Ch. 3 New Ally
I finally find an old, creepy-looking mansion that belongs in a horror film. I walk in, not really sure what to expect. I find an old room full of furniture and a girl of about hair is dark brown, and her eyes match her hair. She's surrounded by two men who are asking where someone was. She sobs openly, and normally I would chalk her up as a wimp, but she has scabs and oozing cuts all over her body. I flinch as one man leans over her with a knife.
"I'm not going to ask again Rose, where is Anny?" He demands, his tone only mildly annoyed. I form my wristlet into a knife and try to parry his blade, but mine goes right through his. Rose's agonized scream wrenches at my heart, and I find myself wishing that I could have healing powers. For lack of anything else to do, I send Rose as much courage energy as I can. She instantly seems to relax, and I can only hope that I've made the pain a little more bearable.
For the next few hours, she hangs on. There are times she comes close to breaking, but I send some more courage/bravery/whatever-you-want-to-call-it energy. Finally, one man gets annoyed and shoves his knife into her lung.
I can't bear to listen as she dies, but I suddenly find that I can touch her without my hand going through her, so I gently put my hand on her shoulder and I swear her eyes meet mine as the light leaves them.
A few seconds pass that seem like hours. Finally, I stop staring into Rose's dead eyes, move my hand, and get up to leave, but a flash of moonlight on her hair stops me. I hesitate, trying to figure out what's going on. The two men get out of their seats, pick up her body, and move it. The thing that glues me in place? I still see her on the table.
The moonlight seems to trace her features. Her hair's color seems to darken until it's a dark cinder-gray color, and when she opens her eyes and looks at me, they're a light pulsing red. I'll admit, it took a lot of self-control not to scream. I stare at her, my expression mirrored in her eyes. Finally, she breaks the silence.
"Didn't I just die?" she chokes out, her tone full of terror, fear that it had all been a dream and there was more pain to come. I manage a nod and she looks scared, still. I manage a soft whisper after a few seconds.
"What do you remember?" She looks at me like I'm insane, but tells me a short list of major things about her. I'm now annoyed, but this time, with myself. Why can't I remember anything? I quickly shake myself out of my thoughts and glance at her before blurting out a question that I really should've thought through.
"Do you want to team up? I don't know much of what's out there, but everyone needs friends." I say, feeling like I'm babbling on about nothing, but Rose nods and grins before noticing something that even I hadn't noticed in that last few seconds. She picks up two bracelets and somehow they make me even more determined to stick with the other girl. The two wristlets resemble mine, but they're 1.) A different color and 2.) A slightly different design. Mine look like plain bands with fire designs on them while hers look more like chains. My grin is deadly.
"Let's go, you need someone to show you how to work those." I smirked, and Rose looked at me warily. As we go outside, she stops, and I glance at her, confused. She suddenly shakes off whatever it is and meets my gaze.
"Apparently, my name is Cinderrose now. Freaky voice in my head that says that it's the Man in the Moon says so." She says, expecting me to look at her like she's lost it. I just smile.
"Trust me, I know the feeling. I have a few friends, well one, that knows exactly what you're talking about." Suddenly, I think of something and instantly face-palm. "I never introduced myself, did I?" I ask, embarrassment layering my tone. Cinderrose laughs.
"Now that I think about it, nope. What's your name?" She manages, in between laughing. I grin.
"Cloudfire, nice to meet you Cinderrose." I answer formally before cracking up. After we both manage to calm down, I try to teach her how to surf the heat and light. She fails, but she figures out that she can travel through the earth almost as fast as I can surf, so we're good to go. I grin and we head to Burgess, Jack's hometown.
I just want to see what all's going on, but the instant I look around, I know something's wrong. I quickly tell Cinderrose that I think we should leave, and she agrees.
We head off in a random direction until we come to a small town in the middle of America. Shippensburg, the sign reads. Sweet, let's find new people to annoy, despite the fact that we're invisible. I quickly explained this to Cinderrose on the way here, and, because we still had a few hours of surf time to kill, she told me about her old life, well, the major part that I had questions about anyway.
Anny was an old friend of hers and while she wasn't sure why they were asking the questions, Cinderrose was determined to remain loyal to her friend and not give away the secret that she'd been told. She doesn't tell me what it is, and I'm totally okay with that. If she promised, who am I to have her break that promise?