Guardian

by Jack Porter

  The others were awake within seconds, bleary eyes confused and wild, looking for the source of the banshee sound. When they noticed it was Hannah, worry settled over them. They began to fuss over her hair and face, asking what was wrong and to just breathe, honey.

  Her entire back was inflamed, red sore-looking skin blended out to the soft white of her shoulders and hips.

  “What’s wrong with me?” Hannah ground out between screams, her jaw clenched as if she held her pain in with every fiber of her being.

  It was as I feared. The transformation was taking too long. “Nothing, Hannah. Your wings are ready to come out. I’m going to speed up the process. Do you trust me?”

  She couldn’t speak, only nodded.

  “Number Two,” I barked. “Heat the knife in the fire to sanitize it. Then hand it to me.”

  Snapping back into her role, Layla immediately responded with, “Yes, Captain.”

  “You other girls go outside and fetch some water for Hannah. She’ll be thirsty when this is done.” Not a lie, but I had an ulterior motive. I didn’t want them to see what had to happen next.

  When Layla handed me the knife, I sent her out too. Her face was pale as she exited the mouth of the cave.

  “This is going to pinch a bit, Hannah love,” I said softly.

  Through locked teeth, she managed to huff a laugh and joke, “Think I’m afraid of a little knife play? That’s the soft stuff, Dex.”

  I laughed at the ridiculousness of the situation, and it seemed to calm my nerves. My hand steadied, and I made two super-fast cuts at the top of the bulging places on Hannah’s back. Then, three things happened almost together.

  My crystal bloomed to life.

  Hannah sighed in relief.

  And my eyes widened in awe. “Wow.”

  Two perfectly formed brown and white checkered wings fluttered out of the newly cut skin. A hawk’s wings, I realized. The cuts were already healing, sealing around the wings as they continued to unfold over Hannah’s back. I suspected the swift healing was thanks to the crystal’s magic. I didn’t know what I had been expecting. Perhaps for the wings to be wet and weak like a new baby chick when it comes out of the egg.

  But Hannah’s wings were nothing like that. They were the epitome of strength and beauty.

  We stood together. And for all the world, she looked like a fallen angel. “Wow,” I breathed again.

  “I want to try them,” she said immediately, her voice barely containing its excitement. All of evidence of pain was gone from her face and body. “I can’t stretch them in here. The cave is too small.”

  I realized she’d grown again. And not by a little amount. She had morphed into twice her size in a matter of seconds. Twice my size.

  Hannah gave her soft feathers a test flap as if to prove her point. The gust of wind formed by them blew me back, and a mild pain formed in the back of my head as I hit the ground.

  “Wow!”

  “Is that all you can say?” She laughed, grabbing my arm to haul me to my feet.

  I rubbed the back of my skull, looking for any serious lacerations. “If you could see yourself right now, you’d say so too. Goddess, Hannah you look—” I began, but she cut me off before I could finish my sentence.

  “I like the sound of that. Goddess Hannah.”

  It wasn’t what I intended, but it worked well. In fact, there was no other word to describe the golden radiance, beauty, and divinity that exuded from her body. The change seemed to be internal as well as external. It was like she’d fully slipped into her role. She exuded confidence and calm. Golden light peppered the ground with each touch of her hand or step of her foot.

  “Shall we go out and give them a test?” I asked, fearing she wouldn’t be able to get out of the cave at all if we didn’t hurry.

  “Absolutely!” Her voice became full of her southern drawl again, and I was glad. I liked Hannah how she was, and just because the outside had changed, that didn’t mean her personality had to, as well.

  I told her as much while we made for the entrance.

  “Don’t worry, Dex. I’m still my ornery, high-energy self,” Hannah said. “The rush of magic is just a little heady at first. I’m used to it now.”

  “Good. I wouldn’t have you any other way.”

  Hannah flashed me a quick smile before she had to duck her head to get out of the cave. I glanced at her nails as she grabbed the edges of the cave’s mouth for support. They were not pointy yet, like on the skeleton she had found in the grass, but definitely longer. Her transformation wasn’t fully complete. She still had time to change more.

  That answered one question. Everyone with a crystal would become as large as the bones we’d found at the goddess’s grave site. Or would they become larger?

  Another thing became clear to me too. The change happened because Hannah had tasted the product of my orgasm last night--my cum. Meaning, I didn’t have to physically be inside the girls. They just had to swallow.

  The news spread my mouth wide in a grin. The girls don’t have to hurt themselves riding me, and I can have sex with whoever has been transformed by a crystal whenever I want.

  Megan squealed in delight when she saw Hannah. “Oh my god. I better be next! Look! Oh my god,” she repeated.

  Piper and Layla were too busy picking up their jaws off the ground to say much of anything.

  “Everyone stand back,” I warned. “Hannah wants to try flying. And it won’t be pleasant if you get caught in the crosswind. Trust me.” I rubbed the back of my head.

  The crystal-less girls and I retreated to a safe position.

  “Hey Cap,” Layla stated as we sat down to watch Hannah search the sky, looking for a point to safely land if her first attempt didn’t go well. “Your crystal is glowing.”

  I glanced down. She was right. How long had it been doing that? “I wonder if every time a goddess uses power, it has to come from my crystal as well? I noticed it glowing as Hannah’s wings appeared.”

  “It seems logical,” Piper said, touching the smooth warmth of it hanging on my chest. “Hannah’s crystal only reacts when yours does, after all. Which means every time she needs to use her gift, it will be because you granted it to her. Kind of sweet in a way.”

  “Does that mean we have to stay within a certain range for our powers to work?” Megan asked suddenly.

  My stomach dropped and my heart picked up as I saw where she was going with that question. “Hannah, wait!” I called.

  But it was too late. She couldn’t hear me over the three powerful flaps of her wings as she sprung off the ground with powerful legs. A few more flaps and she seemed to get the hang of the wind, and began to soar through the air as gracefully as any hawk.

  It donned on me that that was what the crystal had given her—hawk-like abilities. Over the fear of watching her disappear upward, I vaguely wondered if she’d be able to see in the dark too.

  With my breath held and my heart thundering in my ears, I sprinted over to where Hannah had taken off. I crossed my arms in a jumping jack motion, trying to get her attention.

  Smaller in the sky than she was a few minutes ago, she waved back at me. Ugh, this wasn’t working. All I could do was watch her movements and try to stay directly under her. I hoped she wouldn’t go beyond the crystal’s limits, whatever they were.

  I doubted even with the crystal’s power she would be unscathed if she fell from that enormous height.

  Hannah was too quick for me. Even running full out, I couldn’t stay underneath her with all the trees blocking me.

  Within minutes, I could no longer see her. She was too high and too far ahead, a couple miles ahead even, at the speed she was soaring. I slowed, unsure of which direction she’d flown.

  Another minute passed and a trail of fear laced up my spine, followed closely by a large crash from somewhere far in the distance. That had to be her. Hannah was the only thing big enough to make that kind of sound, and somehow I knew that I could only hear it because of ou
r connection through the crystals. This world was weird, I thought for the hundredth time as I sprinted toward the sound. Each time I thought I’d seen the strangest thing I would ever see, something else happened that was even stranger.

  Fear still tugged at my chest, growing more insistent as I closed in on Hannah.

  But her fall wasn’t what was causing my fear, I knew.

  The tell-tale panic of the darkness was nearly palpable. It was angry, and headed right in the direction of Hannah’s fall.

  If I didn’t get there quickly, it would reach her before I did.

  Eighteen

  Twigs crunched underfoot. Birds took flight as I sped through the trees and against time. My lungs and legs burned from my efforts as I desperately made my way toward Hannah. I’d never truly pushed this new crystal-hyped body to its limits. Sure, she and I had played around a little, racing each other and timing how long it took for cuts and scrapes to heal, but until bolting like mad to try and save a loved one’s life, you don’t truly know what you’re capable of.

  So, I pushed. I smashed through trees like a cartoon superman. I scaled up cliffs and I stumbled down others. Sometimes I broke fingers and toes during my falls. But I just kept going, trusting that my body could handle it, that it could handle anything.

  And eventually, I came to a small clearing by a fast-paced river. Hannah was there, one large, white wing crumpled under her. She was still unconscious.

  And hovering over her body was a hulking form made of mist and darkness.

  He had the relative shape and form of a man. But like the guardian back at the ruins, black magic swirled around him. Nearly consuming him, except for his eyes, which were red and crazed, and bits of clothes that looked old, maybe from the seventeenth or eighteenth century.

  The head of the thing twisted toward me as I approached while the rest of its body remained in the exact same position. Creepy.

  “Mine,” the darkness hissed, and its maw stretched wider than would be possible for a human.

  I hadn’t thought it could speak, but that didn’t matter. “I don’t fucking think so,” I said. My hand grazed the crystal around my neck and it lit up with power.

  The darkness’s eyes—if you could call them that, they were more like swirling red vortexes—dropped to glare at the crystal as I absorbed its power. Rage twisted the creature’s already ugly features into something downright dangerous and primal.

  Energy flowed through my body, giving me a taste of the raw power my crystal possessed. I knew I could keep drawing on it indefinitely if I wanted. Part of me was tempted, but I knew that you couldn’t get all that something for nothing. And I couldn’t save Hannah if I sucked out all my life force or burned my body up with energy until I was dead. Because I felt that the magic within the crystal would consume me if I weren’t careful, and I didn’t want to attempt too much until I was ready.

  The creature lifted to its full height, which turned out to be quite a bit taller than mine, and wasted no time in coming at me.

  I expected it to use that swirling black mist to attack me.

  Instead, the darkness surprised me by throwing a punch, instead of, I don’t know, releasing magic at me or some shit, like straight out of a Bollywood film.

  I don’t know what I would have done if it had. This creature seemed to have the power of a crystal too. I couldn’t see one around its neck, but I could sense he held the same power that controlled the serpent-goat guardian that had attacked me in the ruin.

  The darkness obviously knew what to do with his power. That left me at a disadvantage because I knew jack shit about my crystal and how to use it.

  However, hand-to-hand combat fighting was something I could do, and I didn’t waste any time reverting to it. I rolled to the ground and kicked the darkness’s legs out from underneath him.

  It was effective, but not in the way I’d hoped. The moment I made contact, the enemy's body began to light up like the guardian’s had. A blue-white light flew out from the contact with my hand, but then instead of growing, it dissipated and stayed within the area of contact, feebly hanging on.

  The man-creature screeched an inhuman sound so loud that I had to drop my crystal and plug my ears. The flow of power immediately left and made me feel drained and tired.

  The darkness gathered its power, somehow stopping the light I’d transferred to it in its tracks and swallowing it up in the nightmare black mist again.

  “I see you’re not going to make this easy,” I said. Breathing had become more difficult as I took up the crystal again. I’d never used such a large amount of magic in such a little time, first with Hannah’s wings, and just now with Shadow Dick.

  My next few punches hit square and did physical damage to the nose and larynx, but fell absolutely flat in the magical department. I decided to drop the crystal completely. I needed both hands to be effective and the crystal wasn’t going to do anything more than give me a shot of energy. Like an espresso.

  Goddess, I missed coffee.

  Focus.

  Hannah began to stir. Before she was even fully conscious, she tried to flap her wings. The power pulled from my crystal as I was about to strike Shadow Dick. Exhaustion made my vision blur. And the creature struck my jaw instead, hard enough to put my face in the dirt.

  I glanced at Hannah, ready to give her as much as I could to heal her. What I saw horrified me—the new goddess was also pulling power from the darkness. This made Hannah’s wings begin to haze with black mist instead of golden radiance.

  “Hannah, no! Stop the magic,” I yelled. Every ounce of me screamed it. Hauling myself up, I attempted to dash toward her. Somehow, I innately knew that this would turn her into something terrible, and I didn’t want to know what.

  The darkness blocked me with a knee to my stomach, knocking the wind out of me. I pulled the darkness down with me and got in a few good punches and a well-placed knee myself.

  “Hannah!”

  She jerked her head up, confused green eyes searching for my voice. I could tell she was trying to figure out what had just happened, wondering why she was in so much pain.

  Her wing was attempting to heal, but as soon as she saw the darkness surrounding her body, she spit out, “Oh fuck no.”

  There was only one logical next step. We didn’t know how to break the connection on our own yet, or if it was even possible. So, she clasped the crystal necklace and yanked it off, tossing it away from her body. The healing stopped, and she whimpered with what I could only assume was the same exhaustion I felt, before laying her head back down again and passing out.

  The darkness shook me off and moved for Hannah and the crystal.

  Rage fueling me, I grabbed my crystal and relished in its burst of energy. Springing to my feet, I dived after Hannah’s crystal, noticing the smallest piece of it was already rotting with the black power.

  I sent a tendril of my power to it and was pleased when the black melted to pure white again.

  Surprised the darkness had let me do even that much without at least another blow, I glanced up and felt my entire world crumple.

  The darkness was jumping into the fast-paced river, using its misty power to guide him safely along as if he were in a canoe.

  In his arms, limp and pale, was Hannah.

  Nineteen

  My body moved before my mind had a chance to catch up. But my mind agreed with my body, so it was okay. Icy river water hit my face and torso as I dove headfirst into the white rapids.

  I didn’t know what it was about this island that seemed determined to keep me in dangerously quick waters, but if it was trying to kill me off, it needed to pick an element I hadn’t mastered.

  I found it was difficult to keep my vision clear under the water. It was slightly murky and made my eyes burn. There was an uncomfortable pressure on my eyes, as well, as if someone aimed a jet stream directly at my face, trying to knock my eyes farther back into my skull.

  But it was better than keeping them closed like I w
anted to. I needed to be aware of where I was. Dark shapes in the water zipped by me and I rolled and swerved so I would avoid hitting any large rocks that sat hidden underneath the foamy surface.

  I hit a few stubborn ones anyway. One so large that it knocked the wind out of me when it grazed my bare torso, but I kept going with the current, desperate to catch up to Hannah and unable to stop even if I wanted to.

  When I finally managed to come up for air, coughing and spluttering, I noticed the darkness was farther ahead of me than I had anticipated. “Damn it, get back here and fight like a man you sadistic fuck.” I didn’t speak anymore because the foamy river just filled my mouth every time I tried.

  Finally, I found my equilibrium. I raised my body flat against the foamy waves so I would avoid most of the bone breaking surprises lurking underneath.

  Between heaving puffs of breath, I tried to glance up and see where I was in relevance to the darkness. Droplets of water splashing into my eyeballs blurred my vision, but it seemed I was gaining on it.

  Luck seemed to be on my side because at least he hadn't turned to send some sort of magical attack my way. I probably would have been toast if he had. But then I realized he wasn't looking for me.

  Probably thought he got away. Cocky son of a bitch, I thought. Although, I was more than happy to let him believe what he wanted while I closed the gap between us.

  Still, it struck me odd that he hadn't bothered to check. Then, I realized it was because at no point had I touched my crystal since entering the water. I was willing to bet my next ration of deer that the darkness had used my crystal’s energy to sense me more often than he used those creepy red eyes.

  That must have been why it only drew closer when a crystal’s power was being used.

  As soon as I drew close enough, I decided to put that theory to the test. Sleek and quiet as a hunting cat stalking its prey, I slipped under the water and touched my crystal for a burst of speed that put me right up next to the cloud of misty darkness that mixed with the current to make a gritty black cloud of water.