by Martha Carr
They were gathered on the top of a large kemana, holding hands around every artifact they had saved in their closets and attics, pulling them out of old boxes and drawers, waiting for a day like this.
The vibrations from the explosion in Chicago were felt as far away as Missouri and every magical being inside of the radius took note. Most brushed it off and went on about their day. These things happened and the Silver Griffins would get to the bottom of it. There was a proper and orderly system. Best to not get involved.
But there were others who had met in secret for generations who longed for a different ending. A rebirth of Rhazdon’s movement and the purity of magic and the right beings to follow his teachings.
Recently, rumors were flying around their circles at dinner tables and card games and standing by the soccer fields at children’s games, that there was a new high priest rising up to take Rhazdon’s place. He believed everything Rhazdon had taught and even was said to have skill at dark magic.
A twisted hope sprang up, weaving itself through groups spread out over the Earth, bringing them together in ever closer circles. Then the explosion happened and those closest to it knew it was all true
An artifact from Oriceran that carried great powers, both light and dark, was brought to Chicago. The most powerful kind of artifact that could be used for something magnificent and dangerous.
They wanted to open a gate, between the two worlds centuries early. It would stay open, but be hidden from everyone but their own kind. Those who believed in the teachings of Rhazdon.
This time it would be possible to find their new leader, this high priest, and join forces. A new darkness would begin and this time, on both worlds.
They joined hands around the pile of artifacts and relics that were purposefully arranged so that the energy would continue to combine and connect outward toward the circle.
Each hand grasped the one next to it, and the energy began to flow faster around the circle, building in intensity, flooding the members of the new cult. Their faces glowed, first pale gold, building to a dark royal purple. A feeling of bliss came over them, a few even giggled, unable to contain themselves.
But everyone held even tighter, determined not to break the ring of energy. Slowly, small embers appeared around the pile, racing around it in the sand. A blue light expanded upward, throwing off a hot wind powerful enough to knock someone off the rock formation if they got too close.
The heat intensified as the artifacts and relics were picked up by the wind, swirling into the blue haze, melting into pure energy. Rivulets of glowing, metallic blue liquid flowed out toward each member of the circle, seeking them out. A young half elf cried out, trying to pull her hands away and run but the others held on tighter. The energy seeped into their feet, crawling through their veins and settling into their bones.
A vision appeared in each of their minds. The same vision.
“The necklace is in Chicago,” said the young elf, wonder in her voice. She could feel the surge of power. The blue fire subsided, gradually disappearing back into the ground. The artifacts and relics were gone and in their place the rock beneath their feet was cold to the touch, scattered with small crystals littering the ground. Everyone in the circle let go at the same moment and went to fill their pockets with the crystals. Small pieces of energy they could use later that worked like an energy balm. The user only needed to be magical and hold it tightly in their hands for a burst of temporary energy, enough to pull off one good spell.
“We should get going,” said an older male Light Elf. His face was aglow with a blue inner light, much like everyone else. A younger Light Elf stared at him in wonder. “The glow wears off in a few hours,” he said. “The energy will too after a few days. There isn’t a lot of time. We’ll need to gather together again and hit the road.”
“Not everyone,” said a half-Crystal man. “We should ring the city with followers. That way if the Order manages to escape with the necklace, there will be others waiting to stop them. Besides, it will be easier for us to slip through unnoticed by the humans if we don’t march in there like a brigade.”
“Then we have a plan.”
“And a mission.” The Light Elf’s eyes glowed blue and he smiled as he looked out over the dark vista.
Chapter Eight
“Thank God! A day off!”
“Why does this feel like the first day of school?” Leira was driving the green Mustang toward Lavender Rock. “You didn’t need to bring snacks this time. Twenty miles doesn’t count as a road trip.”
She looked over at him, happily using a Twizzler as a straw in a Dr. Pepper.
“That can’t be good.”
“I imagine just as good for you as all of that coffee you’re constantly drinking.” He slurped the bottom of the can.
“Coffee is a national treasure.”
“Mine!” chirped the troll, sitting on Correk’s leg. Its little hands reached out, tiny claws digging into the Twizzler. Correk let him drag it away. He looked up in time to see Leira glare.
“I’m not fighting a troll over a licorice stick. I have my limits,” he said.
“I was beginning to wonder.”
“Besides, I bought the big box at Costco. I have hundreds left.”
“You keep this up you’re going to need a bigger portal to get back home.”
“Light Elves have amazing metabolisms. Like hummingbirds. We burn fuel at a very high rate.”
“Twizzlers and Dr. Peppers are not fuel but that does explain a lot about my own ability to eat and stay in shape.”
She turned on to the gravel road into McKinney State Park. The road wound back to the right till it reached an oversized lavender-colored crystal spread over three acres. Lavender Rock.
The sides jutted out, making a natural staircase to the top that was flat and fairly smooth, and big enough to lay out a blanket and relax or hang out with friends. Leira pulled into the small lot parking the Mustang off by itself.
“Are we planning for a quick getaway?”
“I’m still not used to this whole idea of magical people everywhere. I’m not sure how I feel about being surrounded by them.”
“You’ve been surrounded by them your entire existence. That would be true if you were completely human. Oricerans stayed behind after the gates closed thousands of years ago. They made a home here and their descendants do their best to blend in most of the time. Your dentist could be part dwarf, or the lady who bags your groceries could be part Dark Elf. Humans have a hard time with the smallest of differences amongst themselves. We find it’s better to stay hidden when on this planet.”
“But the gates are going to start to open in my lifetime.”
“Your lifetime, I predict, will turn out to be longer than you imagined, and then some. But yes, there are only twenty years or so till the gates start to very gradually open again and Earth will be introduced to a rise in magic, whether they like it or not. Eventually, nothing will keep the two worlds from becoming enmeshed.”
“Wouldn’t it be better if there was some planning going on now?” Leira asked, scooping up the troll and sliding him into her pocket. She was getting used to having him along. She got out of the car and adjusted her jacket, and noticed Correk was watching her.
“What?” She looked around, turning in a circle, trying to figure out what Correk was looking at so intently.
“Are you wearing your gun?”
“They call it carrying. Are you carrying your gun,” Leira said. “And yeah, I am. I’m still an officer of the law.”
“Now who sounds like bad cable TV?” Correk narrowed his eyes at her. A thought occurred to him and he hoped he was wrong.
“You’re unhappy that you’re Elven, aren’t you? This is some kind of self-hate thing!”
Leira was taken aback, her face warming as she stammered, “It’s not that… I don’t trust, well - anyone.” The words hit her square in the chest and knocked the wind out of her. She put the thought away and pushed pa
st Correk, marching toward the large rock.
“I’m also not afraid of anything,” she said over her shoulder.
“That first part, that not trusting anyone. It’s not even true,” Correk declared. He was taking long strides to catch up with her. “Craig, Mitzi, Mike, Scott, Estelle…”
“Okay, I get it. I have a tribe. That’s what the Huffington Post calls it these days, right? They’re more of a team than a tribe. I take care of myself. It’s been that way, more or less, since I was ten years old. I’m an independent spirit who kicks ass, motherfuckers!” She spit the words out, feeling the anger growing inside of her.
She felt it before she saw it. The magic was taking over her body.
She looked down and saw the symbols blossoming under her skin, crawling up her arm. She clenched her fists but that only made the color deepen and the symbols spread to her neck. The tall grass around them bent away from her and a nearby tree rattled as a flock of starlings shook loose and rose to the sky, turning north and flying away. The troll stirred in her pocket.
Correk thought about saying something but instead held out his hand and waited.
“I can take care of myself.”
“No doubt of that at all. You are very independent. That doesn’t mean you have to be alone. It just means you get to choose to let people help you. It’s a choice.” His hand was still extended. “It takes courage to ask people for help, even when you can do it yourself.” He looked into her eyes, lit from within, and the angry set of her jaw, and he waited.
Leira slowly opened her hands. It was taking all her willpower to harness the magic flowing through her. Part of her wanted to let it have its way and flow out from her, just to see what it could do. What she could do.
The troll trembled in her pocket and burrowed deeper, curling up in a ball.
“You have a choice right now,” Correk said gently. His hair was flowing out behind him from the blast of energy coming from Leira. The nearby pines were starting to bend in the direction of the flow of magic.
He was using his own magic to steady his heart rate and center the energy within himself. The harder she pushed, the calmer he became. A calm in the middle of a storm.
Leira felt like she could hold the pulse forever. It was like a runner’s high. Just there, and endless. She pulled her shoulders back, standing up straighter, lifting her chin. A familiar defiance came back to her. It’s easier to just do it alone, she thought.
Thin streams of lightning within the energy flow crackled and popped and suddenly started to reverse themselves. Correk watched with some concern but he did nothing to interrupt the flow. The sharp blue tendrils of magic continued to find their way through Leira’s wide open surge, traveling back to the source. To Leira.
The opposing energy was now pulsing blue and white, climbing up the outside of Leira’s body until it reached her chest and disappeared into her body in tiny spirals.
An ache appeared inside of her as she felt the connection of the other energy meeting hers. Something familiar that she recognized, but it had been too long. She did her best to ignore it, wanting to hold on to the feeling of power, but it kept spiraling inside of her, tapping away at her consciousness.
“Mom,” she whispered, shocked. Her mother was making contact, again. The energy surged forward, doubling its strength and weaving in on itself. Leira could hear the sounds within the energy. Like the singing speech of Light Elves on Oriceran. Her eyes widened as she realized their music were small pulses of magic energy. She opened her mouth and the same stream flowed out of her. She knew how to do it without anyone teaching her. It was a part of her.
The energy from her mother wrapped itself around her, searching for answers.
Leira let go of the pulse she created and the energy abruptly reversed itself, flowing back into Leira with a whomp that made her stagger backward a few steps. Leira reached out for Correk’s hand, still open in front of her. He closed his fingers around hers and held tight, pulling until he could wrap his arms around her. Leira held on as a shudder moved through her.
Her knees buckled and she felt her legs give way but Correk held her up until she could find her feet again. There were tears streaming down her face
The air around them settled and the grass stopped moving. Leira pushed away from Correk and turned away as her stomach lurched.
“What the hell was that?” she asked Correk. The world seemed to be spinning in front of her. Correk reached out to grab hold of her again but she took a step back. He looked pained but dropped his arms and stepped back.
“That was an amazing display of magic, Cousin. You are a natural channel of energy. A rare being. I have never seen a display of magic like that. I’ve only heard about something like this from hundreds of years ago at the time of the defeat of Rhazdon.”
“My mother…” Leira gasped, trying to catch her breath. Another wave of nausea threatened to overtake her. She pressed her palm into her stomach.
This time Correk insisted and steadied her, holding her arm. His eyes glowed dimly for just a minute and he sang in a low voice, letting the small pulses of magic vibrate around her, steadying the stream. Slowly, Leira began to feel normal again. She held her hands out in front of her to check, but they were rock steady.
“One more time. What the fuck was that?”
“Basically, a pure stream of energy, of magic. You were able to channel the energy coming off of the nearby rock, straight through you. You were a part of the kemana for a little while.”
“But my mother. She was here! I could feel her!”
“Yes, I saw what happened. Your magic is so strong it reached out to her. She felt your pulse of energy and responded to you. That doesn’t entirely surprise me. After all, you share the same DNA. But I can clearly see from the varying strength of your energy flow not all of your powers came from your mother. Your father must have had some magic as well.”
“Yes, well, he’s a big question mark. My mother would never talk about him.” Leira shook out her arms and blinked a few times. “I don’t feel tired or worn out from that,” she said, surprised. “I would have thought that would take something from you. You said you have to recharge when you perform magic.”
“It can and I do. That’s what I mean. You are a very special being. A natural channel. You can use the magic flowing through you and pull in even more. We’ll have to look into that, but for now, we should go introduce ourselves.”
“What about my mother?”
“It’s good news. Her ability to control her emotions is still strong enough for her to send a pulse this far, and to basically check on you. Your mother was making sure you’re alright.”
“We have to go see her.” Leira turned to head back to the car. Correk pulled her back and rested his hands on her shoulders.
“Every magical being within ten miles felt the hum of that surge. It’s a lot like the bomb blast in Chicago but in the opposite, positive way,” he said sternly. “They’ll be coming off the rock to see who it was. Best we just go say hello. We’ll go to see your mother, just like we talked about. We’ll even get her out. Did you just see what you could do? What in this world or the next could stop you? But we do it right. For now, let’s go let everyone know that nothing other than the usual weirdness happened. Stop them from making up their own stories.”
“So, it’s a good thing I brought my gun.”
“You put out that kind of magical energy and still think you even need a gun.” He shook his head and trudged ahead of her, up the hill toward the rock, mumbling about missing the obvious and newbies.
“This all still feels like an episode of Oprah during sweeps week,” Leira called, taking off at a run and passing him easily. It felt good to use her muscles and feel her legs move up the rough terrain. She leapt over a small boulder and felt more of the fragments of energy still clinging to her burn away, the energy rising in waves through the air. “Last one there eats too much junk food!”
“First one there has
to introduce herself!” Correk called out. Leira stopped and looked back at him.
I can choose to be with others. She waited until he caught up with her and changed her mind, running ahead. And I can choose to do it my way. A smile spread across her face. My mother came to check on me. She’s okay. I will bring her home. Leira ran as fast as she could, leaping up the first few steps of Lavender Rock.
She stopped, a thin sheen of sweat on her face and looked back at Correk who was walking up the path at a fast clip. She looked up toward the top of the rock and realized there was a small crowd, all peering over the edge, staring at her with varying degrees of curiosity and worry.
Leira waved just as the troll popped his head out of her jacket pocket. He gave a small wave of his own. She froze, not sure what to do next.
“First the magic quake and now Oriceran trolls,” she said quietly. Correk caught up to her and saw what had made her stop in her tracks.
She looked at him, and asked, “Is this good or bad?”
“I’m learning, Leira Berens, that with you there will have to be entirely new definitions. It’s not a great way to walk into this world but it could be worse. At least we won’t have to explain who we are.”
“I thought they could all do that little thing we did the other night and tell who’s magical and who’s not.”
“It’s not like we do that all the time, but yes, they could. That only goes so far. It reads the magic but doesn’t give you any history and it can tell you how powerful the being is, but only up to a point.
“Well, are you coming up or not?” A woman with a large, bouncy afro was shouting down to them, a welcoming smile on her face.
“So far, so good.”
“I told you, even Oricerans who have been on Earth for generations don’t separate themselves out like human beings are so fond of doing. That woman is elven. She’s happy to meet more family.”
“Now, that’s a concept. Like fast food family.”
“Yes!” Correk smiled at her but Leira only shook her head.
