Blackthorn: In the Tween

by Jamie Ott

  ~~~

  Sometime later, Lin opened her eyes.

  She was lying on the cold, hard floor, and twilight was coming. The meeting might have already begun. She panicked. Lin tried to stand but her feet and hands had been tied.

  Someone was pulling the ties off her; it was the girl from the mall.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I’m helping you. What do you think I’m doing?”

  When she’d done, Lin said thanks and told her they needed to get to the meeting in the hall. Her heart sped as they ran past a grandfather clock that pointed to 7:30 p.m.

  The Shoester girl followed her through the doors into the hall. It had been magically expanded to hold an arena sized amount of people, who were all listening closely to Professor Milton who was explaining the situation.

  Lin ran in, pulled Mandel aside and told him what happened. Without delay, he yelled to the entire room, “We need to get everyone to the warehouses, NOW! The Wackens will be here shortly!”

  “What? Why the rush?” asked Ms. Crackwell.

  “We’ve been betrayed by a local, Blair Blesswell,” said Lin. “There is no way we can do this clean and quietly. We need to get out before they stop us!”

  It was like a 7.0 earthquake, with the way the grounds and walls shook as everyone made to exit the Great Hall. The doors magically expanded to allow them all to leave with ease.

  Despite the expansion, there was pushing, shoving, shouting and screaming, but amazingly, they made it outside, down the mud path and out of the gates within minutes.

  Those who could fly or transport themselves disappeared into the night, but Lin and the teachers remained behind to protect those who couldn’t.

  They ran as fast as they could down the dirt road. Lin straggled behind the slowest of them all. Every few minutes, she called the wind to her fingertips and blew them, harshly. The strength of the winds gave them gravitational lifts that pushed them a few feet along, causing them to shriek, periodically.

  A shout came from ahead.

  “They’re coming,” someone yelled.

  Lin looked ahead. A row of hooded figures walked, fast, toward them.

  Lin flew to the front of the crowd.

  The person in the center of the hoods raised an arm, skyward, and the others stopped in their tracks.

  “Everyone, stop!,” shouted Doctor Mandel as he waved his arms, criss-cross. Then he turned to the on comers and asked, “What do you want?”

  The man pulled down his hood.

  To everyone’s surprise, it wasn’t Golshem, it was Angel Craig.

  “Angel!” shouted Ms. Crackwell. “You traitor!”

  Ignoring her, he said, “You are all to return to your homes. If you continue forward, we will stop you.”

  That was all he said.

  Lin, Milton, Riley and Crackwell gathered.

  “What do we do?” asked Ms. Crackwell.

  “I propose we continue toward them, as if we’re simply going home,” said Professor Riley. “When we reach Blackthorn Street, we make a break for it.”

  “We can’t do that! We are putting these people’s lives at risk!” said Milton. “Do you really think everyone will be able to make it up that hill?”

  “We have no choice, but to fight. It’s either Golshem’s men or the Fairies,” said Doctor Mandel. “I’ll stay back and make sure everyone gets there.”

  “Me, too,” said Lin.

  Doctor Mandel turned and shouted, “Okay, it’s not worth it. We don’t want to fight. Kindly let us pass. We’ll return to our homes.”

  The chain of hoods broke to both sides of the road and allowed them all to walk by.

  Behind Lin, she could hear people whispering the plan to each other.

  The block was getting nearer and nearer. It was just a hundred feet away. Lin slowed her walking pace to allow others to pass her by, and then hung back and prepared to fight.

  The hoods stood less than fifty feet behind her, and the sidewalk was a few paces away.

  They reached the end of the road and turned onto the first paved street.

  Mandel shouted, “RUN!” And everyone picked up, fast.

  “STOOOP!” screamed Angel.

  Lin turned around and sent up a shield large enough to cover the entire road, but it was hard to hold up because she’d never had to use her magic in such an immense way. If she could only give the students a few moments head start, because that was about as long as she’d be able to hold her position.

  Spells flew from every one of Angel’s comrade’s wands. Suddenly, her shield flickered. Angel was muttering a counter curse against her, and it worked.

  When her shield died down almost completely, Angel and the rest of them ran at Lin shouting a variety of incantations in English and Latin, but she lifted her hand and, calling the wind, forced them backward, along with all their spells. It took all of her energy, but she managed to hold them that way for a few more minutes, allowing all the students time to make it up the first incline to the base of the mountain.

  Finally, when Lin could no longer hold them, she let go and ran for it. Unable to fully reignite her shield, she ducked and swayed as she dueled with Wackens along the way. None of which, not even in numbers, seemed able to match Lin’s power of sorcery. Her magic was quicker and more powerful. Every time they sent a spell, she reflected it by redirecting it with the will of her mind.

  As she ran, she tried to call a storm again, like she did the night on the mountain, but she was too emotional and too distracted.

  Then, to her surprise, all the hoods had given up on trying to take her out, and ran past. Lin took the opportunity to shoot as many of them, with sleeping spells, in the back as she could. Some she missed, and others fell to the ground, snoring.

  Up ahead, many students and adults fought the Wackens, and then helped one another further up the incline. Mandel dueled with a couple of hooded men she’d never seen before. Ahead of him, several students wrestled down a guy who’d knocked out Ms. Crackwell with his fist.

  Out of thin air, more hooded figures had appeared. They lined the street in a row, in an attempt to stop them from making it to the second incline. Lin called the wind and flew through the air, and blew them away. They rolled across the sky in the direction of the horizon and landed in various places all over town.

  Two students helped Ms. Crackwell limp up the second incline while Professor Riley helped a young girl fight off attackers. Milton fought with a dark haired woman whom Lin remembered from the restaurant when they went on their date.

  Lin held her arms forward and sent a powerful stream of air that lifted the remaining stragglers up onto the second incline.

  Someone flew down behind Lin, tackling her to the ground. She rolled over and stood up. Lin barely had time to register that it was Blair who attacked her, before she punched her square in the face several times. Lin stumbled backwards and fell to her knees. Blair jumped on top of her.

  Lin barely gathered enough strength to give her a side hook, as she continued to pummel her in the face. Then she rolled Blair onto her back and climbed on top of her. Blood sprayed from her mouth as she screamed, “Where’s Mara?”

  Blair pulled a dagger, from under her sleeve, and swiped at her neck. Lin leapt off her and stood back. Blair ran, screaming at her. Lin stared at the knife, telling its molecule to speed up so that it got too hot for her to hold. As soon as she dropped it, Lin sent an axe kick to her face that knocked her out.

  Up the road, most of the students had made it onto the third and final incline. Now they stood around, waiting and defending themselves from attackers.

  Lin decided not to waste any more time. She gathered all of her strength and focus, and called the wind and floated the remaining students to the final incline.

  On the hill, people panicked because it was so crowded and disorganized. Ms. Crackwell tried to tell everyone to be calm, but then Angel cursed her to sleep. Doctor Mandel conjured
a serpent that bit Angel Craig in the leg. He ran off, screaming. Then Doctor Mandel bent over Ms. Crackwell and tried to wake her.

  Milton ran to her side and said, “If she can’t wake up, then we can’t do the spell. It requires too much power.”

  “Then I’ll open the warehouses so that as many as possible can go home.”

  Lin pushed through the hundreds of students between her and the warehouse. She tried to rip a doorway into the invisible wall. It was hard work and she was fatigued from the power she’d already used in getting them there. Milton seemed to understand, for he held her hand and gave her a blessing of strength with his wand.

  Finally, she managed to get a door ripped in one of the warehouses. She sighed, feeling some relief, and began to work on the other. Milton gathered people and led them into the warehouse, into which they must have disappeared because there was no way a hundred students could have fit in there.

  She finished carving a door into the second warehouse. Students, then, filed in as quickly as possible. Lin smiled because it felt like success, until a flurry of spells, red, white and blue, reminded her that they were still fighting. It was only because students were protecting her, so that she could do her work, that the fighting seemed to abate.

  Just then, a tall man floated across the sky toward them. In his hands, he conjured two fireballs and sent them hurling at the warehouses. They exploded, blasting everyone back. Lin was blown a hundred feet down the mountain to the second incline. She was covered in dirt, blood and bits of aluminum.

  Suddenly, the Shoester’s daughter appeared. She helped Lin to her feet and flew her back to the base of the mountain. Then the girl held up her hand, and every single person, there, was frozen solid.

  “What did you do?” asked Lin.

  “Hurry,” she shouted. “I don’t know how long I can hold them all.”

  The mists were escaping the warehouses quickly. The only way to salvage the remaining was to try the spell. Lin ran to Ms. Crackwell, who was out cold on the ground, and pulled the paper from her pocket.

  “Shadows of this planet, I command you

  Like marionettes, I now bind you

  Stay in your place

  Until we’ve moved through your darkness

  And entered our home, the Earthly plane.”

  At that moment, she felt the particles in the atmosphere surround her; they felt cold and dark, yet inviting. Just barely, their darkness was visible in the twilight of the evening; they were like black clouds of smoke, only friendlier to breathe. But then, it felt like the shadows were swallowing her, and it was too cold. Lin was drowning and didn’t know what to do. The shadows required much more power to control them than she had.

  The feeling started to lift when people ran from every angle, into the dark clouds and disappeared. This seemed to make the shadows evaporate, leaving Lin able to breathe once again.

  Lin focused as hard as she could to telekinetically hold the shadows in their space, but it was almost like they had their own will to dissipate. No matter what, the shadows had to die and magic couldn’t prevent that.

  She groaned through gritted teeth as she fought to stay focused, but like sand through fingers, the darkened mists slowly slipped through her grip.

  A few attackers rounded on Lin, who knew she was unable to hold the shadows and fight at the same time. Fortunately, Ilda appeared and fought for Lin. With one point of her finger, she obliterated her attackers.

  “Help me, Ilda.”

  “I can’t help you. Shadows and Fairies don’t mix; it’ll kill me.”

  Most of the Blackthorn residents had gone, and a hundred or so lingered, trying to find patches of shadow big enough to send them home.

  Tears leaked from Lin’s eyes because her power was ebbing, and she knew the rest of them were likely trapped there for good. She wanted to argue with Ilda but she hadn’t the strength. Holding the shadows was taking all her concentration.

  She felt faint. Then something wet was dripping down her front. Lin looked down and saw a brown handle poked out of her chest.

  One Last Rescue