“Now what's the plan?” Chelsea asked in tears.
“I don't know! I just did what you told me to do!” I shouted back, whining like a punk. I was scared. Sue me. My leg also throbbed in pain from all the sudden movement, and the tingling in my hands was getting out of control, like a fire burning just beneath the surface of my skin.
“Okay, let's just… jump out the window!”
I flashed her a glare like she was insane, but it didn’t take long for me to grasp that there were few better options. We were on the third floor. We'd break our legs, but we could survive.
Suddenly, I spotted movement out of the corner of my eye. “Oh, Mrs. Taylor! Thank God—”
But then I got a clear look. It was her, alright, but she was all wrong. Her eyes were an oily black, and tendrils protruded from her throat, ears, and nostrils—and she was missing an arm. She definitely had two arms yesterday, I noted. From the bloody stump, an oily squid-like tentacle was beginning to take shape. A sick gurgling sound came from the woman, but I wasn't sure if it was from Mrs. Taylor or simply a sound the tendrils made on their own.
“Go! Go! Go!” I shouted, and Chelsea ran toward the window but couldn't bring herself to leap through it. Her body jerked back toward me, unable to commit to the course of action we both knew was necessary.
“Liam, hurry!” she said, shaking—clearly stalling herself to build up the courage to take the leap, her hands gripping the window frame.
As she shouted, though, something thickened in the air. I could feel it—I was the nexus of this atmospheric shift. Judging by the shrill gasp coming from her, Chelsea could see this change occurring in me, too. It started with the calming of my tingling, burning hands.
I was overtaken by something resembling natural born instinct, only there was nothing natural about it. Supernatural, yes, but certainly nothing normal. Nothing human.
I felt Mrs. Taylor’s tendrils recoil and hesitate as I began radiating my own purple aura. I straightened and took a step toward the possessed woman. My hand extended as though I were about to bless her, and indeed, I placed a palm on her forehead, but no blessing occurred. Instead, the woman exploded with a pop in a sick mess of viscera and blood that painted parts of the room, and me, as red as a freshly picked tomato.
Chelsea screamed, her voice as shrill as the screeching of car brakes, but I ignored her. My hands now extended outward, and the green fissures in the walls faded as pulsating black tendrils and stalks receded into them. Within moments everything was back to normal. The cracks and fissures seemed to self-repair; even the lights turned back on.
The only thing out of the ordinary was the messy remains of Mrs. Taylor. And me.
And just like that, I snapped out of whatever trance allowed me to do whatever creepy bullshit I had just done. I turned and looked at Chelsea as if hoping she could provide an answer. God, I must have been a sight, covered in that old lady's blood and guts.
My classmate slowly took a step forward as she lit up at what must have been a sign of recognition in my eyes as my original posture returned. “…Liam?” she asked. I’d never seen her look at me like that before—like I wasn’t human... wasn’t even me. “Is that you?”
I shook my head as though shaking something out of my hair. “Yeah. I think so,” I answered after a moment too long for comfort.
“What the hell?!” Chelsea uttered in a hush, but before I could answer, she added, “We have to get the fuck out of here!”
I nodded and turned toward the door, but there was already someone standing there. I paused to take in the new figure, but it wasn’t new at all. “You're the man from the park,” I gasped. The recognition hit me dully at first until I came to a bold and abrupt conclusion. “This is your fault!” I snarled at him.
The man smiled and lowered his hood, displaying sharp features and cold blue eyes underlined by crow’s feet, indicating that he was probably in his mid-forties. He was smoking a cigarette, just a few feet in front of the hallway’s now re-lit ‘No Smoking in the Building’ sign. “Negative. Nope. Not my fault. But I did know this would happen,” he said. “They came for you,” he continued, pointing at me. “Happy birthday, by the way.”
Chapter 3
Welcome to Esoterica
My heart felt as though it had stopped beating. First of all, even having spent so much time staring at my calendar day after day, I’d literally forgotten it was my birthday. More than that, though, I had been jolted by the man’s words. They came for me? Was this all my fault? What had I done to bring them here?
“What do you mean they were here for me?” I asked through hushed tones, barely tempering my frustration and keeping a lid on my own fear.
The man stepped into the room. He was tall with angular features and a hooked nose. He sported a goatee and looked pretty normal now that his hood was down, but an occult emblem hung around his neck, dangling from a black nylon cord. It was a silvery inverted pentagram with an eye in the center.
“I mean what I said. But you do deserve more of an explanation than that,” he admitted. “After all, you made my job easy and handled the damn thing yourself. But we can’t be here for that.” He nodded sideways toward Chelsea, who'd collapsed onto her knees by the window on the far side of the room. My guts twisted to see her like that.
I kept my eyes fixed on the stranger and tried to play it cool. “Well, I have to go to work soon and—”
“Oh, yes, you do. But not the work you think,” the man interrupted. His ominous words gave me pause. After a moment, he continued, already visibly bored. “Liam, let me cut to the chase. It's time to say goodbye.”
I flinched at the words. “What?”
“Time to go.”
“Go where?”
“Elsewhere,” he growled. The man sighed deeply, signaling his irritation. “Liam, say goodbye,” he said with severity, lowering his head on the last word as he tilted it toward the pretty college girl quivering in the corner.
Then something happened to me. An epiphany of sorts. All that I had here was my pain: painful memories, few true friends, and no family. Chelsea counted for something, but one friend—even with benefits—didn’t constitute a life. And there was very little plan or promise for my future, to boot. Nothing mattered. I might as well go. It'd probably be safer for Chelsea anyway.
“Will she be okay?” I asked, looking at my one true friend.
“She’ll be safer with you gone, Liam. I promise,” he said.
I turned my head toward the trembling girl and stared. She stared right back at me, her emotions starting to calm, but a new fear taking her as she realized what I was about to say. I walked over to her and grabbed her by the palms, helping her to her feet and attempted to throw my arms around her in a hug, but she recoiled.
“Oh God, you’re so gooey,” she groaned.
I had forgotten about the blood and guts. “Chelsea, it looks like I have to go.”
She shook her head. “When will you be back, though?”
I looked over at the man at the door for the answer, but he just tightened his lips and shook his head.
“I don’t know,” I said. “But I think you can agree, it’s not worth it for me to stick around if this is going to be my new life.”
She didn’t react but to chew her lip and tear up as she stared me in the eyes.
“Goodbye, Liam,” she said, forcing a smile. “I’ll miss you.”
“I’ll miss you, too,” I admitted, looking down at her feet.
She sniffled and emitted a single loud sob. “Can I have your textbooks, then?”
I had to laugh. Even the man in the corner let out a chuckle. “Sure,” I said. “Help yourself.”
I turned around to find the man walking straight up to me. I faced him, and a flash of green light burst from the extended palm of the mystery man, completely washing over my body. I raised my arm to cover my eyes from the blinding emission, but almost as soon as my arms reached my face, the light had dimmed to nothing.
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br /> Opening my eyes, I soaked in the sights of an entirely different sort of terrain. I stood, now, side-by-side with the strange man, at the center of some kind of circular symbol, a five-pointed star etched on a stony platform. A pentagram, I knew, mostly from pop culture. This was some kind of magic circle that was surrounded on all sides with stairs leading steeply down the side of a tall structure, a structure which I now stood at the summit of.
Farther outward from the circle, I could see that there was some sort of ocean or sea, but it was vexing to look at. The way the waves rolled made the water seem weirdly thick and heavy, and it was a sickly green under a deep indigo sky dotted with unfamiliar constellations. The mountains at my back looked straightforward enough. There was sparse vegetation, at least as far as I could see. It was mostly dirt and stone out here, with a few giant crystals protruding from the soil and alien-looking trees with diamond-shaped leaves and red bark that swirled in bizarre patterns around the trunk.
I looked back at the man, not sure what to say, but I ultimately ventured to ask the first thing that came to my mind. “Where the hell are we?”
“Almost home,” the man said. “I'm Devon, by the way. Devon Mayberry. Your assigned Rescuer.” He reached a hand out to me. I shook it inattentively as I stared at the alien surroundings, a bit of monster blood smearing on his hands from my grip. He didn’t seem to mind at all.
“But what is home? What is this place?”
“A sanctuary. A world hidden between all worlds. Those things can't follow you here. Not easily, anyway.”
I was at least relieved to hear that. “What were those things, though?”
“Void Graspers. They really aren't all that bad once you know how to deal with them, but they can be freaky the first time you encounter one.”
A million questions suddenly flooded my mind, but as I opened my mouth to ask them, a hand fell on my shoulder.
“All the answers will come in time, I promise. Let's get you home, first.” This dude wasn’t going to tell me shit. I grimaced, still frustrated at my own cluelessness.
“And how do we do that?” I asked.
“By getting you to cast your first spell, a Waypoint Spell,” Devon said.
I blinked. “Say what?”
Devon reached his hands in his pockets and pulled out a small crumpled parchment, a pocket knife, and a gemstone that looked like a ruby. “Prick your finger with the knife, hold the gem in your left hand, and trace the symbol that we're standing on in the air as you recite the words on the parchment,” he explained. “It's not that bad.”
My jaw hung open as the mechanics were explained, but I followed directions dutifully. I grabbed all the materials, pricked my finger, clutched the gem, traced the symbol, and spoke the words… the best I could.
“N'glui k'thara ju'dzo kar n'ath!” I approximated, and as I did the stars above me seemed to glow brighter in reply, but nothing else obvious occurred at first. “Is that it?” I asked, disappointed. “Did I blow it?” My finger throbbed from the pain of being sliced open. What a waste.
And then it happened. As I turned to face Devon, looking for some guidance, I felt my skin tingle. I looked down at my hands and watched my body crumbling into dust that blew away in the breeze right before my eyes. Before I had time to ask if this was what was supposed to happen, I locked eyes with Devon and he spoke.
“I'll see you there, kid,” he said with a smirk. “Eventually.”
I rematerialized outside of what could only be described as a campus. It seemed like an oasis in this otherwise inhospitable alien landscape. It was perfectly green and grassy, so dense with grass in fact that it was impossible to make out the color of the soil beneath. There were also several rolling hills, many of them with buildings atop them. Beautiful cherry blossoms and pine trees outlined the perimeter, standing just behind high red brick walls that stood proudly along the edge of the campus boundaries.
A smattering of short Victorian-style buildings were spread out throughout the campus, linked by stony pathways. The campus itself was quite large but didn't look like it could hold all that many students given the number and size of buildings. This seemed like a rather small institution, supporting maybe a couple hundred students, albeit with a lot of land between them. A single large sign stood at the entrance, displaying the words “Asenath Waite’s Academia Esoterica.”
“Finally, there you are!” said a beautiful raven-haired young woman in a red dress, which nicely accented her slender figure.. She looked to be around my age. She approached from beside one of the trees on the edge of campus at a jog, and I couldn't help but stare blankly at her, so overwhelmed I was with the new surroundings, and now this. “Hi!” the woman said, waving at me aggressively. “I'm Carmilla, your Integration Assistant today! You're Liam, right? Liam Elloway?”
I could only nod. At least she was cute.
“Great! Let's get you into the central building and register you. Won't take long,” she said, and to my surprise she grabbed my hand and led me into the campus through a large metal door on one side of the walls.
I worked up some courage to speak. “Umm, so sorry,” I began. “What the hell is even going on?”
The girl chuckled. “Devon brought you in, huh?” she guessed. She looked over her shoulder to see me nodding in confirmation. “Thought so. He never takes any time to explain things. He was my Rescuer, too.”
“Your what?”
“When our powers begin to manifest, we always attract attention from the Void Graspers or other Void Things. The Academy sends out Rescuers to find people in those situations and bring them here where they can learn to control their powers and hide from those dark forces,” she explained. “Happy birthday, by the way!”
“How did you know it’s my birthday?”
“Lucky guess,” she giggled. “Everyone arrives around their birthday. That’s when powers always manifest to the point where graspers get involved. Mine’s July 12th. Mark your calendar.” Her grin was intoxicatingly cute.
“This is weird.”
“Oh, sweety, it only gets weirder,” she said with an amused sigh as she let go of my hand.
Chapter 4
Basically Magic
We stood in front of a building with a wooden sign posted above its door, where the words “Central Office” were etched on a golden plaque.
Before we entered the building, I had a quick look around. There weren't a lot of people walking by. In fact, at the moment, I could only see the two of us.
“Where is everyone?” I asked.
“We've only got like one hundred and twenty students at the academy right now,” she explained. “And it's the middle of the night here, so everyone else is asleep, or the nocturnals like me are out on assignments or in class, but the office is expecting you. Come on.”
I followed her inside, entirely unsure of what I was getting myself into, but I’d come this far. As I entered the so-called office, I noticed that the building felt more like a house than a workplace. It was charming. There was a brick-laden fireplace on the far wall opposite the door we entered the building from. Winding staircases led up to the second floor. At the center of the room, though, there was a miserly looking old man with a stack of paperwork and an unfriendly look on his face sitting at an oaken desk.
“Is this the new brat?” the man muttered, flipping through papers and folders haphazardly. The top of his head was bald, and he wore perfectly round spectacles with gold frames. Gray hair protruded, unkempt, from the back and sides of his head where he had not yet lost all his hair. He was portly and dressed in an ill-fitting, decades-old corduroy suit with a checkered red and black tie that clashed badly with his other attire.
“Yes, sir. This is Liam Elloway,” Carmilla said, unfazed by the man's discourteous demeanor.
“Good, good,” he grunted as he signed a few papers and then handed them over to me. I took them hesitantly but dutifully—like a hot potato.
I looked over the forms and documents. N
ot a single mention of money, which was kind of a relief. Mostly they seemed to be related to registering as a student and reserving a dormitory room and supplies such as a uniform and materials for class. I tried to scrutinize a bit more, but the man at the counter looked visibly irritated already, so I signed a bit quicker than I probably should have if only to be done with the curmudgeon as expediently as possible.
I handed over the papers to Carmilla, and for the first time I had a moment to process the young woman herself while she was looking over them for errors.
She was probably in her early twenties, like me, and she had naturally wavy raven-black hair that hung past her shoulders. She possessed a dainty nose and porcelain white skin that looked as smooth as silk. Her lips were either naturally very red, or she wore some sort of lipstick; I couldn't tell. I would guess lipstick for the color, but it was so seamless that it was a tough call to make. Her impossibly long eyelashes constantly fluttered in excitement—or anxiousness. She wore a long black hooded cloak that hung over a form-fitting red dress with spaghetti straps. The practically painted-on dress betrayed a petite and attractive physique, and she stood half a head shorter than me. She was pretty, excessively so, but I didn't have time to flirt or get flustered, so I kept my mind on the matter at hand.
Or tried to. Damn, she was cute. No, Chelsea was cute. This chick was in a whole other league.
“What's next?” I asked, surprised at my own eagerness. Wasn’t I just fighting for my life less than twenty minutes ago? What the hell was even going on?
“Thanks, Bill,” Carmilla said as she signed and handed the forms back over to the grumpy old codger on the other side of the desk. She turned to me at last, and it felt good to have her gorgeous red eyes on me. Red eyes. Wait, that’s weird, right?
“You must have so many questions. Let me give you the tour first, and then I'll answer as many of them as I can,” she said, beaming at me with radiating warmth.
Esoterica 1: Liam's Awakening: A Lovecraftian Fantasy Harem Adventure (Esoterica Chronicles) Page 2