Chapter 16 #2
Instantly I see countless images flashing through my mind.
None of them make sense and the noise from them overwhelms me.
My mind can’t fathom what it’s seeing and hearing and it makes me want to scream.
Gradually they slow down and that’s when I start to see flashes of familiar faces.
Penny, Caleb, the pack, my mum and dad. They’re younger and carefree.
Laughing together with other people, werewolves that I don’t recognise but feel a connection too.
A man stood embracing my father who is unmistakably Seth.
The resemblance between him and Lukas is jarring.
Then the pictures darken to night and I see Alistair flanked by other vampires, running through the trees.
Some are jumping across the branches overhead.
I hear howls of anger and screams of agony.
Blood and fur and fangs. Then fire. Blinding fire that ravages everything.
The house is surrounded by debris and flames.
Through the smoke I see my mums lifeless body being carried on the back of a sandy brown wolf.
Seth. Lukas is beside him also in wolf form.
The only difference is his face is lighter although blood coats his maw.
They’re running quickly and quietly through the trees.
Then they stop dead as a black, roiling darkness surrounds them.
The two wolves stand back to back looking for a way through, but there isn’t one.
A figure emerges from the dark. Alistair.
Eyes black as night and blood dripping from his mouth onto his black shirt.
His relaxed walk only adds to his intimidation.
Blood drips from his hands and the shadows coil around him like snakes poised to strike.
“Give her to me.” His voice that I’ve heard so often holds an emptiness that chills me.
Seth and Lukas growl and bare their teeth in response. Crouching ready to attack.
“You really think you stand a chance against me? Stupid mutts.” He laughs as he releases a tendril of darkness towards Lukas.
It wraps around his throat and forces its way into his mouth, nose, eyes and ears.
He’s lifted onto his hind legs as he wines and chokes.
Seth can only look on in horror as his son drowns on liquid obsidian.
Alistair doesn’t make a sound as he beckons back the darkness and leaves Lukas to collapse on the ground. Seth howls and wines in despair as he stares at his child’s lifeless body.
“This is your last chance dog. Give her to me.”
Seth looks between Lukas and Alistair. Weighing his options as my mum stirs on his back.
She props herself up and slides off of him.
Her legs go to buckle but she steadies herself.
Her hand going to her stomach. Alistair notices and tilts his head to the side listening.
His eyes widen for a fraction of a second before he goes back to his original confidant, bored posture.
“Gwen is it?” He says. “My father is waiting for you.”
“He’s going to be waiting quite a while.” She bites back as she unleashes what’s left of her power at him. Wind blows and wood goes hurtling through the air pointed and sharp like stakes.
Alistair lifts his arm and a wall of blue flame forms in front of him turning the projectiles to ash.
It was only a distraction though for as the wall of flame turns to smoke and vanishes, mum and Seth are nowhere to be seen.
“Yes, I expect he will.” Alistair mutters to himself as he glances down at Lukas whose chest rises and falls.
A vampire. A woman in her mid 20’s with long, crimson hair leaps down into the clearing.
“Are you going after them or shall I?”
“I will. You can put that one with the other prisoners.” He orders as he walks away.
“I’m not your lackey.” She snarls.
Alistair is in front of her in a flash with his hand around her throat.
“You are whatever I say you are.” He growls before he throws her to the floor and vanishes into the darkness.
A heartbeat later white eyes stare through the night.
Alistair's Strix. Scanning everything and not missing a thing.
Alistair is perched high in the branches of a tree as the Strix returns to him.
Showing him where Gwen and Seth are running to.
He makes no move to chase them down. Instead, he sends the Strix back to watch them.
This time when it returns it shows him a group of vampires on their trail.
Three of them and the one at the front has red hair.
Alistair curses before turning to smoke.
He reappears just as the vampires reach their quarry. They surround Seth but don't attack.
Mum slips off Seth's back holding her hand to his neck for support.
Seth slowly turns to look up at her. His eyes flash Amber and his teeth glint in the moonlight as he lunges for her throat.
Gwen doesn't notice as her eyes are locked onto Alistair as he leaps from the trees and grabs Seth around the muzzle before his teeth make contact.
The vampire with Red hair plus another male jump onto Seth's back. One bites down on his throat whilst the female digs her clawed hands elbow deep into his rib cage. The choked scream that escapes Seth is agonising.
Alistair conjures a thick cloud, blinding them all of their senses.
Stunned silence. Through the darkness I watch as Alistair conjures a wolf from blue fire and liquid darkness.
He launches it at two of the unsuspecting vampires.
It slices their throats and they fall to the ground.
Dead. The red haired vampire stares around unseeing into the darkness and comes face to face with Alistair.
His eyes grip hers in an unbreakable hold as he mutters.
“You couldn’t find the Nymph. Your comrades were mauled by a wolf that you finally brought down. Now return to Hades.”
She stares blankly then shoots off into the forest. Alistair lifts the darkness to reveal Seth’s mutilated corpse. Gwen is nowhere to be seen. He looks around the clearing and seeming satisfied, leaves in the same direction he sent the female vampire.
A few moments pass and Gwen steps out from inside a tree, tears streaming down her face as she goes to Seth. She drops to her knees and places a kiss on his cheek before closing his eyes. She strokes the fur around his ears then gets up and carries on running.
I’m dragged through the trees at lightning speed and come to a dizzying stop in a smouldering clearing.
The ranch a smoking glow in the distance.
There’re large metal cages with members of the pack inside seemingly unconscious.
I spot a large dark brown wolf with a black ridge of fur going down its back.
My dad. Blood drips from a gaping wound on his neck and both his hind legs are bent at unnatural angles. Burns also cover his body.
The few vampires that are here including the red haired women are all kneeling with their heads bowed. Alistair is stood in the centre of them. They’re all facing a tall male figure shrouded in darkness. His icy silver eyes shining through the cloak of darkness that swirls around him.
Sheer terror freezes me to the spot as I realise I’m stood mere feet from Hades.
His presence oozes terrible power. The suffocating feeling of death and decay ebbs and flows from him like roiling, tar filled waves.
Despair fills me at the onslaught of his aura.
When he speaks his voice chills me. That soft, malicious lilting voice.
“You failed me. All of you.”
The coven cowers from him. Some are quivering and sobbing they’re apologies. Alistair simply stands still. His shoulders tense.
His voice is even when he says. “My apologies father. I underestimated the power she would have access to here.”
“I see. You disappoint me Alistair.” He sighs. “I will track her down myself.” He begins to turn away.
“Please father.” Alistair kneels down on one knee his head bowed. “Allow me to bring her too you. She will not evade me a second time.”
Hades contemplates then holds up a hand where an ornate dagger appears wreathed in blue flame. He throws it with perfect precision at Alistair. I gasp as it stops an inch from his face. Hovering level with his eyes. Alistair doesn’t flinch but stares at the dagger slowing twisting in the air.
“You will not fail me again.” Hades’s tone is low and filled with threat. “You will bring her to me or I will burn every drop of your blood whilst it pulses through your veins should you prove to be as weak and pathetic as you were today.”
Darkness engulfs me as I’m torn from the clearing.
Then I'm back in the woods, by Seth's body.
Three figures emerge. All have a dead, zombie like appearance.
They're skin is grey and torn revealing black, oozing flesh.
They're decaying even as they move in struggling slow steps.
Their eyes are hollow but through them I see a never ending void.
Like the abyss lives inside them. They crane their heads and stare straight at me.
Then the scream that bellows from them threatens to tear the world apart.
It's suffering, anger and sorrow all rolled into one blood-curdling screech that turns my blood to ice.
I feel myself screaming as well as I struggle to get away from the most terrifying beings I have ever witnessed.
I blink and I’m back in the glen. My hand braced against the old oak tree. I look up into its branches in wonder as my chest throbs uncontrollably.
“How?” I whisper to it.
A pulse of power into my fingertips is my reply.
“Why did you show me that?” I plead.
Another pulse into my hand but this time followed by a vision of a glowing white stag with deep black pools for eyes. The spirit of Gaia. Her voice echoes through my mind like a softly spoken message carried on a gentle breeze.
“Fall into the darkness to discover the light deep within its depths.”