A Girl Between

by Marjorie Weismantel

Will said in a tired voice, “It makes sense, Tess. You think you know who he is?” He nodded toward the ice.

  Silent tears ran down my cheeks. “I think he’s Abe, one of the luminars that recently came to town. He and his sister helped me out in school one day.”

  Will grabbed my arm and looked me in the eye. “I know just what you’re thinking, Tess; that YOU caused his death. Listen to me. This is not your fault. THEY killed him.” He shook his fist outward. “And we’ve got to keep moving or we’ll be next.”

  For a while, I let Will lead me through deep drifts. We finally managed to get to a side street that was partially plowed. It was easier going, but we were more exposed so we had to be really careful.

  “Tess, check that out.” Will pointed to some flashing lights off to the right. “And there, more lights,” he pointed in front of us. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d think it was thunder snow gone wild. It’s the diaboles and the luminars, isn’t it?”

  I felt sick thinking about what was going on. “Yeah, they’re fighting. What do we do?”

  Will’s face lit up for a second as lightning flashed across the sky. “We have to help them.”

  We strode toward what looked like moving strobe lights behind some trees. I gasped in amazement when I got a clearer view. Two beautiful women with curly dark hair were conducting the lightning with their hands. I was mesmerized by the grace and precision of their movement. As I continued toward them, Will reached out to stop me.

  “Wait,” he insisted.

  “What?” I asked, puzzled at his action. Then, I noticed an odd stink in the air. I was horrified when I found its source. There were several bodies sizzling and writhing in the snow, the unfortunate recipients of the high voltage storm. The smell was the stench of their burning flesh.

  The women turned their luminous and triumphant eyes on us. It was Dika and Nadya Petrov, the gypsy witches. They approached us, their long black coats flowing behind them. They each hugged me in turn.

  “Sorry for you to see such a spectacle. Earlier, we saw the lightning in the sky and we knew you needed us. We were on our way to you and these creatures,” Nadya waved disdainfully at the blackened bodies, “thought they could harm us. They learned otherwise.”

  Dika stuck out her hand to Will. “So, I presume you are Will.” She glanced at me sideways, with a sly look in her eye, “I’ve heard of you.”

  “You have?” Will looked over at me, his right eyebrow raised.

  “So, Tess,” Nadya said in a more serious tone. “We are here for you. What would desire of us?”

  “We’re making our way over to Old Kiley’s meadow? Do you know of the place?”

  “Yes, of course. We all know of The Tree of the Living Spirits.”

  Will touched my arm. “Tess, if I may. I suggest that we split up to maximize our usefulness to other luminars.” He nodded toward Dika and Nadya. “It’s apparent that both of you are talented and resourceful fighters. Follow the flashing lights to find the luminars and tell them to go to The Tree of the Living Spirits. How about if you head in that direction and we’ll head in the opposite? We’ll eventually meet up at the field.”

  Nadya and Dika both nodded in agreement. Nadya turned to me, eyes glowing, “Don’t worry, Tess. We have been anticipating this for a very long time. It will result in a great victory. We will see you soon.” They quickly turned and strode away with their long coats flapping and hair blowing, vanishing into the black void.

  63. Sam and Doug

  “Will, I’m so cold and tired. I wish I could curl up and go to sleep.”

  He put his arm around my shoulder and hugged me close. “Tess, we have to go.”

  “I know, I know,” I grumbled.

  We headed in the other direction, sticking to the side roads. We could still see flashing lights all around us. As we turned the corner, we came upon a large tree that had smashed right on top of a vehicle, almost cutting it in half.

  Will was shaking his head. “Oh, crap. That might be Sam’s SUV.” Will looked around and added, “And you know what? We’re back on Capen Street. I told him and Doug to come here in an hour, if we didn’t show up. This has gotta be his truck.”

  As we approached it, we noticed that the side windows were smashed out. There was also a huge load of snow dumped on the car. The car was filled with snow.

  Will started nervously running his fingers through his hair. “I guess I can understand how a tree fell right down on the middle of their SUV, but it’s also buried! How did all that snow get in? The back window has that strange bulls eye mark on it, like my jeep.”

  I looked darkly at Will. “It was struck by one of those nasty ice harpoons. They were attacked by one of those diabole gangs we saw earlier. I bet they caused that tree to fall on their car. I wonder if Sam and Doug crawled out or if they were taken.”

  We started moving as fast as we could, following the quickly vanishing footprints in the snow. After we got through some trees to a small clearing, we almost ran right into the backs of several diaboles, hands raised, waving huge ice daggers and yelling. Even in the gloom of night, I could see the blood red aura churning around their heads. I saw hate, fury. And I knew who they were after.

  Will and I immediately started rubbing our hands together. Since lightning had already been brought into the vicinity and we were still partially charged, I knew it wouldn’t take long. Soon, we were crackling and sparking.

  “We gotta work together and nail ‘em. You ready?”

  Will nodded.

  “I’ll count to three and then let loose. Surprise is our best weapon. One . . . two . . . three.”

  We both shot lighting directly at their backs.

  “Aaaaaaaaaarrrrg . . . . ” The diaboles immediately turned, fury twisting their faces. The ice daggers started coming in our direction. A freezing wind blew straight into our eyes and icy sleet stabbed my skin. The onslaught caused me to falter for a second.

  “Tess, you gotta keep it up or we’re doomed!” Will screamed over the wind.

  I closed my eyes and concentrated on the escalating heat in my fingertips. Several bolts of lightning flew straight across, knocking away the icy spears and cutting the wind. It struck the diaboles head on. I played with the lightning, moving it over any areas of bare skin such as faces, and some hands. Then, I aimed at burning through coats and hats. The diaboles were staggering back, and I got a whiff of burning flesh. There must have been some kind of signal because, suddenly, they turned tail and started running. They disappeared behind the trees.

  “You see Doug and Sam?” Will asked.

  I shook my head, peering through the falling snow. “Those diaboles were all yelling at something in that direction.”

  “Oh, my God, Will. They’ve gotta be under all that snow.”

  We frantically started digging with our hands. I finally hit something solid and blue. “This must be Doug. Looks like his coat.”

  Will pulled him out of the snow. “What the heck?” he gasped. Four icicles were stuck in his upper legs and his torso and he was covered with a layer of ice.

  “You get Sam out and I’ll take care of this. Just hurry!”

  I rubbed and rubbed until the sparks came. Then, I lowered both of my hands over Doug’s body and ran them directly over his ice covered skin. My goal was to slowly melt the ice without burning him. As the icicles imbedded in his skin dissolved, I noticed the blood red drops seeping into the snow.

  Doug sputtered, opened his eyes. “What?”

  I pulled him up and hugged him. “Thank God! How’re you feeling?”

  He looked rather dazed. “I’m freezing and I feel like crap.” He looked around. “Where did they go?”

  “The diaboles? I don’t know. They took off.”

  “No, I mean where did Mercy and Sam go?” Doug asked frowning.

  “Sam was right behind you. Looks like he’s hurting but he’s awake.” I frowned. “What are you saying about Mercy? She’s not here!”

  Doug�
�s eyes widened and he immediately stood up. He was shaky so I steadied him. “Mercy must be here! She came with us.”

  Sam said in a hoarse voice, “I saw her fall over there.”

  We dove at the snow and started digging. “Here she is,” Sam yelled from a short distance away as he desperately brushed snow off her. He was shaking his head. “It doesn’t look good.”

  Mercy’s face looked like it was made of smooth, cold marble. She was completely encased in a sheet of ice. A large frozen spear was stuck right through the middle of her chest, where her heart was. Even from where I was standing, I could see that there was a bright red circle of blood under the glaze of ice. There were also some smaller ice daggers stuck in her left arm and leg. A sob caught in my throat as I frantically rubbed my hands together until the sparks came. Then, I ran my hands over her body to melt the ice. Sam and Doug also dropped to their knees and did the same.

  Will reached over and snapped the huge dagger that was in her chest. He left the ice that was stuck in her heart and wrapped a scarf tightly around her middle. “The ice may slow up the flow of blood from her heart,” he said grimly. We spent more time warming her up, then Will finally asserted, “It’s time to check. If she’s alive, she should have a pulse.” We all held our breath as Will put his index finger on her neck. He sat very still for a while, head turned slightly to the side and finally shook his head, his concerned eyes watching me. “I’m afraid I can’t hear anything.”

  “WHAT? No, I don’t believe you!” I screamed. I dropped down and wrapped my arms around her. “She just has to be warmed up some more. I KNOW she’s alive.” Tears were running down my cheeks.

  “Tess, listen to me,” Will said gently. I turned to face him as he crouched down to my level. “Do you see her aura?”

  I sat up to get a better view of Mercy. Something about her stillness had disturbed me. Her aura was always around her: bright, colorful, loud and proud. It reflected her confidence and intelligence. At this time, there were was nothing swirling around her body. Her aura was gone. Of course, that meant that she was gone, at least from here. I sat up and wiped my sleeve across my wet face. I looked over at Will and shook my head. I felt numb all over.

  We couldn’t leave Mercy’s body in the woods so we carried it back to Sam’s truck and placed her in the back. After I said a little prayer for her, I leaned against the car. I didn’t feel right leaving her.

  Doug spoke softly to me, “She was a crazy-mad fighter you know. When the diaboles were chasing us, Mercy turned around to face them. Sam and I immediately joined her because we couldn’t leave her there to face them alone. She was spinning the lightning and throwing fireballs at them left and right. The whole time she was under attack, she was laughing and taunting them. You’d almost think that she was deliberately targeting herself.”

  Sam smiled, sadly, “She was something! She acted so nuts the diaboles actually backed off at first. But, there were just so many of them.” He shook his head.

  Will gently took Tess’s hand. “Tess, we’ve got to go. There’re hundreds, maybe thousands of diaboles, around here. The only way we don’t all die is to get to the tree. Even then, there’s no guarantee.”

  “I know,” I whispered.

  Will held his hand out to me and I took it. He proceeded to lead us through the side streets and various shortcuts, down driveways and through back yards, where the snow was deep, above our knees. Sam and Doug stayed with us, helping each other out, limping along. As we moved, my mental numbness was gradually replaced with a sense of unease.

  There was some flashing in the distance which indicated to me that fighting was still taking place. Even though I was breathing the sharp cold air, I felt an odd breathlessness, as if I was suffocating. Goosebumps crept over my skin and prickling sensations ran down my spine. My instincts were telling me there were a large number of black souls who were seeking us, encircling us, squeezing us in. Their eventual intent wasn’t just to kill our physical being. They were seeking to do far worse, for they wanted to erase the light of our being, our eternal souls.

  64. The Appearance

  As we were moving along, Sam stuck his arm out to stop us. “Shhh . . . . Can you hear that?” he whispered. At first there was silence. Then, we could hear laughing and talking. As we listened, it was apparent they were coming closer. We moved into a copse of trees and hid under the snow burdened limbs.

  Suddenly, from around the corner, came a mob of at least 200 diaboles. They were tossing what appeared to be large ice/snow balls all around. It reminded me of a crowd of people randomly tossing balloons around, only this horde was using icy packed balls of snow. As they passed within a few feet of us, I caught sight of their intense crazy eyes and heard their jeering and hollering. Many of them were also carrying harpoon sized icicles. As they marched away, I observed the swirling mass of dark gray mist around their heads, interspersed with splashes that looked like drips of blood. Their heads were full of murder and mayhem.

  “We have to get off this road!” I proclaimed to Will.

  We stood up to leave and Doug stopped us. “Wait a minute. I think I know how to get to the Spirit Tree through the woods instead of on the roads. An old friend of mine lived in a house that backed up to those woods. We should see fewer diaboles using that approach and at least we can hide in the woods if they get close. Unfortunately, it probably means a walk through some very deep snow.”

  We looked at each other before Sam shrugged and said, “No other choice. Let’s go.”

  We turned down a dead end that backed up to a town park. The side of the park that was heavily wooded bordered the field of the Spirit Tree. Once we reached the park, it was tough going through the deep snow, but at least it was dry snow, not all wet and heavy. We finally reached an old stone wall that was around the field. If you stared hard enough through the gloom and the relentless falling snow, you could barely make out the outline of the Tree of the Living Spirits, far away across the wide open field. The area between us and the tree was oddly deserted.

  We paused and looked around for a minute, then decided to take the plunge. After a quick climb over the wall, we started making our way across when I heard a yelp from Sam a moment before I felt a sharp pain in my left shoulder. Abruptly, Will shouted, “Run!”

  All around us, ominous figures appeared like apparitions arising from the snow. I glanced back and gasped. They were everywhere.

  “Holy crap,” Doug yelled. “Don’t look now, but there’s an army behind us.”

  Will’s fingers dug into my arm. “Sam, Doug, we have to stand back to back and fight. We’re just not gonna make it by running.” Will swung me next to him and Sam and Doug stood behind us. We started rapidly rubbing our hands to set off the fireworks. My hands were shaking so much that I could barely manage one spark. A searing pain shot up my leg. I looked down to see an ice dagger stuck in my calf. I leaned over to pull it out and a spear of ice whizzed over me and struck Will in the shoulder. He groaned as I used all my strength to pull it out. I turned to see a huge icicle graze Sam’s ear. Then, I heard a loud grunt. Doug got nailed in the upper thigh. None of us were sparking now. We were working too hard trying not to die.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a mob of at least fifty diaboles standing still, just watching us. One of them yelled, and in one quick move, they bent their arms back in unison and threw long sharp spears of ice. We watched in terror as the volley of deadly ice harpoons arched upward. We knew where they were headed and there was no place to hide.

  “WHAT??? Look over there!” Doug screamed.

  We turned to see a giant fireball shooting across the sky. Right as the volley of ice spears reached their apogee and started toward the downward decent, the fireball collided with them, creating a huge explosion of vaporous steam. The ice spears instantly evaporated into a sizzling mist, but the fireball broke up into hundreds of fist sized globules of fire that fell into the crowd of diaboles. Screams of terror erupted from the mob as they tried
to escape the searing heat and flames.

  “Tess, check that out!” I turned to see what Will was pointing at. Four more giant fireballs, the size of cars, streaked to earth, landing and scattering on the mobs of diaboles, creating panic and mayhem. As the horrid stench of burnt hair and charred flesh reached my senses, I saw several human torches flee in panic. Some of them were smart enough to drop and roll, but others just ran in blind terror.

  A long jagged streak of lightning hit the ground right in front of us, and then something very odd occurred. A tall man appeared, standing proud and erect where the lightning hit the ground. He seemed to come out of nowhere. A beautiful silver haze circled his head and I knew that he was an advanced soul.

  “He is a Master Luminar,” I explained to Doug.

  “We don’t have the auric sight but it is obvious, even to us,” Sam claimed.

  The man strode up to me, placed his hands around my face and stared at me with a sad longing. “Hello, my child,” he said softly.

  I stood there for a moment, than my hand went to my mouth in shock. He put his arms around me and I felt a peaceful warmth spread throughout my body.

  “It’s all right, Theresa. I’m so sorry for everything, my dear.”

  “Oh, daddy, I’ve missed you.”

  “Theresa, you are such a lovely being. I did not want things to work out the way they did. Just know that I did not want to ever leave you. My presence was a danger to you. I cannot really say any more for it is urgent for you to get to the Spirit Tree.”

  “You must come with us,” I pleaded.

  He shook his head smiling slightly. “I will stay here and try to keep some of the diaboles away.” He looked around before adding, “Unfortunately, there’re many more coming, so you must have the protection of the Sprits of the Tree.”

  Sam piped up, “Sir, are you the one who threw those huge fireballs?”

  My father nodded, “Yes, son. That was me.”

  Doug exclaimed, “They were unbelievable!”

  Suddenly, my father turned his head to the side as if he heard something. “You must go. I will do what I can.”