Arianna Rose: The Arrival (Part 4) (5 page)

Arianna barely heard him.  Her pulse echoed the erratic tempo of her heart and pounded wildly in her ears.  “Others are here.  Others like us.  I can feel their dark essence.  We need to get outside
now
.”

Desmond sprang to his feet and she grasped his wrist.  Together, they sifted to the perimeter of the Parker property, to where grass edged woodland. 

The surrounding woods were still, too still.  Nothing moved, not even the occasional bird flitting from one branch to the next.  The air was heavy with the scent of evergreens and musty earth.  But something felt off.  Her eyes scanned the backyard.  Nothing seemed out of place and her eyes continued surveying the area.  They stopped immediately when they reached the shed, though.  MaryAnn and Adam Parker stood hunched and deep in conversation.  And they were not alone.  Two mangy looking figures loomed behind them.  The Parkers were oblivious of the fact that they were in danger. 

Irregular heartbeats began hammering her chest like shrapnel when she saw that two intruders gripped a pair of large swords, one for
each terrifying set of hands, the steel glinting in the early sun.

In the time it took her heart to produce one furious beat, she and Desmond had teleported and stood before the grimy warlocks just as their filth-crusted hands were clutching their swords and about to cleave the Parker’s skulls in two. 

Heat ripped through her body as a burst of pure energy surged through her.  A tornado of fire whirled in her core before rushing to her arms, saturating them with warmth until her hands blazed.  Tiny bolts of silver danced between her fingers, venting wrath like molten lava before the full might of their force erupted.  Incandescent fire burst from her fingertips and blasted against the man behind MaryAnn.  He never saw her before he was struck down by her torrent of flames.  His body staggered backward and his blade fell to the ground just before he did.  From the corner of her eye, she saw that Desmond had jabbed his daggers into the throat of the man behind Adam.  The grungy warlock had collapsed to his knees and clutched the wounds at his neck that spurted blood faster than he could control.  Arianna watched his crimson silhouette hemorrhage garnet rivers.  

An inferno still raged from her hands and the filthy being who’d attempted to kill Beth’s mothe
r had been reduced to a mound of ashes when screams tore through the silent morning.  Desmond’s head whipped in her direction and she lowered her hands.  They stopped what they were doing and teleported toward the sound.  But when they reached the side of the house where a door to the basement had been opened, they found three more bodies.  All wore their hair in messy, muddy dreadlocks.

“Where are they?” Adam asked frantically when he appeared behind them with his wife. 

“Bastard!” they heard Jason shout.  They followed his voice and saw that he, Dane and Beth faced off with one more warlock who held a dagger to Avery’s throat. 

“Let her go or you are dead,” Arianna commanded him in a rich voice that flowed from a deep hidden source within her.

“You’ll never let me out of here alive,” the man with the blade pressed against Beth’s eleven-year-old sister’s jugular hissed.  “You’re a lying bitch!  You ruined my future, all our futures,
Sola
.”  He spat her name like bile then pressed the tip of his dagger so that it pierced the tender flesh of Avery’s neck.  A thin rivulet of blood streamed from it.  She could smell the coppery scent of it and her breathing became ragged.  She was nearly panting when he looked to Dane, Desmond and Jason, all armed with their own weapons, and ordered everyone to drop them. 

“We can drop our mo
rtal instruments, but our other weapons remain with us,” she reminded him as a small storm brewed between her hands.  White flames encircled her fingers and licked at her wrists as images of their burning bodies filled her thoughts.  Avery winced as the man wrenched her body closer, poking the blade deeper.

“All right, we’ll drop them,” Dane said through his teeth.  He knelt and placed his knife in the grass.  As he did Jason hurled his dagger end over end, burying it to its hilt between the eyes of the man who’d held his sister at knifepoint.  The man stared,
was stunned for a moment, before he toppled face-first to the ground.  Avery slipped from his grip and dashed to her parents. 

“You idiot!  He could have killer her!” Beth’s voice was shrill as she yelled at her brother. 

“He would have if we didn’t do what we did!” Dane fired back.  “We did not have a choice.”

“Are there
more?” Beth did not argue further.  Instead, she looked all around her for a split-second.  Her eyes rested on Arianna for an answer. 

Arianna reached out with all her senses, searching for the vile sensation that had invaded her minutes earlier.  She did not feel it anymore. 

“They are gone.  It was just the six of them,” she said with certainty.  “More will follow, though.  We have to leave.” Arianna decided that now was as good a time as any to announce her plans to leave, now that the Parkers had come under attack. 

“No.  You must stay.  We can protect you,” MaryAnn said.

“We will call upon others, our allies.  They can come here and help us,” Adam added.

“No, I have put you in danger long enough.  And then this,” her hand gestured to the dead bodies around them.  Guilt swept over her like angry flames devouring a trail of gasoline.  “I cannot continue to endanger people I care about, the children, the elders, you guys.”

“I am coming,” Beth said in a voice that left no room for negotiation.

Still, Arianna tried.  “Beth, you’ve done so much for me already.  I do not want your life in jeopardy a moment longer.  Please, stay with your parents.”

“No,” Beth said firmly.  “I was born to protect the Sola,
you
.”   

“We’re coming, too,” Dane spoke for him and his brother. 

“No, you need to stay and protect everyone here,” Desmond insisted. 

“Sorry, man, it’s our destiny.  We are sworn soldiers of the Sola,” Dane shook his head, but his eyes never left Desmond’s
face.  “We do not need some ancient book to tell us that.  She is our destiny.”

“What about me?  I want to come too,” Avery protested. 

Beth bent so that her eyes met her sister’s gaze.  “You need to stay here with mom and dad.  More scary people like the men that were here a moment ago are out there.  They will be following us.  We will fight them.  But we need you here to protect Grandma and Grandpa, and Ella and Joe.  Please Avery, do it for me.”

Avery nodded reluctantly and Beth turned to Arianna and Desmond. 

“I know a place we can go,” Dane said.

Arianna thanked Adam and MaryAnn, but knew that her thanks merely splashed the surface of the vast sea of gratitude she felt for them.  Words would never be sufficient.  She vowed to repay them one day. 

She and Desmond, along with Beth and her brothers, returned to the house to gather their belongings and plot their future.  After a tearful good-bye, Arianna Rose stepped away from Adam, MaryAnn and Avery then linked hands with Desmond and the others.  White light filled her field of vision and warmth encircled her.  She felt herself fall away from the Parker’s compound and the only true sense of family and security she’d ever felt, and she was gone. 

Chapter 3

Darius
exerted little effort sifting from the East coast to Ellsworth Land on the Antarctic Peninsula.  This feat was yet another example of the magnitude of his abilities.  He was the most powerful being to ever walk the earth.  He knew it.  And the time had come to show the rest of the world. 

True, he’d been banished to a
bleak and dark realm for centuries, cast there as a prisoner of sorts by Asus, the first of their kind, the very warlock who’d penned the Tome of Ares.  He’d spent four hundred years in exile, all because of Asus and Agnon.  Agnon had been Asus’ young apprentice and had not approved of Darius, the fact that he’d grown an army and had prepared to overtake the world.  Asus had insisted he wait, that he and every supernatural being on the planet needed to wait for the arrival of the Sola, that she would unite them and initiate their uprising.  Darius recalled hearing of her prophecy and snickering.  Asus’s face had pinched with wrath as he’d mocked the prediction.  He remembered the interaction well, remembered his stern look of disapproval as he’d ordered him to stand down.  He also remembered the silly little lapdog, Agnon, nodding with his arms folded across his chest, mimicking his master.  The memory was pathetic and made his throat burn with bile.  Agnon had pranced behind Asus as the mighty teacher had paced, concurring that it was necessary for him and his army to postpone their coup of humankind.  Had Asus stopped short, Agnon would have lodged in his anus, exactly where he belonged.  Perhaps then he could have been spared four hundred years of expulsion.  But he had not.  Instead, Darius had continued his rant and scoffed at being told to wait.  He’d complained rather loudly, in fact.  He’d cursed and protested, but it wasn’t until he’d issued threats that Asus’ demeanor changed.  His threats had caused the sage warlock to condemn him as young and overly aggressive.  He’d been labeled impulsive, volatile and unpredictable.  Asus had decided then and there that he and his army would be cast to an alternate dimension filled with offenders far worse than he.  

His centuries spent in captivity
had taught him a great deal.  They had also allowed him to reflect a great deal.  But time spent learning and reflecting did not cause him to begrudge his punishment.  In fact, he chose to view his banishment as time spent regrouping, sharpening his already razor-sharp skills and become stronger and more powerful. Now, he planned to utilize those sharpened skills and reclaim all that was his, all that he was entitled to.  He would assume his rightful throne.  But first, he needed to pay a visit to an old friend. 

He closed his eyes
as he sifted, as his body became one with the earth and wind, and concentrated, grabbing hold of the mental map his memory had preserved of the mudroom of Agnon’s house.  A hum of power quickly stirred at his command, echoing from his chest.  It flowed down his arms to his fingertips like swelling vibrations of water on thin metal.  His entire body burned with the purest of white-hot heat, stinging and itching with need.  It demanded release.  It compelled him to act.  He focused on the ornate chestnut cabinets that flanked a cushioned bench.  Beneath the bench square storage compartments sat, a useless component, really.  Darius doubted Agnon ever had guests, much less eight of them to fill each compartment.  A small gust of wind swirled around him and his insides blazed.  He felt alight, as if he were one with the current of air, a tornado of fire.  Suddenly, the whitewashed world around him was incinerated.  Before his eyes, he saw nothing, just felt the intense glow of molten heat.  He closed his eyes and tilted his head back, savoring the luminescent warmth, before his body became one with it and disappeared.

When Darius reappeared, he stood before the massive, pretentious furniture of Agnon’s mudroom.  He did not bother to remove his boots.  Such courtesies were reserved for fragile minded humans who believed their demise awaited them in the form of outdoor germs.  Such fools!  They remained oblivious of the covens of supernatural beings that resided among them, yet fretted over the common cold. 

Agnon, along with the rest of humanity, would likely prefer the arrival of the common cold, or the Ebola virus for that matter, over his arrival.  Regardless, he had arrived, and he would never return to the realm he’d left. 

Darius
left the mudroom and swept into Agnon’s living room like a tidal wave, filling the room with his very presence.  He saw the back of a broad-shouldered form seated before a massive hearth.  Agnon, he presumed. 

“Hello, old friend,” Darius heard the words slip from his lips like ribbons of silk.

His voice caused Agnon to spring from his chair and turn to confront him.  He could feel the shift of energy around him before he noticed the subtle glint of surprise in the ancient warlock’s eyes, but he doubted Agnon was as surprised as he was. 

Unlike Darius, Agnon had aged
dramatically.  His hair had grayed and azure eyes that had once rivaled the color of the sky on a clear day had dulled and creased.  But that had not been the most alarming aspect of Agnon’s appearance.  His face had been disfigured, more than half of it, at least, ruined by burns. 

“Looking a little well-done these days, huh, Agnon?” he commented on the puckered skin in a range of shades that varied from charred brown to pale pink
that marked his complexion. 

Agnon
had yet to utter a sound. He remained, unblinking and with his mouth agape, looking every bit the fool he truly was. 

“Was your tongue lost in the blaze as well or has age claimed your ability to speak?” he taunted.

“Darius, how did you get in here?  You were able to sift?” Agnon asked and attempted a thin smile.  Clearly, the mutilated warlock had not anticipated his swell of strength, his ability to circumvent the protective field he’d kept in place around his fortress.  Yet Darius had.  And here he stood in his home, unannounced and uninvited. 
Surprise, surprise, old friend
, Darius thought and felt the threat of a smile tug his cheeks.