Immortal Slumber

by S. L. Perrine

  A candle went out and we all looked around at one another, and then to the room. We still weren’t able to see the rents in the room with us, so we knew the circle hadn’t been broken. We all stood and held each other’s hands again.

  “Maybe it’s a warning,” Chad spoke up.

  “Or maybe they think we’re taking too long,” Crystal added.

  I looked around at their worried faces. “I’m going to try something.”

  “Whatever you do, do not break the circle until we can figure out what is going on,” Clara yelled above our scared voices.

  I remembered Clara telling me once that it is possible to view outside a circle without anyone being able to see in. Her father had taught her that it was a good idea to see what was around before breaking a circle, even when you believed you were casting in a safe place. I wasn’t sure we would be able to hear anything, until I did.

  “Where are they?” a deep masculine voice erupted into our circle like a boom.

  “What’s going on? I don’t see anyone!” Matt yelled.

  “Hold on a second.” Clara closed her eyes and mumbled something we couldn’t hear.

  “You said we would be able to see.”

  “Where are they?”

  Everyone was screaming at me for answers. We began to hear a bout of crashing sounds erupt around us, but were unable to see even the parents that we knew were in the room with us.

  “QUIET!” I bellowed. “I need quiet so I can get the translation right.” I had given my first order as high priestess. It felt unnatural to command them to do anything, even if it was in their best interest to listen to me. I guess that was what Chester had been trying to say to me all along.

  They settled in the circle, still holding hands, not breaking contact. The crashes were not coming from the room we were in, but from the adjoining room near the stairs.

  “Stop this! What do you want?” I could hear Elle yelling.

  “We want the girl, and we know she’s here.”

  “We are the only ones here, and you need to leave my house now!” Marshal Blackwood bellowed at the voices we could hear.

  A woman screamed, but it didn’t sound like Elle.

  “Mom.” Clara looked at the doorway. Everyone stood as she did, in an effort to go to her mother.

  “Don’t.” I reminded her we were safe as long as we remained within our circle.

  If the intruders had made their way into the room, they would see nothing. It would look like a room with books and various tools lining the shelves. They wouldn’t see the circle of the five of us in the center.

  “But my mother,” Clara begged as a tear slid down her cheek, landing softly on her shirt.

  “If they come in here and start walking around looking for us, then that’s different. We would have no choice, but right now, we can stay put. I know your parents and the rest of them would want us to stay where we are,” I told her what she already knew.

  The voices kept yelling and then became quiet. We could hear footsteps upstairs and all agreed to remain in the circle until the parents came back to tell us it was safe to break it.

  My legs started shaking when I realized we had been standing there, hand in hand, for close to an hour and nobody had come. A crash sounded from the other room and we could see the figure of a man. He had been thrown into the double-arched doorway that separated the two rooms. The unwelcomed men, who had come into the house, had turned the corner from the stairs, and we could see them. The man lying on the floor began to stir, and I could tell it was Marcus. He had a cut on his forehead that was bleeding profusely.

  “Why hasn’t he shifted?” Chad asked.

  “My father hasn’t shifted in forever. I don’t know if he even can,” Matt added as he stood there, helplessly watching his father try to stay conscious.

  “That’s it! I can’t do this anymore. We’ve got to help them,” Chad said as he tried to let go of my hand.

  “Are you sure? Crystal has only just come into her powers, and we’re not at our full strength.” I held his hand tightly.

  “Yeah, and we don’t know who or what they are. We don’t even know how many of them are here,” Matt said, never taking his eyes off his father.

  “If there are so many that our parents couldn’t tend to, then . . . ” Crystal was cut off before she could finish her sentence.

  “Stop it!” Matt yelled. “You know damn well your mother doesn’t openly practice, except in circle. My father is washed out,” he said, nodding to the man who was lying so still, the men didn’t see a need to hurt him again. “The only parents here that could take on anyone is Mr. Blackwood and Chester.”

  “He’s got a point,” Chad spoke to me, “but it’s your decision.”

  “Fine. Let’s get a plan in order here, though.” If we were going to do this, we needed to be smarter than the smartest guy, who was dumb enough to break into a house full of witches and shifters.

  “What do you suggest?” Chad looked at me, and so did the rest of them. I didn’t know if I could lead them, but at least I was being given a chance to try.

  “Chad and Matt, shift as soon as we break the circle. Don’t give them a chance to knock you down. The three of us will hold them off of you while you get your bearings. Crystal, find the parents, and dodge those men as much as you can. Clara and I will come find you as soon as the boys are good.” I looked around and everyone nodded in agreement.

  We raised our hands together and chanted. This one I knew and was happy to say. We thanked the goddess and the gods for their protection within our circle, and wished them well. When our hands broke apart, so did our circle of protection.

  The moment we became visible, Marcus yelled, “No, you were supposed to stay hidden!”

  His rant prompted the one man in the room with him to come running toward the doorway. He made it in time to see Matt and Chad halfway through phasing. Crystal had already made it over to Marcus, and was behind the man who was dressed all in black. She turned and looked like she would try to help us, but then ran upstairs.

  “There she is.” The man slurred his words as if he had been drinking heavy amounts of liquor.

  Clara and I looked at each other and back to the boys, who had both almost fully shifted. Clara lifted her hand and sent blue sparks at the man before he could scream any louder. Once a giant black panther squeezed through the doorway, I knew Chad was headed upstairs to find his father.

  Clara looked at Matt, who had chosen the shape of a larger male witch than that of a furry creature. “I told you, man or beast. I’m the complete package,” he said as he walked past us to his father, who was trying to stand. Matt grabbed him with one hand and lifted the man to his feet, leaning him against the doorframe. “Take your time, we got this.”

  Matt squeezed past Marcus and ran for the stairs. The man Clara had zapped was lying in a heap across the giant room.

  “Think you should keep an eye on this one. We got this,” Clara copied Matt, and dismissed Marcus with a wave of her hand as we walked past him, heading up the stairs to help the others.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  We walked over limp bodies lying on the floor in every direction. We made it past the foyer and through the kitchen, to the dining room. Chad had two men pinned against a wall. Another man snapped a whip at him from behind, attempting to make him release his prey.

  I lifted my hands, one with blue flame and the other with red.

  “Wow, watch out for Crawford!” Clara exclaimed.

  I balled both flames together and hit the man in the back. He fell to the floor with a thud, and the whip slipped from his hand. I bent over to pick it up and dug the heel of my boot into the man’s shoulder blade in case he tried to move.

  “I don’t think you need this any longer.” I grabbed the whip from his hand and wound it around my shoulder and elbow.

  “Girls . . . this way!” Marshal yelled from the entrance to the living room.

  “Dad, what’s going on?”

/>   We moved to the living room, where Marshal had three men unconscious and heaped together in the center of the room. They were on top of, what I had guessed was, a very expensive coffee table. His wife stood in the doorway to another room, peeking through a crack in the door.

  “Whatever you do, don’t let any of them touch you,” he said. Then he and his wife ran to the next room.

  “What in the . . . ?” Clara looked after her parents and was about to follow when we heard a bear’s roar from the back of the house.

  “Chester,” I said with a smile.

  We ran back through the room we came from and saw that Chad had successfully knocked down his two victims. When he saw us coming, he followed. Clara led the way, through the house and to the backyard. A woman stood on the roof of a small shed, back behind the pool. Her hair was cut short and she was yelling about Crawford magic.

  “I know she’s here! I can sense her!” she yelled. The sun was going down behind her, so I couldn’t make out who she was. I could see the new scores of men who were coming down a hill, behind the boundaries of the Blackwood estate.

  Someone moved behind me and grabbed my arm, pulling it hard behind my back.

  “I’ve got her!” I heard the man scream. He started pulling me back, away from my friends, and a burning pain seared my skin where he touched.

  “Ahhhh!” I screamed, and more men came around us, blocking my friends from me.

  I realized I still had the whip in my hands and I closed my eyes. I followed Alistair’s advice. I pictured what I wanted to occur, and then I let it happen. The whip turned into a long black snake that wrapped around the man’s leg. I tried to concentrate, but the pain was blurring my senses.

  The snake twisted and slithered up the man’s leg, and then wrapped itself around his torso. He let go of me, and I grabbed at my wrist to rub the pain away. The snake slithered farther yet as I stared into the man’s eyes. It coiled around his neck and squeezed until it looked as if all the blood in his body had rushed to his head. Then, the snake struck its victim at the base of his neck. It uncoiled and slithered to me, only resting once as it wrapped around my arm. I looked down, and the whip turned snake had become a long, coiled, black beaded bracelet that covered me from wrist to elbow. At my wrist was the head of a snake, with gold eyes, and the tail was also a tip of gold.

  I looked around and each of my friends had taken on different men. Chad had one pinned to the ground and was shredding him to pieces. Clara had another in a choke hold, without laying so much as a hand on him. Matt had taken two from behind, made them collide with each other, and tossed them aside.

  The woman stood on the small shed and screamed for victory, but only received defeat. She wallowed in it as the man with the snake bite started to stumble incoherently in her direction. I let the blue flame grow within the palm of my hand and set the fire soaring across the sky. It hit her in the face and her hands flew up to extinguish it.

  “You have not seen the last of me, you little brat! I will have what is mine!” With that, the men inside the house all began to dissolve into nothingness. I saw my aunt scramble to her feet and jump from the top of the shed.

  Just like that, she was gone.

  “Was that . . . ?” Chad asked as he walked back outside, holding onto a towel.

  “Yes, my Aunt Sabina,” I said, looking around at my friends. “Are you sure you want to align yourselves with me and my wicked family?”

  They all looked around, Matt still two feet taller than normal, and nodded their heads in agreement.

  “What’s a little family drama between friends?” Crystal came up between me and Clara, hooking an arm over each of us.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Thanksgiving break came and went, and before we knew it, the first major snowfall had come too. The town looked just as pretty as it always had, with the twinkling lights of the holiday season. Even though the snow didn’t accumulate too much, some of the smaller kids had tried to build a snowman in the school yard lawn. An unexpected warm day melted it, but was promptly replaced when we got a foot of snow the following weekend.

  My aunt hadn’t tried anything since the attack at the Blackwood’s house. I was baffled at the fact she had known to find me there, and thought either she knew how to trace me because of our shared blood, or she overheard me speaking with my grandfather. She was a more proficient witch than I, after all. During the last visit with Alistair, I realized that she may have devices all over the house, helping her gain information.

  Alistair had fallen ill shortly after the attack, and we canceled all further study days. He said to come to him again after the solstice ritual was complete. He also promised to deal with his daughter in kind, when he saw her again.

  I sat in the Cooper, waiting for Chad the morning after Thanksgiving break, but he didn’t show. I drove to his house and his father said he had borrowed the truck to go to school. That was the first day since the first grade that he hadn’t met me at my house before school. I knew he was still mad about not being around to protect me from the men in the woods, and he was so upset that he had yelled at me during the altercation at Clara’s house with my aunt. I just didn’t know why he was suddenly pulling away from me. Even if he didn’t want to date me, he was still supposed to protect me.

  “Hey,” I said, slamming my fist against his locker door as he attempted to open it. The door slid from his hands, and my fist successfully dented it into the opening so it wouldn’t budge. Luckily, I knew he had an advantage of being super strong, and didn’t bother apologizing.

  “What are you doing?” He lowered his voice and looked around to make sure I hadn’t attracted a crowd with my outburst.

  When he saw Crystal and Clara standing with their backs to us, he probably figured our conversation was private from the rest of our classmates.

  “I want to know why you’re avoiding me. You didn’t come this morning.”

  “Yes, I came here to make sure there wasn’t anyone here waiting to attack you when you arrived, instead of finding out about it when it was too late.”

  “So, what? Now you’re going to walk into rooms before I do, to make sure they’re safe? You have walked with me to school every day since we were little.” I felt my eyes well up and saw Crystal and Clara turn to look at us.

  “Yes, it’s better this way.” He lowered his voice more so the girls wouldn’t hear him. “I need to think about protecting you. Not being close to you.”

  He turned to walk away, but I grabbed him by the shoulder and turned him around.

  “There is something you’re forgetting about here, C!”

  I leaned in and kissed him, harder than I had before. There was nothing sweet and innocent about the kiss, nor was it loving and romantic. It was hard and forceful, but ended tenderly, slowly pulling my lips from his. “I can protect myself now,” I said, and backed away from him. The bracelet I had begun to wear every day came to life and hissed at him.

  The girls dropped the glamour and we walked off to class. Some students stopped at Chad’s locker, wondering how the huge dent happened. Michelle bounded up on her two inch heels and hooked arms with Clara. I knew what that meant, and kept walking in the opposite direction, with Crystal next to me.

  “Looks like the charade continues,” she said as we took our seats in class.

  “For now, it has to. Clara needs to protect Michelle from my deranged aunt.”

  When class let out forty minutes later, Matt found Crystal. They were inseparable for the rest of the day.

  I found myself doodling in my Book of Shadows. I made it a habit to start carrying it with me everywhere. If I had a thought of something, I would write it down as soon as I could.

  I had a lot of time to myself, as it turned out, and I had written quite a bit in the book. It was almost full. I decided I would like to take a drive up to Dublin and visit Spirit again. I knew Chad wouldn’t want to spend any time with me, since he had declared he needed to act more as my protector than my
friend, or boyfriend, for that matter. I remembered the way there, and decided to take the trip after school by myself.

  As I started up the car, I felt the familiar buzz of my cell phone for the millionth time that day. Chad had been texting me from class all day, and kept trying to get me to read them by throwing paper at me to get my attention. I pulled the phone from my pocket and saw it was a new text from Clara. She told my sister she was grounded and had to go right home. She wanted to meet up with me.

  When I stopped the Cooper around the block, she got in the passenger side of the car. “Where are you going?”

  “Dublin, how’d you know I was going anywhere?”

  “No idea, but I wanna go.” She pulled the seat belt across her lap and folded her legs into the seat.

  “Okay, it’s a long ride. I didn’t want to go by myself anyway.” I put the car in drive and headed for the interstate. I thought I heard a strange noise coming from the stereo speakers, but when I went to play with the knobs, my phone buzzed again.

  I pulled over so Clara and I could switch places, and I could finally read Chad’s messages. Clara wanted to drive a bit, and my head started to throb. Just as I was about to close my eyes, I changed my mind and dialed Chad’s number.

  “Hello.” I heard on the other end of the receiver when he answered.

  “Hello, it’s me. You stalking me now?”

  “No, I’m trying to protect you . . . remember?”

  “No, I remember telling you I can protect myself. Leave me alone, Chad. I need time away from you too. If you’re going to call this thing between us off, without letting me have a say, then I need space.”