The Secret Circle
The white cloaked figure swept through the woods, circling around on the path she had first taken. The sun was below the horizon now, and what little light remained was fast fading. She scanned left and right as she swept past the oak she had marked a few minutes earlier. None of the twigs she had spread out along her route had been cracked – either she wasn't being followed or more likely her pursuer was a wily character, well versed in such basic methods. She lowered her hood, revealing her white-blonde hair, curling down her head and neck ethereally, and followed the sounds of noise in a distant. She pulled off her clasp and allowed her cloak to unfurl so it acted more as a coat then a cape. There was something deeply unsettling about the woods today.
The trees seemed to howl danger at her from their immobile branches, those woodland creatures hardy enough to brave the winter had disappeared and even the streams that criss-crossed the wood, who normally played such a merry melody, seemed subdued. She heard a twig snap some distant behind her and bolted, thanking whatever subconscious instinct had told her to wear running boots that day as she hurtled across the woods, refusing to look back. Her dagger might be useful at close-quarters, but without the advantage of distance her magic would be limited, other than giving her some subconscious power. With the elements as restrained as they were her spells would not be that powerful, and tapping into the dark side of her power was becoming all too common a recourse in a bad situation.
"You can't keep running Cassie," she thundered into what felt like a brick ball and hit the ground with a heavy thud, causing her brain to explode in pain as her body took the full force of impact on the forest floor, "I'm going to catch up to you one day."
.
"Cassie? Cassie?" her Grandmother's voice began to filter through the haziness of the twilight between dream and lucid consciousness. She rolled around in her bed a few times, pulling the covers tightly around her before relenting and sitting upright, as her Grandma threw open the door. Cassie watched her Grandma open the curtains and then perch on the end of Cassie's bed, smiling at her Granddaughter. "Did you have a bad dream?"
Cassie nodded glumly. It was the same very baddream she'd been having for the past two weeks.
Her Grandma smiled weakly, "Dreams are sometimes formed by our subconscious desires, other times, if we have something of the sight within us it can be a premonition…or a forewarning," she could see she wasn't settling Cassie, "I wouldn't dwell on it. The future is always changing…I'll leave you to get ready for school."
.
Cassie ambled downstairs, thankful that the weekend was only a few hours away and she could finally relax. She'd thrown on a pair of old jeans, a tee-shirt and a cute blazer she'd bought at a new boutique in Chance Harbour with Diana. She'd also put on the necklace Jake had given her before he'd left – it was a good luck charm, and she needed all the positive energy she could get. It was likely to rile up Adam but she couldn't help that…she only wanted a friendship and he…wanted destiny. "See you later," she called as she left the house, walking down the path to the road and hopping into Faye's waiting car.
"How was your dream?" Cassie enquired – it was the same conversation they'd been having for the past week since Cassie had first asked Faye for a ride to school in preference to Diana.
Faye shrugged, "Longer this time, I almost saw who the guy was…and the clasp was different this time. An Asp I think…or some other kind of snake. Sinister and sexy…it was me all over." She joked, although Cassie could see through the front Faye seemed to exude so effortlessly at all times. They pulled away and Cassie remained silent, looking at the forbidding skies – grey storm clouds were looming over the hills surrounding Chance Harbour.
"My Grandma said something about the Sight this morning," she said suddenly as they inched closer to the High School through early morning traffic, "do you have any of that in your family?"
"Not with my Mom's side…and I don't know too much about my Dad's," she admitted, "besides I'm not asking my Mom for help….thinks are a little strained between us at the moment."
Cassie raised an eyebrow, "Because of what happened with Melissa?"
"That…and the fact that the Elders know what she and Diana's Dad are up to…and although she wouldn't admit it she's been spooked." Faye said with barely disguised glee – her relationship with her mother had been becoming ever more strained and Faye wouldn't disguise the fact that she was pleased to finally be getting some space and independence from her mother. The fact that her Mother had been plotting to steal something Faye guarded as jealously as her magic had only worsened the situation. "You're wearing Jake's necklace." Faye noted.
Cassie nodded imperceptibly, now concerned with surveying Chance Harbour as they sped through the town, on the last leg of the journey to the High School, "It's a Charm…and I could do with some luck right now…this dream has just…spooked me I guess. Besides with that storm I just…have one of those feelings where you know things are going to go wrong."
"I've had that undercurrent ever since Jake left," Faye concurred, "but I thought it was just me…maybe we should tell the others?"
"I don't want to worry them," Cassie said.
"Please," Faye scoffed, "they're worried enough, this'll just be a raindrop in a downpour." They pulled into the lot and Faye drew up in a space, scowling at someone who had obviously been entertaining the prospect of parking there.
.
She could tell it was Adam before he poked his head around her locker. Diana locked eyes with him for a minute and then turned back to her books, pulling out her Chemistry book and then shutting the locker, setting off without starting a conversation. He grabbed her hand and pulled her to the side where she promptly shook him off.
"Are you really gonna be like this?" he demanded.
"Yes Adam," she said vehemently, "and don't go acting surprised – you knew what would happen."
"Did I really?" he enquired mock-interested.
Diana scowled at him, "Adam you asked me to help you break the Circle – how did you think I was going to react?"
"Like a reasonable person – like you normally are!" he said, barely holding his voice in check.
"Reasonable?" Diana let out a shrill laugh as she walked off again, Adam following in hot pursuit. He drew level again and Diana sighed exasperatedly, "Adam you've been messing with me, flipping between professing love for me and then moping about your silver bond or whatever to Cassie. I'll see you tonight at the meeting…just leave me alone." With that she stormed away, entirely regretting even speaking to Adam already.
"Well that looked fun," Melissa murmured perceptively from beside Adam, "so she didn't go for your little plan?"
Adam glared at her, "Well I'm sorry – but Cassie and Faye have power of their own and at some point they're going to leave us all behind! We need to be able to defend ourselves and we can't do that without them."
Melissa shrugged, "I already told you what I want if we're going to break the Circle – and that needs the power of three Witches, seems you've got work to do."
.
Cassie settled into her seat, entirely intent upon ignoring both Melissa and Adam as they sat down near to her in their English Class. Ever since Faye had been able to tap into her own power she had been drawn into Cassie and Adam's argument. Adam, because of a mixture of hurt at being spurned by Cassie and resulting anger had accused Cassie of wanting to leave the Circle and practice on her own. Once Faye had her own powers he'd levied the charge of separation at her too. Diana wasn't getting involved because she hadn't forgiven Adam for how he'd treated her after they'd first broken up and Melissa…was distant from them all. In fact Cassie was convinced she'd become involved in some off-shoot of the Occult due to her deepening obsession with reviving Nick. She let the class filter through her head with very little input and then left, repeating the same routine for the rest of her classes till the end of school.
She was becoming ever more disenchanted with the Circle – that much was true. Melissa was cold toward her, Diana's nice façade was slipping away to reveal someone who while generally amicable harboured deep reservations toward Cassie's continuing presence in Chance Harbour and then there was Adam. It sounded harsh but he had been throwing himself at her and she didn't want to hear it, he had driven away one of the people she cared about most in the world and was now contemplating breaking the bonds of the Circle because of a perceived threat to the Circle that he had yet to identify. She didn't want to be cruel but Adam had failed to recognize that in reality he was insignificant – it was Cassie and Faye that he wanted, the others were expendable, as Nick had proved.
She slipped out into the lock and into Faye's car for the ride home. The storm clouds of the morning were now right on top of them and a bolt of lightning streaked across the sky above them as they wound their way home. The traffic was heavier because of the rain. Cassie smoothed back her head and looked at the roof of the car. "It's tonight," she said with realisation, "it has to be…the conditions are perfect."
Faye nodded, "I figured that at lunch, I saw the sign of the Asp…only for a second but it was there."
"The woods?" Cassie enquired, Faye nodded.
.
Lighting crackled over had, plunging the woods periodically into a monochrome of black-white colours and shades. Jagged trees jutted out around them as they stumbled across the roots lining the floor of the wood. The creatures were gone again just as in the dream and the trees, as in the dream, somehow seemed to silently scream danger. Cassie stopped in her tracks as a yell of anguish ripped through the woods and she turned to Faye who looked at her nervously, lighting streaked overhead and in a flash Faye was gone and thunder boomed mightily overhead. The rain had now caught up with them, hammering down, but Cassie wasn't wet. She felt the Cloak around her and couldn't decide whether she was hallucinating or she was genuinely experiencing the embrace of the cloak.
She stalked forward nervously, touching nervously at the clasp – hers a pale blue coloured Celtic-style – and sweeping her head around urgently, looking for Faye or a sign of who'd let loose that yell. It felt oddly like her dream, but she'd lost that feeling of familiarity, instead she received a cold, hard foreign aura around her. It was evil and reaching out with invisible tentacles toward her, drawing her in while her surroundings urged her to flee: she had lost Faye, she had no choice now.
As she moved forward with little sense of real direction she fell to the ground, but found herself caught and stood up, recognizing Diana stood beside her…except somehow she wasn't Diana. Her head was framed by a simple metallic tiara of some kind and she was dressed in a loose-fitting toga and tan, leather ankle boots. She paused beside her friend regarding her uncertainly for a moment.
"You don't recognize me?"
"I think it's the get up," Cassie murmured uncertainly, "what are you doing here? We aren't speaking?"
The rain thundered down around them as the two girls regarded one another uncertainly, "I thought you summoned me, as a woodland nymph? It's the power of the woods and the forests…in times of warning they can call upon spirits to help those that they value – that's why I'm here. To help you, isn't that why you asked me here?"
Cassie remained uncertain, other than being relatively sure that she wasn't talking to Diana – just a likeness of her. Cassie shrugged and stalked onward through the woods with the Nymph, uncertain of what that meant for the future of her situation.
.
Faye swept herself up in her cloak, advancing around the woods – she hadn't seen or heard Cassie since she'd heard that man's cry. She drew up at one of the oldest trees, a large, tall, handsome oak, stretching out, offering some cover from the downpour around her. She turned to her left and paused reaching to the top of her leg and finding a dagger clasped there, she drew it from her leg and hid it just inside the sleeve of her cloak, lowering the hood as Melissa – or rather someone masquerading as her advanced upon her. She seemed ready for a masquerade, dressed in a cat-style mask with a simple black, flowing toga thrown over her top, combined with black ankle boots which seemed inappropriate for the muddy wood.
"You can't be here Melissa – you were at home, we saw you getting a ride with Diana."
"Who said I'm Melissa Faye? You of all people should know not to judge on the basis of first appearances," the Melissa doppelganger purred, without menace, instead Faye detected a tone of mischief, "I'm a Wood Nymph, a guardian of the trees. We offer comfort to travellers being menaced…or…in other situations." She grinned and Faye felt unsettled, as though the look-a-like could see something she couldn't. "Let's just go."
.
The thunder was booming ever louder now as Cassie and her Nymph moved aimlessly through the woods. Cassie felt sure somehow she was going in the direction that the yell had come from, though she couldn't tell why…somehow she just knew. Her core was telling her this was the right way to go, though the Nymph had told her very little. The woods began to open up into a loose clearing and at first in the grey, unrelenting rainstorm she could see little, then there was a crack of lighting over their heads and in the flash Cassie thought she saw a raised plinth at the centre of the clearing. She sprinted toward it but then heard a cry behind her. The Nymph version of Diana had been pinned to the ground by blackened, hard roots. First they grabbed her feet, then they stretched up her body, reaching around her and moving up around her face. Then they began tightening around her, wrapping until she appeared for a moment like a Mummy, bound in black wrappings, and then her body decomposed, disappearing away into nothingness like the leaves blowing wildly in the storm. Faye sprinted across and Cassie observed the exact same thing happen to a duplicate of Melissa who had been accompanying them, Cassie was left wondering where Adam was if that had been the two girls.
Faye screamed and pointed towards the plinth as Cassie made recognition of two forms – males Cassie realized strained against the plinth. She then identified them more horrifyingly as Adam and Jake, the two Witches struggling against similar black bonds that had taken down Melissa and Diana – did that mean that those Nymphs hadn't been Diana or Melissa at all? Cassie sprinted toward the plinth and struggled with the roots, looking down at Jake as he struggled while Faye wrestled with the roots holding Adam down.
"You can't run this time Cassie," a deep, masculine voice murmured and Cassie turned around, terrified as she stared into the eyes of John Blackwood, "how fitting to have both my daughters – light and darkness, here together – with the Circle dead together we will rule – we will be unstoppable."
"No," Cassie screamed, "you can't!" she summoned up her magic and direct her fury toward her father but he simply outstretched a hand and Cassie felt her magic jerked from her, and entirely consumed by her father, "Will you try the same as your sister Faye?" Faye seemed to consider it and then relented, standing back to consider the issue, "The Darkness has always and will always triumph."
With that he touched Adam's head and his entire body begun to convulse and writhe with pain. He began choking as Cassie remembered him choking once before when she'd lost her temper and then she saw him began to cough up blood, "Stop," she shouted at Blackwood, "stop it now please, haven't you done enough." She could feel tears building in her eyes as she felt a stirring of magic back in her heart and she started toward him and then looked at Faye, but she was lost. She seemed somehow mesmerized by the man, although Cassie couldn't understand it…Faye was dark but how could she have lost her head so suddenly. Then she turned toward Adam again who was shivering and convulsing as Blackwood's magic soared through his body, painfully tearing him apart internally while externally he seemed perfect apart from the occasional spurt of blood from his mouth. Suddenly he stopped moving and Cassie realized he was dead. She ran at Blackwood and was hurled back, landing with a thud on her back, her head wringing with pain. She stood up regardless and this time ran to Jake, trying without success to release him from his bonds.
"Please…don't do this…I love this boy, he's saved me before, this is a necklace he gave me." She produced it, proffering it to Blackwood to regard. He held the necklace in his hand and then with it touched Jake's head. His body began convulsing the same as Adam's had. His muscles convulsed and spasmed visibly as the Black Magic swept like poison throughout his body. Jake began screaming violently as his body began to give way to the Black Magic, Cassie looked at him and then clutched him tightly to herself staring at him and then she screamed out loud as she felt his life drain way while he lay in her arms.
Then there was light. The thunder storm abated and the rain was away and everything was glowing around them. Cassie could feel it burning inside of her as it surged to rush from her, burning brightly around her like some kind of mystical aurora. It raced forward from her toward Blackwood and she felt it smash into his darkness, the light was evenly matched to his darkness and she understood implicitly Faye held the key. She felt a hand take hers and received renewed power as the light exploded all around her and her ears shrieked in agony as the world crumbled beneath her feet.
.
I hope you enjoyed that,
I'm not altogether sure if that's a teaser,
But for the moment it's more an experimental one-shot,
But I liked writing it,
Reviews and responses as always really appreciated and welcomed,
To those of you that do review it means so much to me that you like my work
And how I'm writing things, it keeps me going,
Acrobat
X