by Amanda Churi
The woman forced a smile across her face, the black paint on her lips making her smirk unsettling. Yes… she answered though it seemed hard for her to speak. It is nice to see your face again…
What are you talking about? Kevin wondered incredulously.
She sighed. Nothing, nothing… I just wanted to explore… See if our bond still held true.
Bond? he repeated. Look, I’m sorry, but I don’t… His thoughts faltered, and in a snap, he found himself staring at the woman with a different view. She did seem slightly familiar, though Kevin could not remember for the life of him how his mind was tied to hers at all. Her appearance possibly confused him the most; it reminded him all too much of his now destroyed identity—the black and white face along with her concealed figure.
You look like me… he whispered in awe.
She chuckled. I suppose, she replied in a light, soft, and reassuring voice. My appearance is a way to hold onto you—to prove that you can never be destroyed.
A million questions swarmed through his brain—far too many for Kevin to ask. The only one that he could manage to transfer to his lips was the one burning in his brain the moment this vision had been presented to him. What do you want?
She lowered her head slightly. I… I wanted to ask you something…
Which is?
…Do you remember the legendary prophecy?
That startled the new mortal, his heart quickening as his guilt surfaced, wondering if the truth was getting closer to being revealed. Yes…? Why?
We found them, she continued in a darkened tone, lifting her dulling blue eyes to her prey. They believe they found the prophets, but I’m uncertain. Many pieces still do not make sense… It’s never made sense. Do I trust my comrades or my fear? If I am wrong, I have doomed us all. You are the wisest of wise; you would know what to do in my position. But I am corrupted; I do not. I seek advice from you that my own people cannot give me…
Them… So it was happening, regardless of how he tried to stall it…
Although he did not know who this woman was, he could see the worry in her eyes—the terror of making a wrong move. Still lost as to all that was happening, he hardly found himself able to speak. Sometimes… he enlightened her through a strained voice, you have to take a risk. If you don’t, you’ll never know what could have been the outcome.
She frowned. I suppose… But if you truly believe that, you need to take your own advice as well.
Excuse me? Kevin demanded, taken back by her rebuttal.
Stay strong. Those who are close to you… Hold them closer. Love them longer. Everyone is taken soon enough…
What?! Kevin exclaimed in dread. What are you talking about?! Reveal yourself!
Pinion? another voice came.
The woman’s eyes widened with fright, and on that note, she turned into mist and vanished, an ear-piercing wail reverberating in his head as she destroyed their connection.
Kevin gasped, his eyes flying open as he pressed his hands down onto the cold floor to keep himself steady. His arms trembled, his muscles quivering beneath his skin as the face of the unknown woman faded away into the cold night. What… Was that?
Kevin exhaled heavily, running his hands through his hair and down the back of his neck to try and calm himself. He had experienced visions before but none as realistic as that… It was almost as though the message was sent with no intention other than to taunt him for lying—for keeping a secret about the ancient prophecy that he knew he shouldn’t have, and with his minor act of treachery, she had given him a grave warning: ‘Everyone is taken soon enough.’
Reluctantly, Kevin looked down at his love sleeping contently next to him, then to his adoptive daughter. Of all things… No. He couldn’t lose them. He lost so many people that he had once held close; he would do anything to keep that pain buried forever.
Sleep would evade him for the rest of the night; he couldn’t possibly put his mind to rest after such a terrible phrase had been drilled into his head. He sat there for minutes, which turned into hours, the dull moonlight shifting about the room until finally, Kevin looked over at their possessions resting on a small table against the wall, his anxiety tearing his stomach apart.
Moving very slowly to not wake Lucy, he pushed the covers away from him, standing up and making his way over to their bags. His hands loomed above it in temptation, Kevin looking over his shoulder cautiously before proceeding. He lifted up the flap of his bag, reaching inside and pulling out whatever his hand pleased to touch.
It was small and cold, his heart tripping as he held the glass vial in front of his face, staring down the glistening red liquid within the confinements. There was no labeling system Calla had, but having been around her for so long, he could name nearly every one of her creations at a simple glance. This, however, was no creation; it was Calla’s own blood—an ingredient she often used in her brews.
Despite all of the treason, he did in fact smile when he looked at the small token left of his old mentor. She may not have been the best person, but she still helped mold Kevin into the person that he was; he still wasn’t sure if that was a good or a bad thing, though.
Kevin’s smile collapsed when he noted that only half of the vial was full; what was left of her was disappearing quickly.
He swapped items, his hand settling on the hilt of a sword that he knew too well. He pulled it out of his bag, his eyes racing across the slick golden blade and polished bronze hilt; it was such a simple weapon but one entwined with a destiny unlike any other.
A light click bounced against a sheet of glass, Kevin quickly lifting his gaze and shifting his eyes to the window. Nothing was there.
Suspicious, Kevin looked back down at King Sterling’s sword, keeping a watchful eye on the pane of glass through his peripheral vision.
Believing that he was no longer looking, a dark, mysterious shadow crept across the surface in the shape of a hand, its sharp claws lightly tapping the frostbitten glass. Kevin’s eyes widened, and his arms stiffened, the ex-sorcerer spinning on his heels and holding the golden sword tightly in his hand as he turned his furious gaze to the ominous presence.
The hand immediately stopped moving upon realizing that it had been caught. Neither moved, squaring one another off.
The shadow chose to initiate the challenge and test Kevin’s strength. One with the darkened night, the shadow easily phased through the glass, entering the territory that Kevin had claimed as his own. A light clicking noise emanated from the creature, the shadow slinking down the windowsill and then across the floor. The other shadows within the room seemed drawn to its presence, pulling towards the entity and combining with the original shadow so that it slowly increased in size.
Kevin did not move a muscle, focusing on the strange being—one which he had never seen in his years. He watched the claw as it crept across Lucy’s sleeping body like a wave, returning to the floor and then slithering over Kevin’s feet as it approached the wooden table next to him.
It began to hiss intensely, winding up the leg of the table and over to the bag resting on the surface. It slid into the bag Kevin had opened before sliding back out with a single object in its ghoulish hand.
Kevin gasped, dropping his sword and reaching for it immediately, but not before the shadow raced across the wall with a daunting giggle, dragging the Sword of Maeve with it.
“Get back here!” Kevin roared, his voice so ferocious that both Lucy and Daisy jolted awake just in time to see the Sword of Maeve dragged over to the window with Kevin storming after it.
The shadow slipped through the glass, but the sword did not have such an ability, stuck inside the room, banging against the glass while the demonized shadow held onto it tightly, desperately trying to pull it through.
Daisy squealed the moment that she saw the creature, pulling the covers to her mouth and screaming. Lucy did not move, speechless as she watched her lover wrap his hands around the hilt, trying to tear it away with an angered grunt. Whatever this
being was, it was not a naturally born supernatural; a real supernatural could not hold the sword without being destroyed.
The hiss from the creature began to turn into a grave cry of vengeance as their struggle continued, the shadowy hand holding onto the blade quickly solidifying as a pulse of blue overtook it. Kevin gasped, the shock to his eyes nearly causing him to release his hold on the sword.
The hand of the shadow rapidly turned into the hand of an ice soldier—a dense mass of ice and snow, thick and hard, yet frozen at such extreme temperatures that every petrified cell within glistened in the low light, visible to the naked eye. The ice traveled from the hand up, forming a being of ice outside of the window.
A frozen soldier held onto the sword, staring Kevin down with eyes made of pure ice. One leg was on each side of the window, keeping the warrior propped up against the building. His hair was formed from frozen water droplets, small snowflakes blowing from his solidified locks in the light breeze. A set of ice borne chains was wrapped around his frozen, crystalline body, a sharp grapple dangling from his waist.
Kevin held his harsh glare for a moment, the soldier scowling with hatred to reveal his teeth that were sharpened icicles. The soldier suddenly yanked the sword back towards his body, and since he was now a solid figure, he shattered the glass with his powerful display of aggression, ripping the legendary weapon from Kevin’s hands.
Kevin grunted in surprise, pulled forward slightly as the glass shards collapsed around him, watching the minion of winter fall away from the window with the Sword of Maeve held close to his chest. He somersaulted backward in midair, landing firmly on his feet before immediately retreating around the corner of the tavern to flee Kevin’s ire.
“What was that?!” Daisy screamed shrilly.
Kevin didn’t answer; he could hardly think. His fingers burned, begging for access to his powers once more so that he could summon a swathe of cards and destroy the soldier before he could be their downfall. He may have never seen one, but he didn’t have to, to know that whatever creation his eyes had just seen was nothing more than an evil minion molded by Reeve herself. She was finally initiating whatever plans she had prepared.
“You guys stay here!” Kevin demanded viciously, refusing to look at his family as he ran to the table, grabbing King Sterling’s sword before bolting back to the window.
“Don’t you dare!” Lucy scolded him. “You don’t stand a chance!”
“If I don’t, then we don’t either!” Kevin retorted, not giving Lucy’s words an ounce of consideration.
Angrily, Kevin swung his arms back, leaping into the air and jumping out of the window which had to be almost fifteen feet high. His adrenaline was so overpowering that all he could see was red as the thirst for blood overtook him; sorcerer or not, he had always been protective over what he cared about, and he was not going to lose anyone else.
The dull moonlight reflected off of Kevin’s deadly eyes as he flew through the air, hitting the earth heftily on his feet, one arm out in front of him like an animal as a cloud of dust shot up around him and hid his presence. Kevin snapped his head up towards the path which the minion fled on, glaring through the waves of dust as an infuriated growl rose within his throat. He quickly stood up, his legs pushing him to close in on his route of escape.
“Daddy, no!” Daisy cried as Kevin followed his instincts. He tore around the corner of the tavern, her voice a mere whisper in his ears as his brain swarmed with curses from the Underworld.
He shot through the streets like a bullet, his observant eyes following the frantic tracks in the dirt. Uncountable townsfolk looked on in bewilderment from their windows and the sides of the streets as they were awakened from their sleep, watching incredulously as Kevin flew by them, one arm pumping to keep the momentum of his run up while the other clutched the hilt of the golden sword, begging him to find the soldier so that he could use it to steal his life.
Kevin took another sharp turn around a merchant stand as he followed the footprints, his feet sliding in the dirt and rapidly pushing him forward as he struggled to round the corner without falling. Just as he began racing down the street, his eyes noticed a figure quickly turn into an alleyway, a swarm of snowflakes blowing behind them.
“Oh no, you don’t!” he snarled bitterly under his breath, his intensely beating heart and disoriented brain giving his body another burst of adrenaline so that he could successfully catch his enemy.
He reached the alleyway, coming to a pause. The walls were dark and slimy, the foul smell of rotting scraps and feces wafting into his nose. The soldier gracefully leaped over multiple piles of trash and other entities which attempted to slow his advance, desperately trying to reach the exit before he could be caught.
Kevin snickered upon seeing his futile attempt, turning away from the narrow passage and racing down a street parallel to it so that only a line of semi-built houses stood between the two. He pushed himself as hard as he could, turning a corner again as he entered the center of the nearly abandoned town, the ice soldier racing out of the alleyway mere feet in front of him.
Kevin threw himself forward as soon as he was within reach, catching the soldier roughly around the waist. The man grunted in surprise as Kevin yanked his body towards him, Kevin throwing him onto the street so that he landed on the earth back first.
The few civilians out and about shrunk back in fear, screaming to their neighbors. The ice soldier looked up in surprise, snapping his teeth like an animal at Kevin as he swung the Sword of Maeve up towards Kevin’s throat. Kevin narrowly sidestepped it, grunting heavily as he spun in a circle, ducking his head so that the deadly blade whooshed in the air around him. Kevin hurriedly shuffled backward, twisting his sword fluently in his fingers and stretching his knuckles.
The soldier threw his legs forward, his solidified body bending like rubber as he leaped gracefully to his feet. He spun the Sword of Maeve as he took a fighting stance, prepared to face off against the master of combat.
“Tell me where your leader is!” Kevin demanded furiously, aware of the growing number of peasants on the sidelines.
“We… The Elites…” he breathed heavily as a cloud of bone-chilling mist seeped from his mouth and circled the air, “Will serve our queen until death. You will never know… You… Will fall to our hand…”
“Like hell I will!” Kevin screamed angrily, sprinting towards the Elite with the blade of his sword aimed straight for his gut. The Elite smiled slyly, awaiting Kevin’s onslaught with hungry, ravenous eyes that yearned to taste his blood. The Elite waited until Kevin was almost upon him before leaping into the air, a large pillar of ice rupturing from the earth to provide him height in his jump.
Kevin’s blade sunk into the massive icicle, the sword lodged deeply inside due to the overwhelming force that Kevin had swung at the Elite with. Kevin urgently yanked on the hilt, only to realize it could not be freed. After one futile attempt, he immediately directed his focus towards the Elite who screeched like an animal as he fell back down through the air, gripping the hilt with both of his frozen hands, preparing to end the fight when it had hardly begun.
Kevin threw his body to one side, rolling across the ground and narrowly missing the ivory blade as it sunk into the dirt where he stood seconds ago. The Elite looked up in disgust, snarling as he slowly stood up, pulling the sword out of the earth and stalking towards Kevin with a menacing growl rumbling in his throat.
The old sorcerer stepped back warily, his arms out beside him as he pressed his back against the wall of a house. He allowed the Elite to approach him, his ears screaming with the cries of passersby who urged him to run.
“Not… What I expected,” the Elite chuckled darkly under his breath, raising his sword as he closed in on his victim. “Thank you… For making this much easier.”
Kevin’s eyes narrowed, his pupils locked onto the dazzling white sword. The bubbles of air in the Elite’s frozen arm suddenly expanded like a muscle, the Elite bringing the sword down upon Ke
vin’s skull with as much strength as he could muster.
His survival instincts and training kicked in. Kevin immediately reached for the Elite, grabbing him by the wrist with crushing force as the hand prepared to slay him. Kevin held onto his arm like a rope, yanking it down and swinging in between the soldier’s legs, the sword following closely behind him as he stood up behind the Elite’s back.
The Elite grunted with surprise, Kevin refusing to waste a second. He grabbed the back of the Elite’s skull, squeezing it tightly in his grasp before aggressively shoving it forward, slamming his forehead into the wall.
The moment that the overshadowed ice struck the house with such pressure, the skull of the Elite caved in, crumbling like sand from the head down as his body shattered into a million ice fragments. A strong burst of cold air was released upon the breakage of his body, Kevin muffling a painful grunt as his hand became covered with a light layer of frost.
Kevin watched intently as the last of the Elite’s body came to ruin, his eyes cold and unmerciful as he stared at the pile of remains that began to melt the moment they touched the soil. The Sword of Maeve lay on the ground, shimmering as it was released from the enemy’s hand. Kevin smiled, taking in heavy, short bursts of air. He did it—a mortal, beating a minion created by his archenemy.
The cries from the civilians did not cease even though the threat was now gone; if anything, they strengthened.
Confused, Kevin looked over his shoulder while leaning his hand on the building, his heart stuttering the moment that he saw another frozen hand aimed at him, immediately releasing a bolt of frigid, bone-splintering ice.
The beam of ice struck him in the back, the frost quickly sinking through Kevin’s shirt and skin, penetrating his veins and entering his bloodstream. Kevin screamed, the impact so overwhelming and sudden that his body flew forward, the strength in his arm crippling and doing nothing to stop him from face-planting the wooden planks. His face instantly went numb, his knees buckling and sending him flying onto his back into the moist soil. Groaning in agony, Kevin weakly looked up, his eyes becoming one with another Elite nearly identical to his assailant earlier.