Rising (19 page)

“
Setti
,
valr
,
s
vá
váru
þeir
allir
hraustir
at
engi
talaði
æðruorð
.”

 
She then stared
menacingly at the beasts, with a terrifying fierceness in her voice.

“
Myrkr
jötnar
,
tekinn
minn
lífdagar
.
 
Vér
nálægr
þessi
dyrr
.
Vér
vili
neinn
andask
.
Minn
kyn
vili
nálgask
endr
.
Vér
ávalt
hafa
.”

Her head bowed just an instant, and
I thought she whispered something else then she glowered at the menacing
creatures in front of her.
 
A glimmer of
what I can only call pure hatred came from her eyes, then a shuddering, violent
vibration rose out of her body.
 
She
yelled, but not because she was in pain.
 
It shot out of her throat at the same time her full power blasted from
her body, shattering all four of the creatures into splinters and dust.
 
She continued to wail, loosing her killing
power on ash-eaters that were circling the kill.
 
There was a feral squeal from every creature
she destroyed with her force.
 
The black
abyss and electric circle between the two stones behind her blurred, crackled,
then vanished.
 
She continued to cry out
until I saw her own skin begin to shudder, shake, then split and explode into
tiny fragments of shimmering light.

“Gabriel!”

It was Clara, leaning over me.
 
I had fallen back onto the bed with the stone
in my hand.
 
Theresa had pried it loose
from me.
 
A piercing pain throbbed in my
head, and I felt sick to my stomach.

“Are you okay?”

I could barely open my eyes without
pain.
 
I couldn’t even feel the fear
coming from Clara that was obviously written all over her face as she peered
down at me.

“I’m okay,” I said, trying to sit
up.

Clara helped me to a sitting
position.
 
Slowly, the world came back
into focus.
 
The throbbing was fading.

“Dude, you look like hell,” said
Jeremy.
 

“It’s getting better.
 
Just give me a minute.”

“What happened?” asked Clara
anxiously.

“I saw something.”

I looked up at Theresa, who was now
holding the black stone in her hands.
 
The more minutes that passed without me holding it, the better I
felt.
 

“What, dude?
 
Don’t keep us in suspense.
 
You looked like your head was gonna pop off
or something.”

“I saw that person’s death,” I
said, pointing at the stone.
 
“She was
like me.”

I realized after I said it that I’d
have to confess to two other people about my supernatural sense, that weird
secret that I’d kept hidden for so long.

“What do you mean like you?” asked
Theresa.

I glanced at Clara who simply
smiled and nodded.

“I have this other sense,” I said,
unable to find the words.

Jeremy was looking at me way too seriously,
and Theresa looked confused.
 
But,
neither of them was staring at me like I was crazy.
 
Not yet anyway.

“Go on,” said Clara.
 
“Tell them.”

I sighed heavily.

“Ever since I was really young,
I’ve been able to sense people’s emotions, especially strong emotions.
 
When someone’s really angry or sad or happy,
I can sense it the moment they walk in the room or come close to me.”

“And so, you could sense that the
woman you saw was like you?” asked Theresa.

“Yes.
 
Well, no, not at first.
 
It wasn’t like that.
 
It’s so complicated,” I said, feeling my own
frustration growing.
 
I looked at Clara.

“She could use her emotions as a
weapon,” I told her.

“What do you mean?
 
Like what happened this morning?” she asked.

“What happened this morning?” asked
Jeremy.

“Clara and I were on our way to
school when she got really upset about seeing that shadow man in her bedroom.”

“What!” said Theresa in a
completely horrified voice.
 
“One was in
her room?”

“Hey, hey, one thing at a damn
time.
 
I’m
tryin
’
to keep up here,” said Jeremy.

“Okay, let me explain,” said
Clara.
 
“Yes, Theresa, one of the shadow
men was in my room last night.
 
He didn’t
do anything but stare at me hatefully then say some weird word ‘
setti
’ then he
vanished.
 
Then on the way to school, I
got really upset thinking about it.
 
Gabe
was trying to comfort me, so he kissed me and—”

Clara stopped short, obviously
embarrassed at confessing a little too much.

“
Kissin
’
and
drivin
’?
 
You’re a multi-
tasker
, huh, Gabriel,” said
Jeremy.

I punched him in the shoulder, but
not too hard.

“
Ow
.”

“Well, when he did,” continued
Clara, “it was like being shocked, and I felt a sort of vibration.
 
I knew that it was this gift he had.”

“Vibration, huh?”

Jeremy was grinning sheepishly
again.
 
I leaned over to punch him.
 
He flinched back.

“Just kidding, just kidding.
 
Geez, dude.”

“I don’t understand,” said Theresa,
ignoring all of the stupidity.
 
“How can
that be a weapon?”

“In the vision, the woman I saw
used her anger to kill the giants.
 
She
projected it out somehow.”

“She survived?” asked Theresa.
 
“Then how—”

She was looking down at the stone
in her hand, which we all knew now was a fossilized piece of the woman.

“They had already stabbed her
before she killed them.”

For some reason, I couldn’t explain
everything I saw.
 
I didn’t know what the
warrior woman said before she died, but I knew it was some kind of
sacrifice.
 
I wanted to keep this to
myself for now, but I had to tell them about the monoliths and what I thought
it was.

“I couldn’t understand what she
said, but I know that she was blocking a gate so the creatures couldn’t get
back through.”

“What kind of gate?”

“It was between two tall stones,
monoliths, like what we learned in Mr. Weber’s World History class last year,”
I said, turning to Jeremy.

“Do you think I really paid
attention in that class?”

“Anyway, that’s what they looked
like.
 
There was an electric field
between them, but she used her power to close it.”

“Why wouldn’t she want them to
leave?” asked Clara doubtfully.

“Honestly,” I said, “I think she
wanted to kill them for what they’d done to her friends.
 
Maybe she closed the gate so no more could
come through.”

“Wait a minute,” said Theresa,
“what did these monoliths look like?
 
You
said there were two of them?”

“Yeah.
 
They were about twelve or thirteen feet high,
rounded at the top, and made of dark stone.”

“I don’t believe it,” murmured
Theresa.
         
“What don’t you believe?” asked
Clara.

“I saw these stones,” she said, her
brown eyes widening.
 
“Right before I
left the excavation pit for my camera’s memory card, I heard a weird humming
noise and saw some workers sort of bickering around two tall stones they had
nearly dug out.”

“Wow,” said Clara, “then you
actually saw the portal right before they came through.”

“You said, Gabriel, that she closed
the portal between the gate, right?” she asked.

“Yes,” I agreed.

“But, somehow they found a way to
reopen the gate, didn’t they?” she asked thoughtfully.
 

“Where do you think they come
from?” asked Jeremy.

Theresa looked at all of us
somberly.

“I don’t know.”

She turned the pouch holding the fossil
of the ancient warrior in her hands over and over.

“You must have a connection to the
stone, because of the power you shared,” she said to me, then turning to the
wall of photographs.
 
“You said she had
friends, this warrior woman?”

“Yes.
 
There were others around her.
 
They were all dead.
 
I knew they were warriors like her because of
the similar tattoos on all of their forearms.”

“And, you said she spoke to the
creatures?”

“Yes, but I didn’t understand
it.
 
It was a strange language.”

“Interesting.
 
I only wish we were able to see the entire
wall before, well, before it was all buried again.”

“Dude, I’m gonna need to get home
soon,” interrupted Jeremy.
 
“My dad will
think I’m
stealin
’ cars or
somethin
’
if I’m gone too long.”

“Really?” asked Clara, sounding
rather shocked.

“No, not that bad, but not far off.
 
He doesn’t get me.
 
But, what parents do?”

I sensed a sudden shift in Clara to
bitterness.
 
My supernatural sense was
clear now, reading everyone in the room.
 
Jeremy was anxious, apparently about his dad, or maybe something
else.
 
Clara had that sort of uneasy vibe
I felt whenever I knew she was thinking about her mother.
 
Theresa was completely detached, absorbed in
the photos on the wall.
 
There was still
more to talk about, but it was getting late.
 
It was enough for one day.

We left in silence.
 
While I knew the others were unsettled by
what they saw and learned, I felt something entirely different.
 
I felt empowered.
 
For the first time in my strange life, I felt
a purpose for this curse of mine, this gift.
 
More than that, I could feel it inside, pushing its way upward from the
depths of my gut.
 
Strange that I knew
some hellish monsters from another world were coming to kill me and everyone I
knew, but all I could feel was a heightened sense of confidence and
control.
 
I was connected to an ancient
warrior who had learned to use her power to destroy the invaders.
 
I would learn, too.
 
I would be ready for them.

8

CLARA

Dad was devouring the fried pork chops,
rice, and gravy I had cooked for dinner.
 
I was just picking at mine.
 
I
watched him, sunk down in his comfy chair, chuckling at another rerun of
The Andy Griffith Show
.
 
His earthy green aura waved out around him.

“Dad?”

“Yeah,
hon
,”
he said forking in another piece of pork chop.

He snorted a laugh.
 
Barney Fife was parading around ridiculously the
jail of Mayberry, playing king of the castle.
 
I definitely didn’t get my dad’s sense of humor, but I loved his
simplicity.
 
Right now, I wondered if I
should even bring up what I was about to.

“It’s a little weird what’s going on
with this hurricane, isn’t it?” I asked, trying to sound casual.

“Yes.
 
It’s quite an anomaly,” he said, glancing toward me.
 
“How’s that science fair project coming along
with Gabriel?”

“Fine.”

I wasn’t exactly lying.
 
Gabe and I were definitely doing lots of
research on the hurricane.
 
Only, we were
trying to discover how it was linked to the murdering monsters from another
dimension that planned on eating humankind rather than its bizarre scientific
origins.