The Licensed Mage

29 Sacrifice

There was silence. The world around her was dead and still as the ice climbed up her feet. She bent her head forward and watched as her feet was buried under ice, licking its way up her legs. She stared at it queryingly as she realized, she didn’t feel a thing. She no longer felt the bite of the ice as it dug into her skin. She held her hand up and watched as the wind pulled at the hairs on her hand and no longer felt the knives of the wind slicing her skin. She looked up into the vast horizon of nothing but bleak black. Her eyes sluggishly blinked against the cold but she never even felt that. She turned her head to her right and saw the glowing figure of Claire, staring at her in amazement. Her eyes did not register the light coming from Claire for she did not see it. Claire was shocked and nearly cried as she stared at such a tattered version of Emily, freezing before her eyes. She tried to speak and call out Emily’s name but no sound was made. Emily stared at her unblinking as she studied Claire.

Are you the one?

Emily’s voice echoed and reverberated through Claire’s mind as she spoke. She threw up her hands to her ears as she cringed at the overwhelming noise. As silence fell Claire looked up and tried to answer but her voice was still gone, instead she nodded her head. She expect Emily to speak again but instead she blinked and looked down at her hand. Claire watched as she held up her right hand and saw she clenched something so tightly her knuckles were white and her palms were bleeding. Emily held out her hand to Claire and she knew she meant for her to take it. Claire reached up and saw that her hands were transparent and was worried that whatever Emily was handing her would simply fall onto the frozen ground. She held her hands together under Emily’s clenched hand and watched as Emily let go. Into her hands dropped Emily’s dream catcher, tattered, torn and bloody but whole. Claire looked up into Emily’s brown eyes watching her, trying to ask what this meant. Her voice went silently into the wind as Emily turned from her. She tried to grab her shoulder and pull her back but she suddenly stopped. Standing before Emily she now faced a being covered in black blood. Claire held a hand to her mouth feeling vile creeping up her throat as Emily turned once more to her. She expected to see horror and terror in the girl’s face but instead saw calm acceptance, even a small excitement. Emily’s lips twitched into a weak smile before she turned back to the being. Claire could only watch helpless as the being raised a hand and placed it on Emily’s forehead. Emily’s lips moved as she spoke and closed her eyes.

        Claire gasped as she woke. She held a hand to her head feeling it ring like a bell, What was she saying? She ran her other hand to her neck, rubbing at the kink when she felt a blast of cold air.

        “Crystal how many times do I have to tell you to shu-“

        Claire snapped her jaw shut as she opened her eyes and realized, she’s not in her bedroom any more, or even her loft. She looked around, unsure of where she was as she was surrounded in darkness. Finally the clouds moved and enough moonlight filtered through the roof for her to recognized she was in the building the gold thread had led her and Raven two days ago. She looked around and noticed she was alone and looked down to see her nightwear covered in dirt.

        She looked around wondering what the hell she was doing there when she noticed the ground before her. She had obviously been digging and she felt compelled to finish the dig. Her fingers scrapped the dirt away as she dug the hole deeper and finally felt her nails brush against something. Using her hand she brushed the dirt off and was shocked to find Emily’s dream catcher, tattered, torn and covered in blood, much like her dream but still whole and real. She went to pick the dream catcher up out of the hole when she heard a gun hammer click.

        “Don’t move.” Claire slowly put her hands up and turned her head, “Damnit I said don’t move!”

        She turned and looked down the barrel of an anti-magic gun. She felt her blood freeze as she looked up into the crazed eyes of John. She licked her lips as her mind raced and she spoke softly, “Hey J-“