Samantha moon phantasm, p.125
Samantha Moon Phantasm, page 125
part #9 of Vampire for Hire Series
“Come on,” I said. “We don’t have all the time in the world.”
I hurried along a quaint dirt footpath toward the Forest of Woe… or whatever the place was called. Surely it had a name somewhere in the depths of Van Gogh’s mind.
We walked past fields of grass, both green as well as teal with azure patches. Flowers with bizarre repeating geometric shapes like something out of an MC Escher painting leaned closer to us as we passed, as if alive and curious.
“The tulips are looking at me,” said Anthony.
I glanced back a moment later to find Allison fifty or so feet behind us, staring into one of those flowers, mesmerized.
“Don’t look into the flowers!” I half yelled, then ran back to grab Allison’s arm.
She snapped out of it, blinking. “Whoa. That was trippy. Felt like I was staring into a Mandelbrot zoom. Just endless repeating fractals.”
The trail continued into woods composed of black-trunked trees with pale blue needles.
“Heh. Emo pines,” said Tammy.
“If they had fur, would they be Lou Pines?” asked Anthony.
Kingsley groaned.
“You’re adopted,” said Tammy. “Please tell me he’s adopted.”
I hugged them both. “Nope.”
We passed a small pond of glowing water. ‘Fish’ that resembled partially inflated balloons with eyes and tiny little flapper fins that blurred like hummingbird wings zoomed around like overcaffeinated Pomeranians. They looked part goofy and part cute, but when I started toward them, my alarm sense blared strong… as though they could legit kill me.
“Stay back!” I grabbed my kids. “Those fish are bad news.”
Everyone looked at me like I’d gone nuts, except Kingsley. He, too, had an inner alarm, although I always suspected mine was a little more far reaching. Still, if his triggered... then, yeah, this was bad news.
“Listen to your mother,” he said in a low voice. “Not everything that looks cute is harmless.” He smiled. “Take your mom for example.”
“Eww,” deadpanned Tammy.
Allison giggled. “Aww, you guys.”
I gave his hand a squeeze, but also walked faster. I loved spending time with everyone here, but alas, time was one thing we presently didn’t have much of. Both because the Rider would recover his power eventually and prey on another innocent, and because we would all disintegrate. Already, I noticed parts of my body—as well as everyone else’s—fading semitransparent for seconds at a time before solidity smeared back over the opening as if by brush stroke.
Van Gogh, a dimension or two… up or down? Ugh. I have no idea. Anyway, he obviously still sat by that painting and kept fixing the damage. Seeing everyone else disintegrate as well got me worrying that they had really come through into this world with me, not simulacrums like J.C. and Daisy.
“How’d you guys get here?” I asked out of the blue, while gazing around at the massive black trees, as tall as high-rises.
“When you slurped into the painting, Anthony tried to grab you,” said Tammy. “He got pulled in after you. Kingsley told me not to, but I went after him.”
He sighed. “And then I followed.”
“Party of one is boring,” chirped Allison. “So here I am, too.”
“We all ended up in a forest that looked like a Van Gogh painting, said Kingsley. “No sign of you, but we found each other reasonably soon. Wandered for a bit, then this doorway opened and we saw you on the other side, so we stepped through.” Kingsley sniffed the air. “This place is playing hell with my nose.”
“What’s it smell like?” asked Allison.
“Yes.”
“It smells like ‘yes’?” Anthony blinked. “What does that even mean?”
Kingsley chuckled. “It’s too intense to describe. Like everything at once but nothing.”
“You are a hipster.” Tammy rolled her eyes. “That was so esoteric it hurts.”
“Esoteric! Like that’s really a word,” snorted Anthony.
His sister was about to reply—no doubt derisively—when a bluish-white glow from ahead caught my attention.
“Shh,” I said, raising a hand. “I see something.”
Everyone quieted and followed me as I crept forward. Past a grove of massive trees, these coated in a glowing orange lichen, stood an energy bubble the size of a compact car. Well, I assumed it to be an energy bubble. It might’ve been a crystal ball, though I’d never seen one six feet around before. Inside, the distorted image of a city appeared, but shifted back and forth, trading places with a barren field where something dark lurked in the distance. I couldn’t place the city, but it appeared modern and third-dimensional. My link to the Red Rider pulsed stronger the closer I moved to it.
“Whoa,” whispered Allison.
“You could say that again,” I said. “But don’t.”
“Whoa,” she said.
“Bitch.”
Tammy reached out to touch the ball, but I caught her hand.
“Wait a sec, hon.”
She shot me a look like the sarcasm cannon was primed, but must’ve picked up the worry in my heart for her safety, so she didn’t fire it.
“This is definitely connected to him somehow.” I walked around the giant ball. “I think it might be that dimensional anchor I was thinking of. This could be the other end of the box, or maybe it’s some manner of bridge between frequencies.”
Kingsley shot me a strained expression. Right. I shouldn’t burden werewolf brains with arcane metaphysics.
Tammy giggled.
I thought about touching it and no warning sense went off in my head, so I gingerly reached out and rested my hand on a perfectly smooth ice cold surface. At that, Tammy did the same. Nothing happened other than a potent tingle of energy sweeping over the back of my hand, and I imagined, hers, too.
“Yeah. It tingles,” said Tammy.
“That’s what she said,” muttered Anthony.
Tammy gasped and blushed.
“Anthony!” I stared at him. “That’s your sister.”
Kingsley snickered.
“I didn’t mean her.” My son rolled his eyes. “Jeez, Mom, it’s just a joke to say that.”
I spent a few minutes mentally feeling out the giant crystal ball. The sense that Annie empowered me with, rather the sense I had that the kid made stronger, pulled me upward. Somehow, I doubted it meant flying literally straight up from here. One of the two images in the ball looked like normal Earth, so I assumed the other one to be a higher dimension. Maybe sixth since it didn’t appear too different from my present surroundings. Though, it lacked the color, being rather gloomy and drab.
“There’s a way to activate this thing.” Allison rested both her hands on it, gazing far into its depths. “I think the easiest way to describe it is an elevator. Only, instead of traversing floors, it’s hopping realities.”
“We’re gonna be late getting home for dinner, aren’t we?” asked Anthony, scratching his stomach. “Can we get pizza?”
The only hunger in this world greater than the Red Rider’s thirst for power is a teenage boy’s hunger for… pizza, chicken nuggets, fries, or whatever else comes within arm’s reach that isn’t considered ‘healthy.’
“Any idea how to make this ball work?” asked Kingsley. “Maybe if we rub it something will happen.”
Tammy glared at Anthony, commanding him not to make another ‘that’s what she said’ joke.
My son does know when to keep his mouth shut… sometimes.
“Working on it.” Allison muttered about prodding and pulling at magical energy threads. That I didn’t understand her annoyed me, even though it shouldn’t have. I’m not a witch.
Not anymore, whispered Elisabeth. We’re not so different, Sssamantha. You know what it is like to be deprived of something that belongs to you by right.
Oh? And what exactly belongs to you by right that was taken away?
The world.
I rolled my eyes. Not even the same thing. You want to dominate people, control everything. No one gave you the world. Magic belonged to me by bloodline, for generations. It should’ve been mine. I should have…
I glanced over at Allison, struck by a sudden pang of sadness that I couldn’t fulfill the role fate had set me on a path toward. I stood on the outside while some other woman stole my rightful place in the trifecta. Hell, my best friend had to block me out of her mind.
Elizabeth receded again, and I felt her smiling to herself. Ooh. Bitch. I never should’ve thought about feeling cheated. Now she’s going to be holding that over me for the rest of time.
An inkling of thought formed in my head for no particular reason, growing into an understanding of how to focus on the orb to activate it. I’ve never studied magic in any form, but somehow—maybe via the link I shared with the Red Rider, I received some kind of psychic hit that read his thoughts at the moment he used it. Kind of like the way some psychics can pick up a murder weapon and see the crime. Or maybe it came from Elizabeth. The understanding grew and took shape in my mind...
“No way that makes any sense,” said Tammy, cringing, and shooting a look from me to Allison.
Except my friend blinked... and smiled. “Oh but I do. It’s so complicated yet so simple. I should’ve thought of that.”
“Wait. You understood that?” asked Tammy, gobsmacked.
“Yeah. It’s like rather basic in fundamental theory, even though it appears hella complicated.” Allison looked over at me. “Ready?”
“Yeah.” I placed both hands against the orb. “Everyone get close to us.”
As they did so, Kingsley said, “Wait! Maybe we shouldn’t trust sudden flashes of inspiration like that. Something wanted you to know that. And nothing is ever free.”
“Or what if I read the Red Rider’s mind by his link to this object?”
Kingsley narrowed his eyes at me.
“Is your danger sense going off?” I asked.
“Not really.” He grumbled.
“Mine isn’t either.” I nodded at Allison. “You ready?”
“Yeppers.”
“Please don’t say yeppers again.”
“I second that,” said Tammy.
And before Allison could say it again, I pushed my right hand up, left hand down, twisting. Despite lacking any magical ability, I flexed my brain in a manner that I imagined a witch or warlock might when invoking spells or manipulating magical energy.
The crystal orb swelled up to many times its size, engulfing us. Two seconds later, it collapsed, pulling us inward with shoving force. A brief flash occurred, and we appeared in midair, a frightening distance above a barren, tundra field. On the left, a long strip of grey mountains lined the horizon. To the right, ahead, and rear, the empty land stretched as far as I could see. It took me a second to realize we were fairly high up—and falling...
Chapter Eighteen
Reflexively, I sprouted my angel wings and reached for my kids. Anthony burst into the Fire Warrior, growing too large—and hot—for me to carry. I grabbed Tammy, who clamped onto me like a koala bear. I hurled myself into a power dive and caught Allison.
Kingsley shifted into his werewolf form seconds before hitting the ground. The fall probably wouldn’t have been fatal to a normal human, but it would’ve meant broken bones. He landed with relative grace, the greatly increased strength of his shifted form allowing his muscles to absorb the impact with minimal effort.
From the air, I spotted a dark-walled castle built against the mountains a fair distance away. At my thought of ‘hmm. Probably should just fly there,’ Tammy clung tighter and shivered. I glided lower to the ground to calm her fear of heights, and skimmed along maybe ten feet above sparse grass and dirt. Allison’s hair whipped me in the face as she looked around awestruck.
Anthony followed us, running over the land in great strides, hurtling smaller trees and chasms, up and over hillsides with mind boggling speed. Meanwhile, Allison didn’t seem to mind either the height or being carried. If anything, she seemed focused on my son, who was a sight to behold, to be sure.
Mom?
Yes?
Allison is having creepy thoughts about Anthony. She thinks he’s like hunky or something. Eww.
I smirked. Allison is having ‘thoughts’ about the Fire Warrior. The body she’s fantasizing about is not technically Anthony.
Much like Talos, I suspected my son was only borrowing that body. Who or whatever the actual being is, I’m still not entirely sure.
Okay. That’s a lot less gross to think about—and don’t you dare!
Damn. She heard me wondering if I flew a little higher if I could get her to spill the beans about her possible new boyfriend. Of course I wouldn’t really terrify my little girl by flying higher and higher to extort information from her. Nah. That would be mean.
“Not funny,” whimpered Tammy.
Kingsley sprinted on all fours, a black streak of fur zooming over the dying grass, keeping pace with my son the fire warrior.
With the fear of imminent splat gone, I finally took in my surroundings. No longer did the world have a strange painterly quality. Everything looked beyond perfect. Seeing this reality around me felt like the first time looking at high definition television—only this went beyond the sharpness of mere high-def. Every ridge or crinkle in the distant mountains appeared crisp enough to slice paper. Every cloud above so fluffy they resembled levitating cotton puffs. Individual blades of grass fluttered in such extreme detail I couldn’t help but picture Anthony raving about the awesome graphics processing power of his new game system.
Kingsley slowed, gazing at me for direction, and continued following along behind me, close enough that he could’ve leapt up and grabbed me out of the air. Anthony, in turn, followed him. Upon reaching a thin dirt road flecked with white stones, I swung my body upright and landed, setting Allison down first. Tammy hugged me in thanks for being back on the ground, and let go.
Anthony landed beside me and surveyed the area with his fists on his hips. Despite the horror of what the Red Rider did, and the urgency I felt to eliminate him, my son seemed to be adoring this. Like he was a character in one of his video games.
He’s scared too, said Tammy in my head. But, yeah, he thinks he’s Conan or something.
I smirked. Well, he basically is at the moment. Or at least has Conan’s body on layaway.
If Conan was fifteen-feet tall and on fire.
“Wow, everything looks so… so… vibrant here.” Allison whistled. “It’s almost painful to look at anything.”
“I can count individual grains of dirt,” said Kingsley, after shifting back to his human form. He dropped to a knee and lowered his face to the ground, sniffing, then looked toward the distant castle. “I believe the entity we’re chasing passed by here recently. Leather, blood, and… a sulfurous foulness.”
“Demon? He’s part demon?” I asked.
“Not entirely. But he has touched the same energies they used. Perhaps he has absorbed those who trafficked with them and taken that energy?”
Anthony shifted his large head to stare at Tammy with a purposeful glint in his flaming eyes.
“He’s wondering if this thing absorbed evil witches and they made him turn evil.”
I shrugged. “Maybe.” Although it did seem unlikely. Not too many young witches would have gone dark at such an early age, but who knew?
“Or,” said Allison, “maybe creatures as evil as this bastard just stink.”
“I like her theory.” I marched forward.
“Explain Anthony’s underwear,” muttered Tammy.
“There’s no explanation for that,” I said.
The giant Fire Warrior shot me an ‘aww Mom really?’ stare.
Minutes later, we reached a footpath of white gravel that led to a huge stone wall. A massive portcullis gate blocked our passage. However, being a simple wall, I flew over it. Anthony pulled himself over it like a ranch hand jumping a fence. Kingsley, back in his wolf form, sprang to the top, then dropped down past it.
I landed in a large courtyard of dark cobblestones. Hundreds of figures in hooded white robes milled around a fountain at the center. The thin material pressed to their bodies as they moved, revealing the shapes of young girls ranging in age from maybe fifteen up to their early twenties—the majority probably sixteen or seventeen. Some stood in place, others meandered about, all with vacant far-off expressions. Like everything else in this dimension, they appeared hyper-real, every pore on their faces stood out in exquisite detail. Bare feet peeked out from under the dragging hems of their robes. Hands and arms hung limp at their sides. Not one reacted to our presence.
“Whoa,” whispered Allison. “This is so damn eerie.”
Narrow stone stairways connected from the ground here and there to equally narrow openings in various towers around the courtyard. The expressionless girls wandered up or down, disappearing into the castle, reappearing elsewhere—or maybe those were different girls.
One, a redhead of about seventeen passed within inches of me, not acknowledging my presence at all. She radiated a charged energy that washed over me like a rain of tiny needles scratching at my skin despite my clothes. I stood in horrified awe, staring at what had to be hundreds of girls.
“Hey,” said Tammy, attempting to communicate with a dark-haired girl about her age. “What’s up?”
The girl walked right on by.
Anthony waved his enormous, fiery hand at a young woman trying to get her attention. She, too, ignored him.
“Oh, my God,” rasped Allison. “These must be all his victims…” She looked from girl to girl for a moment, then swooned to her knees, bawling hard. “He killed them all…”
“Worse than that,” muttered Tammy.
Kingsley sniffed at one as she passed him, then sneezed from the electric tingles on his hypersensitive nose. He emitted a whine and looked up at Tammy.
“He doesn’t think these are true spirits,” said Tammy. “I’m not entirely sure what we’re looking at.”
Allison kept crying.
“We’re looking at the reason I’m going to end this…”
“Go ahead, Mom. Say it. This deserves an f-bomb,” rasped Tammy, a hitch of sorrow in her voice.
