The Protectors: Book 1 in the Protectors Saga

by Paige Dooling

  Deciding dying in a pool of her own vomit, wasn’t the most dignified way of going, Avery wrenched her top wrist slightly to one side, then yanked with her arm as hard as she could. Her still throbbing shoulder begged her to stop, but she ignored it, finally wrenching her wrist free. The creature jerked his head up. He let go of Avery’s arm, not bothering to hold them down, and instead, wrapped his hands around Avery’s throat. Avery grabbed at his hands, trying to wrench his crushing grip off of her windpipe.

  “Who do you think you are?!” He screamed down at her, “I am Sevil, a Serpentine Demon of the Drake Clan. You are nothing compared to me!” He laughed down at her, “You are still so stupid. Just like you always were, stupid and weak. They died because of you, you know. You led them into slaughter with your stupidity. Your weakness killed you…it killed all of them.”

  “Get the hell off of me!” Avery shouted, tugging at his hands. More than anything she wanted him to stop talking. It was a horrible realizing his words were hurting her worse than anything he could do to her body.

  He laughed down at her, picking her up slightly and pounding her back into the ground, “You’re just the same.” He hissed, “You haven’t changed. They’re stupid and weak, too. They would follow you right into their deaths, just like they did last time. I’m really doing you a favor by killing you. Saving you the trouble of killing yourself and everyone you love.”

  “Shut up!” Avery screamed agonizingly.

  “Don’t worry,” He whispered into her ear, “they’ll join you soon enough. I’ll make sure of that. I’ll taste their blood too.”

  She let go of his hands and tried pushing on his chest, anything to get him off of her. His hands tightened around her throat and Avery chocked. She couldn’t breathe and her vision was beginning to get fuzzy.

  Not like this, she thought to herself, I can’t die like this. I’m not ready. She thought about never seeing her family again, or hearing Cinder ask her a hundred nonsensical questions. She thought of her friends having to fight on without her, and she thought of Jade. She thought about never talking, or laughing, fighting with, goofing around, and touching the people she loved again. Avery couldn’t let that happen, she knew she just couldn’t.

  She placed her hands flat on the creature’s chest and pushed with all the strength she had left. As the world in front of her began to fade, she felt a warm sensation growing throughout her body. It began in the middle of her chest, and then spread out to every other part of her. A surge of searing hot energy went off in her body, snapping her eyes back into focus. A split second later, a blinding white light burst from her hands, sending the creature sailing backwards through the air, landing a good twenty feet away into the forest. Avery lay on the ground for a moment, shocked by what had just happened. She sat up slowly and examined her hands. They looked just as they always did, only covered with spots of blood and a few scrapes. She had no idea how she had done what she did, or where the powerful energy had come from. What she did know, is that whatever it had been, it was gone now, and she could see the creature painfully picking itself up from the forest floor.

  Avery stood up, taking in a deep breath of the cool air that she had been cut off from not too long ago. She turned and walked over to the tree where the ax the creature had thrown at her was still sticking out of. Avery heard the creature behind her, running towards her at a hasty pace. The ax was stuck deeply into the wood, but Avery’s Protector strength allowed her to pull it out with ease. The creature was less than three feet away when she turned around. She gave him a hard thrust kick to his chest, close to his broken collar bone. The creature cried out as he fell backwards onto the ground.

  Avery strolled up to the creature, lying on the ground, clutching at his collarbone. On his chest, where Avery’s hands had been when the electric energy had exploded out of them, were two large burn marks where his cloak had been singed away, and his scaly yellow skin was charred and bleeding. She looked down at the creature who had almost killed her. The last thing he had said to her, thundered in her mind, ‘I’ll taste their blood too’.

  Avery lifted the ax high above her head, and as he wailed, “Noooooooo!” she brought it down on his neck, severing his head from his body.

  The ax slid from her hands, and Avery gently backed away from the body. The adrenaline that had been rushing through her began to subside, leaving her feeling dizzy. Avery felt a tear sliding down her cheek. She hadn’t even realized she had been crying. If at that moment, Phantom hadn’t strolled up to her, giving her a sweet little nuzzle on the side of her face with his fuzzy nose, Avery was sure she would have collapsed into a shaking weeping ball. She wrapped her arms around Phantom’s neck and let herself release a few more tears. The tiniest of smiles touched her lips when she realized she was alive. She had done it.

  As she was about to mount up on Phantom and head home, Avery noticed a glowing orange light coming from around a curve in the road up ahead. She grabbed a hold of Phantom’s reins and walked him up the path. When she turned the corner, she had to catch her breath slightly.

  She had reached the end of the road. She was standing at Wildpoint Lookout. In front of her was one of the most awe inspiring views she had ever seen. The large trees of the forest ended, giving way to a small circular clearing about fifteen feet in diameter. At the other end of the clearing was a drop-off. Avery tied Phantom’s reins onto one of the branches of a large tree and walked over to the edge of the drop-off and looked down. It was a sharp fall, at least a good thousand feet.

  Avery took a seat on the cool grass, curling her legs up underneath her, and gazing out at the view below and in front of her. She could see everything. Directly in front of her was forest, green and lush treetops blowing in the breeze. She could see random clearings throughout the forest area. In a few of the clearings, she was able to see dots of tiny houses. Little puffs of smoke streamed out from a few of the clearings with houses. In the far distance was a mountain range. The sun was just beginning to set, lighting up the high rounded peaks of the mountain in a rust colored glow. In the very far distance, slightly to the right, Avery could see, what looked to her, like the outline of a castle. It sat mainly in a heavy forested area, only slightly elevated. Draven’s castle stood proud and clear to the left of her. She could see the entirety of Knighton Castle, resting on its hill, its black flags clear and waving. Avery could see the valley below, with its small farm houses. People that looked the size of ants could barely be seen walking around. To her far right, Avery saw, clear as day and unmistakable, the Emperor’s fortress. It was too far in the distance for Avery to see much detail, but what she could see gave her chills. The fortress was dark as night, with one high pointed tower in the center of it. The top of the tower was surrounded by high sharp pillars. The enormous wall surrounding it was heavy stone, with pointed towers protruding out from it. The fortress sat on top of a hill made of black ragged rock. The same black rock seemed to comprise the high mountain range that lay behind and to the east and west of the fortress. The forest that lay in front of the fortress looked nothing like the dense green Wildwood forest, teeming with life, that Avery was use to. This forest, which Avery knew must be Darksin, was filled with twisted and misshapen barren trees.

  Avery pulled her eyes away from nightmarish sight and focused on the beauty around her. When Avery leaned her head all the way back, she was able to see the round full moon beginning to take over the sky, chasing the sun away. The moon on Orcatia was unbelievably big, at least twice as large as the full moon back on Earth. It lit up the entire land, like a giant night light. Behind the moon, Avery could see a planet glowing brightly, a delicate purple shade. It was about a third of the size of the moon, with wispy white cloud-like areas dotting it.

  Avery lost herself in the peaceful beauty of the moment. She let her mind wander to thoughts she would have normally preferred to keep at bay. She thought about what the creature said about everyone dying being her fault. She wondered how much truth there wa
s to his statement. It had hurt her more than she was even willing to comprehend. The thought of her friends getting hurt just because they followed her was unacceptable, and the idea that Jade could get hurt was just something that Avery couldn’t let happen.

  A little while later, Avery wasn’t sure how long, but it was long enough for the sun to have almost set, casting the whole landscape in a bath of orange and purple, the sound of galloping hooves caught Avery’s attention. A moment after that, a worried looking Jade galloped around the curve in the road. She pulled up Steel, her worried expression turning to one of anger.

  “Where the flaming hell have you been?!” She shouted, jumping off of steel, “You were supposed to be back at the library over two hours ago! Everyone is out looking for you!”

  Avery had completely forgotten that part. Although, after the fight she had just went through, she felt she deserved a little leniency.

  “I’m sorry,” Avery said, straightening herself up off the ground, “I guess I just lost track of time.”

  “You lost…you…lost” Jade raised her fist in the air, and clenched it tightly, trying to get control of her anger, “You just can’t do that Avery! People worry about you! You can’t just…”

  Jade’s words were cut short the second she walked up to Avery and took in the state of her. Jade’s eyes immediately went to the four gashes on Avery’s neck and the stream of dried blood that led down from them and covered her chest. Then she scanned over to the bruises left on Avery’s neck by the creature’s throttling hands.

  “Oh, my God, Avery,” Jade’s voice came out in a rushed high-pitched whisper, “what happened to you?! Are you alright?! Was it that headless thing back there on the road?”

  Avery laughed and it caused the wounds on her neck to twinge slightly, “I’m fine,” she said, “they just bled a lot, but they’ll heal soon. That creature was some kind of snake Demon…mean bastard to.”

  Jade nodded and took one more wincing glance at Avery’s wounds, “I knew something had happened.” Jade told her, “There’s no way you’d be cruel enough to leave me alone with Gumptin, Bunny, Skylar, and Sasha for over an hour.”

  “Whatever,” Avery scolded, giving Jade’s foot a little tap with her own, “you know you love them.”

  Jade smirked, “I never said I didn’t care about them; I just said that they bore me to tears. Seriously,” Jade continued when Avery rolled her eyes, “I mean, what do I have to talk about with those people? Their knowledge of movie quotes is pathetic. Sasha doesn’t even know the difference between Star Trek and Star Wars, and just a few days before we came here, Skylar referred to my Suzuki as ‘adorable’. She should have just hit me…that would have been less painful.”

  When Jade lifted up her hand to tuck a loose strand of dark hair behind her ear, Avery noticed that her wrist had a white bandage wrapped around it.

  “What happened there?” Avery asked, pointing towards Jade’s bandaged wrist.

  “Oh,” Jade said, looking down at her wrist like she had completely forgot it was injured, “it’s nothing, just a sprain. I ran into a group of dwarves trying to rob this family on some crappy little back road.”

  “Dwarves?” Avery asked, thinking how weird their life had become to have actual dwarves come up in a sentence.

  Jade nodded, “Yep, they basically looked like really ugly Gumptin’s. Gumptin said they were most likely dwarves from the Western Mountain Range, ’cause they’re the only ones that have joined the Emperor so far. You should have seen Gumptin’s face when I compared him to the dwarves.” Jade laughed out loud at the memory, “I thought he was going to put some magical hex on me.”

  Avery smiled and nodded, her mind still preoccupied with what the creature had told her. She thought it was as good a time as any to breach some of the thoughts she had been thinking with Jade.

  “Jade,” Avery asked tentatively, “if something had happened to me, if I didn’t end up coming back…you’d be ok, right?”

  Jade looked at Avery like she had just spoken a different language, her previous laughter completely gone from her face, “What are you talking about?” Jade asked her.

  “I mean, you wouldn’t do anything stupid, right?” Avery pleaded with her eyes.

  “Avery, what the hell are you talking about?” Jade asked again, her voice growing higher and louder.

  “Think about it,” Avery told Jade, “we all died last time. I was the leader, and we all died…and that’s when I was crazy single-minded warrior Avery. If you follow me now, there’s no telling what could happen to you.”

  “Well, it can’t be any worse than the last time.” Jade tried to joke.

  “That’s what I’m talking about!” Avery said passionately, “Jade, you could do anything you wanted. You don’t have to follow me.” As Avery spoke, the creature’s words continued to play in her mind, “I’ll have Gumptin talk to the Elementals. I’m sure if I promise to stay…”

  “Just stop!” Jade cut off Avery, “You know I’m not going to let you go fight without me. Somebody’s got to look after you. You’re more reckless than an adrenaline junkie.”

  “I don’t want you here, following me, because you feel like you have to protect me. That’s stupid, Jade. This whole thing is becoming way too dangerous.” The idea that her old self had possibly gotten Jade killed had put Avery in panic mode, “You have to get away from me. You have to think about yourself. This is your life!”

  “Don’t you say that to me.” Jade said quietly, “Don’t you ever say that to me.”

  From the look in Jade’s eyes, Avery knew her words had hurt her. It wasn’t what she had intended to do. In fact, right now, she wasn’t sure what she had intended to do. She knew Jade would never leave her, and she had a pretty good idea that the Elementals would never really let any of them leave. Avery was just scared, and wounded, and thrown by what the creature had said to her.

  All strength seemed to drain out of her and she collapsed back into her seated position on the ground, staring out at the sunset, “I just don’t want you to get hurt.” Avery said softly, on the verge of tears, “I don’t know what I would do if you got hurt.”

  Jade stared off into the distance at the sunset for a minute, the deep orange and purple rays lighting up the sharp angles of her face. She then took a seat on the ground, next to Avery.

  “I’m going to say this to you one time, and then we’re never going to talk about it again, alright, because I never want to hear you talking like this again.” Jade looked at Avery seriously, but softly.

  Avery nodded.

  Jade looked back out to the sunset and landscape as she spoke, “I never told you this before, probably because I never wanted to freak you out, or give you a complex, but my parents, and Skylar, Sash, and Bunny’s parents always use to tell us to, ‘watch out for Avery’, ‘keep Avery away from trouble’, ‘Make sure Avery doesn’t get hurt’. I mean, I use to think it was because you get into more trouble than anyone I know.” Jade laughed softly and shook her head, “It makes sense now, with you being the leader of the Protectors and everything, but I could never figure it out back on Earth.”