by W. M. Martin
Elliot, sensing the dread which was beginning to suffocate Maggie’s fortitude, shielded her body and mind with his power.
“Thanks, Elliot. This place is horrible. Let’s get the Pentagem to General Strato and get our friends out of this place,” said Maggie.
Alice had quickly been shielded by Mr. Thistle and she looked as relieved as Maggie felt. The two Aviors made their way to a large chasm and peered out across the sad and empty expanse. Neither of them could see anything ahead of themselves that would have given them the impression of a stronghold. It was not until Alice decided to step up to the edge of the chasm and look down, that they discovered that the Pentagem’s omniport had brought them directly to an enormous black castle, which rested at the base of a monstrous canyon.
“Well that’s just brilliant!” Alice snapped before continuing with her complaint. “That stupid thing brought us all the way out here to this hideous wasteland and put us within flying distance to that castle, but failed miserably to actually get us there. In case you’ve forgotten, Maggie, I can’t fly like you and Lucy or shift into my armor and jump safely from this height like Stephanie and Sara. That means I can’t reach that horrid castle as fast as you can. Instead, I’ll be bringing up the bloody rear while trying my hardest not to fall to my death to get down there with you! This is complete and total rubbish!”
Maggie looked over at Alice who was visibly livid and replied, “It’s okay, Alice. I’m just glad that you came this far with me. It’s actually probably better this way because the Fallen would kill you if they caught you, and I’m the only one who’s supposed to be here anyway. Besides, I’m really kind of happy that the omniport to get back home is all of the way up here, by the way, because if things go sideways, I’ll be able to fly up and out to safety. You should wait here for me and the others. I’ll be back, and when I get here, our friends will be with me. Hopefully.”
Alice crossed her arms in agitation and stepped away from the edge of the massive chasm that cradled the dark and lonesome citadel amidst a lake of lava. The black structure, though impressive in magnitude, was devoid of anything except for the appearance of evil and maleficence.
Maggie summoned Elliot and asked him, “Are you ready?”
Elliot simply replied, “Always.”
With that, Maggie ran toward the edge of the abyss that housed almost certain doom at its base and jumped out into the expanse above the fearsome castle which rested in solitude on a bed of liquid fire far below.
Maggie’s eyes began to glow with the power that she shared with Elliot. Her mystical wings burst forth and caught the dense air and they carried her safely down to where the high castle stood strong. The vile and twisted Keep had been created to be the imposing focal point and center of the Fallen’s dark fortress. Many of the sinister structure’s towers had large spikes jutting out from them. Others had bars where windows should have been. In the courtyard, far below, there were multiple torture and execution devices, mercifully empty of prospects.
Maggie landed silently on the highest parapet which surrounded the uppermost section of the wicked-looking Keep. Elliot retracted his mighty wings from Maggie’s back and returned himself into the blazing mark on her forearm. Maggie crouched down low behind the parapet and slowly raised her head to get a better gauge of her immediate surroundings. She found that she was all alone with not even a single sentry posted at her location.
“I think we’re good, Elliot. I don’t see anything do you?” asked Maggie while still doing her best to stealthily survey the area.
Elliot responded telepathically from the inside of Maggie’s mind, “I see nothing through our eyes either, Mags. However, I would stress that we should be cautious as we have never been here before. Neither of us knows what to expect from this horrid bastion or even from this side of the Veil, which appears to be in its death throes.”
“I agree. I also have an idea, Elliot. We’re going to sneak inside and try to find everyone and free them before any of the Fallen even know what’s happening. We’re only giving General Strato the Pentagem if we get caught,” stated Maggie while hiding behind the short wall which circled the tower.
Elliot responded with a hint of relief in his voice, “I am glad to hear that, Mags. I was extremely concerned about handing the Pentagem over to the Fallen.”
“I know you were, Elliot. So was I,” said Maggie before continuing, “They’re only going to get it as a last resort.”
Maggie pressed her body against the parapet and moved along with it towards a door which led into the highest tower of the dark fortress. When she reached the door, she grasped the large, round handle and tugged hard on it. The heavy door did not budge in the slightest. Maggie remembered the strange word that Kylie and Alice had used to break into Mr. Akiyama’s office both times and decided to give it a try against the imposing door that barred her entry into the black castle.
Maggie placed her hand back onto the door and whispered, “Ostiumpatentibus.”
With a single click from the other side, the great door opened slightly and Maggie quietly pushed it open and made her way inside of the frightening tower. The door made far more noise as it was being closed than it did when Maggie had opened it. She squeezed her eyes shut as though that would somehow help to diminish the racket caused by the heavy door being shut, but it did not.
“Good grief!” Maggie whispered to herself in frustration and fear that she had alerted everyone on that side of the Veil that she had arrived and was, in fact, inside of the castle.
“Where to now?” Elliot asked.
“Over here,” Maggie answered telepathically while pointing to a room that was almost out of view, having been partially obscured by a large wall.
Maggie slowly peered around the corner of the large dark room which she had just entered and spied a Fallen knight who was looking out of a large window to the left of an enormous fireplace, seemingly oblivious to the young Avior who was creeping up behind him. When Maggie was within striking distance of the knight, he turned and swung viciously at her head. Maggie was prepared for this however and had braced a sleeping arrow which she had been holding aloft, ready to strike. As soon as she ducked below the Fallen’s swing, she jabbed the arrow into the Fallen’s leg. Elliot quickly shot out of Maggie’s arm in his liquid sapphire form and surrounded the dark knight’s face so as to muffle his short-lived scream of rage. The effects of the sleeping arrow were almost immediate.
“Try and use the Pentagem to hide him,” Elliot instructed.
Maggie did as Elliot said and closed her eyes to try and tap into the raw power of the ancient gemstone once again. After a moment, the Fallen who was now snoring on the floor beside the large fireplace, fell into an omniport born of the Pentagem.
Elliot found it amusing that Maggie had used the Pentagem to summon an omniport that sent the sleeping Fallen from that side of the Veil directly to where Kindred prisoners were hidden and held by the power of the Guardians; The Nexus Prison Isle.
“So you do pay attention in Mr. Akiyama’s class after all?” Elliot teased, finally gaining a better understanding of humor and sarcasm.
Maggie left the room with the large fireplace and quietly made her way down a long corridor which led to a spiral staircase. She crossed her fingers, hoping that the great set of stairs would take her and Elliot deep into the bowels of the fortress. Maggie felt drawn to the lower levels of the castle where her peers were certain to be held.
As Maggie rounded the staircase heading down, she caught the conversation between two Fallen knights who were complaining about being tasked with guard duty on that particular floor.
“All I did was forget to address Ara as ‘lieutenant’ and she flips out, attacks me, and sends me here. I’m a warrior, not some feckless guard dog. Do you even know what we’re supposed to be ‘protecting’ up here anyway?” asked the first Fallen.
The second Fallen answered, “Yeah, I know what’s up here. General Strato’s poetry. I’ve even read
some of it too. It’s complete rubbish.”
The first Fallen shrieked with anger, “Poetry?! I’m stuck up here with you guarding poetry?!”
The second Fallen shushed his comrade, “Shut it! If General Strato or Lieutenant Ara hear that you’ve been griping, they’ll send you to the gallows, and they’ll send me with you just for a laugh!”
Maggie needed to go further down the staircase but could not move due to the two Fallen who would certainly notice her trying to breach deeper into the fortress. Maggie pressed her back against the wall where the threshold to the occupied hall was and braced her sapphire bow. She drew back on the mystical bowstring and turned the corner to take aim at both of the Fallen guards. When Maggie released the bowstring, two magical arrows were loosed, having been born of her power as they were each guided by Elliot’s. Both of the guards received an azure bolt to their chests and were immediately wrapped in large nets and gagged upon impact.
“You are getting good at this, Mags,” complimented Elliot.
“So are you,” Maggie responded.
Just as with the last Fallen knight, Maggie used the Pentagem to send the two bound and gagged guards to the Nexus Prison Isle. Maggie was steadily growing in confidence because the rescue mission, thus far, had gone better than she had hoped that it would. Elliot could sense Maggie’s bravado being fueled by her pride.
“Careful, Mags. We are still very much in danger on this side of the Veil. Do not allow all of your successes to be negated by a single failure. Pride is an enemy and should be held in check. Let us continue onward,” Elliot instructed.
Maggie knew that Elliot was right. She would need to keep herself grounded or risk losing everything. She had grown very powerful over the past year in the Veil, only failing to shift into her armor. Barring that, the progress that she had made was exemplary and impressive.
After a few more close calls, Maggie made her way to an area just above an open chamber that housed a spiked, black throne adorned with charred skulls. There were eight, large, black pillars in various stages of decay which lined each side of the room. The pillars began at a pair of monstrous, metallic doors and ended on either side of the spiked throne. The room was lit by sconces formed into the shapes of gnarled and mangled hands and they were all cradling the dark, orange flames in their palms.
Maggie left the area above the throne room and made her way deeper into the heart of the massive and foreboding structure. She had gone so deep into the bowels of the Keep, and had taken so many twist and turns down so many empty corridors, that she had managed to get herself lost.
“Elliot, I don’t know how we’re going to get out of this labyrinth. I don’t know where we are in here. I can’t even remember how to get back to that repulsive throne room. How are we supposed to find everyone if we’re lost?” asked Maggie with no small amount of fear and trepidation in her voice, which echoed softly in the empty corridor.
“Maggie?” came a woman’s broken and ragged voice from behind a wooden door which had iron bars in the place of a window.
Maggie’s heart almost stopped inside of her chest when she heard her name being called in her mother’s voice. She was frozen in place for fear that the castle had become sentient and was playing a cruel and evil joke on her. Maggie cried out for Elliot’s help inside of her mind because she had, in that moment, been robbed of her ability to speak. Elliot rushed to comfort Maggie and to give her the confidence and strength to respond to the question of her name being spoken in Mary Bennett’s voice.
“Mom? Mom, is that you?” Maggie asked, with her voice cracking under the pressure of daring to hope, if only for a moment, that her mother was still alive. She was trying extremely hard to hold back the tears that were threatening to burst through the dam of her eyes. Maggie slowly walked towards the door and looked through the iron bars to try and get a look at who she desperately wanted to be her mother. A pair of ladies hands, which were worn down almost to the bone, grabbed the bars from the other side.
Maggie stated through sobs of a type of happiness that she had given up hope of ever having again, “Mom, it’s really you!”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Mary Bennett wept at the touch of her daughter’s hands wrapping around hers as she clung tightly to the iron bars of the door. Maggie searched her mind for Elliot to confirm to her that her mother was real and was indeed just on the other side of the cell door. Elliot assured Maggie that the prisoner was in fact her mother. Maggie’s mind raced with questions, and when she had gathered her wits, she asked the first one that came to her.
“How did you get here, Mom? I thought you were dead. Are you alright?” Maggie asked as tears filled her eyes.
Mary answered, “Your dad and I were captured, brought here, and tortured by a cruel Fallen General, Sapka Strato, and his lieutenant, a vicious and traitorous witch named Ara. They wanted one of us to convince you to steal an artifact called the Pentagem for them. We refused. They knew that if we were kept here and weren’t permitted to leave, ever, then we couldn’t hide you from them. They also knew that if they stayed away from you, that you would eventually feel the pull to find a Haven by your sixteenth birthday. They believed that once you had made it to the academy that you could be manipulated and also be maneuvered into a position where you would have no choice but to bring them what they wanted. I told those butchers that you would never steal the Pentagem, and that they should just kill me and get it over with because I certainly would never help them get it.”
Maggie asked, with caution in her voice, “Where’s Dad? Is he here in the castle?”
Mary hung her head and said, “He’s gone, Maggie. He died shortly after we were taken.”
Maggie’s body went numb at her mother’s words. She had grieved for her parents once already, but finding her mother had given Maggie the slightest hope that her father was still alive also. That singular hope was now doused like embers in a rainstorm. Mary spoke up first, so that Maggie would not have to.
“Here, Maggie. This was your dad’s medallion. He gave it to me to hide just before he was taken away. He would have wanted you to have it,” said Mary.
Mary ripped a seam in her filthy and tattered cloak to reveal her late husband’s medallion from Clan Secarn. There was a clear image of a cicada, resting on a tree, emblazoned on the front of the diamond-shaped, ruby shield. She had managed to keep it hidden from detection for the entire time that she had been held prisoner by the Fallen. Mary gingerly passed Wallace Bennett’s medallion, through the bars on the door, to their daughter.
“Your dad’s medallion, which was freely given to me, is now freely given to you, Maggie. His power is now yours to command and yours alone. Place his medallion against your own to bind them together,” stated Mary with the slightest hint of melancholy.
Maggie, staunching her sorrow so that she could focus on her mother, asked in a hushed and hurried tone, “Why haven’t you summoned your totem or used dad’s medallion to get out of here, Mom?”
“Because each prison cell in this wretched place is warded specifically to negate a totem’s power. I’ve only been able to speak to mine through our psychic link. I can’t summon him, and I haven’t seen him since the day that the Fallen threw me in here. Sapka Strato and his lieutenant allowed me to keep my own medallion as a cruel form of torture. I can merely communicate with my totem and often that is a struggle. I can’t see him or even really feel his presence all that much. It’s maddening. My medallion is a sad reminder that Regis, my totem, is so close, but so far away,” answered Mary before continuing, “You need to leave this place, Maggie. Leave me and never look back. Go.”
“Stand away from the door, Mom,” ordered Maggie with startling authority.
Maggie did as her mother had instructed a few moments earlier and placed her father’s ruby medallion against her own sapphire shield with great care. Her medallion quickly emitted a single azure flash of light upon making contact with her father’s medallion. The radiant blaze quickly
died down, and Wallace Bennett’s medallion melted against his daughter’s and the two items, in effect, became one. Maggie felt the unrestrained rush of her father’s Kindred power coursing through her veins and ricocheting off of every, single magic-fueled cell in her body. The feeling Maggie was experiencing was unnerving and exciting all at the same time. It was, of course, no substitute for her father’s physical presence, which sadly, Maggie would forever be denied, due to the pure cruelty of the Fallen. However, having his power blended with hers, gave her a sense of peace.
Maggie stood away from the door and tapped into her father’s power, all of which now freely resided within her. She confidently held the Pentagem out towards the prison cell and felt the raging swell of power inside of herself begin to rise in tandem with the raw magic of the ancient stone. This time, Maggie did not have to close her eyes or even need to focus very hard at all.
Maggie summoned Elliot to join her outside of her mother’s cell. As he took on his falcon form, the mystical energy which once belonged to Wallace’s totem began to enhance Elliot’s aura two-fold. Elliot’s elegant feathers began to dance with large, magical, blue flames, while Maggie’s eyes, as if in response to Elliot’s own enhancements, began to glow. Her sky-blue irises were lost amidst a sea of crackling sapphire flames which mirrored perfectly the storm erupting around her beloved totem.
Maggie ordered the first of all of the Kindred artifacts in a tone of voice, that would not be denied obedience, “Open this door!”
To both Maggie and Mary’s shock, the cell door not only unlocked, but it swung open with such force that it blew off of its hinges.
Mary, after her initial joy of being released and hugging Maggie, looked her daughter in the eyes and asked, “You took the Pentagem and brought it here? Why, Maggie?”
Maggie answered, “I did it to save my friends, Mom. I don’t plan on giving it to Sapka, even though that was the original plan. I’m here to rescue them and return the Pentagem if I can. The only reason that I would let the Fallen have it now is if they were to catch us all trying to escape. The only problem is that I don’t know where everyone else is. I have to keep looking for them, but I’m getting you out of here first. I’ll open an omniport, using the Pentagem, that will send you to the academy. As soon as you’re safely on the other side of the Veil, Elliot and I can go and find our friends.”
