Post by StoryGirl83 on Oct 20, 2012 12:58:08 GMT -5
Chapter Twenty-Two – Headless Bodies and Healing Hands
10:11 AM (1:11 PM in Duxbury)
Arielle stood at the edge of the clearing, twigs in her hair and tears in her clothes. Her gaze was firmly on Elisa’s headless body. “She has no head.” Arielle stated, horrified.
Sam relaxed. That was all she was reacting to. He looked down at Elisa as he picked himself up, but his eyes didn’t stop on her. He looked horrified as well as his eyes stopped on the bleeding body of his brother as the events of the last few minutes set in.
How could he be so focused on his long dead mother and sister that he didn’t pay any attention to his hopefully still living older brother? As soon as he reached his brother’s side, he started checking for signs of life.
“What happened here?” Arielle asked as she walked into the clearing and looked around.
“She liked knives,” Caroline announced.
Arielle gulped.
“This,” Rebecca informed Arielle as she made her way to her sons, “was her not trying to kill anyone other than my younger son.”
“This is trying not to kill?” Arielle asked in disbelief.
“No, this is not trying to kill,” Rebecca corrected. “There is a difference.”
“Who cares what the difference is,” Arielle argued. “The point is they are dead.”
“No,” Sam told her, looking up from his brother. “Dave’s alive. And the girl ‘tis only asleep. Or at least I think she is. Thou should attempt to wake her while I try to bandage my brother’s wounds.”
“Why not just call a whitelighter?” Arielle asked bewildered as she walked hesitantly to where Paige and Cilly lay. “I would, but my whitelighter has not been heading my calls.”
“Mama, what is she talking about?” Sam asked as he looked across the field at his mother.
Arielle groaned. “I suppose that explains that. If only Paige was awake, she could help.” She almost tripped as a thought formed in her head. “She is not, but . . .” She didn’t finish the thought as she began digging in her pocket. She pulled out a cell phone and punched some buttons.
A sound caught her attention and she groaned as she realized Paige had her phone in her pocket. She sighed and sped walked over to Paige. Once there she stooped down and dug into her pocket, pulling out Paige’s phone. She opened it and unlocked it. Thank goodness there wasn’t a password. “Call . . .” She froze. Call who? “Hank!” she exclaimed. Paige’s son, Hank, was in her grade. They didn’t go to the same school, but she had met him a few times at school functions. “Call Hank,” she repeated and waited for the phone to ring.
Alanna let go of Hank as soon as they were fully materialized and she spun around to glare at him. “How on earth do you get lost orbing across town?! How on earth do you get lost orbing period?”
Before Hank could answer his phone rang and he held up a finger as he used the other hand to dig into his pocket and pull out his phone. Seeing the number on the other end he smiled. “Everything all right, Mom?”
“This is not your mom,” Arielle informed him. “Please do not freak out on me. I need you to listen. Your mother needs help and she is not the only one.”
“What do you mean?” Hank asked, glancing at his sister who was still glaring at him.
“She is need of a whitelighter and fast,” Arielle told him. “Do you know how to contact one? I know that your mother can heal. Can you or either of your sisters or any of your cousins?”
Hank gulped. “I’m coming.” He didn’t wait for instructions as he shut the phone and turned his attention to his sister. “Stay here. I'll be back as soon as I can.”
Alanna did not seem pleased by this. “I can talk to Dad myself. I don't need your help.”
“Stay here,” Hank repeated, his voice growing steely.
“But I can . . .”
“Alanna Samantha Mitchell, just stay here,” Hank ordered her. “Wait until I get back.”
Alanna glared at him, her eyes narrowing as she said, “Henry Wallace Mitchell, Jr., you are not my boss. I am your older sister and you will –”
“Mom’s hurt,” Hank told her reluctantly. “Stay here.”
Alanna stared at him shocked. “What?!”
Hank didn’t answer. He didn’t have an answer. Instead he just orbed out of there. There would be time for answers when he got back.
Arielle closed her phone. “He is coming.”
“Who’s coming?” Sam wanted to know. “How can he help?”
“’He is her son,” she told him pointing at Paige.
Sam raised a surprised eyebrow. “And how exactly . . .” He stopped mid question as blue-white orbs swirled around and formed into Hank. “Oh.”
“You are here,” Arielle said, trying to get Hank’s attention.
Not even the sound of her voice registered with Hank as his eyes zoned in on his mom and he ran to her side. He dropped to his knees next to her and held his hands over her, begging his powers to work. He’d rarely had need for this power, but now it was imperative that it work.
He sighed in relief as a gold glow covered his hands and her wounds began to heal.
Sam was momentarily frozen as he watched Paige’s wounds seem to heal from nothing more than glowing hands. A moan of pain from his brother caught his attention and both relieved some of his fear and reminded him that whatever this boy was doing to Paige, he needed him to do to Dave. “My brother,” he pleaded. “Help Dave, please.”
Hank was so focused, he didn’t notice.
Arielle put a hand on his shoulder. “You can get back to your mother. She is not the only one in need of help.”
It was enough to get his attention. He looked around and the first thing he saw was Cilly.
Arielle held tight on his shoulder when he made a move toward her. “She will be fine for a bit more. A little sleeping powder and the one wound in her leg is all that is wrong with her.” She used her hands to direct his attention toward Dave. “We are not sure how badly he is hurt. He was thrown into the tree. He was bleeding and unconscious before he hit the ground. I am worried about him.”
Hank heaved in a deep breath, but he did as she directed and headed over to where Dave lay. Getting down on his knees, again, he held his hands over the most obvious of Dave’s wounds, his head and jumped back as if burned. “What on earth?!”
Everyone snapped to attention.
“What’s wrong with my brother?” Sam asked full of concern.
“Nothing, nothing,” Hank looked at Dave with determination. “Don’t worry about it,” he said before he held his hands over Dave waited for the gold glow. He ignored the relief he felt as the glow appeared and he ignored the feeling of electricity coursing through his body as Dave’s wounds slowly healed. Frustration was getting to him almost as much as the electricity. The wound was taking too long to heal.
That’s when the grass caught fire.
Wind appeared out of nowhere and just like that the fire was smothered by a tiny funnel of wind. Forcing himself to ignore it, he focused on Dave. It was so difficult to keep his hands there, but he did until Dave’s eyes fluttered open. Finally, he could breathe a sigh of relief. He stood and brushed himself off as he looked around. He smiled as he saw his mother standing there watching.
“What are you doing here?”
“What does it look like?” he grinned. “I’m playing doctor since you couldn’t. Cilly?”
“Cilly’s got a headache,” his cousin announced, “but otherwise I’m fine. Your mom took care of my leg.”
“You woke her?”
“Elisa talks too much when she brags,” an unfamiliar woman’s voice told him.
He didn’t look for the voice as he took in the rip in Cilly’s jeans. What had happened here?
“She dost love to brag,” Sam commented.
Looking around, Hank found that other than the familiar looking wild child in ripped designer jeans, everyone seemed to be all right. At least it was until he looked down. Just a few feet from where he knelt on the ground was a headless body. He felt a chill fun through his body as he couldn’t seem to take his eyes off it. “Mom? Since when do we behead people?”
He couldn’t see his mom’s face as she frowned and followed his eyes, but he could almost hear her reaction in her voice as she spotted the headless body. “Oh.”
“Mom?” This time he did look at her.
She gave him a little half smile. “I don’t know how she got like that, but she is the reason for my injuries and Dave’s and everything else you see here.”
An uneasy feeling flooded his body. “One person did all this damage?”
“More or less,” his cousin mumbled. “I think we managed at least a little of it.”
“I don’t mean the broken tree branches,” he informed her. “I mean the damage to all of you.”
“’Tis common enough for her,” the unfamiliar woman informed him.
Looking across the field this time, he spotted someone he hadn’t before. A young woman in her mid to late twenties, wearing what appeared to be Puritan garb stood there with a small girl of maybe three or four at her side.
“She was trained from a young age and she has had a very long time to train.”
With a frown he continued to look at her. “Who are you anyway? You’re not from around here.”
“Actually, I am from exactly around here,” she told him with a smile. “My home was perhaps one hundred fathoms from here, perhaps a little further.”
Fathoms? Hank shook his head hard. I’ll look it up later. “Fine, fine. You’re from around here. Who are you?”
A smile lit her lips for some reason and she replied, “I am Rebecca Warren. I am the mother of those two strapping young men standing by you and the beautiful girl here with me.”
His gaze switching between mother and sons, Hank’s confusion only grew. “How old are you?”
“Hank!” his mom sounded horrified. “You never ask a lady her age.”
Cilly laughed, not giving him a chance to reply. “Hank, remember that entry in the Book that you found about Patrick Warren?”
If she wanted instant attention she sure had found a way to get it. The four Warrens looked at her with different levels of surprise and interest.
Cilly ignored. “This is his family.”
“Them?” He looked around. “But the entry said they were dead.”
“Mama is,” Dave offered. “And so ist Caroline.”
“He’s not a ghost?”
Sam sighed. “It seems thou should take them at their word even if thou wilt not take us at ours.”
“Calm down, Son,” Rebecca lifted Caroline up into her arms and headed toward her sons. “Thou must admit, it is a rather incredible thing we ask him to believe.”
Dave smiled at that. “If thou wishes for something incredible, I can provide something most incredible for you.” He walked over to his mother and sister and got to where he was face to face with his little sister, he touched a finger to the air right in front of her face, and in a whispered voice that was still loud enough for Hank and everyone else to hear, he said, “I see you.”
Rebecca gasped. There was a catch in her voice as she exclaimed, “Oh, my lord!”
Looking at his mother confused, he asked, “What’s with her?”
Paige shook her head, just as confused.
“He is blind,” Arielle told them. When the only response she got was blank stares and frowns, she added, “He cannot see. Do you not get it? He cannot see, but he can see her. He can see his sister.”
That got reactions. It was Cilly’s reaction that got the most attention though. She laughed.
It was a laugh of delight and discovery, but it was a laugh all the same and garnered a pretty annoyed look from Sam. “’Tis not funny.”
She smiled. “I know. It’s wonderful. How did you get your vision back?”
Dave shrugged. “I don’t know. It sometimes comes and goes, but it always seems to come back. Of course, it has only been today that it started.” He looked at his mom and with the most childish glee on his face he said, “I think I might have come into my powers, Mama.”
“Hey!”
“Sam, too,” Dave grinned at his little brother.
Rebecca covered her mouth with her free hand as another gasp escaped her lips. “Then . . ?”
Dave shrugged. “Probably, but I’m not going to worry about that.”
For some reason Rebecca’s eyes went to Hank. “Do you think . . ?”
“I have no idea,” Dave replied before repeating, “but I’m not going to worry about that. Sam seemed to think you wanted to find Papa’s grave. Why?”
A smile curved Rebecca’s lips, before it was replaced with a frown. “Patrick told me ‘twas Elisa who he suspected was behind his being framed and I believe he would have tried to watch her. If he was watching her, he’d know what happened that night all those years ago when I died.”
“So why don’t we just summon him?”
Hank found himself nodding to his mom’s question.
Rebecca did not nod. She shook her head sadly. “I tired that, but something prevented him from coming. Sometimes if you go to their grave there is a stronger link.”
Paige frowned. “Why have I never heard that before?”
Rebecca shrugged. “The old magic is sometimes lost as time goes on. Thou would do well to learn it, if thou hast not already.”
He had to keep himself from chuckling at the scowl on his mother’s face. His cousin was not so successful at hiding her mirth which meant his mother’s glare was not aimed at him.
“’Twas not meant as an insult,” Rebecca tried to assure her. “It is a common thing. My mother once told my sister and myself about one of our ancestors and I felt humiliated, for the magic my mother described was beyond what I could even imagine, let alone reenact. It was enough to convince both myself and my sister, Hannah, to practice our craft even more.” Her head dropped down and her chest heaved as she added, “I wonder what happened to her after we left for Plymouth colony.”
“Plymouth colony,” Paige mouthed in surprise. Then, she shook her head and said, “I forgot that you were from the colonial days. Though I certainly shouldn’t have.”
“Colonial days?” Rebecca queried at her. “No, do not tell me. Elisa told me far more than I ever desired to know. Her tauntings the last time were of a war in which a country became and of another war in which that country nearly broke itself in two. And in both wars she said that the blood of my blood was spilled and in the first on both sides as she said my brother’s descendants fought on one side and my own descendents on the other.”
Her two sons looked at each other, distress in their eyes.
Dave heaved in a deep breath and looked at his mother. “Mama, obviously Sam and I art gone from our time and it could not be either of us fighting in this war you speak of and I have no offspring, so this cannot be an offspring of mine you speak of, but Sam’s only child ist a daughter. When is this war?”
Rebecca sighed. “I know not. I imagine they know, but perhaps it is best not to ask.”
Arielle exhaled and kicked at the dirt at her feet. “Yes, we do know.”
Cilly gave her a look. “And, yes, she’s right. We shouldn’t be talking about it.”
“What could it hurt?”
“I don’t know, but can you prove it won’t?”
Arielle frowned. After several seconds she sighed. “Fine. I will not say anything.”
Hank rolled his eyes at them. “The country, in case any of you are wondering is called the United States of America. The first war was against England in a successful attempt to gain our independence, which I would imagine is why your brother’s descendants fought in it, if they are still in England.”
“Hank!”
He shook his head. “This is ridiculous. They don’t know what year this is. They don’t what years those wars were fought. They’ve never heard of the people involved in them seeing as those people weren’t anywhere close to born when they lived. Regardless of what Cilly or the other girl thinks, knowing that is not going to hurt anything.”
His mother just shook her head at him. “It still is probably not a good idea.”
"Are we going to argue this? Or are we going to find out if my Patrick can help us?"
"Lead on."
Hank grinned at Cilly.
She grinned back and shook in silent laughter.
“Mom?”
Paige and Rebecca both looked at Hank, Rebecca smiling and looking back to her own children when she realized that it was not one of her sons speaking.
“I really need to get back to ‘Lanna. She’ll be worried about you and we still need to talk to Dad and see what’s going on with his boss.”
Paige pulled him to her and pressed a kiss on his forehead. “Be careful.”
He swiped his hand across his forehead and nodded. “I will. I love you, Mom.” Without waiting for an answer he disappeared in blue-white orbs.