Wings of The Wraith

by Khardine Gray

  It had to lead outside, but going that way meant running across a moving floor. One that moved like water.

  “Thought you were trying to escape.” The man taunted.

  I looked back to him and my mouth dropped when I saw he’d removed his shirt and was now hovering in the air.

  My eyes landed on the sharp definition of peaks and valleys all along his abs. Then on his right peck there were the Greek characters for Alpha and Omega tattooed in black, black ink. Along with some other characters from a language I didn’t recognize.

  “To escape, you’d have to at least try to stop checking me out.” He laughed. “We can explore each other’s bodies when this is all over. Or, maybe before. Depends on time I suppose.”

  I narrowed my eyes at him, wanting to snap at him or something, but I couldn’t.

  Escaping was the goal right now.

  I ran straight over to the floor and found that I could move across it. The only thing was it kept setting me back. For every step I took forwards, I went back two places.

  “It’s called the void,” he said. “You have to have pure thoughts to cross it, and you were just thinking of sex.”

  “I was not.” I snapped. Okay, maybe I kind of was. But it was more the case of me feeling something rather than thinking it.

  Still, how dare he?

  “Why don’t you just fly? Alyssa.” His vice lingered on the edge of my name, making my insides tingle. Then suddenly he appeared on the other side of the room, where I was trying to get to, but he was still in the air.

  He placed his hands in the pockets of his leather pants and leaned back against an invisible wall.

  “Why don’t you come over here, up here? If you come I’ll show you the way home. It’s just over there.” He pointed and smiled.

  I looked through a window that suddenly appeared and saw there was a road outside. It looked like it was near my apartment, although somehow, I knew it couldn’t be.

  It wasn’t possible. I couldn’t remember ever seeing a massive castle, big enough to be a world of its own, near my apartment.

  “Come on, you could be in your bed within the hour. Don’t you want that? To be home?”

  Home. This was the second time tonight this man had appealed to what I treasured most.

  Grandma Elma, and home.

  In regard to my apartment, it wasn’t anything to shout about, but I bought it with the money she left me in her will. She left me enough so I could buy my apartment and have a home. She always emphasized the importance of that and like everything she’d given me, whether advice or physical things I treasured it.

  “Alyssa, just step into the air like you would if you were climbing the stairs,” he smiled at me, making it sound so easy. Like it really was just that easy.

  Okay, I could do it. I would do it and he would show me how to get home.

  I took a step just like he said and found my footing, then suddenly I was thrust into the air and hovering just like him.

  What the hell? I was flying. I was actually flying!

  How many times had I tried to fly when I was little? I even jumped out of a tree once, attempting to fly, and broke my arm.

  How could I do it now?

  “You didn’t have powers back then?” He laughed.

  “Powers?” I didn’t know what he was talking about.

  “Yep, looks like you’re very powerful too. How about you try out something else, like an energy ball.”

  “Can I just go home?” I just wanted to go home. That was all. Nothing more.

  “Come here.” He crooked his finger and beckoned for me to come to him.

  I looked over and held his mischievous, desire filled gaze.

  The guy was hot, but there was something about him that drew me to him. something I wanted to resist and run away from. I didn’t know him, but yet... I did.

  How did I know him?

  When in my life would I have known an angel. It was crazy.

  “Come here princess.” He said again. He’d called me princess earlier too.

  I was too panicked to take note of the heat that rushed over my body on hearing the endearment. I felt it now though, and I could have cursed myself for being so silly.

  Now was not the time for my brain to turn to soup just because a ridiculously hot guy just called me princess. Particularly when I was certain I looked like shit. No one could claim to look good after they’d jumped out of a window of a fifteen story building.

  Gathering my courage, and pushing aside my attraction, I went to him. I walked across the air and he watched me with keen interest. When I got up to him a smile crossed his face and he disappeared.

  He just disappeared.

  Where did he go? Where in the hell did he go?

  “Here.” He appeared behind me, once again frightening the hell out of me. When I turned around flames shot out of my hands.

  This time it caught his face. He laughed, and it flickered over him.

  More tears ran down my cheeks.

  “Stop crying baby, and practice that power of yours. This may be the only practice you get.”

  “Please, just take me home,” I begged.

  Dante... I remembered his name. But where did I know it from.

  “Dante.” When I spoke it he regarded me with sharper eyes.

  “Soon, princess. I promise. Soon. Shoot me again.”

  All I could do was look at him.

  “No.”

  “Why?”

  “It’s horrible. Don’t you feel the flames.”

  “I can’t.” He held up his hands and the same flames that came from mine surrounded his. “Angel magic. I have it too.”

  “Angel magic? Am I...dead?”

  “No baby,” he chuckled. “But how about you try to survive this.”

  It wasn’t enough notice.

  The flames that coursed through his hands grew bigger and he threw them at me.

  I screamed but retaliated by putting my hands up.

  Instead of flames bursting from me, though, a shield of bright white light surrounded me. It looked like glass but with a white light beaming from it.

  Before I could marvel at the sight, Dante sent another round of energy at me. It shattered the sphere of light, but I countered it with flames of my own.

  He laughed. “Impressive, very impressive.”

  Balls of energy now came my way.

  On instinct I fired back sending my own energy balls at him. They crashed into his and neutralized them. He laughed, a sound that filled me, but also terrified me. This was no laughing matter.

  I couldn’t see anything funny about the situation.

  Balls of fucking fire were blasting from my hands.

  He disappeared again and flickered back into existence right in front of me.

  The shield came up again, and my energy levels dropped. It dropped like someone had taken it away.

  My head...

  My head felt light and the room shifted around me. Not like before. This time I was just dizzy.

  Dizzy and falling.

  Dante caught me before I could hit the ground.

  Second time tonight, or in the space of whatever time I’d seen him.

  He carried me and I rested my hands on the rigid muscles of his chest. Heat radiated from his skin and his eyes flickered gold again, but then went back to chocolate coal.

  “Well done,” he said leaning in close.

  “What did I do?” My voice was so weak, it came out like a whisper. I pressed my hands into his skin as I felt my mind slipping again.

  “Happy Birthday Alyssa. You my dear are a syphon. So Syph, you just syphered my powers and used them on me.”

  “I don’t know what you’re saying. What does it mean?”

  “I don’t know. But it was sexy as hell to meet my match.” His eyes sparkled.

  I blinked several times and ran my fingers over his chest as his skin seemed to get hotter.

  “You’re hot.”

  “I know
, so are you.” He winked at me and the darkness took me again as I fainted.

  Chapter 4

  Alyssa

  My eyes fluttered open and I bolted upright.

  I was back in that bed. The bed in the room down the hall. I was back here again. Not at home.

  I looked around the room. It was different. The colors had changed. Instead of the white and beige colors that were previously in here, it was dark green.

  Forest green.

  But I knew it was the same room.

  The window flung open and I sucked in a sharp breath as a little owl flew inside.

  It was a little snowy owl that would look right at home in a Harry Potter film.

  It screeched, then did what looked like a little bow.

  The large doors opened next. Slowly.

  And who I saw standing there made me leap off the bed. It was excitement, then fear, then shock that made me move.

  Now all the emotions combined paralyzed me.

  The woman standing before me, dressed in a long white robe, was Grandma Elma.

  My Grandma Elma, who I buried ten years ago.

  I opened my mouth to talk but couldn’t.

  I hated crying, but it was the reaction my body had chosen several times since the madness took over my life in this night.

  “Grandma?” The words couldn’t even come out fully.

  “Yes, sweet girl. It’s me.” She nodded. The door closed when she walked into the room.

  I noticed straight away she looked the way she did when I was a child, not like when she died. She looked to be in her early forties. I remember her saying that was the best time of her life.

  “Come here child.” She opened out her arms to receive me.

  Right then I didn’t care what madness this was. Love took over and I flew straight into her arms.

  “Grandma, oh Grandma, I died. I must have died, and I can’t remember how. I think it happened when I jumped through the window at work. Maybe I snapped, and I lost my mind.”

  It had to be that. Must have been because there was no other explanation.

  None whatsoever.

  I must have gone crazy when I looked at the stack of books on my desk at work. It was after that that I heard Balmora.

  I figured I must have lost my mind and jumped through the window.

  Now I was in heaven.

  Maybe. Or perhaps it was somewhere my mind had conjured up.

  Grandma pulled away from me and looked me over, sorrow in her eyes. Sorrow filled her face, clouding her beautiful features.

  “No, my dear. You are not dead, and neither am I. My human life is over, and this is my next calling. My first calling was to watch over you and protect you.”

  What was she saying?

  “I don’t understand. I don’t understand.”

  She sat me back down on the bed and sat next to me.

  “Do you remember the stories I used to tell you when you were little? Your father couldn’t stand them.” She offered a kind smile.

  “I remember.” She told me fairy tales similar to what you’d read in a Grimm Brother’s collection.

  Witches and sorcerers, vampires and demons. Angels and other magical creatures. Those were the beings in her stories.

  “My dear girl they weren’t stories. There were um... I was telling you about this world. The world no one can see in the human realm.”

  “What?” I shook my head. I must have gone crazy, must have.

  “No. You are not crazy.” She read my mind.

  Read my thoughts.

  “Grandma.”

  “Yes girl. I’m so sorry. I’m so truly sorry. This wasn’t what was supposed to happen. It’s your birthday today and everything is about to change for you, more than it already has.”

  “What do you mean?” I still couldn’t understand.

  She pressed her lips together. “Your father is human, but your mother’s side of the family comes from a long line of witches who developed the ability to become the most powerful mages history has ever seen.”

  “Mom? So she’s a witch?”

  “Yes, she is. We kept it from you because we all thought it was best.”

  My parents were divorced. Dad was from England so he moved back just after they split. Mom got remarried a few years back. They were both happy with their lives but I had to admit that recently they were acting strange.

  On my last visit to Dad he said he wanted to talk to me about something, then when it came to it he chickened out and started talking about some artwork. That was four months ago. Then I saw Mom last week and she was acting strange too. She looked anxious and she freaked out way too much the other week when I had problems with the car.

  When I told her what happened the first thing she asked me was if I was wearing my necklace.

  She knew it was a talisman.

  “Why did you guys think it was best?”

  “Because of who you are. Most witches come into their powers by the time they are eighteen. Late bloomers get them at twenty one at the very latest. You were different.”

  “Why am I different?”

  “Our line is old, dating back to when the human world was first thought about. We took the practice of witchcraft beyond what anyone could anticipate. Our power was inconceivable, and we always enhanced what we already had.”

  This sounded like one of her stories. I would have told her that and continued my mantra about me going crazy, but the words she spoke felt true.

  It felt that everything she was saying was real.

  “Witchcraft and mages...”

  “Yes, you have all the powers of a witch and all the abilities of a mage. That is your birthright, but you are also something else. Something that could be dangerous in the wrong hands.”

  “I’m a thing?” I shook my head at her.

  “No, not like that. Thousands of years ago, our ancestors created a super being. They wanted to harness our abilities and become more powerful. Why limit yourself when you could have everything? They started trying to find ways of doing that, and the only way they could do it was to tamper with our genetic line. But it didn’t work with everyone. Only our blood line, and it was selective.”

  “What did they do?” I was curious to know.

  “They created a being called a syphon. One who could draw on the powers of anything they choose and use it for whatever purpose they want.”

  Syphon. That’s what Dante called me.

  “A syphon?”

  “Yes, all you would have to do is touch someone and you’d have their powers. Someone, or something. You came into your powers late because you had a greater responsibility to carry. Different from the other witches in the clan. Your powers were bound until today. It was felt that you would have the level of maturity better suited to handle them.”

  I stood up and folded my arms under my breasts.

  “It’s all so... unreal. It sounds ridiculous Grandma.”

  She stood too.

  “This is a lot to take in, but we don’t have the luxury of time. Balmora’s visit to you tonight was an attempt to take you before we could get to you. I was supposed to come to you at midnight and give you a choice of living this life or continuing to live in the human realm. It wouldn’t change who you are, but it would give you a choice to do whatever would make you happy.”

  “Great, let’s go. I want to go back to my world. To my home, God, even to my job I hate so much. I want to go there. I have a business to run and it’s doing really well.”

  She looked sad for me and shook her head. “My dear girl.” She reached out and brushed her hands over my cheek. “If you go back now, you will be used as a vessel for evil. You will be used to unleash the biggest threat known to man, witch, vampire, angel, everyone.”

  “What does that mean? What threat?”

  “The hell god Razul. He has been trying to break free of the chains that have held him in hell for centuries, and it just might happen.” She blinked several times. “His
followers found a way to weaken the sentinels by casting a spell on them. They are the beings that put him there, and the only ones strong enough to keep him there. In two days, the Star of Elena will show itself in all realms. The star contains unbelievable amounts of magic that only a syphon can harness in its’ entirety. They found out about you and plan to open the gates sealing him in hell using you. They want to use your abilities to syphon power enough to do that. And if that happens there will be no world to go back to.”

  I couldn’t believe what she was saying to me. It was unreal and an outrage. It was...

  Shocking and terrifying.

  “I don’t know what to do. What do I do? Grandma, what do I do?”

  “All we need you to do right now is get to the Cave of Endless Night in the Shadowlands. The cave has the ability to take away any kind of magical abilities and powers of anyone who goes inside.”

  I blinked several times.

  “You want me to go and sit in a cave?”

  “Basically, yes. You aren’t strong enough to fight anyone, and this is the only way we can keep you safe. We hide you somewhere that no one can find you, and in a place where your magic can’t be detected.” She nodded with conviction. “It should be easy and hopefully error free.”

  “Error free? I hate that nothing makes sense. You just expect me to believe and accept all of this? It’s too much. I don’t even know how I’ll get to this place.”

  “The sentinel will take you.”

  “I don’t even know what a sentinel is.”

  “That would be my cue to take over, don’t you think?” that voice.

  Suddenly Dante appeared in the room. He was wearing full black; his hair as ruffled as it was earlier and a long black leather jacket flew out behind him.

  “I wanted a moment longer with her.” Grandma said.

  “Time’s up. I think you’ve done quite enough. A heads up of what she was would have been nice, at least the sentinels would have been better prepared. Instead you hid her and you still want to hide her.” He snarled. “Although this time the idea is good.”

  “Don’t talk like you’re still one of them,” she retorted.

  “And thank God I’m not, right? Or else what the fuck would we do?”

  My cheeks burned at his use of language.