Blessed Page 3

  The three of them were masters of small talk and every year it was an unspoken contest to see who could talk to every person at the party more. Ardra usually won because she was the birthday girl and people sought her out. Though, it never stopped Piper and Anne from trying.

  Frank had his own routine when it came to Ardra’s birthday. He was up for breakfast, he was ready for shopping, he always helped carry her bags, but as soon as Piper came through the door, he hid in his office for the rest of the night. He was not the schmoozing type. He preferred to leave that to the women in his life.

  The gift table at the far end of the living room was piled high, the music was pumping through the sound system that was wired throughout the house, and conversations ran wild. Ardra drifted through the house feeling the good vibes and glowing in the fact that all of these people showed up for her year after year. The number of people in attendance had always seemed to grow with the number of birthdays behind her. It was due to this trend that the back deck was now enclosed. The first year that the house had filled up and they had shuffled people outside, Anne had made sure to nag her father about freezing teenagers until he finally hired someone to put the walls up.

  Several good looking returned missionaries were in attendance this year and every one of them made sure to seek her out as often as they could. It made her feel good knowing that the older guys still found her attractive. Premature aging was becoming very real to her generation and she took extraordinary measures to fight it. It appeared to be working.

  Not wanting to send anyone out into the terrible December weather and icy roads in the middle of the night, she opened presents around eleven thirty and started saying her goodbyes around midnight. As steadily as it had grown, the number of guests dwindled down until it was only Anne, Piper, and Ardra again.

  Frank came out of his office and said good night before heading up to bed. He yawned, “Happy Birthday, sweetheart.” And kissed her forehead before disappearing up the stairs.

  Ardra sat on one of the bar stools at the center island long enough to kick her shoes off and stretch her sore feet. Once she had full use of her toes again, she started the monumental task of cleaning up the empty plastic cups that seemed to litter every available surface. She was only five cups into the project when her mom started insisting that they take care of it in the morning. Both of the younger girls agreed that it was a fantastic idea and dumped what they had managed to pick up into the recycle bin. Piper always had an overnight bag stored in Ardra’s closet, so they headed up to her room to get ready for bed.

  They had barely turned the lights out when sleep took Ardra once again into its dark embrace. This time, she dreamt.

  Very bad dreams.

  He headed north into the heart of Indianapolis where he took a turn to the east along a large road labeled Interstate 70.

  He ducked into the shadows under an overpass and faded away to his natural state of Chaos.

  He willed himself east along the Interstate, his molecules flying through space at the speed of thought, until he came to a crossroads. He then headed north along another Interstate, this one being 77, until he saw a blue and white sign that read, “Kirtland: City of Faith and Beauty”.

  He shifted back into a solid state in a stand of trees not far off the side of the road and allowed the beast out to recharge its batteries. Refueled by the energy it had sapped from the surrounding plant life, the beast settled and urged him forward, leaving another circular field of ash behind.

  He headed into the little lakeside town feeling good about the journey ahead of him. His blood was singing as the first step in attaining his prize drew near. He could physically sense it now. With every step he took toward it, he felt his body begin to vibrate faster and faster. It felt like he was full of tiny piranhas that knew a feeding frenzy was about to occur.

  He spotted a large black cross set on top of the domed roof of a white tower and had to put some effort into keeping his passenger contained. Unleashing his power here would draw too much unwanted attention. The last thing he needed was a player from the other team deciding that he wasn’t playing fair.

  Angels meddling in his business had never ended well.

  He double timed it in the direction of the building, not wanting to waste any more time and risk the beast breaking free of his control. When he spotted the green doors as he rounded the last corner, he stopped.

  While the building was quite plain, the people who had built it had known what they were doing, and the people who had concealed his prize within it had known as well.

  The whole property was glowing with a dazzling light. Green flecks sparkled within a luminescent bubble surrounding the building. It appeared to be harmless enough, but he knew better. When it came to the types of energies that had been put into this shield, the prettier the bubble, the more pain it could cause.

  “This might prove to be a little more of a challenge than I was expecting.” He muttered to himself.

  He shored up his aura and pulled it tight into his body. While this effectively cut off all senses beyond the natural five, it made for a fantastic ethereal shield. He slowly made his way across the street, not wanting to get too close too fast.

  As he stepped onto the sidewalk about twenty feet from the property line, he noticed that the flecks of green were gathering on the side of the bubble closest to him. He didn’t like the look of them at all.

  He pulled his aura even tighter to his body and took a few more steps toward the outer edge of the dome.

  The green flecks responded in turn and amassed into a dark green tentacle protruding from the side of the bubble closest to him. He took several hurried steps backwards while dodging ferocious cracks of the large green whip. It appeared that the thing had been given the task of removing his head from his shoulders.

  One last swipe of the tentacle caught him off guard just before he made it out of its reach. He was violently thrown across the street. Had he not been shocked into his natural state, his physical form would have, without a doubt, crashed through the sweet little white picket fence surrounding the house that had been built there.

  Cursing the wasted energy that was now coursing through his body, he wished that he had a way to process it and make it useful. However, because it hadn’t been absorbed through his own energies and filtered first, the extra molecules were doing nothing but tearing through his body and bouncing off of his own.

  He recalled the first time that he had encountered energy like this with a cringe. He had been so caught off guard by the sensation of being burned alive from the inside out that he had flickered in and out of his physical form for a good half an hour. The Druid that had delivered the blow left him there to die, thinking that his flickering body was a sign that his energy was being dispersed back into the Universe and that he would eventually fade away completely.

  He had been wrong. Chaos not only pulled himself together enough to hold a solid form, but he hunted the Druid down and destroyed his entire circle. He caught all twelve of them off guard as the Druid responsible for the memory was regaling his companions with the details of the fight. He had made sure that they knew exactly what had hit them. He wanted each and every one of them to experience the agony that he had been left in.

  Simultaneously, twelve tendrils shot forth and plunged themselves into the tops of their heads, pumping the Chaos that existed inside of him right into their own energies. They had all dropped to the ground writhing in agony, their screams swallowed by the surrounding trees.

  Their skin began to flake and peel off in large black chunks and their screams ceased shortly after. A well timed breeze blew through the grove and carried what remained of them away.

  Chaos smiled briefly at the memory and, after taking in the area to make sure nobody had seen him take flying lessons and vanish, solidified back into his physical form.

  “Time for a change in tactic I suppose.” He said to himself as he cracked his neck and let the beast out of its cage. De
fense hadn’t worked out so well thus far, so adding offence to the plan was the next logical step. The risk was higher, but it would need to be done sooner or later.

  As black tentacles shot from his aura, he headed back across the street. Not bothering to conceal his energies had sent the green sparks into a frenzy as he approached. Several more dark green tentacles shot out of the side of the shield, reaching for him and causing the air in the street to crackle with their energy.

  The Druids who had put the barrier in place had known that something like him would come for what they were protecting. Their lives had most likely been sacrificed in order leave so much energy behind. He was willing to bet that more than one very powerful person had been charged with the task of protecting his prize. The fact that they had died in vain made him feel that much better about what he was about to do.

  He put his game face on and charged, closing the distance between himself and the vicious tentacles slashing at his body. He fought back savagely. Dodging what he could, and parrying the rest with tentacles of his own.

  Massive amounts of energy flew through the air around him, roaring like thunder every time one of the green tentacles collided with one of his own. As he dodged left and parried a tiny-but-savage green tendril, a rather large branch-sized one smashed into his chest, resulting in another flight, another disappearing act and a feeling like molten lava coursing through his entire being.

  He couldn’t tell if it was his rage or the jolt of pure, undiluted energy coursing uselessly through his body, but he felt like he was vibrating on a molecular level. When his limbs failed to follow his instructions, he cursed the glowing assailant for the well placed strike and took another moment to gather himself.

  With the ward on high alert, the tendrils reaching out for him did not withdraw this time. They kept feeling the air, probing like a serpent’s tongue. Searching for him.

  He reminded himself that he could not risk someone seeing his vanishing act and withdrew to wait until he had the cover of darkness to hide him. The retreat would also give him time to find a way to pop the bubble that was keeping him from moving on to the next phase of his mission.

  As he waited for the sun to sink below the horizon, he was glad it hadn’t snowed recently in that particular part of the country. Not that the cold bothered him, he just hated the snow. It was ugly, boring and far too bright. Everything about it made him want to melt it all away. Instantly vanishing snow didn’t tend to bode well with the locals, though. Another lesson learned long ago.

  He sat in the center of yet another charred circle of land. Having decided that he’d need a little more oomph if he was going to break through that thing, he had leeched the patch of earth dry, refusing to admit that the Ward might be too strong for him.

  It didn’t take much to convince himself that he was merely out of practice.

  While he waited, he drew symbols in the ash around him. The lines and curves formed ancient characters that hadn’t been used since the time when he had been banished from this plane. Druidic symbols that arched and swirled in tight formations surrounded him in a matter of minutes. The story he had carved into the ash covered surface of the frozen earth told the story leading up to his imprisonment.

  The world around him faded away as the characters were replaced by his memory of the events.

  The Druids who had finally succeeded in ridding this pitiful world of him had been very strong magick users. They had controlled the very Earth and all the powers that came along with it. It had taken centuries for him to regain the energy needed to once again be useful to his master.

  The tendrils that had bested him earlier in the day were much like the ones that had whipped around those men and women so many centuries ago. He took little pleasure in the fact that there was no way that they could have been the ones who had erected the ward. However, he wouldn’t be surprised if their decedents had had a hand in it.

  He found himself hoping that they had. For no other reason than the fact that it would give him that much more pleasure to tear through it and invalidate their sacrifices.

  He enjoyed the train of thought and allowed himself to dwell on it a bit longer. The beast caged inside of the physical shell he had created thrashed around, urging him to get back to work, but he ignored it as best he could as he waited for the timing to be just right.

  His mind drifted to the time he had spent in his natural state over the last few centuries. He had only slightly botched his last mission, therefore he had spent the time in relative comfort. After the first hundred years of his cells being scrambled and his energy being stretched to the near breaking point by the Big Bad, he was cast aside and allowed to do as he wished. As long as he didn’t leave the Astral plane.

  He had spent the next couple of centuries only existing. Gathering bits of information from those who had ventured to other planes and storing it for future reference. He had wasted no time in finding a nice place to sit quietly and recharge himself until he was called upon again. He knew it was only a matter of time until his expertise would be needed, though he had no idea that it would be such a big order to fill. Being held responsible for keeping the Cosmic scales in his boss’ favor would win him a major power boost.

  Failure would have him scattered throughout the Universe.

  He pulled himself back to the task at hand as the last bright sliver of the sun sank below the horizon and the sky slowly relinquished its oranges, reds, and yellows to the purples, blues and black of the night.

  Being a servant of Darkness, the sun wasn’t exactly his favorite thing to deal with. He much preferred the nighttime when he could drift among the shadows unnoticed.

  He did so now, heading back toward the temple. In small towns like the one he was passing through everyone all but barricaded themselves indoors during the harsh, cold winter nights for lack of anything better to do. While there may not have been snow on the ground, it was definitely cold. His breath was puffing out of him in white clouds of vapor.

  He drifted past window after window revealing people either sitting down with their families to eat, or watching television in the living room. Some were even exercising. “Times have changed more than I thought.” The statement went unheard by everyone but himself and the shadows.

  Many of the businesses were closed for the night and there weren’t very many cars on the road. His plan for privacy was beginning to look even better than he had hoped. He moseyed around the town a little longer, waiting for the sky to fade from dark blue to completely black before traversing the last few blocks to the temple.

  Once he could see the constellation Orion in its entirety, his long stride ate up the short distance in a matter of minutes.

  The glowing ball of energy surrounding the building brightened as he approached. Green spikes protruding from the entire surface, making it look like a sea urchin on steroids. It did not like that he was in the area and it liked even less that he was there for a second time.

  He shored up his defenses by pushing as much energy as he could afford into his aura, and pulling it as close to his body as he could get it. The result was a super-dense, black armor that he could manipulate at will. There were no chinks for a sharp point to stab through, and he could still will tentacles of his own to form outside the armor.

  He did so at that moment and rushed forward with unnatural precision and focus. He dodged tentacles, blocked others and minimized the blows from some of the smaller ones that managed to track his movements and escape his own assaults. He ignored the bone crushing jolt of energy that shot through him each time one connected and pressed forward.

  He only had another ten yards of hell to go, but the green vines were becoming denser the closer he got to the perimeter of the dome. He took blow after electric blow all over his body as he resolutely pressed on toward the center of the violent, writhing mass. He could feel the shield around him weakening with every devastating blow.

  He was only five feet from the glowing white wall of the bubb
le when the tentacles descended upon him with shocking ferocity. They had him wrapped up like a man on a stretching rack. His arms and legs were restrained; there was one around his neck, and another around his chest. All of them squeezing as one and sucking the power right out of him.

  He saw one of the tentacles heading for his chest and knew it was all over. He would be reduced to a pile of ash and blown away by the wind if he didn’t do something. And fast.

  With what was left of his flickering shield and the last of his inner reserve of power, he formed a large black thorn and thrust it with all of his might towards the glowing white wall. It shot from his outstretched palm like a bullet but the pain racking every muscle in his body it seemed like he was watching it all happen in slow motion.

  As the darkness penetrated the wall of the barrier, he felt the crushing grip on his body loosen and time resumed its normal pace.

  He fell to the ground and gasped for air as green wisps of smoke vanished before his eyes. The glow emanating from the barrier pulsed a few times and dimmed before going completely dark.

  Drained of nearly all of his energy and disoriented from his physical form’s lack of oxygen, he was having a hard time keeping it together. He kept flickering between his natural state and the physical body that he needed to complete his tasks.

  “Do you have a temple recommend?”

  Before he could stop himself, a black spine shot out of his aura and reduced the old woman to ash. He hungrily devoured the faint green aura that was left behind, relishing the residual Druidic energy that she had carried within her. He savored the energy boost while regretting the fact that he had let his energy stores drop to that point. He needed to be careful and avoid drawing attention to himself. Incinerating people in the middle of the sidewalk was not very discreet and tended to draw a lot of attention.