‘Okay,’ Amy said, though she felt scared.
‘Close your eyes.’
Amy knelt in front of him and as soon as she closed her eyes, shapes and colours merged to form a picture. The next moment she stood at the foot of a staircase, orange velvet flowers climbed the papered wall down one side but the colours all around her seemed dull, making Amy feel straight away that she’d landed in the past.
Before she could take in the surroundings of the tiny, old house, a woman with long blonde hair walked to her side and gazed up the stairs affectionately. As Amy followed her eyes she saw a younger, fresh faced and scar-free version of Mark. Even as a teenager, he was handsome.
‘Your godmother just phoned,’ the woman said excitedly, the sound muffled, like an old TV that had lost part of its volume. Amy could only just make out what she was saying. ‘She wants to come and see us this evening.’
Mark’s face lit up. ‘Thanks, Mum. I love Adaizi.’ His youthful voice was higher in pitch but, even through the muffled sound, it was still distinguishable to him.
The scene faded out and then back into a later time that day. Amy was now facing the front door. After a sharp knock, a man strolled out of the living room as if to answer it, but Mark ran out behind him, a haunted look in his eyes.
‘Don’t answer it, Dad!’ Mark yelled, stopping the man in his tracks. Mark was up to his father’s shoulders in height.
His father turned and gave a confused expression. ‘Why not, son?’
‘I don’t know,’ Mark said, looking troubled. His father gave a shake of his head and carried on. ‘I have a bad feeling,’ Mark added before he reached the door. Mark’s mother came from the living room, stood behind him and held his shoulders.
‘You and your bad feelings and nightmares! I’ve told you there’s nothing to worry about,’ she said lovingly.
‘Please,’ Mark begged.
‘Why?’ his dad repeated, looking puzzled as another loud rapping came.
‘It’s someone bad!’ Mark asserted, but after his father contemplated the statement, he smiled and opened the door. As the door opened, Amy’s blood ran cold.
There stood three bald men, two of whom she recognised from the alley the time she followed Luke, and standing in front of them was a younger male figure, a horrid-looking creature only just resembling human. It could only have been Ethan in his last life because the eyes—the hateful, black, oil-like eyes—were the same.
The darkness of his inner being seeped through the surface of his sallow, transparent skin. As he smiled, revelling in their gasps of horror, a sudden gust of wind, making all four of their long black cloaks billow, tore off rough shards of his thin skin. Mark’s father tried to close the door but with just a sideways, macabre look, the door flew back off its hinges and knocked Mark’s father to the ground.
‘No!’ Mark screamed, running to his father and making a shield of light to protect him as the Dogod and his men stepped inside.
As they entered, a dark, cold mist came in with them, climbing the walls and creating a haze of hatred, fear and pain. Mark’s mum ran out to help her husband but Mark held out his arm.
‘Get back, Mum. Run!’ Mark commanded but his mother was grounded to the spot with fear.
‘What have we here then, Guardian?’ said the Dogod in the same frightening voice Ethan used now. The sordid tone sent a cold shiver down Amy’s spine. ‘You’re not too good at guarding, though, are you?’ he sneered, baring his rotten teeth. The three men behind him laughed.
Mark’s father stood shakily and positioned himself in front of his wife and son. ‘Get out!’
‘Look at him, thinking he can protect his family.’ The Dogod laughed. ‘Bet the Squaddie doesn’t even remember he volunteered to be this vermin’s father. You haven’t a clue who your precious son is, do you, Daddy-kins?’ His voice grated on the ears of all who listened.
In the tense, still moment that followed, Amy could see the Dogod for the true beast he was. The blackness inside of him completely visible through his thin skin, was like looking at Ethan’s future. Then, after the beast wriggled furiously inside him, he stepped forward. It was only one step but it was a sure move. He had come for one thing and one thing only: to kill.
‘Don’t hurt my parents—hurt me instead!’ Mark screamed, his voice cracking as if ready to break out in tears. Mark thrust himself forward, his arms stretched out in front of him. With a determined, concentrated look on his face, his bright white shade projected out through his skin, lighting him up. As his parents jumped back in shock, Mark’s face couldn’t have been more pitiful.
With one clean sweep of his hand, the Dogod swiped Mark out of the way. ‘Don’t worry, this will hurt you.’ Mark flew into the living room and slid down the wall, where a dark, vaporous streak, burning and tearing into his cheek, caused the deep, vertical scar Amy had always known him to have.
As Mark writhed in pain, his white shade flashing in and out, Amy could tell he was trying to let down his guard. She could see him struggling with his power, trying to become a receptor for whatever the Dogod was about to induce; leaving him wide open to be killed.
Before Mark could get back, the Dogod’s three conspirators advanced on him, sending dark streams into his body via the long pendants worn around their necks. Mark fought against them with all his might, his light dispelling most, but they grabbed him and, while he continued to fight against their restraint, they sat his body up and turned his head to face the Dogod and his parents.
Mark’s beautiful mother was beside herself, trapped in the hall, screaming Mark’s name and clinging onto his father like she had no idea what was happening.
‘This is my revenge, Guardian!’ the Dogod spat to Mark. He turned back to Mark’s parents and began pointing from one parent to another singing: ‘Which one of you shall I kill first…’
‘Arrrh…’ Mark screamed.
The Dogod turned back, smiling as he watched his men struggle to hold Mark. ‘Shall it be the mother…or shall it be the father…?’
‘No!’ Mark shouted in intense agony and torture—just what the Dogod wanted. The men covered his mouth. As Amy looked from Mark’s enraged face back to the Dogod’s malicious eyes, she felt every inch of his pain.
‘No?’ the Dogod said, turning his head as if confused. ‘You don’t like the song? I won’t bother with the rest of it, then!’ He turned and, with a squeezing hand gesture in mid-air, Mark’s mother gripped her neck in alarm. Her eyes bulged with pressure, her body convulsed.
Mark’s father quickly made to grab the Dogod, but as he moved, he threw out a dark blast and stopped him dead in his tracks. The Dogod then twisted his other hand towards Mark’s father and he dropped to his knees, his eyes wide with torture. As Mark screamed through the clutches of the men’s smothering hands, blood began to pour from his father’s nose, ears, eyes and mouth and he fell forward, landing hard and flat on his face where a pool of blood began to ooze outwards.
His mother couldn’t scream or react to what had happened, for she had no breath left in her lungs. Her eyes, almost bulging out of their sockets, took one last pained and confused look at Mark before she landed on top of her husband in an undignified heap.
Amy, her heart screaming inside, looked back at Mark, writhing uncontrollably. The three men were red in the face, struggling to hold him back.
The Dogod’s black eyes were fixed on Mark’s mother. His head tilted to the side, he stared manically into her open eyes as if trying to savour the memory of what he’d done in his wretched, evil mind. Her dead eyes, staring out in Mark’s direction, still somehow showed love. Like she knew, if this was the last thing Mark ever remembered of her, he could remember them the way they had always looked at him.
Mark suddenly broke free and as he did, a tortured, pain-stricken scream echoed out of him as though from the depths of a cave. Before the men could cover his mouth or retain him once more, he roared: ‘Adaizi!’
The three men instantly dropp
ed Mark and rushed towards the Dogod who, after setting fire to the hallway with a swipe of his hand, left in a dark, warped bubble. The next second, a Light-Void appeared and a younger-looking version of Adaizi stood in the centre of the room between the two dead bodies and Mark, her usual serene looking face full of shock and anguish.
Seeing Mark was still alive, she rushed to the bodies first, her hand already lit as she knelt before them. Mark crawled towards them on his hands and knees, tears falling down his horrifically injured face as he sobbed in complete agony for his parents. As he reached them, Adaizi turned and tucked him close to her body, where she began rocking him back and forth.
‘It’s too late,’ she said, pulling him farther into her, trying to block the vision from his bright red eyes and in much torment of her own.
‘No, no, no,’ Mark wailed and sobbed as flames grew behind them. ‘Please bring them back! Please.’ He grabbed Adaizi’s hand and shoved it back on his mother’s head.
Tears flowing from her eyes, her heart in painful spasms, Amy couldn’t breathe. The Dogod had an opportunity to kill a Guardian and he didn’t take it just because he wanted him to feel this pain. As Adaizi let go of Mark’s mother and took Mark’s young, damaged face into her hands, he looked up at her like he would never smile again.
Adaizi’s tears fell as she watched his old optimistic self fall away. Amy knew Adaizi felt every part of the damage instilled into Mark. As he fell, deflated, against her, she placed her healing light on his scar.
As they Light-Voided out of the room, the burning scene began to fade from Amy’s vision. The dreadful image of Mark’s burning parents, however, was imprinted deep into Amy’s mind. What she witnessed had surpassed her most lurid expectations. The scene fell further and further away as if she was losing her vision and when she came to, her face was soaked with tears and her perspiring hands were hot inside Mark’s.
She readjusted to the light as her eyes opened and no sooner had they done so, her eyes found his.
‘Oh Mark,’ she cried, leaping forward and throwing her arms around him.
He grabbed her tight and hugged her close. As she sobbed for him, the love and care she felt seemed to spill out of her. He held her closer, comforted by her embrace. The image of his parents’ frightened, tortured and then empty faces, changed in her mind to her own parents. She relived the scene in her mind’s eye, this time the Dogod replaced by Ethan, and this time him torturing her parents. Just the thought that Ethan could do that to her parents tore her insides apart. It left her already feeling the devastation it would cause her.
She held him for what felt like an eternity and, after controlling her sobs, she broke free and stared up into his eyes. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she said, her voice breaking as she spoke. It hurt her just to breathe.
‘Thank you,’ he said, the pain apparent inside him. She lifted her hand to his cheek and stroked his scar and he leant into her hand, his eyes closing as if savouring her touch. ‘I couldn’t save them.’ He hung his head in shame. ‘I even showed fear! You should never show fear. He feeds on it!’ He opened his eyes and they held a world of pain and regret.
‘You did everything you could!’ Amy pressed, wanting to reassure him. ‘You even tried to let your guard down!’
‘Yes,’ he said. She knew from the conviction in his voice that he’d do it again tomorrow. ‘Unfortunately we don’t actually get the power to let down our guards until age twenty-one.’
‘But you would’ve died!’
‘I’d have done anything to save them! He knew I was strong. He thought killing them would weaken me.’
‘You were the Guardian who was sent to kill him last time?’ Amy said, only just realising.
‘Yes. I had to. Just like Tom. Before Tom, I was the next best thing. I passed the Test in the least lives.’
‘Did you…’ Amy stopped herself from asking.
‘Kill him?’ he asked.
‘Yes,’ Amy said, her eyes wide, not knowing how she would feel once he answered.
‘Yes,’ he whispered. He didn’t say the words with any ounce of vengeance or hatred. There was no sense of triumph at all. It was just a fact. And the fact didn’t scare her or make her think less of him at all. It didn’t make her feel more for him either; it was just what it was: a fact!
One thing it did do, surprisingly, was make her have more respect for him. He knew exactly what this mission was about. He knew who the Dogod truly was, and it was time she found out too. After what she’d witnessed, the fear of meeting herself no longer mattered. She felt determined to face herself.
‘Thank you for helping me with my decision,’ she said. ‘Help me get to Omnipion!’
CHAPTER 23
THE ATTEMPTS
‘Let’s leave the practice until tomorrow,’ Mark suggested. ‘We could do with a mental rest.’ He smiled proudly but then looked concerned. ‘Do you think you can handle saying goodbye to your family?’
‘I don’t want to say goodbye to them, Mark, you know that, but I certainly don’t want…to have to go through what you…Yes, I’m sure!’ she asserted, her eyes and heart still full of pain.
He pulled her forward and wrapped her in a tight embrace. It felt like a warm, comforting blanket. As her arms gripped his broad, muscular back, her wet face resting against his chest, she was aching to tell him she loved him.
She knew he loved her in that same caring way too. She could feel it in every inch of his tender embrace. Through every flicker she caught in his eyes.
As if he was trying to get as close as he could, Mark pulled her in even closer and her heartbeat pushed out into his chest. In this wonderful, intimate moment, she felt an extreme closeness towards him. His soft hands moved up her neck and they were in her hair, brushing it back from her face, making her look him in the eyes.
His tender palms on her cheeks as if ready to kiss her at any moment, his gaze full of a certain kind of longing, he said: ‘I love you too!’
His sweet breath so close she could taste it. Her pulse quickened and her face flushed. She stared deep into his magical eyes, wondering if there was more to what he had said. He couldn’t love her like she wanted him to. Even if he could, because he was unique, or because he somehow had to break all the rules, she knew he wasn’t allowed to.
As if satisfied by his communication, he relaxed his hold. Her body felt so limp that she knew if he wasn’t still supporting her, she would have fell back on the white cushioned floor. Instead she gaped at him in wonder. Her mind screamed at her, telling her she’d made a mistake. That she was imaging seeing this passion in his eyes. That she was confused because of her own feelings.
‘I think we better get out of here,’ she suggested, her voice shaking and mouse like.
‘Yes,’ he agreed, his expression now unreadable. He held out his hand for her to take and as they stood, the floor sank back to a hard surface beneath them.
She made to walk out, but there was no door. Mark came up close behind her and with one hand on her waist, making waves of pleasure rush through her stomach and down to her knees, he moved the other hand down the white wall. It fell away before her eyes, leaving the closet in front of them. He guided her through the piles of coats then peered through the slightest gap of the closet door.
There were a few people in the kitchen and a few in the living room, but none seemed to be looking their way. Mark opened the door and, as if they’d been up to no good, they quickly closed it behind them.
‘We’ll try and connect you to Omnipion tomorrow evening,’ Mark informed.
Amy nodded in agreement. He grabbed her hand and squeezed it hard, looking at her with pride.
As she walked up the stairs, she felt his eyes follow her and she forced herself not to look back. She’d lost hope of her child having a normal life, she had to face saying goodbye to her parents and, as if her brain was trying to cause her more trauma, she was again craving something she couldn’t have—something that had already caused her so much pai
n already.
The following evening, while no one was looking, Amy followed Mark into the closet. This time as they entered, a white chair appeared in the centre of the room.
‘Have a seat,’ Mark instructed, business-like. ‘We need to try and align your mind with that of Omnipion.’
‘Okay!’ Amy said, with a salute.
‘Light-heartedness.’ He smiled. ‘A good start!’
‘Thank you!’
Mark walked behind her and placed his fingertips on her temples. As his unique warmth melted into her scalp and crept deep under the surface of her skin, she tried to ignore the arousing shock waves of utter bliss that ran through her body from his touch. She focussed not on how his touch pleasured her, but on how lovely and at ease she felt from it.
‘Your mind has to let go of all resistance. Let the calmness flow towards you and take you. You have to trust it…embrace it…welcome it.’
‘Okay,’ she said. Her eyes closed and she relaxed as much as she could. She needed to do this for Tom. She needed to do this for her father.
‘Relax,’ Mark instructed in a softer tone. ‘Deep breaths…concentrate. That’s right…now feel.’
Amy breathed deeply and tried remember the state of bliss she was in when her channel opened. As she remembered the ecstasy she felt on that night, her mind left the white room for a moment and seemed to drift into an intense calm. She concentrated as hard as she could to go with the new depth but, as a bright light appeared in the distance, her mind grew fearful and the feeling faded.
‘You were close then, Amy,’ Mark informed, his silky voice sounding miles away. ‘Trust the light. It can only heal you.’
She focussed again and not only did the depth return, but a sense of weightlessness entered her body. The light came back and, as a vague feeling of fear returned, her natural instincts kicked in and she tried to push it out.
‘Don’t push it away. Just allow what’s happening.’
The Guardian's Protector: The Chamber of Souls Page 25
