Al felt the little prickling needles in his skin that he always got when he cast a spell as the power of his Guardian surged through him. Blinding light blasted out of his hands as the creature came with only a hairs width of his skin. The deadly creature reeled back as it shrieked in pain. Al looked at it astonished, as if he couldn’t believe his plan had actually worked. The giant snake reeled away from the light, and when Al noticed this, he hoped out of bed and ran towards the creature, hands still alight with the holy light. The beast thrashed out as he neared, but Al held his hands out closer to it, burning the creature with its light. Al pressed his hands hard on the creature, and though it was solid and felt like a snake’s skin, he could feel the wisps of shadows licking his hands as they disappeared.
The creature’s shrieks were blood curdling and maddening at best, but Al stood his ground. Light began to peek out from inside it’s body as it’s cries grew louder, and the red glow of its eyes were replaced by rays of light bursting through its skull. And then, all at once, the creature burst into little wisps of disappearing smoke and ash. Dazed and astonished, Al put a hand to his head, brushing his long black bangs out of the way to look around with his now wide brown eyes. He let out a sigh as he saw that there were no traces of it left, and he collapsed on his bed. The power of his Guardian still rushed through his veins, though the light had dispersed from his hands when the creature was killed.
“I just defeated something all by myself using my Guardian’s wonderful power,” Al chuckled as he reflected his first victory. “Who could’ve predicted that to happen? I want to see any one of my brothers try to do that.” Suddenly, Al’s breath caught in his throat. If he was attacked, who’s to say that the others weren’t attacked by shape shifting shadow smoke as well?
With a rush, Al darted out of his bed and to his door, throwing a hand on the cold metal. He jiggled the handle, but to his horror, it was locked from the outside. Scowling at his stupidity, he hit his head on the door lightly, which gave him another idea. Al took a few steps back and examined the door, hoping it wasn’t as hard as it looked. With a deep breath, Al charged towards the door. The frame rattled as he rammed it and loosened a tad, but did not open, to Al’s disappointment. He repeated it three more times, even though his shoulder was beginning to ache, and finally the door swung open, letting Al rush into the hallway. The sound of muffled screaming caught his ear, and he ran to the door it came from.
He tried opening it, but found once again it was locked. With a curse that was out of character for him, he rammed against the door with all his might.
Oblivious to the sounds coming from the hallway, Vaze clutched Scarlet closer as she kissed him. He was so happy and full of joy, he could have thought it was just a dream, if Scarlet hadn’t felt so real. Everything about her felt real, the touch of her lips, the texture of her hair, the heat of her body, even the way she smelled was exactly the same. Her arms were laced across his neck and he held her head with one hand while the other rested on her back. He didn’t even notice when her hand slid onto the hilt of the dagger beneath his pillow.
“The only thing I could think about in that horrible place was you Vaze,” Scarlet whispered into his ear, and the sweet sound of her voice made chills go down his spine. But what she said made him stop for a moment.
“Only of me?” he repeated, hardly more than a whisper. Scarlet looked at him with her gorgeous grey eyes and smiled.
“Yes, I never thought of anything else.” Scarlet moved her head to kiss Vaze more, but he held her back.
“What about your brothers?” Vaze asked with his hands on her shoulders. “Didn’t you think about them?”
“How could I, when I’m in love with someone as amazing as you?” She bent her neck closer and kissed him again, but Vaze was still staring wide eyed, even when her lips were on his. He pushed her away.
“Did you go mad?” he asked, now on edge with suspicion. “Were you tortured until your mind couldn’t bear it?” Scarlet looked at him in disappointment and confusion.
“No, I’m perfectly sane.” She drifted closer to him with one hand still remaining under the pillow. “Vaze, what’s wrong?” He didn’t seem to hear her as his mind was flooding with questions and doubts. He could feel his heart throbbing in his ears like a drum, and the sounds outside his door were lost to him.
With one last desperate slam against the door, the wood splintered as it broke open jaggedly, and Al jumped inside. The first thing he saw was Siren bound to her bed by vines, thrashing and trying to escape desperately. Whenever it looked like she could free herself, the vines tightened, and before his eyes Al could see they were crushing the life out of the little Guardian. The tiny wisps of black smoke coming off the vines were all the reassurance Al needed to know this was the same kind of creature that had attacked him only moments before.
“Da mihi lumen!” Al shouted the spell as he aimed his hands at the beast. It shrieked as the light touched it, and released Siren from her bounds, drifting to the far corner of the room as the black smoke now formed into something else. Siren gasped for breath as she saw Al jolt across the room at the half formed beast. It was already starting to take the form of a soldier and it was forming rapidly, but Al was quicker. Before the smoke could become entirely solid, Al shoved his hands into the heart of the forming soldier. An inhuman shriek cut through the air as the beast exploded in light, leaving nothing behind but a few wisps of smoke. Without pausing to be pleased in his work, Al went back to Siren.
“Are you all right?” he asked. Siren looked at him in amazement. He did not look like the child he was when he left on the journey with Scarlet. He looked more like a man, and on top of that, a fighter.
“I’m fine,” she replied as she grabbed for her sword. In reality, her bones and body ached from being squeezed and restrained like that, but she would manage just fine. “Where are the others?”
“In their rooms, I think. You were the first one I heard who had been attacked besides myself.” Siren burst out of her bed and bolted to the broken door way.
“We probably weren’t the only ones,” She said as she brandished her sword in hand. “Go and get Vaze, I’ll get Yuki.”
“But what about my master?” Al was worried for him because he was the closest thing to a father Al had ever had. Siren turned her head back to him and smirked.
“I’m not worried about Gidian one bit,” she said with a sly smile. “If you can do that, what do you think the man who trained you can do?” Without waiting for a response from Al, Siren bolted down the hall to Yuki’s room. Noticing he was wasting time, Al did the same and ran to Vaze’s door. He didn’t even bother checking if it was locked this time before he threw himself against the door.
“Vaze, are you alright?” Scarlet asked again, this time catching his attention. She stroked his cheek with one hand, but he slapped it away.
“Get away from me,” he hissed. He couldn’t believe he had been so stupid.
“Vaze, what are you saying? It’s me, Scarlet.” Vaze would not be fooled again.
“You are not Scarlet,” he growled, and even he had to admit his words could make venom seem harmless. “And it was a foul trick for you to pose as her.” For a moment Scarlet looked hurt. That moment was gone almost as quick as it came. Her mouth twisted into a devilish grin as her hand tightened around the dagger.
“Took you long enough, you brain dead buffoon,” the Scarlet imposter said still with Scarlet’s voice. There was a bang against the door, and Vaze’s eyes shot to it. In the moment he wasn’t paying attention, the Scarlet imposter yanked the dagger out from under his pillow and brought it down in a viscous ark. Slightly dazed, Vaze caught her wrists just as the tip of the blade was an inch from his bare neck.
He struggled to force her back, and the dagger hovered dangerously close to his neck. She was stronger than an average human, and it was difficult to keep her from slicing his neck open. There was another bang on the door again, but this time the door started to
crack and splinter. The imposter shot a look at the door and hissed, then looked back at Vaze. The beautiful grey eyes it had copied before were gone, and instead of eyes at all the sockets glowed red like a dying flame.
“I am going to finish what my master told me to do before I’m sent back into the black of nothingness, in which I will have the pleasuring thought that I sent you back to your dreadful God.” The thing’s voice was inhuman, and came out more as hisses and shrieking than words as the imposter shoved the blade closer to his throat. Vaze struggled under the pressure, his muscles straining.
At the same time, in Kyra’s room, Matilda was oblivious to the commotion outside the door. She was too busy thinking of all the ways to kill Kyra, whether she should paralyze her and kill her slowly, or if she should just kill her quickly. She was leaning more towards enchanting her into stabbing herself to death. Deciding on a slow and inevitable death, Matilda poised the dagger a bit above Kyra’s heart, intending to stab then slowly rip down into her heart, little by little.
Resting by the foot of the bed, Gidian’s eyes fluttered open slowly. His back ached from sleeping on the hard floor for so long, and for a minute he didn’t remember where he was or why he was there. His memory came back to him quickly and he cringed, hoping Kyra wasn’t awake to find him on the floor of her room. He didn’t want her to think he was a pervert and was watching her sleep, because he knew that wouldn’t end well at all. He started to inch his way up, until he saw a shadowy figure standing beside the bed. The light prevented him from seeing her face, and for a moment he thought it was Kyra. He stopped and tried to hide himself, but then saw a faint of metal in the moonlight. He looked back to the bed and saw Kyra’s peaceful sleeping face and his heart almost leapt out of his throat. Unable to think of a spell, he lunged at the intruder, and the dagger flew out of their hand as he made contact and cluttered to the floor.
For a second, Siren almost thought nothing was wrong in Yuki’s room. She found the wolf girl awake crying tears of joy and clutching something to her chest, and when Siren had burst through the door, she showed her the baby in her arms. It was a beautiful little boy, but the second it looked at Siren things went sour.
The baby’s big brown eyes turned into hollow sockets that glowed red and it hissed at Siren. Yuki stared at it in horror as its little body grew into an enormous copy of a Blood Wolf. It snatched Yuki in one giant hand and roared at Siren. Siren swore under her breath and pointed the tip of her enormous long sword at the shadow beast. The power the Healer had given her prickled all over her body, eager to be released. Even for a Guardian, Siren’s power was unique. She had the power of Holy Light, which given the situation, could give her nearly infinite power. It had been a long time since she had even tapped into the power, but it was as natural to her as breathing. Her heart pounded in her chest as white light began to shine from within her, illuminating the room.
“Being of the damned,” she said as her eyes began to change from her own to sockets spewing angry white light. “In the name of my holy Lord and Creator, I shall send you to the depths of hell where you shall be burned by flames in unrelenting darkness for eternity!” The Holy Light engulfed her sword and made it a beacon of light in the dark room. The creature drew back from her and released Yuki as it tried to get away from the small Guardian.
Yuki stared at Siren in amazement. She looked like an avenging angel sent by the Healer, which wasn’t too far off at all. Siren lunged at the beast and sliced through it as if it were paper. It howled in pain as it burst apart into tiny wisps of smoke and light. When it was gone Siren turned back at Yuki, and smiled. The light faded out of her as she walked back to the wolf girl.
“Are you alright?” Siren asked as if nothing happened. Yuki nodded in amazement. Siren smiled again and turned away from her towards the door. “Good, now we should help Al and Vaze before something bad happens.” She walked towards the door confidently, but then stopped abruptly, and collapsed. Yuki scrambled over to her.
“Siren, what’s the matter?” Yuki put a hand on her, and drew it back quickly. Her skin was cold, and she shook violently.
“No, not now,” Siren whispered, fear apparent in her voice. “Not when they need me.”
Not knowing what to do, Yuki snatched the blanket off of her bed and wrapped Siren in it in hopes of warming her up. Siren was swearing silently but colorfully. She had not expected lack of strength in the body she had would cause this condition. Madam Gale had warned her not to use her power while still in the form of a child, and it seemed her prediction of an aftershock had come true. At the same time, neither of them noticed the other smoke creature gliding into the room. It had been assigned to attack Gidian, but it had not found him in his room, and decided with all the commotion going on to find someone else to kill. It had picked out these two, since the Guardian was weak and the wolf girl was hardly a threat while she was incapacitated. It had already picked up on the small Guardian’s greatest enemy and was already beginning to form behind the open door. It would only be a matter of time before their blood would stain the walls, and their bodies became a meal for the beast. If the beast had had an actual mouth, it would be drooling at the thought.
With one last desperate attempt, Al threw himself at the door, and it burst open unexpectedly, causing him to fall into the small pile of splintered wood. Dots of blood appeared on his skin as he grazed the sharp splintered wood, but he hardly noticed. He shot his head up and searched the room, only to gape in amazement. Scarlet was on top of Vaze on the bed, trying to skewer him with a dagger.
Vaze saw Al and let out a sigh of relief that he would have help. He shot a look of victory up at the imposter, but instead his heart almost burst. The imposter once again was wearing Scarlet’s eyes, and the look on her face matched one of Scarlet in rage perfectly.
“Scarlet?” Al yelped in shock. “What are you doing?” The imposter turned her face to him.
“What does it look like?” she snapped in a perfect impression of Scarlet. “This pervert tried to sleep with me! I’m going to stick you like the damned pig you are Vaze!” Vaze shot a look at Al, pleading him to see the truth, but he just stared in disgust.
“You pig!” Al shouted at him as he got up and made his way over to them. “I trusted you! I thought we were friends! What kind of a friend tries to sleep with his friend’s sister!”
“Al, I didn’t,” Vaze struggled to look at him and keep the imposter from killing him at the same time, and trying to speak made it even harder. “Do you really think I’d try to do that? You’ve got to trust me!”
“That’s a load of crap!” the fake Scarlet screamed with her eyes flaring with hatred. “Al, who’re you going to believe, a lying pig or your own flesh and blood?”
“Save the lies for someone who cares.” Al’s voice came out as a quivering hiss, and Vaze couldn’t see his face at all. The blade began to hover closer to his neck, and Vaze started to think this might be the one time he wouldn’t escape alive. Rather than look at the imposter when death took him, Vaze closed his eyes and imagined the real Scarlet, smiling and laughing. At the very least, he wanted her to be the last image burned onto the inside of his eyelids.
“Da mihi lumen!”
There was a crash against the wall accompanied by an inhuman shriek, and the pressure over Vaze disappeared as bright light turned the black from behind his eyelids red. He opened them, and, to his surprise, found Al pinning the imposter by her face against the wall with his hands seeping sunlight out of his palms. The imposter’s skin melted away and was replaced by shadowy smoke.
“Go back to the hell hole you crawled out of!” Al’s eyes were blazing with fury as he shoved his hand farther into the creature’s head, seeming to pass through the skin like structure entirely. With a loud pop, the creature burst into light and tiny wisps of smoke. Al released the light from his hands, and once again the moon was the only source of light in the room.
“Are you alright Vaze?” Al asked.
; “I’m fine,” he replied. “How did you know that she was a fake?”
“I saw Scarlet being taken away by a demon,” Al said quietly. “I know if she went willing to go like that for all of us, she wouldn’t risk coming back if she did escape, because she would know she might be putting us in danger. And the fake called me her flesh and blood. Scarlet knows better than anyone in my family that none of us are truly related to each other, and she would never call any one of us that.”
Gidian and the attacker hit the ground with a loud crash, and the attacker let out a gasp as Gidian knocked the wind out of them. As swiftly as he could, Gidian pinned the attacker down. The attacker struggled underneath him, but Gidian held fast. His attacker looked at him and immediately recoiled. Gidian’s cheeks flushed as he looked at the beautiful woman, whom at the moment he was man handling.
“I’m so sorry ma’am, I didn’t mean to,” Gidian stuttered as he got up off of her. She smiled at him in response.
“Don’t worry, it wouldn’t be the first time a man has thrown himself at me.” The woman’s voice was soft and flirty, which made Gidian flush again as she raised a hand to him. “Unfortunately, this will be the last time you throw yourself at anyone.” Gidian didn’t have time to react as the woman’s eyes flared from black to red, and her nails extended into sharp dagger-like claws that reached all the way over to him, piercing his flesh.
Gidian could only stare at her with wide disbelieving eyes as he felt the claws pierce deep into his flesh. His gaze shot to Kyra, whom still slept soundly in her bed. He opened his mouth to speak, but instead of words, Gidian coughed hoarsely, and blood splattered the woman’s spear like nails. He knew he had to do something fast, but he could only think of saving Kyra.
“Kyra,” he coughed up blood, but the words came out. “Wake up, Kyra!”
Playing With Fire Page 25