Not wanting to mess about much more as she could already feel the Magic inside the building growing and affecting her perception, she chose to get moving, and picked a direction at random, gingerly making her way over the grass and uneven ground.
Shadows shifted, the walls to the building seemed to not be there, and then there again. These were just the usual effects of strong magic as your brain questioned the reality around it. She didn’t notice it as much these days as she grew used to these effects, but it could be a useful warning system.
Walking around the building, she turned a corner to see an open doorway and dancing lights spilling out of it. Things were progressing and she needed to be in there.
She moved as quick as she could and ducked into the doorway towards the back of the building, closest to the road and found herself on a solid flat floor again.
She couldn’t see much from where she stood now, various machinery and other disused items still stood in place, and beyond those, the lights that danced towards the middle of the building cast strange shadows over the rear wall.
Despite the darkness, she could see quite well with her enhanced vision and moved around the machinery to see where the light had been coming from.
As she moved, the scene came into view and she wished she’d arrived here sooner.
The four students stood at the four corners of a summoning circle, one for each compass direction. Between them, on the floor, a circle had been clearly marked out with runes and candles. Christina held the book in her right hand, reading from its pages while she held her left hand aloft. Of the four, she seemed like the only one of them taking this relatively calmly. The other three, Scott, Tomo and Jake, all wore expressions of shock and fear as strange smoke rose from the circle and a flickering, pulsing light hovered in the centre, a good six foot off the ground. As she watched, a Dark form materialised within the light and started to grow and take form.
Amanda had no idea what this thing could be, but it didn’t look good.
She’d heard stories of Demons and Spirits living in the Abyss that could be summoned by Magi or those with the right tools such as this book.
Amanda stood and stared for a moment, not really sure what she should do. Disrupting the spell would be a good idea usually, but with the spirit now there in the middle of the protective circle and being held in place by the Magic that Christina conjured up, disrupting the ritual now might actually release the Demon in our world, not something Amanda felt keen on doing. So she watched and waited, hoping for an opportunity to end this craziness.
Christina finished chanting and looked up, apparently surprising herself by what the book had done.
‘It worked,’ she said in a shaky voice.
‘Shit yeah it worked, now what?’ Jake said.
‘Um…’ Christina said, and opened the book again, flicking through pages as fast as she could.
‘Oh great,’ Scott muttered to himself, no doubt realising that Christina had no clue what to do next.
‘Can you send it back,’ Tomo asked.
‘I’m looking, I’m looking. Give me a moment.’
‘You’re looking? It’s looking… at us!’ said Tomo, desperation edging into his voice.
Amanda looked, and indeed the thing, which didn’t look human at all, seemed to be looking around itself. The thing seemed to be little more than a black shape, the top half kind of looked like a Manta Ray, smooth and sleek, the top of its body bent over like a head. The bottom half of the thing tapered off and split into black tendrils and tentacles that writhed about like a mass of snakes across the floor. As she and the 4 kids watched, the thing turned on the spot and regarded each of the participants.
‘I don’t like this Chrissy,’ said Scott, a bit more worried now.
‘It’s in here, give me a moment, I can send it back,’ she replied.
‘Well hurry up, I don’t want to stay here much longer,’ Jake said.
‘Don’t you move! If you move or break the circle then you will set it free, that would not be good,’ she said sternly.
Jake lifted his hands in supplication.
‘I ain’t going anywhere yet.’
Amanda didn’t know a lot about these kinds of things, summoning creatures like this was not something she had ever really done before. Christina seemed to know what to do, and Amanda had no reason to doubt her, so she fuelled her Aegis and waited, hoping that Christina would pull this together at the last moment.
Amanda then noticed some movement on the other side of the circle, but she found it difficult to make out who or what the new arrival could be through the dancing lights and magical energy. She moved about, trying to get a better look and saw someone running towards the summoning circle on the far side, but by the time she had realised this, the figure had crossed the edge of the circle and stepped into the same space as the creature.
As she moved forward, Amanda could make out this person held out a cross pointed towards the spirit while they she chanted something, a passage from scripture maybe.
Amanda got a bad feeling about this and moved forward to get a better look, and as she did so, her stomach sank.
Alicia had stepped into the circle with her cross held out attempting to banish the spirit.
‘Alicia, no,’ shouted Jake, recognising her suddenly.
Amanda suspected that the thing came from the Abyss, and a simple nun reciting bible verses would be about as effective as a broken umbrella in a typhoon.
Amanda moved forward quickly and reached the edge of the circle, but as she tried to step into it, she found her passage blocked.
An Aegis surrounded the creature, a powerful one that kept the thing confined and Magi like Amanda out. Alicia, as a Sundered Mortal, could cross it without problem. As she watched, the thing bent low to give Alicia a good long look and suddenly grabbed her with one of its powerful tentacles.
‘No,’ shouted Amanda at the thing, which turned and regarded Amanda for a moment before looking back at Alicia who now struggled and had started to shout at the creature.
‘I’ve found it, bellowed Christina and gave her friends a desperate smile.
‘Then use it, get rid of it,’ Jake shouted.
Christina looked down at the book and started to read. Amanda watched as the creatures head snapped up to look at Christina, feeling the change in Magical energy and understanding what she had started to do.
The spirit moved quickly now and turning back to Alicia, pounced at her. The whole eight or nine foot of black Abyssal spirit shot at Alicia’s chest and in a puff of black smoke, passed into her. Alicia staggered backwards as black smoke bubbled around her body, the force of the thing possessing her making her take a few steps back and drop one knee to the floor.
Alicia hadn’t worn her Nuns Habit to come here, she wore a dark hoody over the top of her grey Novitiate outfit Amanda had seen her in a couple of years before. She twisted and dropped to the floor, ripping her tights as she went.
Christina finished her chanting and the barrier dropped. Amanda ran forward and crouched down next to Alicia as she tried to sit up.
‘Ali, Ali? Are you alright? Alicia, talk to me,’ she pleaded as the four students gathered around them. Alicia looked up at Amanda, she looked to be in shock, her skin looked very pale, but most disturbing of all were her eyes. They were black, a solid, oily, glistening wet black. She looked up at Amanda, and whispered two words.
‘Help me…’ she said, before going limp and dropping to the floor. Amanda caught her a fraction of a second before her head hit the ground, before pulling her in for a hug.
‘Alicia,’ Amanda said quietly to herself.
‘Err, hi, can we help?’
Jake crouched down next to her, concern filling his face as she reached out and touched Amanda’s arm that held Alicia.
‘Not really Jake. She needs specialist care now.’
Amanda placed Alicia on the ground carefully before looking up at the other students from her crouched posit
ion. Jake stayed next to Alicia, crouched down, Scott stood behind him, looking down at Alicia, also clearly concerned, but not as much as Jake.
Straight behind Scott stood Christina, her magic book in hand and a defiant look upon her face, while Tomo stood off to one side, lighting up a cigarette and pacing back and forth, muttering to himself.
‘What the hell were you thinking you ejit,’ Amanda asked Christina.
Christina raised her eyebrows at Amanda. ‘I don’t think you’re in any position to question me, did you see what I just did?’
‘Oh really?’ Amanda answered.
‘The power I wield with this book allows me to…’
Amanda had raised her hand, and the book shot out from under Christina’s arm and stopped dead in Amanda’s hand as she caught it. Christina stopped speaking, her mouth left agape.
‘No, no, please continue. You were saying about power,’ Amanda said, questioning.
‘I, err… that is…’
Amanda slowly stood up as Christina struggled to find the words, staring hard into Christina’s eyes. ‘You’ve played with forces so far beyond your understanding you have no idea, and now you might have killed someone,’ she said as she took a couple of steps towards her.
‘She looks alive to me,’ Christina said in defiance.
‘Something is alive in that body, but it might not be Alicia.’ Amanda held up the book she now had in her hand. ‘This stays with me,’ she said, only for her to feel someone behind her grab it and try to pull it from her hand. She knew it was coming, but she let the kid do it in order to teach him a lesson.
Amanda twisted, going with the motion and took hold of Tomo’s hand as she did so, prying it from the book and in one smooth motion. She forced the six foot teenager to the ground, where he landed on his knees, his wrist held almost effortlessly in her left hand in a very awkward position that made him wince with pain.
‘As I was saying, if you try any more funny business, then people will get hurt,’ Amanda said. ‘Now, where did you get this book?’ She asked, and as she did so she plunged her magic into Christina’s mind. She didn’t need Christina to answer the question. Just by asking Amanda had triggered memories of buying the item that Amanda could now see.
‘You think I’m telling you that?’ Christina said.
‘Thank you,’ Amanda said telepathically directly to her mind and the minds of the others there.
‘What,’ Christina said in shock.
‘You already have,’ Amanda answered. ‘You bought it at Sligo Nik Naks. Thank you.
Christina looked utterly bewildered by what Amanda had just done, and stared at this impossible woman.
‘Now, are we all good?’
Tomo nodded dumbly, Scott backed off while Christina just looked angry. Amanda let Tomo go and stepped back to Alicia. Jake still crouched next to her, holding her hand. He looked up at Amanda.
‘Will she be ok?’
‘I have no idea, but I will do everything in my power to try and ensure it. You have my word,’ she answered quietly. ‘Now, go back to your dorm rooms and forget this ever happened,’ she said to the group.
They started to back off and walk away. Amanda knew that she had progressed further in her Magical ability, she seemed to be able to travel further with her Porting now than just a few weeks ago, so she wondered if she might be able to take an additional person with her now. She figured she’d give it a go and see if she could take herself and Alicia back to her Cottage, just a short jump that would be really easy on her own.
Amanda waited until none of them were looking back at her before she pulled on the threads of Essentia and wrapped them around herself and Alicia, focusing on the bedroom in her cottage. With a quiet whip crack of energy, they disappeared from the warehouse.
Christina turned away from the Redhead and scowled to herself. She felt a mix of emotions that only really made her feel frustrated and angry. She’d felt elated that the Magic they had used from the book had worked, but also a little scared at what she had managed to do. Sister Alicia’s meddling ways had only served to frustrate her further, she’d felt sure she could have banished that demon back to hell if Alicia hadn’t turned everything to shit.
But who the hell was this Redhead? She seemed to know Alicia and seemed to have some kind of power herself as well. Not to mention she took down Tomo with one hand.
She’d only been turned away from the Redhead for a second or so when she heard a strange whipping of air sound, she looked back and both women were gone. They’d disappeared into thin air.
Christina paused looking back, her mouth agape in surprise and confusion.
‘What the hell?’ she said.
They appeared in Amanda’s cottage on the north side of the Blue Stack Mountains, Alicia appearing on Amanda’s bed.
It had been a bit of a strain to take an additional person, she really had stretched herself to Port Alicia with her, but it had been worth it.
She looked at the unconscious Alicia, and then back at the book in her hands. She really wasn’t sure exactly what had happened with that spirit, but as she looked at Alicia now with her Magical vision, she could see something had changed. Her interaction with Essentia seemed different, her Aura had shifted and there seemed to be a deeper, more fundamental shift she couldn’t quite place.
She knew little about spirits or possession; she wasn’t an expert and couldn’t pretend to be. She would need to find someone who knew a little more about these things.
First though, she could do with knowing more about this book. After weaving an alarm spell over Alicia, that would let Amanda know when she woke up, Amanda did a quick search on her phone to locate the shop that Christina had thought about and after a quick Scry of the street and then the shop, she Ported directly into the building.
The shops interior sat quietly in the shadows of early evening, closed for the night, lit only occasionally by a passing car. The shop had been filled with household items of all kinds, from cooking implements to chairs, tables, handmade ornaments and books.
She approached the handful of bookshelves scattered about the shop interior, but even under close inspection, there was no residual magic here.
Finding this book must have been a fluke. She could see plenty of items listed as pre-owned on the price tag, so maybe someone sold it to the shop, probably in amongst a pile of unwanted books and just didn’t know what they had in their possession.
She left the shop, Porting back to the cottage, writing the shop off as a dead end for the time being.
Alicia still lay on her bed where she’d left her.
‘God damn it Ali, why’d you have to go and do that,’ Amanda said to the room. She perched on the edge of the bed and looked down at her friend. She could see the Essentia within her that twisted about, as if fighting itself. She could see two minds inside in the body, the thoughts of both seemed erratic and under stress, but they seemed to be linked somehow.
This was all new to her, something she had never seen before, so she started to open a Link to Gentle Water in New York, but paused half way through and looked at Alicia. She wondered about trying to link with Alicia’s mind, would it be possible? Would she be able to help her or would she present a more alluring prize for the demon? She had no way to know, but she knew her Aegis had been brought up to strength for the potential fight in the warehouse, so surely she would be protected.
Throwing caution to the wind, she closed her eyes and reached out with her mind.
Her Magic closed in around Alicia’s head and started to press in on the mind she recognised as Alicia’s. Slowly, thoughts started to reveal themselves to Amanda, like shouts in the distance that she struggled to make out. They sounded stressed and in pain.
So Amanda sent thoughts of her own into the depths of Alicia’s mind, comforting thoughts, that she was there for her should she need her.
Darkness swooped in from elsewhere in her body, the other mind, the mind of the creature, pushing Amanda out
and away from her friend.
The creature had power, more than enough to force Amanda’s Magic out of the way and defend its prey.
Amanda pulled her magic back in defeat and finished sending the Link request to Gentle Water, she needed him to Port Alicia back in one go rather than hop from country to country.
I have no idea what happened today, that thing I summoned and what it did to Alicia. I suppose I always hoped it would be real, but I never really expected it to actually happen. It’s like films and video games, part of you thinks it would be cool to live in that world, when in fact, it would probably be fucking scary as all hell. I’m still pissed off at that Redhead though, that book had been the find of the century and now it’s gone.
I hope Alicia is OK. I never intended for anyone to get hurt. Jake won’t speak to me and Scott’s a bit more distant tonight. Why can’t they understand?
I guess we all have a lot to deal with.
- Christina’s Diary.
New Information
May 19th
Greenwich Village, New York
Amanda sat back in the chair, then after a few moments sat forward again her elbows on her knees. She rang her hands through each other, fiddled with her rings on her fingers and played with her hair.
‘How are you? You seem worried.’
A half smile crossed her features upon hearing Gentle Waters comment, snapping her out of the endless rollercoaster of thought that her mind had been strapped to. The endless recriminations and self-doubt swam about her head that sprang from not being there in time to stop Alicia, or not seeing that her headstrong friend might take it upon herself to try and stop the children in her charge from doing something stupid. Had she been there sooner maybe she would have seen Alicia, maybe she could have stopped the kids from starting the ritual in the first place. She’d been distracted by old friends and spent too much time with her old teacher drinking and talking about old times.
She should have taken Alicia more seriously, followed the kids more diligently, and maybe, just maybe she wouldn’t be sat here next to her friend who had been possessed by who knew what.
Magi Saga 2: Shadows of Darkness Page 19
