Post by StoryGirl83 on Apr 5, 2011 0:57:55 GMT -5
Chapter Seven – Failed Spies
Seth shimmered into the backyard of a single family home. He looked around confused as behind him Wyatt orbed in.
“Anything interesting?” Wyatt asked as he came up behind him.
Seth held up a hand as the sound of yelling reached their ears. He couldn’t understand what was being said, so he crept closer to the house.
“I know what you saw,” Toby yelled frustrated, “but not even you know what that means and they don’t believe me!”
Wyatt chuckled softly.
“You shouldn’t have given up so fast,” Aka scolded him. “They are in danger or someone is in danger that they need to protect.”
“We can protect them,” Toby growled.
“We don’t know who they are unless they are the Halliwells,” Aka reminded him.
“Who else could it possibly be?”
“Are you serious?” Aka asked, sounded bemused. “Surely you don’t think the Halliwells are the only ones with demonic prices on their heads. And in case you didn’t pay attention, demons don’t generally need a reason to attack.”
“But they need a reason to stake out their victims first,” Toby insisted.
“Not really,” Aka shook her head. “And you call me naive.”
“What do you think you’re doing?” a voice behind them asked startling both friends.
Wyatt and Seth turned around and looked at Brianna. Seth glanced at Wyatt. “Busted.”
“Very much so,” Brianna agreed. “You’re coming with me.” She pointed toward the house. As they got closer she called out. “Toby, looks like you were followed.”
Toby looked out through the glass back door. His eyes widened in surprise as he recognized the two friends. “I thought you weren’t going to help me.”
“He insisted,” Seth announced, indicating toward his best friend.
“Inside,” Brianna ordered them. “I need to tell Dad we need better security at this house. Any old demon can just shimmer in.”
“That is rude and racist,” Seth informed her.
Brianna looked at Wyatt and Seth in surprise. Her eyes focused on Seth. “Are you saying that you’re a demon?”
“Are you saying you didn’t know?” Seth returned. “With a comment like that, I figured that you did.”
She shook her head. “Actually I’m kind of surprised to hear that the Charmed Ones let their kids associate with a demon.”
“Our family is more open minded than that,” Wyatt protested. “Seth’s my best friend.”
“If you didn’t mean me,” Seth looked at her, “then who did you mean?”
“My best friends are all part demonic,” she replied. “I was actually just teasing Toby and Aka.”
“What does that make you?” Wyatt asked as he stepped into the house next to where her two friends waited.
She shrugged and pointed at a couch in the next room. “I’m a witch. Didn’t your brother mention it?”
“Actually, my brother has not explained much of anything to me,” Wyatt admitted. “Our cousin showed up asking for help and he decided to split our forces.”
She shook her head in discussed. “I hate how you say family means so much and don’t mean it.”
Wyatt frowned. “What on earth are you talking about?”
“Never mind,” she waved her hand in dismissal. “Just a really old story I heard a long time ago. It really has nothing to do with you. I’m sure for the most part family is very important to you.”
“It is,” Wyatt agreed, looking at the three friends confused. “I don’t understand at all.”
“Actually, I guess that’s smart,” Brianna admitted. “If your cousin needs help, you should help . . . her? Most of your cousins are I believe, but not all, so I guess it could be him.”
“What do you know of our family?”
“No offense, but your mom was a Charmed One.”
“Actually my mom is a Charmed One.”
“I hear they can’t use that power anymore.”
“That’s because . . . it only works when all three of them are together.”
Brianna shrugged. “I assume you are here, because you want to know more about the demons Aka spotted.”
Wyatt nodded.
Seth just pointed at Wyatt.
Aka chuckled.
Toby sighed.
Brianna rolled her eyes. “Fine. I suppose we should start with introductions. I’m Brianna McInnis. This is my home. I live here with my dad who, like me, is a witch.”
“Wyatt Halliwell,” Wyatt replied. “But you knew that.”
Toby sighed. “Toby Edmunds, in case you missed it earlier.”
Brianna snorted.
Seth shrugged. “My name is Seth Silberman. I’m half human, half manticore.” The last part was directed at Brianna. “And I was raised by my human half, in case you were really interested in how a Halliwell is friends with a demon.”
Brianna nodded. “Sorry, I actually know a great guy who is a demon, raised by demonic parents, both of them demonic, so I shouldn’t have said what I did.”
“A great guy she’s been fighting with for most of the last five months,” Toby retorted under his breath.
“How about we don’t air our dirty laundry in front of guests,” Brianna suggested. Without waiting for a reply, she turned to Aka. “You’re the only one left.”
“Akalia Kaella Wilkinson,” Aka informed them. “I’m half Grimlock, which is how I noticed their auras.”
Wyatt frowned. “What’s a Grimlock and what do you mean by auras?”
“Where to start,” Aka laughed lightly. “Well, a Grimlock is a demon. They are extremely pale.” She waved a hand in front of her in demonstration. “I’m actually dark for a Grimlock because my mother is a darklighter. You’ve really never heard of us?”
Wyatt gave her a wry look. “I think I probably needed to pay more attention to my mom and my aunts’ lessons over the years.”
Brianna chuckled. “You didn’t think magic was coming back, did you?”
He shrugged. “I never gave it much thought. I could orb and I could heal. The rest didn’t seem to matter that much.”
Brianna sighed. “How could you think that?”
“You said that you’re a witch,” Wyatt commented. “How much use of your powers did you get?”
“Just spells,” she admitted. “But I got a lot of use out of those. Any magical powers needing to be used had to be from Toby or Aka.”
“Which doesn’t amount to much,” Toby retorted, “especially for Aka, since she has a grand total of two powers even now and one of those is dark orbing.”
Aka shook her head. “And yet I have a bounty on my head for the other one.”
Brianna watched them for a few more seconds and then headed out of the room.
“What’s so special about this other powers of yours?” Wyatt wanted to know.
She smiled. “Imagine looking at someone and knowing without any doubt if they were good or evil.”
Wyatt blinked. “You can do that?”
She nodded. “Not only that but I know what they are. Human only shows up on those whose other parts naturally aren’t, like your friend.”
“Explain.”
“I look at you and I can see witch colors and I can see whitelighter colors, but I don’t see human colors because both of those are naturally human.”
“And what do you see when you look at them?” He asked indicating Seth and Toby.
“I see demons,” Aka admitted. “Though I must say it’s very rare to see two demons quite so bright.”
“What does that mean?” Wyatt wanted to know.
“I see things in different colors,” she informed him. “Those colors come in varied levels of dark and light. They indicate different types of creatures and different levels of good and evil.”
“And that’s how you see all the time?”
She shook her head. “No, I can turn it off, but it has to be a conscious decision.”
“And it’s always been this way?”
“No, only since magic came back,” she admitted. “Before that it was just an acute awareness of who someone was.”
Brianna returned right then with her dad, Sean McInnis. “Dad, these two young men are Wyatt Halliwell and Seth . . . well, I forget his last name, but he is a friend of Mr. Halliwell.”
“Halliwell, huh?” Sean commented, eyeing the two friends. “Well, I suppose it’s a pretty good guess they’re on the side of good then. What brings them here?”
“We went out to eat at The Manor,” Brianna explained. “While we were there Aka saw some demons and she thought they might be up to something. Unfortunately, we had to scatter before we could find out what.”
“Are you sure they weren’t just hungry?” Sean asked.
Five sets of eyes turned to look at him.
“Is that possible?”
Aka blew out a breath. “Unlikely. They were extremely dark.”
“So’s my brother-in-law from what you tell me, but as far as I can tell he hasn’t done anything in years.”
“Your brother-in-law is evil?” Wyatt asked, confused. “But I got the impression you were a witch.”
“And my wife was a warlock,” Sean admitted. “I have Brianna, so I can’t really regret that, but it does tie me to him. So what makes you so sure these demons were there for anything other than food, Akalia?”
She closed her eyes and exhaled slowly. When she opened them, her dark eyes were extremely focused. She looked at Sean and said, “I just know.”
Sean considered her for several seconds. “This is like that Finnegan baby, isn’t it?”
Brianna chuckled.
Toby groaned. “Leave me out of that one. I could have burned Max for that fiasco.”
“As if you could have,” Brianna retorted.
“You want to test my acid?” Toby asked.
Aka shook her head. “I’m just glad that Max and CT aren’t here.”