“Yeah, I’m fine,” Chelsea said, following along. Lorelei gave her “the look” that Chelsea had known for years. It was the look that meant “I know you’re lying to me, and I don’t like it, but I’ll wait patiently until you tell me because you always tell me eventually.”
Chelsea wasn’t very fond of “the look.”
It was something that came from a bond shared for decades. Chelsea and Lorelei’s parents had been friends, and neither Chelsea nor Lorelei had siblings, so they quickly became for each other the sisters they never had. Thinking back, Chelsea couldn’t think of a stretch longer than two days that she and Lorelei had been apart from each other.
Lorelei knew far more about Chelsea than Caleb did, and she was perfect at keeping secrets. Either that, or she’d told Caleb everything, and Caleb was the one who was great at keeping secrets.
But Caleb? Keeping secrets?
Fat chance of that.
Trust had been hard for Chelsea, but became easier over time, as Lorelei ended up being there with her for everything.
She’d been at each of the funerals: Chelsea’s mother’s, then her father’s, then her grandfather’s, and finally her grandmother’s.
She’d been there through the frantic period in middle school when Chelsea had her first crush, and the despondent period after Chelsea had been turned down.
She’d been there through Chelsea’s utter nonsense in high school, when Chelsea finally realized she was head over heels for Caleb, and for months danced around the subject before finally, after quite a lot of patient advice from Lorelei, telling that silly boy how she felt, and being stunned that he reciprocated.
From learning Fire Magic to learning to drive, from dealing with bullies in high school to fighting Hollows after college, Lorelei had been there through the insane and the mundane.
So “the look” happened a lot. Chelsea avoided being vulnerable and open with people, but Lorelei’s kindness and patience always pulled it out of her. Why Lorelei had stuck with her for so long, Chelsea would never know.
“It hurts,” Chelsea finally said with a sigh, glaring at a Wisp that was approaching her, causing the pink-gold orb to zip away. “Every time I touch them. I don’t know why.”
“Where does it hurt?” Lorelei asked. The two girls kept a ways back behind Gwen, Delilah, and Isabelle, and spoke softly so they wouldn’t be overheard.
“My…”
Chelsea almost said her fingers, but that wasn’t it. To test it one more time, Chelsea brushed her hand against a fuzzy grey wisp, and she felt it once more.
“My heart,” she said. “It’s kind of like what Isabelle’s music did to me. It’s like loneliness and heartbreak are a knife stabbing right into my chest.”
Lorelei was silent for several paces, eyes on the grass and flowers that she walked over. She looked up, ran her hand along the top of a pulsing, lime-green Wisp, and came away from it grinning from ear to ear. But it was a brief expression, before she resumed thoughtfulness.
“I think they try to attune themselves with others,” Lorelei said. “They’re looking for someone to give them purpose, right? So they’re kind of probing us, trying to understand and then reflect our own emotional states and desires.”
“So I’m just a lonely, heartbroken basket case, then?” Chelsea asked.
Lorelei looked at her with sympathy. “You’re emotionally intense,” she said. “And now Caleb’s gone, and you don’t know when you’re going to see him again… I don’t know. I don’t know exactly how you feel. But I know you have a lot going on in there. So maybe all the pain you already have is resonating with the Wisps you touch, but that only amplifies the pain — and why wouldn’t it?”
“Well, then I’ll be glad when we get out of this place,” Chelsea said, scaring away another Wisp with a glare. “I just… I just want to help Isabelle find her stupid library, and then hopefully Caleb will be back.”
Lorelei chuckled. “When did you become invested in getting Isabelle home?” she asked.
Chelsea shrugged. “What’s it matter?” she asked.
“It seems like she’s grown on you.”
Looking ahead at Isabelle, who was dancing along, laughing and happily conversing with Gwen and Delilah, Chelsea smiled. Of course she’d grown on her. Who wouldn’t be won over by the girl’s ridiculous happiness and innocence?
But she shook her head. “It’s not just that,” she said. “Caleb… he promised her that he’d get her home. Now he’s not here, so… somebody’s gotta do it.”
Lorelei bumped her shoulder against Chelsea’s. “Don’t act so tough,” she said, smiling. “Nothing wrong with trying to help a little girl. And nothing wrong with having a personal reason for it.”
“I’m not acting tough,” Chelsea said. “I don’t feel very tough right now, honestly. I just want to finish this, get Caleb back, and go home.”
“We’ll get there. And I’ve got your back the whole way.”
“I know.”
Naturally, that moment of peace and comfort was when everything suddenly exploded into chaos. Isabelle screamed into the night, and Chelsea looked up to see…
Anastasia.
The mysterious woman had vanished when she’d gotten off the ship, and now she was back, racing into the distance with Isabelle screaming in her arms. Gwen and Delilah were already running after her, along with Delilah’s Feline Summons, but Anastasia was so fast.
Joining the pursuit, Chelsea realized why Anastasia had looked so familiar to her.
“She’s the woman from the library,” she said as she pushed her Enhancement Magic to its limits, running faster than any human could. “How did we miss it?”
“Because she wasn’t wearing her hat and scarf,” Lorelei said, matching Chelsea’s speed. “And because we never got a good look at her eyes. I’d recognize them anywhere.”
Chelsea agreed. She’d looked into Anastasia’s eyes once at the library, when Lorelei had the woman encased in ice. Their impossible violet hue had gleamed as if with magic.
Anastasia, Chelsea remembered, had been insanely fast and strong, likely a result of a focus in Enhancement Magic. So even with Chelsea and Lorelei quickly outpacing Gwen and Delilah, they still had to watch as Anastasia continued to gain ground, while Isabelle’s screaming grew more and more distant.
“Can you handle her?” Lorelei asked, tugging her Talisman glove snug on her right hand. “If I can stop her, can you handle her one-on-one until the rest of us reach you?”
“Of course I can,” Chelsea said, eyes gleaming with determination.
“Can you do it without burning Isabelle?” Lorelei asked.
“I can do precision shots,” Chelsea shot back. “Can you stop her or what?”
“I think so,” Lorelei said. “In five seconds, she’s all yours.”
Chelsea continued running forward as Lorelei stopped to focus. Two seconds, then three. Anastasia was almost out of sight. Four… five…
There! Lorelei came through, as ice shot up from the ground, encasing Anastasia’s legs and bringing her to a sudden stop. She quickly broke free, but Lorelei’s aim was true, and ice continued to form up, keeping Anastasia stuck to one spot.
Just a little bit longer…
Chelsea’s legs burned with the exertion, pushing herself to the utmost limits. And she still didn’t feel like she was fast enough.
Three seconds? Maybe four? It feels like forever!
And then Chelsea was there. She leapt up and over Anastasia, spinning and flipping in the air. A silver lighter in each hand, she sent forth lances of emerald flame, each as sharp and as thin as a needle. Two missed as Anastasia dodged with her enhanced speed, but one hit her exactly where Chelsea wanted — along her ankle. Anastasia tumbled into a roll, somehow managing to keep Isabelle in her arms and safe from harm.
So she wants her alive and unhurt. That’s helpful.
In that brief moment as Chelsea recovered from her landing — she’d jumped higher than she’d i
ntended, so landing was a bit rougher than usual — Anastasia surged towards her, leaping off of her uninjured leg.
It was a distance of thirty feet, yet Anastasia crossed that in a single horizontal bound, spinning into a sweeping heel kick. Chelsea jumped, but not fast enough, the mere wind from the force of Anastasia’s kick enough to knock her legs out from under her, sending her tumbling in midair.
Oh no you don’t!
Chelsea used a wall of flame to block Anastasia’s next attack, forcing the woman back, then landed on her feet. She surrounded Anastasia with a flaming cylinder, capping it off on top before the woman could leap up and over it. Then she jumped into the trees for a vantage point.
With Anastasia’s speed, there was no way Chelsea could fight her on flat, open ground. But now that she was contained, and Chelsea had the high ground, things could turn in Chelsea’s favor.
Just as she was thinking that and considering her next attack, Anastasia spun within her flaming prison, lashing out with her injured leg. Her long, spiked heels glowed with white light as she blew apart the fire and looked around for where Chelsea had gone.
Her shoes are her Talismans? Never seen that one before.
But now Chelsea knew to especially watch out for Anastasia’s kicks. If she was focusing on attacking with her feet at close range, then she wasn’t just strong in Enhancement Magic — she was a combatant skilled with Confrontation Magic.
That put Chelsea in quite the bind. She thrived on keeping her distance and blasting her foes with fiery destruction from relative safety. Since Anastasia was holding Isabelle in her arms, Chelsea couldn’t let loose like she liked to. And since the woman was so insanely fast, she could negate any distance that Chelsea put between them.
Normally, against a foe that desired melee combat, Chelsea had Caleb with her to bind them with chains and make them an easy target.
But now…
“No one needs to die here,” Anastasia said, startling Chelsea. She had a strong, beautiful voice, with none of the harshness that Chelsea had expected. And those violet eyes glaring up at her — they didn’t seem as cold and vicious as Chelsea had first supposed.
“What, scared?” Chelsea asked, regaining her composure. She shot a quartet of flaming needles, which Anastasia dodged, zipping ten feet to the side in an instant.
“Not in the slightest,” Anastasia said, smiling up at Chelsea. “But my master wants this girl as soon as possible. Killing you and your friends would waste valuable time.”
“Don’t get cocky,” Chelsea retorted, sending more darts of fire Anastasia’s way. The woman dodged three, but was struck by the fourth in the shoulder. She barely showed any signs of pain or injury, shaking it off and leaping towards Chelsea in a spinning kick.
Chelsea jumped, leaving her branch for a new one, watching as Anastasia’s heel ripped through her previous perch, shattering it into splinters in an instant. Firing back with flame shots, Chelsea found herself frustrated and on the back foot as Anastasia alternated between avoiding Chelsea’s shots, tanking through them while showing no signs of pain, and viciously destroying every spot that Chelsea tried to attack her from.
Why did Lorelei’s ice stop? Chelsea wondered as she found herself on the grass below, dodging behind a tree as her assailant’s heeled boot smashed a large chunk of its trunk into oblivion. And where are Delilah’s Felines? They were moving so fast before.
Am I actually on my own?
Chelsea had fought hundreds of Hollows — maybe even thousands. And even on the first day of her internship as a Hunter, she hadn’t been afraid. She was powerful, and could eliminate Hollows with ease. She’d only ever been afraid in a battle twice — once when Caleb had been poisoned by a Piper, and then not that long ago, when Caleb had collapsed on Hollow Island.
This was the first time Chelsea had ever feared for her own life.
A wall of flame was turned to vapor by Anastasia’s vicious offensive. Fiery vortexes became nothing but smoke from spinning heel kicks.
Chelsea jumped, ducked, dodged, and ran, but wherever she went, Anastasia found her. She couldn’t keep distance from her foe, and her own offense was torn to shreds, forcing Chelsea into a fighting retreat.
Jumping over a kick, Chelsea mistimed her evasive maneuver, and her ankle exploded in pain as she was sent spinning round and round, flying over the grass until she slammed painfully onto it, rolling across it to a stop.
Biting back a scream, Chelsea found she couldn’t get her feet under her. Her ankle was almost definitely broken, and she was struck by such dizziness and vertigo that she couldn’t rise up. Lying in a bed of flowers, Chelsea could only watch in terror as Anastasia sauntered towards her. The red-haired girl in her arms was unconscious, but otherwise seemed unhurt. Despite a dozen small scorch marks along Anastasia’s arms, legs, hips, and back, she acted unhurt, and she looked down at Chelsea with sympathy.
“Give up,” she said. “I’ll spare your life. As I said, no one needs to die here.”
“You first,” Chelsea said, glaring up at her foe.
Anastasia let out a dramatic sigh. “You don’t need to play the hero,” she said. “You can’t fight anymore. Don’t you value your own life?”
“I have something I need to do,” Chelsea said softly, more to herself than Anastasia.
As Anastasia came in for the killing blow, an orange blur dashed towards her, stepping forward in a sword thrust, aiming his blade towards Anastasia’s arm.
The woman turned into a cyclone of motion, spinning into a kick so strong that Felix seemed to simply vanish, struck away into the distance. Green arrows came raining down, and Anastasia leapt away, kicking aside Nekoma’s chain flail and then dashing towards the purple knight. A swift kick to the chest sent Nekoma to join Felix far in the distance.
Ice rose up around Anastasia’s legs, but she dashed away. Lorelei was on the scene now, blasting cold winds Anastasia’s way while forming ice walls to protect her from powerful counterattacks. Redmond continued to rain arrows down at the woman from the trees, while Delilah floated overhead on her magical platform.
But it wasn’t enough. Chelsea could see that very clearly. Anastasia must be a slow starter in combat, because now she was even faster and more aggressive than Chelsea had seen. Lorelei evaded attacks by a hair’s breadth, and nothing seemed to phase or slow down Anastasia for more than a fraction of a second.
We’re all going to die. Unless… I have to do something. I can’t stand, but… if I could just…
Then, Chelsea felt that pain in her heart, the same she felt every time she touched a Wisp. Wincing, she looked down, and saw a glowing white blob surrounding her twisted, broken ankle.
“What are you doing?” Chelsea asked, her voice weak with pain on two fronts. “Get away — stop it!”
But the Wisp wouldn’t leave. It enveloped her ankle, pulsed three times, and then slowly let go. It drifted towards her slowly, not even flinching as Chelsea mustered a glare.
“You…” Chelsea stared at the white Wisp, as it bobbed in the air before her eyes. It didn’t want to leave. “What do you want?”
The Wisp squished into itself, and then expanded, a small portion of it extending like a fingerless hand. Chelsea reached out tentatively, until her index finger touched against the Wisp.
Emotions surged through her, painful, but after a moment she realized… they weren’t hers. While other contact with Wisps had brought out her own pain and anguish, all she felt now was what the Wisp felt.
Loneliness. Heartache. Fear. Loss.
A desperate sense of longing, a deep anguish over past hurts.
“You… we’re…” Chelsea was breathless at the torrent of feelings and impressions flowing over to her. “We’re the same.”
She felt in this Wisp the same fragility and desperation that she often felt in herself. This small, simple white blob of light was in pain. And in that pain, it wasn’t reaching out to Lorelei, the one so great at comforting others. It wasn’t reac
hing out Delilah, the girl who could command three Summons at once.
It was reaching out to Chelsea.
“What can I do for you?” she asked the Wisp, tears stinging her eyes. “You’ve got to be kidding me. I can’t help you. I’m as much a mess as you are. Get out of here. It’s dangerous.”
But in the silence that followed Chelsea’s speech, she felt emotions and impressions form into words, speaking softly, like a bare whisper, straight into her heart:
“You’re the only one.”
The only one for what, it didn’t say. But Chelsea could guess, and the idea that this small little thing full of pain and longing would think of Chelsea as the only one for it, the only one that could heal its heart and give it strength, left Chelsea nearly speechless. She looked away from the tiny Wisp towards the desperate losing battle against Anastasia, and then back to the Wisp.
Greysons of Grimoire Page 29
