Suddenly Keanu towered over him looking down. "Everything okay kid? Problems with Arielle?"
“It’s over," Gregory shrugged standing up.
"Did she give you the boot, kid?" giving him an encouraging pat on the shoulder, “women, that’s how they are, don’t let it bug you. They are all the same."
Gregory shook his head sadly, "No you're wrong, and it’s not what you are thinking. She wanted to come to Sicily rushing to my aid. I had to stop her somehow, and that’s why I broke up with her. I didn’t want her to take unnecessary risks, and you were right, love is a weakness, it has become clear to me now. It does make us vulnerable." Keanu looked at him and raised his eyebrows, "Kiddo you're an idiot!" Gregory sighed, "I know," he said staring at the ground.
”As a matter of fact, I was wrong. What I’ve told you was an incredible nonsense just because I had some bad experiences with Giada, Gregory," it was the first time that Keanu addressed him by his name and not kid or any other appraising expression. "Love is never weak. Love is the strongest feeling there is and makes the impossible possible. Strictly speaking, everything there is in this world is either based on love or hate. Light or darkness and from love comes hope. What are we without hope?" he patted his shoulder again, "remember this, love is a strength. Think about that for a minute."
Gregory rolled his eyes, "Thanks for the constructive words Dad, I feel much better already. Why didn’t you tell me that from the beginning?" He got up and followed Keanu behind the house to the training area. "What's done is done and can’t be undone. The words that have been spoken can’t be taken back. They are in the past, and the past is over. You have to focus on the here and now. We must summon the Elements to unite Jamiro and Aaliyah, so that they’ll show us the way to the amulet that will guarantee us to have the Milan on our side." Gregory didn’t look particularly motivated, "I don’t know if I’ll manage to do that tonight, I just feel a little down." "Nonsense," Keanu snapped unfriendly, "You should have thought about that before breaking up with her to sink into a depression. We don’t need any wimp but a warrior who is focused on his task. The good thing about your situation is that you don’t have to worry about any girl at all, as you don’t have a girl anymore. Now that you're free as a bird. An eagle gliding through the air."
"Or a lonely bear all by himself in his cave, alone and sad."
"For all I care, then be a bear, whatever! Come on and pull yourself together, it is already getting dark."
Gregory tried to focus, but he didn’t succeed. What had he been thinking? He wanted to call her with every fiber of his heart and tell her that he was an idiot and that he didn’t mean a word he said. To ask her to forgive him, but he couldn’t, Keanu wouldn’t let him out of sight. Not tonight, not during the blood moon.
Finally, he managed to gather his thoughts somehow. One by one, he summoned the elements, the moon stood big and bright in the sky un-obscured. A whirlwind circled around the large white house on the cliffs, followed by thunder and lightning. Hurricane like rain pattered down from the sky, leaves and needles of the surrounding trees danced through the air and four fires, one on each side of the house were burning blazing away into the air. In the middle of this scenario, Gregory was standing on the back porch motionless. His eyes open fixed on the moon, he lowered his arms, like a statue. Keanu was standing diagonally behind him, watching the dark scenery lit only by the moon argus-eyed.
Suddenly two dark figures rose from the ground scurrying down to the lake. The silhouettes of the two were clearly visible and remained motionless in front of a particularly large, trumpet-shaped flower. Then a shadow slowly pushed over the moon, making it look like a large blood orange. Gregory's element spectacle died at a stroke. It was dark and windless at once, and very spooky. Then the moon was completely covered and disappeared. The night was now pitch black. An eerie silence prevailed and lasted, as it seemed for an eternity. Keanu and Gregory looked at each other uncertain. Suddenly there was a deafening clang and every window of the house shattered. The broken glass shot about like arrows looking for a target. Keanu tore Gregory wittily to the ground. They lay for several minutes, on the ground, holding their breath with their arms protectively over their heads, the haunting went on for quite a while and stopped when the moonlight was seen back in the night sky.
Keanu got to his feet first and hurried armed with a flashlight to the spot where he had last seen the two shadows. When he got to the trumpet-shaped flower, with the flashlight between his teeth, he began to dig with his bare hands into the ground. Gregory was still slightly dazed and staggered forward precariously behind Keanu. When he got there, Keanu held a silver amulet in the air triumphantly. The four gems glittered brightly in the moonlight.
Boozing up
Leyla was devastated. Never in a lifetime would she have guessed that Gregory could dump her like that. Sure thing, he was in a difficult situation, but still she didn't get it. Why did he have to dump her over the phone? Telling her stupid stuff, such as love was weakness blah, blah, blah. She couldn’t help feeling like a piece of trash. She was well aware that she was doing him wrong and that there were probably other reasons behind his behavior than callousness but still, she wasn’t able to think straight at the time. Now she needed some time to lick her wounds and dive into her sadness. She turned the sign on her door from 'welcome'” to 'one step closer and you're dead', not being entirely sure whether this would keep Shannon away. Her uncle had finally left yesterday. After all, he had a job back home, but Shannon seemed to have all the time in the world to look for her lost son.
Leyla snorted and lay down on her bed with her arms crossed behind her head. She stared up to the ceiling as if she would find the answer to her problems up there. She put on her headphones and listened to the same sad song in repeat mode. The song was called 'Stitches' and told a tale about a failed relationship. Actually it was about being dumped in a mean way and having a broken heart. Needing stitches so that life could go on nailed it right now. After some time, she moved on to a different song about the Aftertaste of a failed relationship, which praised all the positive issues of the dumped party. With a warning, that he or she could never be replaced for good. After several hours during which she had wallowed in desperation like a pig in the mud, she decided to seek advice from Brooklyn, she texted her that she absolutely needed her help, since she really was in some crappy situation. About fifteen minutes later Mila stood in front of her, "Hey, kid, that warning at your door is really hearth warming,” then she saw Leyla's tear stroke face, ''what happened, is something wrong with Gregory? Is he hurt or dead? Damn it answer me!" Leyla blinked a few times and took a breath before she answered, "Where is Brooklyn?"
"She’ll be coming soon enough; she has to do some ridiculous shit for her mother first. Putting her hair up in curlers or something stupid like that. What's wrong?"
"Gregory has dumped me!" Mila was flabbergasted, as she hadn’t actually expected something like that, wide-eyed she looked bewildered at Leyla, "What?” Leyla shrugged unhappy not giving any further comment. She just stared dimly in front of herself. Mila plunked herself on a gray sofa in Leyla's room, "I can’t believe this, and I even worried that he was hurt or even dead. Now I am after that idiot's blood myself. What a huge ass!" Leyla sniffed again.
There, was a knock on the door and Brooklyn entered the room. She looked as if she came straight from the catwalk. She wore a purple sheath dress and high-heeled black shoes. The contrast to Mila’s combat outfit and Leyla’s sweatpants couldn’t have been bigger. "Sorry girls, I couldn’t come any sooner, I was with my parents in an art gallery, and my Dad is sponsoring an artist, a so-called rising star." Mila rolled her eyes. In Mila's opinion, art was an absolute waste of time. She was a total lowbrow. "What happened, what’s the crisis?" Mila snapped at her, "This ass has dumped Leyla!" Brooklyn was confused. Sometimes, Mila was hard to bear. "What an ass? Who are you talking about? I don’t get it"
"With how many dudes has she got something
going on? Gregory, that idiot! Who the hell could dump her otherwise, genius?" Leyla broke into tears, grabbed her heart shaped pillow, burying her face in it. Brooklyn seemed to understand slowly what was going on. "God, sweetie I'm so sorry," She groped for words, "Did he text you on Whats App, or call you, or did you two have a fight over the phone?" Leyla didn’t say anything and Brooklyn got angry, "I never thought that Gregory could be such an insensitive disgusting creep." Leyla sobbed, "He says love is weakness and he didn't need love to complicate his life and other awful stuff."
Brooklyn and Mila looked at each other tellingly. The situation called out for distraction, because he sure as hell couldn’t be serious. Brooklyn sat next to Leyla on her bed putting a comforting arm around her shoulders, "Guys are sometimes so dramatic, and they say that girls are drama queens. Luckily, I brought something to take the heartache away," she pulled a bottle of sparkling wine out of her oversized shoulder bag, "Ta-da!" Mila turned up her nose, "Geeze get away with this high society crap." Brooklyn snapped, slightly annoyed she roamed around inside her bag again, "For the hard worker among us, I naturally brought along some beer," she took several cans of beer from her bag. Mila nodded approvingly, "incredible what’s in this dinky innocent bag," she grinned, and took a cigarette case from her bag, "I also brought something that’ll help you gather your thoughts and lead them in a different direction, or should I say help to ease the pain." "Forget it, I don’t smoke," Brooklyn shook her head disapprovingly. "Do not be so stuffy Brooklyn," Mila retorted.
Leyla was amazed, the two of them seemed to have completely forgotten what this was all about, disputing whether to get high on alcohol or smoking pot. She needed neither beer nor pot. She cleared her throat loudly, "Umm, hmm, folks. Gregory has dumped me today; did you get that? Isn’t there anything else coming to your mind other than disputing whether we should get high drinking alcohol or smoking pot. Are you out of your minds?" Both of them stopped arguing immediately looking at her. Brooklyn hugged her, “Sweetie, that's exactly the point. You need some distraction right now and then we will run the creep down so that his ears are ringing." Mila sat down to hug both, "Yeah come on, group hug, and we will show it to all the creeps in the world." Leyla tried to break out of the embrace, "He is not a creep, he's just … ," she searched for words. "a guy and they simply tick different." Mila ended her sentence. Leyla nodded miserably, "You are probably right."
"Speaking of guys, how is it going with Shane? If you continue at this speed, you'll die a nun Mila," Brooklyn said laughing. “Shut up. It's about Leyla not me today." Mila turned to Leyla, "So now tell me how did it happen? What made Gregory dare breaking up with you?" Leyla shrugged, "I honestly don’t know, recently we spoke often on the phone and exchanged pictures. Everything seemed to be ok. Even lately, we did something that one would maybe call phone sex or at least sexting, or whatever they call it." She rocked her head thinking about their conversation and his topless picture and smiled to herself, "What are you telling us you perverted little thing?" Brooklyn frowned irritated, lifting one brow, "Well, it was no big deal. He is far away and we haven't seen each other for ages, so we fooled around a bit, that was all."
"So, I think you are trying to tell us that you think emotionally everything was ok and that he hasn’t met any hot Italian girl," Mila said opening a beer can with a loud hiss. Leyla looked confused, "Crap, I haven’t even thought about that possibility, I rather thought that he wanted to protect me and it had to do with his task. You're right, the story gets an entirely new perspective, if you look at it that way. I am an idiot," she grabbed Mila’s can and took a big gulp.
"For the first time in my life I feel that I really should get drunk, this guy is my downfall. I don’t know what to believe anymore." Brooklyn shook her head, "Forget it, he definitely has got no other girl, he has too many problems going on and believe me, he was crazy about you. I could tell, trust me." Leyla looked at her defiantly, “Whatever, I'll get completely wasted tonight to get him out of my head and my heart at least for tonight. Give me some of that sparkling stuff. With this low power beer, it’ll take too long to get his image to disappear from in front of my eyes and to get his face out of my brain" Brooklyn stared at her in surprise, "Wow, who are you and what have you done with Leyla."
"Oh shut up and give me that bubbly stuff." Brooklyn handed her the bottle shrugging. Mila laughed fumbling for her cigarette case.
Gary’s Best
Gabe felt invincible. He had manipulated this damn baseball and got away with it. Without him, the Blue Jays would have clearly lost the game. He practically helped them to their victory. Not noticed by anyone, they were all so eager that their home team had won, that they didn’t see clearly anymore. A ball like that nobody would be able to get, not even Jose Bautista. Without Gabe's help and a well-aimed blast of wind, the game would have been lost. It would have been over. The opposing team had apparently been aware, that something was wrong and protested after the game, but without any success. So, the Blue Jays owed today's victory to his ability to control the elements. He grinned to himself. It had undoubtedly been a brilliant move, and he made a fortune betting on the Jays today. So his dad could go to hell telling him that he had no strategy and got carried away by emotions. What he was capable of, his old man had no clue. He knew nothing about him. With Gary at his side, he was unstoppable. First, Gary was a sly asshole and second he had the best stuff there was. It had been Gary to give him the idea of manipulating the ball and bet on the Jays. Shit, he had made a small fortune even when he deducted the ten percent he promised Gary. Money was no issue anymore, and he didn’t even need his stupid father. He could start a business on his own anytime. No, the old geezer didn’t know a thing about him. He was the real leader of the Vultures, and he didn’t need any damn permission. On the contrary, maybe it was time to break the rules, stand up against him to claim his birthright and take his old man off the streets.
He certainly had it coming after all he had done to his mother. It was time that he ruled the Vultures. Gabe sank into a dark hole, whenever he remembered his beautiful mother, who had died in a car accident some time ago. The circumstances of her death mildly speaking were mysterious. Anyway, they had previously sent him to some boarding school. She appeared surprising him at the school a few weeks before she died. The purpose of her visit was to tell him that she would get a divorce from his father because she could no longer bear his cruelty. She head over heels had met someone and wanted to leave Carmine. Gabe never met the man. There hadn’t been enough time because the two of them had this horrible accident shortly after that and neither of them survived. Gabe was convinced that his father was behind it and that it was not an accident. Because he would never let go of his mother like that, she was his jewel, his puppet. Although Carmine had acted as a grieving widower at the funeral and cried his eyes off, Gabe knew better, his father was a damn good actor. Gabe loved his mother. She was the only person he really cared about. She had been gentle and loving trying to fulfill every wish, he ever had. She had spoiled him blind, only seeing the best in him. She had been so proud of him, and now she was dead. This Ana and her mother made such a fuss because Carmine hadn’t been a part of Ana's life and didn’t support her financially. They should have been glad that he left them alone, at least they had their freedom, and Ana's mother was still alive. Yes, Gabe smiled, he thought that it was time for Carmine to step back for once and all time.
Who knew, an accident had the possibility of happening to him, or if it could be possible to arrange. After all, Gary was quite a handy man when it came to cars. To loosen or cut a brake cable partly, should not cause any major difficulties. He grinned and picked up the phone, "Hey Dad. Do you want to go on a trip with me? We could go to our cottage at Lake Simcoe this weekend as we planned some time ago?
You, would like to go fishing? No problem. I'm glad we finally have a weekend for just the two of us. See you then," grinning he hung up the phone. It looked as if he didn’t even need Gary's
mechanical skills nor any magical abilities that could be dangerous. No, Gary's pills and a canteen would be enough. The boat might tilt, or some Akandos could attack them. He had not yet decided, but one thing was sure his old man would bite the dust this weekend, and if necessary he would find someone to be blamed, like the Akandos. It came in quite handy because the Vultures needed a little kick of motivations to follow him to Sicily and if their boss weren't around anymore, they would be furious and ready for the battle. Exactly how he needed them, to come along with him and kill the Savior.
They finally needed to understand that the Savior had to die, even if the Akandos in Canada were not in immediate danger and would survive. Still according to the Legend, they all lost their powers. There were always doubters among the Vultures, and not everyone was eager to follow him unconditionally. Above all, his new opponent, Greyson, who still had a crush on this bitch Leyla. She had something going on with Gregory before he disappeared. He was sure about that, and he couldn’t understand why Greyson couldn’t leave her alone. What was so damn special about this chick, he didn’t get it. Greyson needed urgently to decide where his loyalties lay. Otherwise, he wouldn’t be needed any longer, and it was possible he would end up as fish feed as well. It was quite a brilliant plan, which would bring Gabe to the top of the Vultures. Still another thing bothered him. Gary knew excessive information, and maybe someday that became a problem, as Gary was a greedy fellow. He shrugged, it would be soon enough to think about it when things got out of hands. He would find a solution when time came, and he needed to.
Elementary Virtue: The Prophecy Page 18