Power Surge

by S. L. Perrine

  “This is getting weird. Where is everyone?” Chad asked, walking in front of me. He was carrying all of our luggage. So when a large figure jumped in front of us, I knocked him down and let my bracelet spring to life.

  “The young priestess arrives.” The man smirked at me and then laughed at Chad, who had completely collapsed onto the luggage.

  “Who are you? What are you doing in my house?” I heard the words come from my mouth but didn’t mean to say them.

  “Your house? Oh, I am so sorry to have trespassed. Nobody was here when I arrived.” The man watched Chad as he untangled himself and stood by me.

  “That doesn’t answer her question. Did Sabina send you?” Chad asked. I could tell he was in pounce mode without even looking.

  “Sabina? No, no. Sabina did not send me. I came for my brother.” The man didn’t waver. He stayed behind the light, so I couldn’t see his face.

  “Why would your brother be in my house? And where are my friends?” I asked, letting the whip dangle freely, even as one end stayed wrapped around my wrist.

  “No, you misunderstand. My brother sent me to look for the young priestess, and here you are.” I noticed the man had not attempted to reach for a weapon, nor was he posturing like we were.

  He took one calculated step forward and I could see he was clad in black leather, as if he were trying to blend into the night. His hands, which were semi-up in a surrendering position, were covered in black leather gloves. He was tall, but no taller than Chester. So, after another beat, I let the snake-like whip slither back to its resting place on my arm. I watched his eyes as he regarded the metal sliding up to my elbow and coiling itself around me, down to my wrist. Once settled, the end poked up and hissed at the intruder.

  “That’s impressive,” he said, pointing to the silver whip turned bracelet.

  “Yeah, well that usually means he doesn’t like someone. So, I’m thinking you might want to leave.” I kept my hand readily available to draw magic if need be.

  “You do not wish to hear about why I was sent?” he asked me, ignoring Chad, who had positioned himself between me and the man.

  “I don’t think either of us care at the moment. Just get out before I drag you out.” Chad snarled, the black panther threatening to come to the surface.

  “Yes, young protector. I will go once I tell the young priestess a message.” He looked around Chad, who I thought was starting to sprout whiskers. “Your grandfather would like to meet you once you’ve accomplished here what needs to be done. You can have your parents bring you.” He bowed his head slightly, which I was coming to realize was a sign of respect to the high priestess.

  “Chad, back off. He’s not going to hurt me.”

  “You heard what he just said.” Chad turned to me. I could see he hadn’t sprouted whiskers, but his eyes were the familiar slits of bright yellow.

  “Yes, he said he was sent by his brother…my grandfather.” I looked back to the man. “So, he can’t hurt me. Isn’t that right?”

  “He might,” Chad mumbled.

  “I would not hurt my own blood,” he snarled back at Chad and then looked to me. “I would not hurt my priestess. You have much power, but you may need more.” He looked to the ceiling as if he knew where the books were hidden. “As the power of our family has now gone to you, you have the loyalty of your entire family.”

  “You know Sigmis wants nothing to do with the Crawford line,” Chad snapped.

  “Yes, that may have been true in the past. However, she is also of the Sigmis line. She holds our fate as well as theirs.”

  “What does that mean?” I asked him.

  “That means there is much you need to learn. One more important fact, being you’re going to need the collective to rid yourself of your current situation.”

  “What do you know about it? What do I need to do?” I stepped forward but was stopped by Chad’s arm. I started to yell at Chad, but the man–my uncle–protested.

  “Do not be weary of him. He is doing what he is oath-bound to do…protect. Even if it was not his oath.” He took a step back and continued. “You need to put the two books together as they once were. Only then can you find the power you are looking for. You will need the power of the immortal. That is all I can tell you.” He took two more steps backwards and I must have blinked, because he was gone.

  It was as if we were in our own private realm of the world, just like my parents. Once the man was gone, we could see all the lights in the house were on. We were suddenly surrounded by our friends.

  “How did you do that?” Clara stood from the couch to my left. She had changed into a pair of leggings and a long gray baseball jersey. Her hair was in pigtails and she was holding a steaming hot mug. Her usual smug expression was replaced by surprise.

  “I have no idea.” I looked around to everyone staring up at me, wide-eyed.

  Matt and Crystal were sitting on the stairs in front of us, speaking low to each other. When we came into view, they both stood. Peter was on the couch with Clara. He jumped up to help Chad with our luggage.

  “Okaaay,” Clara outstretched the word and sat back down.

  “Um, Clara, could you?” Crystal was kneading her hands and biting her lip.

  “Oh. No way. I’m staying out of it,” Clara shot back to Crystal as she again curled up on the sofa.

  “What is going on?” I asked the two, who started a war of darts with their eyes. One glared at the other and vice versa, but neither answered me. Then Ophelia and Chester wandered in the front door.

  “Oh goodness, where have you been? We saw your car pull up, but when we didn’t see you get out, we went to look. It was empty. How did that happen?” Ophelia asked.

  “You can communicate with other realms; the past and the future. You’re really asking me that?” I asked the small woman while she pulled me down to her in a hug. Her short dark hair was a mess from the wind. She was wearing a brightly-colored yellow sun dress and her red-rimmed glasses.

  “Yes, I know dear, but still. What happened?” she asked once she was satisfied I didn’t have so much as a scratch on my person.

  “Sigmis,” I said, and listened as the entire room gasped.

  “Sigmis was here?” Chester asked from the doorway, where he lingered until the mention of my grandfather’s name.

  “No, not Silas Sr. This guy said he was his brother.” Chad locked eyes with his father.

  “Why was he here? Oh my, does he know?” Ophelia threw her hands over her mouth as if she was shocked at her own question.

  “Yes. He said my grandfather wants to meet me. That when I’m done here, I should have my parents bring me to him.” I looked at poor Ophelia as I spoke, making sure she wasn’t going to faint. I had never thought she could be scared quite so easily, but I guess everyone has their limits.

  Considering Silas Sigmis Sr. was the one thought responsible for my parent’s death to begin with, I didn’t think they’d want to go get reacquainted with him. Without them there to ask, I didn’t even know if they would want me to go see him. The man had said they would bring me. The question was if I should even say anything to them. Considering they were essentially there with me, they might have witnessed the encounter themselves.

  “Well, that’s not gonna happen.” Clara smirked, seemingly unaffected by the fact my grandfather wanted to see me. She turned around in her seat and looked at Crystal. “Tell her, now!”

  “Tell me what?”

  “Oh!” Ophelia clapped her hands together. “Your adorable sister is upstairs,” she said with excitement. By the look on her face, I could only assume she had spent time with Michelle and was smitten. My sister tended to have that effect on some people.

  “What!” I yelled and glared at Crystal and Matt to move out of my way.

  “Oh, but she’s sleeping,” Ophelia added and turned to Chester. “I think we should let her sleep for a while longer. We can deal with her in the morning. However,”–she pointed at the stairs and at Matt and C
rystal– “you two can go up and get the books. Just work quietly.”

  Chapter Twelve

  “He said what?”

  I found that when once Ophelia mentioned the books, I remembered what my uncle told me about them. Once I started talking about the Immortal One, Ophelia seemed to calm right down about a Sigmis being in the house. Other than my father, of course.

  “He said I need to put the books together, as they once were. That I need the power of the Immortal One. Any ideas what he means?” I asked both Ophelia and Chester. I figured if anyone would know what the creepy uncle guy was talking about, it’d be them.

  We settled in the sitting room downstairs, next to the small kitchen, to talk strategy. We’d been talking so long I didn’t even notice the sun was starting to peek out over the horizon. I stifled a yawn while Chester and Ophelia went into the kitchen to make breakfast and discuss the Immortal One. I thought I fell asleep but was startled awake when they started talking again. My chin jumped on the fist I was leaning on when Chester started saying something about my grandfather.

  I wiped the wet spot on my chin and sat up when Chad placed a fresh cup of coffee in front of me. It didn’t have the extra shot of espresso like he had gotten me on the ride there, but it was still strong. We had both books on the coffee table. I had settled on the floor to look at them. Clara stretched across the length of the couch hours ago and fell asleep.

  Chad put his coffee on a nearby end table and sat beside me. I took a generous sip. Envy lurked in me at the sight of the two prone figures in the middle of the floor. Crystal and Matt had fallen asleep facing each other and holding hands.

  “Any luck?” Chad asked, interrupting my thoughts, and I looked back to the books to study the bindings.

  “No. I mean they could have been rebound at some point. The chronological order of it doesn’t even make sense. Some spells are duplicates even.”

  “You mean like copied from one and put in the other?” He scanned the pages of each book I had splayed over the table.

  “Yes, look. It’s the same writing.” I pointed to the big brown leather book, and then to the pages in the equally big black leather book. “It’s as if whoever split it wanted to make sure they each had certain spells, but not all of them are copied. There are a lot of different spells in each book that they don’t share as well.”

  “Can you tell if they are older or newer? Sometimes, your mom had a way of being able to tell when a spell was added,” Chester said as he handed me a plate of scrambled eggs and bacon.

  “Um, maybe. I mean, these right here.” I flipped to the front of the brown book. “These, I wrote. I didn’t write them in here though. I didn’t even have this book when I wrote them.”

  Chester looked at the spells and nodded. He took a sip of coffee to wash down his breakfast. “From what your moms said, the book feels the pull of the High Priestess. When you write a spell, it copies it in your hand. Thus, adding it to the history that is this book.”

  “You mean both of those books.” Clara surprised us when she popped up off the couch. She wiped the sleep from her eyes and then stretched her arms outward as she bounded for the kitchen, speaking over her shoulder as she went. “Mmm, is that bacon?”

  “Focus, Clara. What do you mean?” I prodded.

  “Oh, calm down. What I mean is, she is the high P, for both of those books now. So maybe it’s not about putting the books back together. You have the powers of both families that owned them. Maybe they already are back together.”

  “I get it!” Chad shouted, making me jump and spill hot coffee on my arm. “Sorry.” He attempted to use the hem of his shirt to wipe up the mess.

  Clara shook her head and threw us a roll of paper towels. I looked over to Matt and Crystal, who hadn’t budged.

  “What do you get?” I asked as he dabbed coffee off my arm. I snatched the towels from his hand and cleaned it myself.

  “There is a spell in each book. Or maybe half of one in each book. If we figure out which ones they are, put them together, then bam!” He smacked his palms together for dramatic effect.

  “That’s actually not a bad idea.” I closed the books and stacked them on top of each other.

  “What are you doing? We have to look for it.” Chad motioned to the books.

  “I’m too tired to comprehend which spells are gonna fit together to get this done right now.” I chugged the rest of my coffee. Ignoring the rest of my food, I put my head back against the couch and closed my eyes.”

  “Good, you take a nap. I made a phone call.” Ophelia bounced back in the room.

  “To who? I thought we were all here,” I replied, not opening my eyes. I knew I’d see a huge grin on her face, and that was just too much chipper for me on two hours of sleep. And I was estimating that much.

  “Your grandfather.” She beamed. Suddenly, all heads and eyes went open to stare at the short woman, including mine.

  “Is that a good idea?” Clara asked.

  “The other one. Alistair.” She bounced on the balls of her feet, and yup, there was the wide grin. “He should know more about it than we do. Isabella had to have shared something about this Immortal One with him.”

  “That’s a really good point. Wake me when he gets here.” I let my head fall back again.

  I didn’t have my eyes closed for more than a few minutes before I started to feel the familiar pull of a dream I probably wouldn’t have had if not for my uncle Barnaby. It was months after our first encounter when he finally told me of the power he was born with. He had the ability to pull someone’s conscious mind to him, but only when they were relaxed. Being half-asleep was as relaxed as I could get.

  I never got a chance to see what the cosmic call would entail. Chad started shaking me. I looked up and everyone was looking at the staircase behind me. I turned to see a wide-eyed Michelle sitting on the stairs.

  “Oh crap!” I yelled and dragged myself off the floor. As I was moving to my feet, Michelle had run for the door. Crystal and Matt both stirred when I yelled.

  It took me a minute to catch up to her. She wasn’t running on fumes and caffeine. By the time I found her, she was in the middle of the small clearing we used for the blood rite ritual. Since then, it had become our usual circle spot. The altar still sat in the middle of the clearing. There were candles around the outside of it and our tools, complete with athame, rested in the center.

  I had to give her credit. She didn’t look shocked or even scared. I should have been more awake for this moment. I saw the sadness in her eyes when she turned to me. She was still wearing her dress from graduation and her feet were bare. She looked like crap, but well-rested crap.

  Clara rushed out of the house like she just realized what was going on. “I just want to say, Elyse, that I didn’t tell her anything. Also, Michelle, I only kept things from you because it’s what people who are different do.” She walked over to Michelle and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. “Give her a chance.” Clara gave Michelle a light squeeze before letting her go to head back to the house. Michelle playfully tugged on one of Clara’s pigtails.

  “Well, somebody got enough sleep last night.” I kicked a pinecone out of the clearing and did everything I could to make my sister believe I was interested in the dirt at my feet.

  “I didn’t sleep either.” I looked up at her as she spoke. She found the little log we had outside of the circle and sat down on it. She extended her legs in front of herself and put as much effort into studying her toes as I had in the dirt. “I was eavesdropping. I did manage to salvage my makeup from yesterday…so,” she said, shrugging her shoulders at me.

  “Oh, this is madness!” I flung my arms up in the air and was rewarded with a resounding crack from a nearby tree.

  “Do that often?” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Michelle as she jumped and almost fell off the log.

  “Only when I’m frustrated.” I nodded.

  “So, we are playing the truth game now or what?” She stood and
placed one delicate hand against her hip. Her gaze bore into me and I silently thanked the goddess she didn’t have magic in her. Unlike Clara, I had no doubt Michelle would use it on me at that moment.

  “Yes, we’re playing the truth game.” I turned and looked off at the sky as a red haze lifted the clouds higher. “What do you want to know?” I turned back to her.

  “You saved mom’s life.” It wasn’t so much a question as a statement. I nodded, and we stood there, quiet for a few minutes, before she asked the next question I was dreading. “You’re looking for your birth parents?”

  “Kinda.”

  “What’s that mean?”

  “Well. I know where they are. I just can’t reach them.”

  “And they’re...some kind of big deal?” She sounded like she was searching for the right words.

  “To me they are.” I startled myself when I answered. I guess I was so worried I’d never get them back that I didn’t want to admit to myself or anyone else how badly I wanted to find them. This was Michelle I was talking to. No matter what we’d been through, she was my sister and she knew me better than anyone.

  The air stilled as the sun rose in the sky. It dried the dew that clung to the grass and leaves around us. When Michelle spoke again, it was as if I were talking to my ten-year-old sister, trying to explain to her that it was okay to believe in Santa Claus.

  “So, you're kind of a big deal too?” She pointed to the cracked tree and stared back at me.

  “I wouldn’t say that.” I hugged my arms close to myself.

  “We would.” I turned to see Chad leading Matt, Clara, and Crystal out to the circle clearing. Chad stopped before he reached the circle, and everyone else stopped behind him. “You need to tell her the truth.”

  “Why? So, she can run home to mom and dad? Hate me forever because I’m worried about my parents? Who, in fact, never gave me up, but had me taken–quite literally–from them?” I spun around, still hugging my arms to my chest.

  “E, she’s not...” Chad started to talk. I knew what he was going to say, and so did Michelle. I could hear her whisper something to herself and then her hands were on my shoulders as she stood behind me.