Power Surge

by S. L. Perrine

  She dropped from the branches of the tree, touching down on the soft earth without making a noise. Her cloak wrapped securely around her. She could feel the pushing of someone. Not enough to dive into her, but enough to feel for her. Enough to know she was fleeing for fear of her defeat.

  “Let her think that. Let her know she chased me away from here.” She kept her feeling shielded to herself, letting only fear escape her. The tremble in her movements. Her quickening pulse as she breathed shallow breaths.

  As she walked out of the woods, she grazed each of the trees with talon sharp nails. As the bark was pierced, the forest moaned. A web of black dived into the splinters of wood, tracing them to the core of the plants and then enveloping the heart of them; the roots. Even the soil. The trees swayed back and forth, trying to fight off the evil pulsing into them.

  Sabina laughed then. Only once. Only loud enough for nature to hear her. She pulled her hood over her head, allowing her face to be hidden from view. She was, however, too late. An animal in the distance was able to see her glowing red eyes. When it did, it howled. Not moving. Not advancing on her or running back to warn anyone of her presence. It stood still, glaring at her.

  Sabina drew her hands into a fighting stance, claws ready to strike. The animal pulled back, into the darkness. When she was sure it would not advance, she stood, adjusted her cloak and continued her journey.

  She knew what she must do. She didn’t even mind doing it. No, she was going to enjoy it. Then she would have what she needed to get rid of Gwen and Elyse. She would be the Immortal Witch, and she would have all the powers. Not just from her family, but from the ouncil as well.

  With a new destination in mind, she set off west. She would find the village of the Council. She knew where it was nestled in the middle of a mountain. A hidden valley, not shown on any map. She knew the footholds of the lands there. Even though her grandmother's journal gave no exact location, Sabina knew it to be the middle of Mount Antero, Colorado. The mountains surrounding it would have made the terrain undoubtedly difficult to traverse. If her grandmother and a bunch of kids could do it on foot, she figured it would be a no-brainer for her. “Not with the resources of our modernized world,” she whispered into the cool night’s air.

  She decided to travel to Northrop, Colorado, commission a helicopter to the mountain top, and travel by foot to the valley below. A few days should be all it would take. A smile crept onto her face. For the first time in weeks, she was beginning to think she had the upper hand. She would go, get what she needed, and be rid of those who stood in her way…for good.

  For her, time was on her side. Let her sister have her little reunion. Then when they least expected it, Sabina would give her a more deserving homecoming. “Oh, sister dear. We have much to catch up on.” She paused for a moment and looked back at the clearing beyond the trees. Then she snapped her head forward and continued onward. The sky called to her, and she would soon answer.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Everyone had flocked to my parents' side, with the exception of my friends and I. I hadn’t known what to say. Couldn’t begin to think. So instead of the happy family reunion I had imagined as a child, I slipped back to the house. I wanted to let their friends get a chance to welcome them back, ask their questions, and embrace them. That was the return they deserved. Not the reunion of uncertainty.

  It was cumbersome, to say the least. When I was six, I had images of my parents embracing me in their arms. How they would have told me they never wanted to give me away, but had no choice. When I was ten, I didn’t imagine them coming back to life to find me. No, I had dreams of my mother combing my long dark hair and braiding it before tucking me into bed. She would tell me wild bedtime stories that never made any sense to my young mind. They were plenty exciting to keep me captivated.

  I had always awakened with a familiar empty feeling. Like she had been taken away from me for the first time. I felt alone and far too young to go on through life without a mother. Of course, I had a mother. Helen Andrews was my mother. She would always be my mother. Just as Michael would always be my father. I just never felt very close to them. Not from the moment they told me I was adopted. Not even before then.

  They let me keep my given name. Elyse Margaret Crawford. Helen said it was because they wanted me to be able to identify with myself. Helen had grown up with a friend who had been adopted. Characteristics she had were similar to those of her adopted family. She had no clue. Eventually, after she was told, she seemed to have an identity crisis. Apparently, that was also why I found out at a young age. Helen’s friend discovered it when she was in college. I wasn’t able to meet her; to ask any questions about how to deal with it. Helen didn’t give me specifics, but I guessed at how hard it was for her to cope afterward, and I’d imagined all sorts of things had happened to her. One was her jumping off the side of the university building. I quickly forgot about the poor woman and went in search of my own answers.

  At one point, I had thought I wanted to meet other family members, since I had been led to believe my parents had died. That was the longing stage around age twelve. Then came the anger stage, which started around fourteen and lasted till I found out they were alive and cursed to an alternate plain of reality. Immortal slumber is what Gwen had called it. Forever frozen in a place and moment in time. That much I had looked up.

  I sat in the large living area on the second floor of the house, curled up against Chad on the sofa, when Gwen and Silas finally found me. Chad hadn’t budged, but a look from my father and he was excusing himself to the lower level. He didn’t walk away without giving me a kiss on my head and smoothing the hair away from my face, tucking it carefully behind my ear.

  “I’ll just be downstairs. Yell if you need me,” he whispered so they couldn’t hear.

  I didn’t try to look approachable. I moved to the middle cushion and pulled my knees into my chest, my feet on the edge of the seat. Gwen sat next to me on my left and Silas stood opposite us, leaving the small coffee table between us.

  “You must have questions,” he said. His hands were in the pockets of his jeans. He rocked back and forth on his heels as he stood there. Suddenly, I was aware of the nervousness in the room. That was the thing about my growing powers. I couldn’t always control them or keep them at bay. They just allowed me to feel everything from everyone. I was learning, but it was harder to control when I was off guard or emotional.

  When my mother placed her hand on my arm, I got a shot of emotions. They made me jump in my seat, but her hand never left me. She held on gently, almost in spite of my powers. She smiled and I relaxed a little.

  The room spun. Not in a dizzy kind of spin. It literally spun and fashioned into another place. Kind of like it did when Chad and I spoke before the Blood Rite Ritual. In a heated moment of discussion, we had somehow been transported to a beautiful yard in full bloom. Nothing like the dreariness of my parents' yard in December.

  The large open room became a small cave. It was still nighttime, but I could hear water nearby. I could feel the dampness of the cave surrounding me. The mouth was open to the night, and I could see we were on a beach somewhere.

  “I didn’t do that.” I didn’t mean it as a question, but Gwen answered me as if I had.

  “No, you didn’t. That’s not one of your powers. Well, not yet.” Gwen looked at me and smiled.

  I looked to Silas, and he was grinning back at me. I felt completely at ease, despite my earlier confusion about my reunion with them. Considering the last time, I had really been with them, I was a newborn baby. That wasn’t exactly something I remembered.

  “Where are we?” I looked at the rock walls of the cave.

  “My family owned this place a very long time ago. Not far from this cave is the house and grounds. Now, it’s yours,” she said, and I tipped my head in confusion.

  “It’s where we must go for you to learn who you really are,” Silas said as he cornered the table and sat with us on the sofa.
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br />   I stood, amazed the couch and coffee table were there, in the new place. As I walked to the entrance of the cave, my parents followed me. To the left was a large stream that led into a larger body of water. There was a beach, and large driftwood farthest from the water. To the right was a small hill that led up to a line of trees.

  I looked back at my parents and they both nodded. As I climbed the hill, I swore I could feel the cold, wet earth beneath my feet. The moss felt cool when I touched one of the trees it covered. At the top of the hill, the trees were sparse, lining the embankment. On the other side of them was a fence made out of logs–the kind I’d always seen on television, on farms. I lifted my foot to the first rung and hoisted myself up and over the second. Dropping down in the grass, I could tell it had rained recently. The ground still pooled with water wherever my feet touched it.

  Looking up, I saw the house. It was off to the left. At the end of a long driveway, on the right, was a tall cast iron gate. It stood wide open. It looked old and rusted, like it wouldn’t have budged if someone had tried to close it. Further inspection showed a small village tucked beyond the gate. I could see an old stone wall. It was half the height of any wall I’d ever seen and wrapped around the other side of the village.

  “What is this place? Who lived here?” I asked, looking back to see my parents hadn’t followed me.

  I spun around, scared that I had been left there, alone and in a strange place. Then I saw them. My mother and father were walking into the large plantation house. It sat directly in the middle of the large property line.

  I closed my eyes, and when they opened, I was standing next to them inside the house. I stomped up to my mother. “Why are we here? Who lived in this place?”

  “This is where it all started. My grandmother gave me this gift. One gift to hold for her, and for you. I have something Sabina wants, but she can never have.” Gwen turned to Silas and then back to me.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “This.” She motioned around the house. “This property is where Seraphina Crawford started on her crusade, when she became someone that everyone feared. All but two people, her dearest friends. This is where you’ll find all the answers about who you are. Sabina knows about this place, but has no idea where it is.”

  Silas touched his wife’s face and kissed her cheek, then he turned to me. “Don’t get scared. It’s not a prophecy, you-have-to-save-the-world, kind of thing.” He smiled again and the uneasy feeling, which had washed over me, dissipated.

  “Why do I have a feeling it’s similar?” I crossed my arms in a definite five-year-old fashion, complete with foot tap.

  “Well, it’s not," my mother spoke to me. “Your great-grandmother started her path as a young uneducated witch. Her parents were too involved with the humans. They lived by the rules of the human world in an attempt to fit in. When the wars came, they let themselves be slaughtered along with the humans.” Gwen told the story with ease. Eventually, my temper sated.

  “She killed a lot of people. She was mad at her parents and the rest of the adults for leaving a bunch of children behind to fend for themselves without being taught how. They had all these gifts from the mother goddess. Seraphina felt they should have been used to defend themselves. So, she stepped up to defend two very important people,” she continued, but Silas cut her off.

  “One important person, at that time. The other she had no idea would become important at all,” he said.

  “Who were they?” My interest was piqued.

  Silas came around to stand next to me, placed his arm around my shoulder, and flooded me with more information. “One, the important one, was Chadwick’s great-grandfather. Magnus Chadwick Crain.”

  “That’s where Chadwick comes from? He never told me.” I let a small giggle escape me. Then, remembering what he said, turned back to Silas. “His great-grandfather and my grandmother were close?” I felt a bubble of fear fill my throat. I thought I’d choke on it until my mother continued. It was her turn to wrap an arm around me, and Silas withdrew to the staircase we had been standing in front of.

  “They were very close. Some could say if they were any closer, it would not do for you and Chad to be so close.” She must have seen the look in my eyes because she added quickly, “But no, they were not that close. No worries.”

  I could feel my expression change and they both smiled at me. I didn’t think it was particularly funny. What would I have done had I found out I was dating someone I may have been related to? I supposed I’d just be thankful we hadn’t slept together yet. With everything else going wrong around us, I had never even considered that a possibility. Suddenly, I felt odd discussing my relationship with them. I hadn’t even gotten a chance to get used to them being back from the dead, let alone have "the talk" with them.

  “Okay, so other than scare the crap outta me, why are you telling me this? How was what Seraphina did significant to who I am?” I let too much frustration escape my mouth. I wasn’t intentionally pushing, but I really didn’t know how to act.

  “Elyse, I know this is a lot, and that we haven’t even had a chance to connect as family.” I could tell Gwen was about to give her first motherly speech. “However, this is more important than all of that. For that stuff, we have time. For this, we might not. I know what Sabina is after. I know, now more than ever, that she will stop at nothing to get it. So please, just bear with us.”

  “Okay,” I said with an eye roll. Then it was official. We had started to connect as mother and daughter. Nothing said mother-child disagreement more than an eye roll. My father stood in the background, smirking. When my mother turned to look at him, he raised his head and turned the other way.

  The interaction was so normal that it brought me back to how Helen and Michael had goaded each other in much the same way. The teasing and background comments I suspected all happy couples did. Michael had always said it was just another way they enjoyed each other. Seeing my birth parents act in that way made me realize I may have had a similar upbringing with them as I had with my adopted family. My heart felt heavy with the realization of it; sad for all the time we had lost to be together.

  “As I was saying”–she turned back to me, leaving Silas alone to his joke–“Magnus was a very close friend to Seraphina. Has Chester or Chad spoken to you about the first shifter-witch?”

  “Darling, with everything going on in such a short time, I doubt either of them thought to.” Silas turned back to us.

  “No, I don’t think so. I have been reading the family Book of Shadows. It spoke about preternaturals, but nothing about the first,” I said.

  “No, it wouldn’t. You wouldn’t have read about it anywhere. Our shifters are nothing like the preternaturals of the Council. Those are feral beasts; humans forced into service by the Council to serve as their watch dogs.” The look in her eyes as she spoke was dark. Her soft features hardened and her tone was rigid. I could tell she disliked the beasts she spoke of. “Humans shouldn’t be used that way, or any way, for that matter. That’s what started the burnings.”

  “Gwen, we don’t have much time.” Silas started looking around the foyer as if he was expecting we would be attacked at any moment.

  “You're right, for once.” Her light demeanor returned. “The first shifter-witch came to be when the Council sent their beasts after Seraphina and her people. They attacked them after they stole the immortal book.”

  “The books that were divided between the two families?” I asked.

  “Yes. See, you’ve learned some.” She smiled at me as Helen would when I brought home an A on a test. The proud look of a mother. I felt more at ease with her then. I could almost see my own reflection in her face. “Seraphina had only taken one of the books.” She started to explain more. “When a preternatural bites a witch, the result is death. Well, Magnus was one of those that were bitten.”

  In the short time we had been on memory lane–or maybe a history lesson was a better suited description–I’d seen he
r expressions change more than Crystal’s ever had while shopping the end-of-summer sales.

  “So, Seraphina intervened. I heard about the moon magic,” I told her.

  “Yes, she used the magic of the moon. It was a spell the mother goddess had guided her towards when she needed it. The Council was upset at that, of course, but the end result was that those bitten hadn’t died. Instead, they had become the shifters you know of now. Chester, Chad, and Matt. Each of them are descendant from the first set of shifter-witches. More became necessary towards the end of Seraphina’s battle with the Council.”

  Silas walked back over to us. He still looked around as if he were expecting company. “Do we have to stay here for this? I don’t like being here this way. We're vulnerable.”

  My head snapped up. “Isn’t this a vision quest or something?”

  “No, we're really here in our minds. When we travel like this, we have no use of our magic. Others can sense us, though, and that makes us vulnerable,” he explained.

  I looked down and my bracelet hissed. Apparently, my little friend didn’t count. I lifted my right hand and a blue light enveloped around it. “Mine seems to be working. Are you sure about that?”

  “Okay, so we're not all vulnerable. But still…” he begged Gwen.

  “Fine, release us.”

  The air around us began to move. I don’t remember blinking, but one minute we were standing in an old house, and the next we were back in their house in Dublin. I heard the familiar sounds of my friends down on the first level of the cabin and smelled the leftover breakfast. The night disappeared while we were away. I remembered sitting upright on the sofa when we had left, but I was standing over by the small bathroom when we returned.