Precious Anathema (25 page)

“
What was that you were you
saying Bitch?” I smiled as she looked up at Israel, neither of them
expected this. I knew I couldn’t hurt them or hurt people I cared
about, but I could keep them far enough away to give us a head
start. She glared at me, eyes on fire with fear and
anger.

“
I created this world
little girl, don’t think your meek parlor tricks are going to save
you.” I didn’t know what Emma could do, but I knew what Selene
could, and it was time to test her. I raised my hands never taking
my eyes off her, the ground shook as I put the vision of her mouth
on Xander’s in my mind. My hands rose higher and the sky became
dark as I saw her looking at him naked. I raised my hands above my
head and the lightning came when I thought of his hands on her
naked body. I walked towards her as the rain was coming down on us
like a sheet; I never took my eyes off her as she raised her
eyebrows at me.

“
You don’t know who you are
messing with do you?” She gave me a crooked smile and raised her
arms to the sky screaming in a language I couldn’t understand. The
ground began to move, and I braced myself as I saw a whole open up
between us, she laughed as I held on to the men behind me. Israel
had stayed quiet until now.

“
Our powers are too great
for you; we have been using and perfecting them for over a century
where you have had five minutes.” Scott and Brandon stepped in
between us as he walked closer. Scott put his hand out to Israel’s
chest and stopped him as Israel looked at his hand with
disgust.

“
Listen old man, I don’t
know what is going on here and when I wake up from this messed up
dream I will forget you, but for now I think you need to back up.”
Israel picked up Scott’s finger and I heard him start to scream in
pain as he dropped to the ground beside me.

“
I am no ordinary
old
man, I am the great
sorcerer Balthazar and you
will
bow to me.” He looked at me with a smile as he
let go of the poor tortured soul and bowed. “I am pleased we can
finally meet Granddaughter.” I thought I would puke, this was my
Dad, Justin’s evil father, and he wasn’t lying to me in the
basement. I stood up straight, knees shaking under me. “You see
Delilah, if it weren’t for me you wouldn’t be here today, so you’re
welcome.” I looked back to the body of Selene, trying to think
about what connection could be between Emma and Balthazar before I
felt a pain in my ribs that rippled through my chest, falling over
I saw the opening of the great void before closing my eyes and
screaming for Kali in my head. I needed help.

“
Delilah, get up right now
do you hear me?” I could see her standing by me in my
head.

“
Kali, I can’t do this.
Israel and Selene have been taken over by Emma and an evil
sorcerer, Balthazar. I don’t know what to do Kali please help me!”
I cried and she put her arms around me.

“
Delilah, you are the
chosen one, not them. You can do this, take a breath get pissed and
ruin them.” Kali lifted my chin and kissed my forehead. “The curse
has begun to open so you just need to make it out and we can close
them in do you understand me?” I nodded, knowing what I had to do.
“Don’t stand here fighting, just run and keep them away, throw
everything you have at them and we will worry about saving Selene
and Israel after that.” I opened my eyes and no time had passed, I
took Scott’s hand and helped him to his feet. Checking my
surroundings I decided to try some of my new found gifts. Thinking
of Eris I reached out to touch Israel, hoping it would work. He
looked at me and then over to Selene obviously confused, this was
our chance. I grabbed Brandon and screamed to run, as we made our
way through the small path I knew they weren’t far behind. The
ground shook around; tree’s coming down in front and behind us. I
had to think of something fast but I had no idea if we were even
going in the right direction. I thought of something happy and the
sky lit up above us, shining down on the path. I could see a fork
ahead and as we were about to take the path on the right I crashed
face to face with something hard. I fell to the ground, as did the
others. I looked up to see what stopped me but saw nothing. This
must be the way out, I started to bang on the invisible wall
blocking our way out. They had us trapped, and now it was time
to
be
the chosen
one. I told the men to get behind me as I stood in place, waiting
for them to come to me.

TWENTY FOUR

“
Where are we going?” I ran
behind the women on what seemed like a wild goose chase, we were
never going to find the opening in time at this rate, no one was
using magic and we had one hundred acres to search. We reached the
far side of the field when Kali dropped violently to the ground.
Running to her, I tried to pick her up when Freya grabbed my
arm.

“
She is with Ella, leave
her. She might be able to give us some clues.” We stood watching
the sky become darker as she lay unconscious. A shrill scream made
us look to the sky, Cora was nearby and her screams were ear
piercing and angry. Eris got scared and began to shake
Kali.

“
Wake up; we need to get to
Ella now!” Freya pulled her off her aunt when Kali opened her eyes
and smiled at us.

“
I know where she is.” The
rain started to come down, and the sky became darker as she stood
up. Carna looked to the sky and saw as Cora flew behind some
trees.

“
Well, she is certainly
getting closer to being out, and someone doesn’t like that at all.”
We all looked in the direction of the large black bird when Kali
grabbed at me.

“
Xander, the good news is
we were right you never slept with Selene at all. It was all an
illusion, Emma has taken her over and made you think you did, but
on another note Ella doesn’t know that part yet and she’s using her
pain to fight, they are at the opening now and it’s blocked I know
where it is!” She started to run and Eris flashed me a smile as we
took off behind her. We crested the hill at the edge of the field
and I saw a black haze rising from the ground, it looked like a
twister and climbed to the sky. Eris grabbed my arm as we both
stopped in our tracks. The trees around the whirlwind had lost all
there leaves, blowing around in colors of red and orange as if fall
itself had begun. The grass was dead and the air even began to
smell like a crisp October morning. Carna looked up at the sky and
gasped as she spoke.

“
Holy shit!”

*

Emma had the exit blocked with some
kind of spell, I needed time to figure out how to break it or break
her if we were ever going to get out of here. I closed my eyes and
imagined binding her powers, like something that actually covered
her hands and mouth so I could deal with Balthazar one on one. I
couldn’t come up with anything by the time I heard them coming and
opened my eyes to see branches from nearby trees extend limbs to
block her from moving, she began to raise her arms as another limb
wrapped around her body, lifting it off the ground and a third limb
hugged her face leaving only her eyes exposed so she could watch me
take down her partner. I looked down at my own hands with surprise,
feeling quite proud of myself when I saw a flash of light by my
face. Balthazar was casting spells against me, I wasn’t sure what I
was doing but began to rub my own hands together thinking of
Selene’s naked body on top of Xander, the two of them sweaty and
aroused with passion. I threw whatever had built up inside me in
Balthazar’s direction, to my surprise he flew in the air, stopped
only by the massive tree behind him. A noise escaped my lips as I
jumped in surprise of myself. I looked back at my hands for a
moment and then back at him, the man that cheated and lied his way
into my family, made me part of him. That was it, I was part of him
and if I knew anything about my gifts it was that I could take in
the gifts of those I was connected too. I watched him stand up
slowly as I closed my eyes, opened them and was at his side. Taking
his hand in mine I smiled.

“
Welcome to the family,
Grandpa.” I closed my eyes and found myself back where I started. I
felt weird all over, I had taken on a lot and most of it was dark.
I lifted my head to see him raise a hand at me; I was blasted by
something sharp cutting my skin as I landed on the others. I could
see small cuts appearing all over my arms and chest, they started
to bleed slowly. Brandon stood up and began to charge at the man
who had done this to me, He stopped cold in his tracks, grabbing
his throat as he fell to his knees. I couldn’t let them be hurt
because of me; I jumped up and ran to Brandon to bring him back to
the others when another flash caught my eye and then something
collided with me, taking me to the ground. I wasn’t hurt; I threw
my hands in the air and cast all the darkness I had inside onto
Balthazar as I tried to move the limp body off of myself. Scott ran
to help me, and with a few of the other men they dragged him to a
tree where they could prop him up for a better look. I almost
screamed, running to him as his near dead face was
lifted.

“
Stop fighting Balthazar,
you need to kill Emma so the barrier will come down.” I couldn’t
kill her that would kill Selene. I shook my head and his airy voice
became angry. “I didn’t risk my life for you to shake your head at
me, you are Delilah the chosen one, you have to do it!” I began to
cry as I shook my head faster in defiance.

“
No, Lukin I won’t do it. I
can’t do it!” I had never been so happy to see someone as I had
been at this moment, but what he asked was too much for me, I
couldn’t do that to Selene, there had to be another way.

“
Delilah, listen to me she
cast the spell so you need to break the connection or we are all
dead, do you understand me?” I knew what I had to do; I stood up
and turned to see two faces of evil. Balthazar was trying to get
Emma out of the limb web with his back to me. I instructed the
others to keep hands on the barrier and the moment it came down to
grab Lukin and run without looking back, I looked her in the eyes
and began to vision the moment of her climax, raw and hot from the
man I love. Her nails in his flesh, digging deeper into him, her
legs tight around his naked body, becoming tighter as the intensity
grew, then I saw her scream out his name and something from inside
me exploded, I threw my hands at her and Balthazar was tossed deep
into the woods as she began to scream out in pain from the current
running through her body. That which caused her pleasure was now
her undoing as it grew with intensity through her body. I looked
behind me but no one was there, it worked it actually worked and
everyone would be safe now, the souls could find peace and I could
find my family. I started to walk through where the barrier had
been thinking this had been relatively easy, actually it seemed way
too easy considering, I saw the light of the real world, and then I
saw Eris.

TWENTY FIVE

My heart seemed to beat faster and
faster as men began coming out of the base of the large tree at the
edge of the field. As they came out many of them began to just
disappear, leaving only a few behind. I wasn’t sure why some were
gone but as one was dragged out I heard Kali gasp and run to
him.

“
This is Lukin; he’s hurt
someone come and help me!” That was Lukin, the man that had been by
Ella’s side in hell and gotten her to safety. I couldn’t help but
size him up a little as I walked closer, a twinge of jealousy swept
through me as he opened his eyes. I could certainly pretend to like
him more while consoling Ella on the death of her friend, then
actually having to pretend to like him. Given that as the men had
begun to come out so did much more, escaping in the same way. The
vine of darkness had grown, spanning most of the estate and it
didn’t help that we had heard the shrill cries of Cora right up
till the men began to come out, and then a silence so abrupt it
hurt to think about. Our attention quickly went to the opening once
again as Eris screamed.

“
Ella, you are safe!” Ella
ran out, bloody and pale as she collapsed in Eris’s arms. I ran to
Eris and helped carry Ella away from the opening. I wasn’t going to
let it suck her back inside. We all sat on the ground watching the
darkness seep out into our world, waiting for it to close up now
that she had come out. We sat and watched as the opening seemed to
continue getting larger. I looked to Freya who seemed panicked at
the sight before us. Large dark spots were coming out of the
opening now, with no knowledge of what they were Freya and the
aunt’s stood up and held hands speaking in a strange language with
eyes closed. Eris got up and held her mother’s hand to help, and I
looked back at the opening, growing in size no matter what they
threw at it. I saw lights of every color come flying out. Green’s,
blue’s purples and reds flew around our heads. They were much
smaller than the black chunks being sucked up and they managed to
fly out toward us fairly easy. Kali and Carna began swatting at the
lights, more colors flew out and then they came together above Ella
just circling above as I held her close.

“
You can’t have her back;
she is not going back to hell! Do you hear me, she’s not going
back!” I swatted at the lights as I picked her up and began to walk
away. I couldn’t help close the curse, but I could get Ella to the
estate safely. I crested the small hill and almost dropped her as I
pondered what I was seeing. The darkness had reached far beyond the
field now and as it was growing over the house itself it was as if
the estate aged a hundred years or more with no upkeep. The paint
peeled off the planks, the shutters fell to the ground, rotten and
broken. The windows cracked and some even broke, the roof began to
sag and shingles fell to the ground in piles. The gardens around
the estate died and became nonexistent; the grass rose and turned
brown as if it had never been mowed. All the trees lost their
leaves and dried up before my eyes. All color was gone as far as
the eye could see, and as I turned around to scream for Freya I
watched the women come face to face with Selene and my father,
stepping out into the woods.