Phantom
An excerpt from 'Little Ghost - Pt 3'
This past Friday was the 4th of July, and for those tuning in from the United States, I want to wish you a Happy Independence Day! Keeping up with my 2x/ month posting with grad school is actually a little tighter on my schedule than I’d originally calculated. Despite my extra planning and precautions I forgot to factor in four very important things: my birthday, the subsequent vacation for my birthday, Independence Day, and my husband’s birthday. Those things actually ate up more of my time than I set aside for this, and my husband’s birthday is still upcoming.
Never fear, though, I’m doing my best to plug along. Part 3 may not have the edits I was hoping to give it, and it’s missing some of the spicier scenes, but this was a necessary bit of Kylie’s story, and I wanted to make sure it took front and center this go round. I hope everyone’s been having an enjoyable summer (or winter, depending on where you’re reading this!) and please feel free to drop a comment, question, or suggestion.
I sat up with a gasp, the sheets in a tangle around me. Glancing around, my eyes were frantic as I searched for any sign that Ryker had truly been here. My normally cool flesh was hot and uncomfortable, sticky with perspiration as my pajamas clung to my form. Carelessness had my gaze snagging on the mirror I’d so brazenly peered into while I was asleep.
“No.”
Despite my efforts, I couldn’t drag my stare away from the mirror. Thoughts of Ryker’s hands on my body were driven from my mind as images unfolded in the glass, drawing me forward. The glimpse of a sheet-white, lifeless body discarded like a broken doll amongst the mud and rain replaced the room. Without conscious thought, my feet carried me to stand in front of the offending reflection, and my death began to play out.
“You need to run!” I screamed, shoving Karyn forward, away from the monsters closing in. The Undead weren’t one of the factions of East Arcadia. Gritting my teeth, I clawed at the muddy embankment, rain making it difficult to see over my shoulder at the approaching horde.
“I can’t leave you here.” Karyn’s voice was too close, and I met her pleading stare over the lip of the muddy rise.
“One of us needs to warn the village.” I reasoned, grasping a slick vine jutting out of the muck. Karyn’s hand waved in front of my face, and I smacked at it, pulling on my power to force compulsion into my tone. As a Jade, it would be difficult, but I could manage better than anyone else in my affinity. “Go, Karyn. Get help.”
The power was weak, as I’d feared, but it was enough. I closed my eyes at the plea in the weighted glance Karyn shot at me before turning to sprint back toward Jade Sanctuary. If I’d known there were Undead, or even signs of them in the area, I’d never have agreed to bring Karyn on tonight’s patrol. She was too young for watch.
Growling behind me drew closer, and I tightened my hold on the vine I held onto with the dependence of my life. The groan of overstretched wood was drowned out by the approach of gruesome death, and the vine snapped under the strain of my weight, sending me sliding back down to the water. Most of the time, being a Jade paid off. The strongest aspect of our affinity was the very earth around me—all that grew from it and was formed by it—making it the perfect place to build our affinity’s sanctuary.
A shriek tore from my throat as a hand seized my ankle, dragging me further into the shallow stream. The darkness of the night pressed in on me, the pure, streaming moonlight limning the forest around me useless. As a Jade, I could only draw from sunlight and earth to replenish my magic, Burrowing my fingers deep into the ground, I pushed my essence into them, drawing on the power it tapped into.
“It won’t save you now, Greenie.” A horrific, unnaturally layered voice I didn’t recognize sent chills skittering over my flesh, and I pulled harder on the magic, desperate to replenish what I’d lost. “Tsk tsk tsk.” He clicked his tongue, the sound carrying easily over the heavy rain and snarling of Undead surrounding me.
Throwing my other hand out, I channeled from the earth as I pushed the meager remains of magic I’d managed to restore into swallowing my pursuers in quicksand. Yanking my foot free, I turned my attention to the bank, drawing forward stones to support my grip as I scrambled up the slick bank.
“They aren’t going to be coming for you. Poor Karyn will make it home just in time to find the rest of your family fending off a horde of the Accursed.”
Fear froze me, and my mind screamed at my limbs to keep moving. The Undead were bad enough, but the Accursed were so much worse. Had I sent my sister straight into their hands? Karyn didn’t know how to defend against them. It was hard enough for a fully grown Witch like me to fight them off, with their immunity to the magic we wielded.
Now my motivator instead of restraining me, I let the fear drive me forward, up the embankment as I raced toward the sanctuary. My mind reeled as I fought to put distance between myself and that unnaturally guttural, grating voice, but his words echoed in my mind same as they did in the air when he spoke. The Undead weren’t able to speak, and I hadn’t found the source of the hideous voice that chased me back to the home of my affinity.
Fighting the Undead was difficult with low magic, but not impossible—their bodies were a part of the earth now that their soul wandered the afterlife. No one had ever returned to the living after visiting the lands of the dead, but their vessels were left behind. Burning the dead was still such an uncommon practice, despite the ability of the Enhanced to raise them.
These Undead were fast, too. They were gaining on me despite the magic I’d been casting as I ran, and I knew I would be leading them straight into the sanctuary if I continued on this way. But I didn’t have another choice if I wanted to save the rest of my people. The Jade Affinity were the only forest-bound affinity here, lucky for us, since the Accursed were here, too. I could sure use the handy fire of the Garnet Affinity about now. Only fire could completely extinguish the control an Enhanced held over the Undead.
“I want that power, bitch, and I’m going to get it from you if I have to pry it from your cold, lifeless, heart.” Angry snarls behind me had my heart hammering a staccato rhythm against my ribcage, and I willed some of the strength to my legs to propel me forward faster.
It didn’t matter, though. Without the enhanced senses of some of the other factions, I was doomed, it was just a matter of time. That time came too quickly, as my foot sank into a swampy puddle. The sickening crack of my ankle rent the air over the pounding of the rain and I screamed, pain lancing through me and immobilizing my leg.
“Kylie?!” Far off in the distance I heard Karyn’s voice, calling out for me. She should be nearly to the village by now. Please, please, please. Don’t turn around Karyn. I willed my thoughts to her, as though they could keep her moving away from me.
Laughter behind me was close. Too close. Glancing up, I blanched, all the blood draining away from my face as I took in the sight of the creature that closed in on me. It wasn’t one of the Undead, as I’d foolishly believed. It was a Parasite. Terror closed in around me, the squelch of its footfalls coming to a halt as it crouched over me.
“You recognize my kind then, eh, Witch?” His gravelly tone brought a fetid breath with it. The small, finger-sized tentacles extending from his palms left me feeling cold and hollow, though he had yet to touch me.
“I will never surrender my magic to you.” I hissed, a piece of me diving deep into my soul to guard the wells my magic came from. The live and the dormant, though I eyed the dormant well of magic in trepidation. If I had to choose between the two, I knew which I would sacrifice.
“You won’t have a choice. You’re like the rest, in the end, no matter how powerful you are. All of you drain the same.” He chuckled, beady black eyes glistening in the pale moonlight.
“Wrong.” I whispered, allowing him to ignore me, to dismiss me in his arrogance.
A warning might have been nice, but I didn’t expect one. The alien sensation of his tentacles digging into my body, above and below my heart, had pain exploding behind my eyelids. Vaguely aware of the raw terror shrieking out of me, I focused all my attention on the two wells of power I held deep within. He couldn’t have the source of my magic. I would not allow it.
“What are you doing, you insolent little bitch?” He roared, shoving those tentacles deeper into my body, ripping and tearing at the skin as my blood poured from me.
I coughed, blood spluttering out of my mouth as I allowed a malicious smile to pain my lips.
“T-told you. Asshole. You c-can’t h-have—“ More coughing cut off my words, but he got the point. A wordless bellow blasted through the air and a weak flicker of satisfaction filled me, there and gone as my vision blackened around the edges.
“No, I need her power.”
Who was he answering? The pain in my chest began to fade as I clung with everything I had to the source of my magic—both the Jade Affinity and the Qarinah source I’d never been able to tap into, let alone fill. Heat filled my palms as I pictured physical wells, and their enormous rocks burning into my skin as I peered into the vast pools of swirling magic. They began to fade from view, and I sighed. In the end, I wasn’t strong enough to keep them away from the Parasite after all.
“Cease this at once!” He growled at me, but he sounded so far away as my ears failed to pick up the words at volume.
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xo
Grace