Dreamwalker (Persephone's League of Immortals)

by Andrea Heltsley

  As I was flooded with a true terror pumping sheer ice through my veins, I realized that I was the one who murdered Autumn. My eyes widened in revulsion and I frantically searched the room again for escape. Finally I ran across some sort of sensor and a panel opened.

  Inside it, I found something rather unexpected. My breath hitched at the sight of an item so ordinary and suspicious. It was a glass of clear liquid that I presumed was water and a small red capsule. There were no instructions but I was guessing they were for me and I would do just about anything to escape this horror.

  For all I knew, this could be a cyanide pill, left to finish me off. I shivered in horror and tried not to look back at Autumn’s limp body. I decided that I would chance it, because dying for what I had surely done would be poetic justice.

  Without another thought, I raised the cool glass to my lips and swallowed the red pill with what was indeed water. I stood there stunned for a few minutes as nothing appeared to have happened.

  With a shaky hand, I drank the remainder of the cool water and replaced the cup where I found it. I wiped my mouth with a clean spot on my arm amongst the blood and slid back down to the floor.

  Closing my eyes and taking a slow breath, I resigned with exhaustion. Then the tingling started. The sensation of pins and needles began to start at my toes and quickly spread up through my body like wildfire. I was blinded with pain and panic. I let out a long pained scream as blindness set in and the aching engulfed me.

  Once the pain subsided and I was able to open my eyes, I realized that I was small. Not just small fish in a big pond small, but miniature size small as in Honey I Shrunk the Kids small.

  I took in my once claustrophobic surroundings and realized how vast they now seemed. This was strangely reminiscent of Alice in Wonderland, except my clothes luckily made the journey with me.

  The only relief I allowed myself was the assurance that this had to be a dream, no matter how realistic the situation appeared. Taking a slow deep breath, I straightened myself and began to look for an escape. Knowing Autumn was probably not near an escape route, I did my best to steer clear of the large bloody mass that was once my best friend.

  Smearing my tiny bloody handprints across the wall, I felt for any flaws in the wall as I began to make my way around the now enormous room.

  It took quite a while, but finally I found a fissure at the base of the wall and pried my tiny fingers into it creating a larger divide. The wedge of my hand caused the wall to crumble under pressure and a small hole became exposed in front of me.

  With a shred of optimism, I wiped the dust off my hands and slowly stepped into the narrow opening. It was dark and the air was stale. Despite the darkness, I saw a dim light further down the tunnel.

  Feeling along the crumbling wall, I slowly edged down towards the light. Swallowing my panic at the mere thought of what might be lurking in the dark with me; I steadied my breathing and increased my pace.

  I made it a little more than halfway before my shoe caught on something unseen in the dark. I stumbled forward and forced my arms in front of me to brace my fall. I landed with a thud on the dirt ground and was momentarily stunned.

  The panic rose again and I was choking on my own dark thoughts. Tears welled up, as I released my rationality and my grip on reality slid away.

  I screamed with terror and frantically felt around for anything to grip on to. Once I did though, ice melted my boiling blood as I realized that it was a bone. I gasped in horror and scrambled up to my feet in more revulsion than I realized I still held. The idea of carefulness left me. I frantically ran to escape the dark and whatever it contained.

  The light was closer now but the illumination only brought to life the nightmares lurking in the dark. Eyes of gold and red gleamed in the distance, making my flesh crawl. I was quickly losing my grip on sanity as I tried to force the staring eyes from my sights and focused on escape.

  I was so fixated on going forward, that I didn’t notice until it was too late that there was nowhere further to go forward. With a thwack! I hit the crumbling concrete in front of me and blood welled where my cheek hit, mixing with the gravely bits. Momentarily stunned at the unexpected stop in course, I stood there like a deer in the headlights.

  The glimmering red and gold eyes were coming closer. This brought my focus back full force. I strained in the dim light to discover that I had hit a T.

  Looking left, I saw light in the distance but was instantly chilled as light illuminated the creatures that possessed those eyes gleaming with gold and red. They were short stubby creatures with ferrell looks in their eyes and teeth sharp as razors. The path was quickly filling with dozens of the horrid little creatures.

  Terror rose and instantly I turned to the right with desperation. There was light at the end of the tunnel as well, but the creatures loomed before me with their hungry gleam and rotting teeth there also. As they moved in closer, I realized there was no safe path.

  Without the luxury of time, I made a swift decision and hurled myself left. I let out a blood curdling shriek and jumped an instant before reaching the revolting creatures. I sailed just barely over them. Fighting the instinct to look back, I barreled forward towards the light at a pace I was unaware that I was capable of moving.

  A chill equal parts fear and relief slid down my core. As I ran, the sounds of their gnashing teeth and stilted grunts began to dissipate. Fire was ablaze in my chest and spreading to every cell in my body. My reluctance to slow won out and soon my vision became specked with tiny pinpricks of darkness.

  The knowledge of my impending unconscious state was swift and panicked. I slowed my pace hoping to regain my sight as air filled my aching lungs but too late. The light faded and I felt my muscles turn to mush as they gave out beneath me.

  Alarm rose within me as the corners of my consciousness ebbed around me. My first thought was the trolls. This jolted me back to the present and my eyes snapped open with a frantic searching of my current surroundings. When I observed no trolls in my sight, my eyes settled on the only other presence in the room I appeared to be in.

  My panicked glassy green eyes settled on a set of furious brown ones. I first registered surprise at the sight of Augustine, and then shame settled over me like a cold wet blanket as I realized why those molten chocolate eyes were set on mine. He knew what had happened to Autumn and he was gunning for me.

  My temporary relief from escaping the trolls dissipated and a new wave of panic set in. Augustine was angry and looked just as Ferrell as the trolls did. Trying to quickly diffuse the situation, I raised my hands in a sign of peace and surrendered. Words tumbled though my mind as I tried to spit them out as fast as I could.

  “Wait! Augustine…it’s not as it seems. This is terribly wrong and I need your help,” I said pleading.

  Augustine raked that furious gaze over my blood caked figure and shook his head in a way that told me he doesn’t believe my innocence. When he spoke, he spit the words out as if they tasted sour and bitter.

  “You crazy bitch, how could you betray her friendship like that?”

  The weight of his words stung like tiny pinpricks in my chest. I winced and lowered my head in an attempt at submissive peace. This only served to anger him further and he grabbed my shoulders as if to shake me hard. His fingers tightened around my flesh and I yelped in shock at the intense pain of the gesture.

  “Ouch! August please,” I tried.

  My eyes were pleading with his, though it was clear he would show no mercy. Hatred boiling to the surface, he shoved me against the wall and I hit with a loud thud that resonated though every cell in my entire being.

  Tears of shame rolled swiftly down my dirty cheeks at a steady pace. The sting of salt in my gashed cheek was preferred over the emotional pain I was experiencing under the weight of Augustine’s relentless anger. He just shook his head as he bit back his words under a tightly clinched jaw. He wrung his hands fighting the urge to maim me no doubt.

  “There is no way
I will let you get away with this. I can’t and I don’t even want to,” he confessed with spite licking each word.

  A banging sound reverberated through my core. I felt my soul being pulled from me as the dream faded and reality returned. Shards of dust settled and blew away.

  Chapter 5: Serious Magic

  I woke with a start to the sound of thumping on my front door. A familiar voice called out to me and I let out a sigh of relief. It was Autumn, and she was alive. It was just a terrible bad dream. I hurried to answer the door and threw my arms around her.

  Her eyes bugged out in surprise. “It’s good to see you too Nells, but it hasn’t been that long. What is going on? You look frenzied.”

  I grabbed Autumn’s arm and guided her to the couch as I kicked the door shut behind us.

  Autumn didn’t even wait for me to answer. She knew me all too well and surely had her hackles risen by my response to seeing her.

  “You are starting to freak me out here. I just left you an hour ago. What could be that bad? O.M.G….did you find something on the net? Is he a crazy axe murderer or something?” Autumn spouted as if she was going to explode with panic.

  I tried not to let the word murderer set myself into terror and I wiped a tear from the corner of my eye. “I am just so relieved to see you. I had another dream, but not such a dreamy one this time. This one chilled my blood and scared me to the core. If you hadn’t stopped back by, I am not sure what would have happened.”

  I stopped to draw in a slow breath as I crawled up on the couch and wrapped my blanket around myself to stop the shivering.

  Autumn’s eyes were the size of saucers now and she seemed to be thinking as she looked me up and down. “Ok Nells, you are really starting to scare the crap out of me and that is pretty hard to do considering my profession. What happened to your cheek? It looks like it hurts. What did you dream about?”

  My hand flew up to touch the gash I forgot about until now and the realization that it was from my dream dawned. The flood gates opened and my eyes filled with tears as I wiped the streams frantically from my cheeks. I struggled to catch my breath as the sobs seized me.

  Autumn must have realized that I needed a minute to calm myself down, because she hurried to the kitchen and busied herself by making some tea. I had no doubt it was probably honey chamomile and her intention would be to calm me down.

  Once the tea was prepared, Autumn would quickly return to my side. I couldn’t bear to look her in the eyes as I told her the horrid part of my dream. Struggling with my nerve, I took a slow steady breath and blurted it out.

  “In my dream you were dead, and I think I murdered you.” The words tumbled out and I winced at the sound of them.

  In the kitchen, the sound of porcelain combusting against the tile floor served as the dreaded response to my horrible confession. Trying not to chicken out, I let the rest out with a hurried pace.

  “God Autumn, it was awful. Your blood was everywhere and I was trapped. Then it was like I stepped into wonderland because I drank this cup of water and swallowed this pill and became terribly small. I found a panel and escaped the room only to be chased by a mob of angry Ferrell trolls I think and then I got caught by August and he was so angry.”

  I paused but after no response, I continued. “He threw me against the wall and told me he couldn’t let me get away with it. Then you knocked and woke me up. I have never been so glad to see you in my life,” I exclaimed as I tried to suck in a breath.

  To my horror, Autumn still didn’t respond. I was met by deafening silence. Finally, I heard her picking the pieces of the broken mug up and I let out a breath I didn’t realize I had been holding. Unable to take the silence that stretched between us, I bolted up and rushed in to kitchen to face her.

  Even with my salty tears flooding my eyes and stinging my wound with an uncomfortable pain, I could see Autumn’s pale expression looking up at me from the floor. I sank down to the cool tile and resigned against the kitchen cabinet in grief.

  “Maybe I am losing my mind. All I can do anymore is sleep. I am so tired all the time. Maybe it is all my wild imagination running away with me. The nightmare just felt so damn real.”

  I gave a pregnant pause before I continued. “It seems like ever since Brad dumped me I am in a constant state of chaos. There is nothing certain and I am upside down. I feel like this has to be real as unbelievable as it is or I must be bat shit crazy,” I confessed in exasperation.

  Autumn was clearly shaken. Her blue eyes looked dull and pained as she met my anxious green glassy ones. Her careful but shaky tone did little to comfort me when she replied.

  “Nells, this is getting really serious, really fast. I know you don’t believe in all the Wiccan ways I practice, but you should.”

  I wanted to tell her it was nonsense, but I knew things were getting more serious. I wish I could just explain away what had happened, but I couldn’t. I had to take her seriously and listen to her explanation.

  Reaching out, she grasped my hand in hers and led me up off the floor and into my bedroom. She looked haunted and hollow as she retrieved the still pristine crimson tulip from its perch on my dresser and examined it.

  Placing the tulip in my palm carefully for effect, Autumn turned and collected the coin from its location on the dresser and held it up between us. I knew a lecture was coming, judging by the last conversation we had about the sordid silver coin.

  “This coin is high level magic. No ordinary practicing Wiccan could have created a charm with this much energy attached to it. The sigil on the front is for protection. This is used for dangerous situations only. If this really is Jared’s, then he is involved with serious magic’s.”

  She looked deep into my eyes as if trying to drive her point further. “It doesn’t sit well and I am scared enough for both of us at this point. None of the pieces of this puzzle fit together without dangerous magic. Even I am not this deep into the occult. I shiver at the mere thought of the ritual used to procure protection this strong.”

  Her face was now a pale mask and she seemed to mentally brush off the remainder of her thoughts. She let out a sigh and pulled me into a hug. Several seconds went by before she released me and spoke again.

  “Until I know more, I think you should spend the evening at the shop with me.” She held up a finger to cut off my objections.

  “Before you can object, I need to remind you that it appears that we are both in danger and it is in my best interest to keep us both as safe as possible. I have some low level wards and charms at the store that will keep some of the riff raff away.”

  I was still about to protest but she kept going. “You can research books that might actually delve into topics you need to have at least a basic understanding of and the sooner the better. I can’t risk you falling asleep again and putting yourself in more peril.”

  With an exasperated harrumph I nodded and gestured to the closet and my clothes. Autumn understood and excused herself to clean the rest of the mess from the broken mug.

  Now that Autumn convinced me to come to work with her at the Green Vixen, I rushed to make myself presentable. I barely glanced at my reflection in the mirror as I shed my sweat sodden clothes and stepped into the shower. My mind was a rattling cage of chaos and too many thoughts were trying to escape at once.

  If I could just steady my breathing and gather my composure, things would be ok. Dreams and nightmares were plaguing my thoughts and I wish I knew how to explain their sudden appearance. The dreams with Jared seemed like a blessed gift, but this experience had been more of a curse.

  Whatever was going on, it was crazy. Brad was at least out of my system. The hurt and pain that had been there merely a week before had dissipated and was now just a whisper of a memory amongst the current insanity. After wrapping a towel around my shivering body, I rushed to my closet to get dressed.

  Unconcerned with my disheveled appearance, I was ready just five minutes later. A brush ran through my brown hair and I pulled it t
o one side with a ponytail holder. I threw on a gray and black tunic atop my black leggings and simple black flats to finish dressing. I nestled my figure in a loose black wrap and moistened my lips in a rosy lip gloss.

  Autumn looked surprised that I was already ready, but nodded in acknowledgement. She wrapped her arms around me and assured me it would be alright. I noticed her wincing as her gaze settled on my cheek, and she quickly broke away, disconcerted.

  I followed her out, locking the door behind us with my purse clutched tightly in my grasp. My camel colored purse didn’t exactly match my black attire, but I didn’t seem to care at this point. I had placed the coin snuggled within the confines of my purse, safely so I didn’t lose it.

  The Green Vixen was warm and inviting after the biting autumn air outside. The bells jangled as I shut the door behind me and followed Autumn through the racks of product. The store had a warm and soothing feel tonight. The calming uplifting scent of lemongrass clung in the air and a soft island melody was floating throughout. People were drinking tea and casually browsing the racks of product throughout the store.