
“That isn’t funny. Raif, go make some tea for Abigail,” I suggested. Raif jumped up and scurried toward the kitchen.
“I’ll drink it when I return. Thank you, Lincoln,” she said without looking at me and went out the door.
Slapping the paper down on the table, I jumped up and grabbed my coat from the closet along with my gloves and hers. “Raif, we will be back soon. Please make the tea, and keep it warm,” I called out to him and stepped out into the cool October air. Looking around the house, I spotted her walking up the drive to the main road and jogged to catch up with her.
Stopping to wait on me, she turned and said, “Lincoln, you didn’t have to come. I swear I won’t be gone long.”
I handed her the gloves without saying a word, and she slipped them on her hands and nodded thanks. Continuing to walk up the lane, I followed a few steps behind her and kept my eyes on the surrounding landscape. The cool wet air moved in, and I knew that rain wouldn’t be far behind it. Abigail, for the most part, was healed from her ordeal, physically. Since the night of the ritual, her nightmares had ceased, and she seemed more like her stubborn, infuriating self.
“Could you walk with me, and not behind me, please?” she asked.
I doubled my steps until I walked side by
side with her. “How far or long do you intend to walk?” I asked.
“I hadn’t really decided, yet. Now that I’m walking, I’m quite enjoying myself,” she said and gave me a mischievous look. “In fact, I think I’ll take a nice long walk.” She turned off the lane and started to walk across the field. The moment her feet touched green earth, I heard the squishing sound of muddy soil. She grunted and turned to look at me. Defiance stretched across her face, and she lifted her skirt and continued into the muddy soil.
“I’ll wait for you here,” I called out to her, because I had no intentions of getting my shoes muddy. In fact, I’d be rather amused if she fell over in it. A fitting punishment for her obstinate behavior. Trudging through the field, she continued to walk away from me. I leaned on the stone wall along the drive and watched her wishing I had brought my pipe with me. She wouldn’t let me smoke it in the house, and I supposed it did have a strong scent that lingered. Approaching in the distance, I saw a figure moving quickly toward her. “Abby!” I shouted, and she turned smiling at me as I plodded through the muddy field. The figure moved uncommonly fast.
Seeing the fear on my face, she turned to see the figure approaching. The golden shimmer of her personal shield wrapped around her, and she prepared herself to fight. I felt the warm air of her power being pulled out of the wet earth and cascading to her like a rippling brook. When I reached her, she pulled a knife from under her skirt and handed it to me. I stared at it, and then at her.
“Oh, please,” she growled. “It’s not like I forgot how to prepare for a fight.”
As the figure approached, I could clearly see that she had fiery red hair that billowed around her as the winds howled across the field. She wore emerald and golden armor and carried a long spear.
“Do you know her?” I asked.
“She will not harm us,” Abigail said and lowered her shield. I grabbed her arm, and she shook it loose and scowled at me.
“Abigail, who is she?”
“Greetings, Dark Wanderer,” she spoke in a warbling Scottish accent.
Abby bowed slightly, and I followed her lead. “Scáthach, welcome to my home.”