Preternatural (Worlds & Secrets)

by Lloyd Harry-Davis

  “That’s who’s been helping me. Right from when I was attacked at school to my suspicions. He’s my doppelganger. He looks just like me –”

  “We know what doppelganger means, A.J.,” Jade retorted. She seemed to become more and more unhinged by the minute.

  The fog was looming as we approached it guardedly. Eventually, we were face-to-face with him and they could all see the bizarre form that stood in front of them. He stood at the brink of the mist’s entrance whilst we remained outside it, staring back at him. Jade almost fainted at the mere sight of his face.

  “How come only A.J. has a doppelganger?” Jade wondered. He looked halfway back over his shoulder. We saw the fog suddenly darken and grow blacker. Then, we noticed the ghosts of Samhain, growing into the mist ahead like emerging shadows.

  “You see, we don’t leave,” the doppelganger spoke, his voice broken and raspier than usual.

  “So, you are a ghost?” I asked him. He shook his head with a tiny grin on his face.

  “I am much different. But that isn’t important at the moment. You need to get to the Caribbean whereabouts of this Realm,” he spoke.

  “But in the book it talks about it being in the Shadow Realm,” Robbie replied. For a moment, silence swept over us all as the ghosts and my doppelganger stared at Mychaela through the fog. She gently backed away and moved closer to us. Their eyes lingered away from her and back to Robbie who had asked the question.

  “The statement in the book was misleading. It was a hidden answer: the inside of the Cavern is much wider. It’s the interior of the Cavern that is linked to the Shadow Realm. Outside is just the same traversing point we are in now. Think of it this way: a jigsaw puzzle finding itself lost in another jigsaw pile. It’s there, but it doesn’t really belong there. It doesn’t fit.”

  “But even so, I might not be able to teleport us there; I don’t know what the place is like,” Jojo responded hesitantly. My doppelganger looked to his side and a wormhole much like the one which took us here slowly enlarged, shedding its mysterious half-light against our different-coloured eyes. We gulped.

  “And…how do we get out?” Mychaela asked. The doppelganger scoffed.

  “In that case – a coin is all you need,” he said. It made sense; that was how we always got out of here. We trotted towards the wormhole and traversed. I clutched my arms and gently glided through, now prepared for any evil I may face for the third time in two months.

  Tarmo’s breath was heavy in the dead silence. “Where are we now?”

  That was the perfect question to ask actually. None of us knew. We stood on a round patch of land covered with white sand, enough for us and more people to stand on. We were surrounded by a ring of vast amount of water and to top it off, a large cliff that stretched around this place walled us in. But we were, more or less, in a bowl surrounded by a vast amount of water in circumference.

  “Guys, look!” Tarmo pointed out, straight ahead of us. A thick crack, which seemed to run all the way down into the water, was dented into the face of the cliff facing us and was all that seemed visibly clear.

  “Is that it?” Mychaela asked.

  “I think so. We’ve found our doors,” Jade responded, shaken to her core.

  “But it’s so far down underneath all this water. I didn’t think people such as the Barons of Corlévati would be naïve enough to leave their reincarnation chamber vulnerable,” Jaden spoke.

  “It’s not,” Liam and Jordan spoke grimly. They looked at each other, unaware that the other was thinking the same thing.

  “Can you feel it too?” Liam asked. Jordan nodded worryingly. We looked at them, questioning their thoughts, as Liam bent down to pick up a pebble. He took a pace back and threw it with all his vim towards the Cavern’s crack. Before it could even reach a metre of the cliff’s radius, the outline of a large, transparent, circular force-field shone as the pebble disintegrated to dust with a loud crack. The force-field lost its visibility once more.

  “Incineration field,” Liam spoke.

  “It gains energy from the water – it’s spiritual. We clear the water, we disable the defences,” Jordan added.

  “How did you guys know?” Aemilia wondered.

  “I could feel it on my skin –”

  “I could smell it; there’s a type of smell energy has,” Jordan then quickly said.

  I turned to face the water, blocking us from the Cavern doors.

  “Let me handle it,” I spoke timidly as I stepped in front of the crowd. My hair shone a brighter blue than it was and for the first time, turned azure. My eyes glowed a static sapphire that seemed close to Liam’s. I began to throw my arms forward and around my shoulders like two rotating wheels. The water was being pushed in a series of waves that soon became tidal from the back of this bowl-like area. The water around this patch of land that prevented us from going anywhere was being rolled towards the cavern doors. I then slid my hands upwards, as if rubbing them against a wall. The water rushed up the cliff, like jets rapidly ascending, and finally stayed on the cliff’s brim like a blanket rolled over a bed.

  I closed my eyes and relaxed. We looked down from the edge of the patch. Except this was no patch of land. In fact it wasn’t even a patch. We were suspended on a vertical, upright, monumental rock, high off the ground. We seemed to be approximately twenty metres high. The ground further below was covered in swaying mist above a thin layer of fragmented human bones, skulls and gravel, but our eyes drifted from the ground to what lay a few metres ahead.

  There it was: the Cavern of Worlds. The large serrated crack in the cliff (that stretched all the way down before widening) was bordered with two large rocks, connected to the highest part of the cliff. The rocks were a grim grey and looked completely stiff and sturdy, etched in Celt marks covering their entire surface. Even from here, we could visibly see writing in a strange language carved into them. Everything felt ominous, even the silence. The invisibility of the incineration field had been disabled and we could now see the its semi-visible grey structure, projecting from the top of the long crack all the way down to cover its perimeter.

  “What does that say?” Aemilia asked curiously. Mychaela took a step forward.

  “I’ve studied the ancient history. I think I can make that out,” she said. But by then, Tammy had already figured out what it stated. She struggled to bring herself to recite what was in front of her. We noticed that some sort of trouble had found the pair as Mychaela’s eyes swiftly became perplexed and confused.

  “What? What does it say?” Jade asked.

  “Blackened skies and darkened blood will send them to their graves,

  Nightmares, grief and darkened skills shall meet them in the waves.

  His reign will end, the light will fail and the dark will clearly rise,

  But to stop the omen and complete the circle, they must surely die.

  We were baffled. Puzzled. Mentally destroyed, even. The ambiguous rhyme and warning that had been engraved into the walls of the Cavern left an ominous feeling in us with no hope whatsoever.

  “Do you have any idea what it means?” I asked Tammy with worried eyes.

  “No,” she replied, just as frightened. “I have no clue who it talks about. There are so many people it could be referring to.”

  “But whose reign is it talking about? My father’s?” Mychaela worriedly asked. Tammy shook her head, trying to speak even though no sound came out. She was just as baffled as us. We adjusted ourselves to stand in a line.

  “Hold hands for a minute,” Jordan said through the silence. We did as she asked. Her blonde hair inked itself to a dark wine red and her eyes became a bright orange colour. All of us sharply recoiled as we were being filled with energy and stamina. We could feel it surging from our tailbones to our brains, circulating around haywire in our bloodstream. We let go and Jordan didn’t look drained in the least. We looked at our hands. There was a mystical glow moving around in our veins that seemed to enhance the efficiency of our abilitie
s.

  “Just in case things get messy,” she said.

  Well that was reassuring, Jordan. It’s not like you’re insinuating we’re going to die or anything.

  Jaden was the first to take the lead in jumping down as we broke out of our hand link. As he landed, his eyes turned hazel and his black and white hair became more defined. He landed in a squatted stance with his right leg outstretched and the other tucked in. His hands were pressed against the floor firmly and before he knew it Jordan, Tarmo, Aemilia, Robbie and Liam had landed behind him with bent knees in half squats. It was the easiest way to break their fall. Jade and Tammy created slits on the sides of their pencil skirts as Jojo teleported herself below with them. Finally, I jumped down, hovering with a lively breeze around my legs before I let my feet touch the ground.

  The Cavern wasn’t that far off but it was more intimidating now that we were on level ground with it. Everyone stood up straight and boldly. The crunching that sounded on the floor from us stepping on the shards of bones was monotonous and unavoidable. But with each crack, my heart thumped. Finally, we stood face-to-face with the partly-grey force-field.

  “How do we get through?” Jordan asked?

  “A touch should do it,” Mychaela said.

  “We’ll be incinerated,” I quickly pointed out. Liam shook his head.

  “The defences have been disabled,” he mentioned.

  Liam edged forward to it, tapping his index finger on the shield’s surface. The tiniest ripple did it. We stood back and watched the force field scale away into inexistence as a chill settled in my chest.

  Our hearts were drowning in fear and worry. Now we knew there was nothing separating us from the Cavern. We could even enter if we pleased.

  “Are those gargoyles?” Mychaela asked, looking up at the middle section of the Cavern’s rock doors. All our heads drifted upwards as we examined what she was talking about.

  “They do look like gargoyles, don’t they? But…they’re not. They seem a little too human-like to be them,” Tarmo answered. Perched on the walls, with their hands and feet pressed against the rocks but looking as if they were about to leap forward, were nine rock figures; five on the left door and four on the right one.

  “Alright, snap out of it, guys!” I said enthusiastically and loud enough for the others to hear. “We’re eleven,” I continued, “five of us can take one door and another six can take the other.” I ended. We immediately broke off into groups. We were eager to get this job done so we would never again have to think of this horrible endeavour. Jaden, Robbie, Jordan, Tammy and I took the left and the others rushed to the right.

  “Ready?” Jaden yelled over to them. We had no idea our voices were awakening something dangerous.

  “Ready!” they replied. We dug our fingers viciously into the rock doors, emitting a series of not-too-long cracks. The Celtic patterns and arcane writing on the Cavern doors immediately lit to a multi-coloured light through this dark world due to our auras. We were doing it, we heaved.

  “HEAVE!” we yelled.” We groaned as our supernatural Vernaescian strength, combined with the extra energy Jordan had given us pushed these doors together. We knew these rocks were bound with something beyond Vernaescian knowledge because we would have already been able to budge these in three seconds. I mean, come on – we were eleven aliens!

  The doors weren’t so far apart, about a few feet away now. We were almost about to complete this. I could already feel my heart easing with joy. But then, all that stopped. All I knew is that I had been taken and thrown into the Cavern at a vicious speed because I could feel the air rushing against my face and my entire vision had become darkness. I wasn’t thrown that far in, I could still see the light and the others outside. Had something attacked me? Everyone stopped in shock.

  Thump!

  “WAIT! Where’s Aden?” Robbie voiced out, soaked in fear as they all began looking around.

  “Guys, I’m in here,” they heard my voice echoing. I got up and wiped the blood from my nose and slowly made my way to the entrance when suddenly, Robbie was sent flying towards me and landed on the floor with a thud.

  “What’s doing that?” Jordan asked. Everybody stood on their guards – and then Mychaela pointed out the worst.

  “Everyone…where are the gargoyles?” she said, a half terrified tone in her voice. And she was right, they weren’t there anymore. The others turned their backs to the Cavern and faced the rest of this bowl. Without warning, nine figures precipitously dived and grabbed each of the nine remaining. With a jolt, they were sent flying into the Cavern as well. At least we were all next to each other now. The actions were too swift to see who the predators were, but the nine figures stood at the entrance, facing us as silhouettes. Bright light from the outside world hit their outlines, causing us to only see them as dark entities. They slowly marched onwards and stayed stationary, barring us from exiting the Cavern. But as they advanced inwards, we saw them, what they really looked like, with the light from outside reflecting on their sides. They were Demon Grinners.

  All nine of them.

  “With all due respect, the poem was threatening enough to warn us,” Tarmo spoke lightly as a soft banter.

  “I don’t think now’s the time for jokes, Tarmo,” Liam quavered. The others stood up. I ignited both of my hands with loud rustling flames but the fires were immediately stolen by the darkness of the Cavern.

  “HEY!” I yelled outrageously. But I was stopped in my tracks. The fire was turned into gleaming white electricity which was taken in all directions of the Cavern.

  As the lines of static retracted themselves from my hands, they lit enormous white columns that stood on our left and right hand sides, facing each other like opposites. I swallowed so hard that I almost swallowed my throat in the process

  “Guys, look up,” I pointed upwards timidly – all we saw was a void sky, complete with a blanket of moving blackness. It was bitterly cold and as we inhaled and exhaled, frost forced its way out through our gritted teeth and nostrils. We looked towards the depths of the Reincarnation Chamber and noticed the floors were covered in the same fossils as outside. I looked out and realised that we stood on a large rock that was a sort of lookout point – another cliff. Behind us, the Grinners all remained in their positions, immobile. They didn’t even attempt to kill. They just guarded.

  The light from the pillars helped us to see the entire cavernous chamber. Although there were columns on our left and right, there were no walls or roof. There was nothing in between the columns either. They merely seemed as if they lead into oblivion. All I could see between each pillar was an intense, void black that I had to tear my eyes away from for fear of going mad. I kept wondering where it could possibly lead to, or whether they were just barriers to keep us in here.

  “What do we do?” Mychaela asked. Suddenly, the Grinners ejected their wings and flew over to us precipitously, pushing us down. We immediately landed on our feet, our reflexes kicking in during the final second. We ran as far as possible from them down the Cavern. They stood atop the cliff and again stayed stationary – this time at the brim of the lookout point.

  “What if they close the doors?” Jade asked worriedly.

  “They wouldn’t dare,” Liam said as we ran further down.

  “How can you be so sure?” I asked back.

  “They’d trap the Barons in here with us and prevent their masters from ever escaping.” We stopped running as we hit the stairs to what seemed to look like a podium of marble. The staircase winded up a few feet high like a snake, made of a rocky granite and entrenched in ancient cracks. The railing was white and chalky – bone. Our hearts were drumming. It seemed impossible to get out now. Unless maybe…

  “Jojo, why don’t we teleport out and lock them in?” I whispered. Jojo tried teleporting. But merely stayed in the same place and shed off green embers.

  “I – I can’t! It’s an anti-teleporting zone!” she said worriedly. We stood at the foot of the stairs when
I saw something above the podium; a book.

  I gently climbed the few steps and the others stayed below on the bottom floor. I flinched as I drew closer and closer to the arcane book and finally stood paces away from it. It was already opened and I read slowly, not fully understanding the title of the chapter that stared me in the face or knowing its actual pronunciation: “Re…Print…asisal. Re–Printsisal – Reprintasisal. I wonder what that is,” I muttered.

  Just above the strange text was a bracelet made of wooden beads. I picked it up inquisitively, carefully examining the antique artefact but accidentally ripping off one bead. It stayed clutched in my hand as the bracelet dropped onto the book. Yet, again, I was hit away by something I hadn’t seen. All I could see was the moving darkness above as I speedily fell back down to the others. Whilst they gasped, I struggled to get up. My vision was blurry and I had been horribly stunned. But as I hurled myself to my feet, I saw him, the reason we embarked on this trip to avoid him, the one who prevented me from ever knowing my father.

  Trailian.

  He flapped down with his broad, inky-black feathery wings like a lost bird and finally landed sturdily. He was like an animal – a crane, stretching his neck out to examine us. He looked somehow crazed and he had a chin full of stubble. His hair was disoriented, messy (as if it had just been wet and didn’t dry properly), jet black with hints of grey here and there, and went mid-way down his back. His eyes had dark sagging bags resting underneath them and were large like coins, with purple irises that were going to keep me awake for days. But the man wasn’t hideous. In fact he wasn’t even terrible looking. He was charming. Unimaginably charming. But that’s the problem with the devil: his looks are deceiving. Trailian looked more like a youthful prince in his late twenties. He wore a long, thin, torn, black overall (that looked somewhat like a robe), over a long black shirt and black waistcoat. He reminded me of us boys when we were ready for the Samhain ball. He had on dust-stained, pinstriped trousers that were tucked into his medieval black boots. He slid over the podium and stood at the top of the stairs, before finally resting a finger on me and another two on Jaden and Jade.